Results by title

4743 books match the query 'Religion' and 1168 start with t

cover of The Autobiography of B. H. Roberts

The Autobiography of B. H. Roberts

Gary J. Bergera

Signature Books, 1990

 In this exciting and readable autobiography, one of the most colorful figures of the American frontier recounts his poverty-stricken childhood, his rowdy adolescence in Rocky Mountain mining camps, his unsuccessful bid for the U.S. Congress, and his stormy career in one of the leading councils of the Mormon church. Polygamy, women’s suffrage, prohibition, and separation of church and state occupy center stage in the unfolding drama of Brigham Henry Roberts’s controversial life.

The story-book adventures of Roberts’s life made him a household name during his lifetime. His impassioned speeches incited riots, his reasoned writings defined and codified religious beliefs, and his candid disclosures of Utah history brought him both respect and censure. He is best remembered today as a largely self-educated intellectual. Several of his landmark published works are still in print more than fifty years after his death. His life story, told here in his own words and published for the first time, may well stand as his greatest, most enduring achievement.

For many today, B. H. Roberts is the quintessential Mormon intellectual of the twentieth century. But his theological writings came late in life and his historical views were more subjective than definitive. His autobiography, on the other hand, is a forthright account of the events and acquaintances that contributed to his unique faith and intellectual independence. Troubled by the memory of being abandoned as a child, and of the abusive care of quarrelling and intemperate foster-parents, he survived a stormy youth of poverty and neglect. He describes his nearly ten years as a missionary to the southern United States, his subsequent tenure as an outspoken member of the First Quorum of Seventy, his public opposition to women’s suffrage, and his controversial bid for the U.S. House of Representatives as a Mormon polygamist.

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cover of The Autobiography of the Rev. William Stevenson

The Autobiography of the Rev. William Stevenson

Ted A. Campbell

Bridwell Press, 2024

William Stevenson (1768-1857) was a pioneer itinerant Methodist preacher in the southwestern United States, who became the first Protestant of any denomination to preach within the bounds of what is now Texas. His Autobiography, a classic account of frontier and folk Methodism, was first published in serial form in the New Orleans Christian Advocate between March 13 and April 24, 1858. A typescript copy was sent to Bridwell Library in 1936, at the request of SMU President C. C. Selecman. Bridwell Library published the complete Autobiography in 2015, and Bridwell Press is pleased to bring this work to a new audience in 2024.
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cover of The Aztecs at Independence: Nahua Culture Makers in Central Mexico, 1799–1832

The Aztecs at Independence

Nahua Culture Makers in Central Mexico, 1799–1832

Miriam Melton-Villanueva

University of Arizona Press, 2016

Nahuatl-speaking women and men left last wills in their own tongue during an era when the written tradition of their language was generally assumed to have ended. Describing their world in testaments clustered around epidemic cycles, they responded to profound changes in population, land use, and local governance with astonishing vibrancy.

The Aztecs at Independence offers the first internal ethnographic view of these central Mexican indigenous communities in the critical transitional time of Independence. Miriam Melton-Villanueva uses previously unknown Nahuatl-language sources—primarily last wills and testaments—to provide a comprehensive understanding of indigenous societies during the transition from colonial to postcolonial times. The book describes the cultural life of people now called Nahuas or Mexicas in the nineteenth century—based on their own words, their own written records. The book uses previously unknown, unstudied, and untranslated indigenous texts to bring Nahua society into history, fleshing out glimpses of daily life in the early nineteenth century. Thus, The Aztecs at Independence describes life at the most local level: Nahua lineages of ritual and writing, guilds and societies, the people that take turns administering festivals and attending to the last wishes of the dying.

Interwoven with personal stories and memory, The Aztecs at Independence invites a general audience along on a scholarly journey, where readers are asked to imagine Nahua concepts and their contemporary meanings that give light to modern problems.
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cover of The Babylonian Genesis: The Story of the Creation

The Babylonian Genesis

The Story of the Creation

Alexander Heidel

University of Chicago Press, 1963

The origins of Judeo-Christian creation accounts: An complete, authoritative translation of all the extant cuneiform tablets of Babylonian creation stories

The Babylonian Genesis offers, in one compact, accessible volume, a complete translation of all the published cuneiform tablets of the various Babylonian creation stories, of both the Semitic Babylonian and the Sumerian material. Each creation account is preceded by a brief introduction from renowned scholar and translator Alexander Heidel dealing with the age and provenance of the tablets, the aim and purpose of the story, and everything else that a reader of any level  of knowledge needs to understand these stories in their context. Also included is a translation and discussion of two Babylonian creation versions written in Greek. The final chapter presents a detailed examination of the Babylonian creation accounts in their relation to our Old Testament literature.
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cover of The Bad Conscience

The Bad Conscience

Vladimir Jankélévitch

University of Chicago Press, 2014

Vladimir Jankélévitch was one of the most distinctive voices in twentieth-century philosophy. In The Bad Conscience—published in 1933 and subsequently revised and expanded—Jankélévitch lays the foundations for his later work, Forgiveness, grappling with the conditions that give rise to the moral awareness without which forgiveness would make no sense. Remorse, or “the bad conscience,” arises from the realization that the acts one has committed become irrevocable. This realization, in turn, gives rise to an awareness of moral virtues and values, as well as freedom and the responsibilities freedom entails. Thus, while the majority of moral systems try to shield us from remorse, the remedy for the bad conscience lies not in repentance but in the experience of remorse itself.
           
To this careful and sensitive English-language translation of The Bad Conscience, translator Andrew Kelley has added a substantial introduction situating the work in historical and intellectual context. Notes throughout indicate differences between this and earlier editions. A thought-provoking critique of standard conceptions of moral philosophy, The Bad Conscience restores this work by an important philosopher who has only recently begun to receive his due from the English-speaking world.
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cover of The Bahá'í: The Religious Construction of a Global Identity

The Bahá'í

The Religious Construction of a Global Identity

McMullen, Michael

Rutgers University Press, 2000

The Bahá’í Faith is one of the fastest growing, but least studied, of the world’s religions. Adherents view themselves as united by a universal belief that transcends national boundaries. Michael McMullen examines how the Bahá’í develop and maintain this global identity. Taking the Bahá’í community in Atlanta, Georgia, as a case in point, his book is the first to comprehensively examine the tenets of this little-understood faith.

McMullen notes that, to the Bahá’í, Buddha, Moses, Jesus, and Mohammed are all divinely sent teachers of ‘the Truth’, whose messages conform to the needs of their individual cultures and historical periods. But religion—which draws from the teaching of Bahá’u’lláh, a nineteenth-century Persian—encourages its members to think of themselves as global citizens. It also seeks to establish unity among its members through adherence to a Bahá’í worldview.

By examining the Atlanta Bahá’í community, McMullen shows how this global identity is interpreted locally. He discusses such topics as: the organizational structure and authority relations in the Bahá’í “Administrative Order”; Bahá’í evangelicalism; and the social boundaries between Bahá’ís and the wider culture.

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cover of The Bay Psalm Book: A Facsimile

The Bay Psalm Book

A Facsimile

With an Introduction by Diarmaid MacCulloch

Bodleian Library Publishing, 2014

The Bay Psalm Book was the first book to be printed in North America, twenty years after the arrival of the Pilgrims in Massachusetts. Today, only eleven copies are still in existence and fetch as much as fourteen million dollars at auction, making it also the most expensive book in the world.
           
Originally published in 1640 as The Whole Booke of Psalmes Faithfully Translated into English Metre, the unassuming psalter undertook the translation of Hebrew psalms into English verse for a growing population of New England Puritans unhappy with contemporary translations and in need of a version that would better represent their beliefs. The book became popularly known as The Bay Psalm Book, named after the Massachusetts Bay Colony in which its translators—among them the ministers John Cotton and Richard Mather—lived.
           
This beautiful facsimile edition of The Bay Psalm Book reproduces one of the best remaining copies of the psalter, including the translators’ preface and the original printer’s errors and binding marks. An introduction by Diarmaid MacCulloch details the book’s place in American religious and cultural history and explains how the psalter came to have such a profound effect on the course of the Protestant faith in America.
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cover of The Beautiful Agonies

The Beautiful Agonies

Adrie Kusserow

Duke University Press, 2027

The Beautiful Agonies is a luminous, genre-bending work of literary nonfiction that braids intimate memoir, lyric essay, Buddhism, and anthropological insight into a meditation on aging, maternal caregiving, dying, and the beauty of the natural world. With fierce tenderness, Kusserow chronicles her mother’s final year of life in rural Vermont—days shaped by stark comedy and bodily decline, loneliness and fear, a scrappy, dogged search for meaning, and the intense beauty of the Vermont landscape. Kusserow’s trained anthropological lens, alert to stigma, cultural scripts, and the performance of “good aging,” sits alongside a tender daughter’s heart, creating a poetic, nuanced narrative that is both intellectually rigorous and emotionally shattering. Kusserow’s poetic and culturally perceptive voice—by turns wry, furious, reverent, and quietly funny—refuses sentimentality while still delivering catharsis. The Beautiful Agonies offers readers an extraordinary intersection of humanities and health, ethics and embodied emotion, cultural critique and spiritual inquiry, and a mother and daughter’s shared love of the natural world, a work as philosophically searching as it is heartbreakingly human.
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cover of The Becoming of Time: Integrating Physical and Religious Time

The Becoming of Time

Integrating Physical and Religious Time

Lawrence W. Fagg

Duke University Press, 2002

Now available in an updated edition:

 

Integrating concepts of time derived from the physical sciences and world religions, The Becoming of Time examines various questions about time, including its origin, its relation to space and motion, its irreversible nature, the notion of timelessness, and the reality of the future. Lawrence W. Fagg contends that the use of spatial metaphors to describe time obscures its true character. He offers an alternative, non-spatial description of time by developing the concept of time as becoming.

”This lucid and wide-ranging study sets out to reconcile the objective and subjective perspectives in the investigation of the phenomenon of time. [Lawrence W. Fagg] . . . explores the wondrous subtleties of time that modern physics continues to reveal, but complements them with the rich insights of the spiritual perspectives on time that the world's major religions have to offer.”—Helga Nowotny, Former President, International Society for the Study of Time

”Lawrence W. Fagg has made a fundamental contribution to our reflection upon time. His work immediately takes its place as a basic text for students and researchers, from college to seminary and university levels.”—Philip Hefner, Director, Zygon Center for Religion and Science

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cover of The Bedtrick: Tales of Sex and Masquerade

The Bedtrick

Tales of Sex and Masquerade

Wendy Doniger

University of Chicago Press, 2000

"Somehow I woke up one day and found myself in bed with a stranger." Meant literally or figuratively, this statement describes one of the best-known plots in world mythology and popular storytelling. In a tour that runs from Shakespeare to Hollywood and from Abraham Lincoln to Casanova, the erudite and irrepressible Wendy Doniger shows us the variety, danger, and allure of the "bedtrick," or what it means to wake up with a stranger.

The Bedtrick brings together hundreds of stories from all over the world, from the earliest recorded Hindu and Hebrew texts to the latest item in the Weekly World News, to show the hilariously convoluted sexual scrapes that people manage to get themselves into and out of. Here you will find wives who accidentally commit adultery with their own husbands. You will read Lincoln's truly terrible poem about a bedtrick. You will learn that in Hong Kong the film The Crying Game was retitled Oh No! My Girlfriend Has a Penis. And that President Clinton was not the first man to be identified by an idiosyncratic organ.

At the bottom of these wonderful stories, ancient myths, and historical anecdotes lie the dynamics of sex and gender, power and identity. Why can't people tell the difference in the dark? Can love always tell the difference between one lover and another? And what kind of truth does sex tell? Funny, sexy, and engaging, The Bedtrick is a masterful work of energetic storytelling and dazzling scholarship. Give it to your spouse and your lover.
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cover of The Beginning of Wisdom: Reading Genesis

The Beginning of Wisdom

Reading Genesis

Leon R. Kass

University of Chicago Press, 2006

“Extraordinary,” says the New York Times, “will leave no reader’s understanding of Genesis unchanged.”


Examining Genesis in a philosophical light, Leon Kass presents it not as a story of what happened long ago, but as the enduring story of humanity itself. He asserts that the first half of Genesis contains insights about human nature that “rival anything produced by the great philosophers.” Kass here reads these first stories—from Adam and Eve to the tower of Babel—as a mirror for self-discovery that reveals truths about human reason, speech, freedom, sexual desire, pride, shame, anger, and death. Taking a step further in the second half of his book, Kass explores the struggles in Genesis to launch a new way of life that addresses mankind’s morally ambiguous nature by promoting righteousness and holiness. 

Even readers who don’t agree with Kass’s interpretations will find The Beginning of Wisdom a compelling book—a masterful philosophical take on one of the world’s seminal religious texts. 
 

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cover of The Best Effect: Theology and the Origins of Consequentialism

The Best Effect

Theology and the Origins of Consequentialism

Ryan Darr

University of Chicago Press, 2023

A theological history of consequentialism and a fresh agenda for teleological ethics.
 
Consequentialism—the notion that we can judge an action by its effects alone—has been among the most influential approaches to ethics and public policy in the Anglophone world for more than two centuries. In The Best Effect, Ryan Darr argues that consequentialist ethics is not as secular or as rational as it is often assumed to be. Instead, Darr describes the emergence of consequentialism in the seventeenth century as a theological and cosmological vision and traces its intellectual development and eventual secularization across several centuries. The Best Effect reveals how contemporary consequentialism continues to bear traces of its history and proposes in its place a more expansive vision for teleological ethics.
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cover of The Bhagavadgita in the Mahabharata

The Bhagavadgita in the Mahabharata

Edited by J. A. B. van Buitenen

University of Chicago Press, 1981

No other Sanskrit work approaches the Bhagavadgita in the influence it has exerted in the West. Philosophers such as Emerson and the other New England Transcendentalists were deeply affected by its insights, a dozen or more scholars, including Annie Besant and Mahatma Gandhi, have attempted its translation, and thousands of individuals struggling with the problems divided loyalties have found comfort and wisdom in its pages.

The Bhagavadgita ("Song of the Lord") tells of the young and virtuous Prince Arjuna who is driven to lead his forces into battle against an opposing army composed of close relatives and others whom he loves. The Lord Krsna, appearing in the poem as Arjuna's friend and charioteer, persuades him that he must do battle, and we see Arjuna changing from revulsion at the thought of killing members of his family to resignation and awareness of duty, to manly acceptance of his role as warrior and defender of his kingdom.

The Bhagavadgita is a self-contained episode in the Mahabharata, a vast collection of epics, legends, romances, theology, and metaphysical doctrine that reflects the history and culture of the whole of Hindu civilization. The present edition forms a part of J. A. B. van Buitenen's widely acclaimed translation of this great work. Here English and Sanskrit are printed on facing pages, enabling those with some knowledge of Sanskrit to appreciate van Buitenen's accurate rendering of the intimate, familial tone and directness of the original poem.

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cover of The Bible Without Theology: The Theological Tradition and Alternatives to It

The Bible Without Theology

The Theological Tradition and Alternatives to It

Robert A. Oden, Jr.

University of Illinois Press, 1987

In this thought-provoking volume, Robert A. Oden Jr. advocates stripping away the theological and historiographic biases that underlie modern biblical scholarship in order to arrive at a nontheological historical reading of the Bible. Oden calls into question a scholarly tradition that accepts biblical writers' views of themselves and their neighbors at face value and reproduces a view of Israelite religion as divinely guided and inherently superior.
 
Using cross-cultural and interdisciplinary methodology, Oden investigates three biblical issues--the clothing of Adam and Eve, Jacob's name change to Israel, and ritual prostitution and Deuteronomy--in light of extra-biblical evidence. He also challenges scholars' assumptions of Scripture as monotheistic and proposes treating biblical narrative as myth rather than as historical fact.
 
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cover of The Bible and Early Trinitarian Theology

The Bible and Early Trinitarian Theology

Christopher A. Beeley

Catholic University of America Press, 2018

The past thirty years have seen an unprecedented level of interest in early Christian biblical interpretation, from major scholarly initiatives to more popular resources aimed at pastors and general readers. The fields of Biblical Studies and Patristics/Early Christian Studies each arrived at the study of early Christian biblical interpretation largely from their own standpoints, and they tend to operate in relative isolation from one another. This books aims to bring the two fields into closer conversation, in order to suggest new avenues into the study of the deeply biblical dimension of patristic theology as well as the contribution that patristic exegesis can make to contemporary views of how best to interpret the Bible.

Based on a multi-year consultation in the Society of Biblical Literature, The Bible and Early Trinitarian Theology features leading scholars from both fields, who bring new insights to the relationship between patristic exegesis and current strategies of biblical interpretation, specifically with reference to the doctrine of the Trinity. Following an account of how each field came to study patristic exegesis, the book offers new studies of Trinitarian theology in Old Testament, Johannine, and Pauline biblical texts and the patristic interpretation of them, combining the insights of modern historical criticism with classical historical theology. It promises to make a valuable contribution to both fields, suggesting several new avenue into the study of early biblical literature and the development of Trinitarian theology.
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cover of The Bible and Posthumanism

The Bible and Posthumanism

Jennifer L. Koosed

SBL Press, 2014

What does it mean, and what should it mean to be human?

In this collection of essays, scholars place the philosophies and theories of animal studies and posthumanism into conversation with biblical studies. Authors cross and disrupt boundaries and categories through close readings of stories where the human body is invaded, possessed, or driven mad. Articles explore the ethics of the human use of animals and the biblical contributions to the question. Other essays use the image of lions—animals that appear not only in the wild, but also in the Bible, ancient Near Eastern texts, and philosophy—to illustrate the potential these theories present for students of the Bible. Contributors George Aichele, Denise Kimber Buell, Benjamin H. Dunning, Heidi Epstein, Rhiannon Graybill, Jennifer L. Koosed, Eric Daryl Meyer, Stephen D. Moore, Hugh Pyper, Robert Paul Seesengood, Yvonne Sherwood, Ken Stone, and Hannah M. Strømmen present an open invitation for further work in the field of posthumanism.

Features:

  • Coverage of texts that explore the boundaries between animal, human, and divinity
  • Discussion of the term posthumanism and how it applies to biblical studies
  • Essays engage Derrida, Foucault, Wolfe, Lacan, Žižek, Singer, Haraway, and others
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cover of The Bible and the Latter-day Saint Tradition

The Bible and the Latter-day Saint Tradition

Edited by Taylor G. Petrey, Cory Crawford, and Eric A. Eliason

University of Utah Press, 2022

Like other Christian denominations, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons) has been engaged in the battle for the Bible since challenges to biblical authority began to exert significant influence in America toward the end of the nineteenth century. Other believing communities have responded with various reevaluations of the biblical text. Latter-day Saints have experimented with similar approaches, often taking liberal positions on biblical authority and conservative positions on history and authorship. However, Latter-day Saints accept additional scripture and embrace a theology notably distinct from traditional Christianity. Hence, they relate to the Bible differently from other Christians, creating gaps with mainstream biblical studies. This volume bridges that gap.

From comparing the Book of Mormon to the Bible or the Dead Sea Scrolls, to Mormon feminists’ views on the Gospels, this volume takes a comprehensive and inclusive approach to understanding Bible scholarship’s role in Mormon history, exploring these differences for both scholars and students. A diverse group of contributors presents an accessible resource to mediate between Latter-day Saint traditions and the broader context of biblical history, literature, and scholarship. Each essay provides a synopsis of relevant major scholarly views and delivers new insights into varied crosscurrents of biblical studies.

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cover of The Bible as Christian Scripture: The Work of Brevard S. Childs

The Bible as Christian Scripture

The Work of Brevard S. Childs

Christopher R. Seitz

SBL Press, 2013

This memorial volume both displays and evaluates the canonical approach of Brevard S. Childs, whose attention to history through time animated his interest in the Bible’s use in the church through the ages up to and including the present. Just as Childs wrote on a wide range of topics canonical and theological—both Testaments, Isaiah and Exodus, the Pauline letters, the history of biblical interpretation, biblical theology, and historical, theological, and methodological questions—the contributors to this volume, seasoned colleagues as well as younger scholars who studied with Childs, offer an international collection of historical, theological, and New Testament essays as well as contributions focused on the Old Testament. The contributors are Stephen B. Chapman, Brevard S. Childs, Don Collett, Daniel R. Driver, Mark W. Elliott, Leonard G. Finn, Mark Gignilliat, Bernd Janowski, Jörg Jeremias, Leander E. Keck, Neil B. MacDonald, David L. Petersen, Murray A. Rae, C. Kavin Rowe, and Christopher R. Seitz.
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cover of The Bible in Asian America

The Bible in Asian America

Tat-siong Benny Liew

SBL Press, 2002

In this issue of the journal Semeia, readers will find essays less concerned with what the Bible says about Asian American lives than by how Asian Americans read biblical texts. Pulling together Asian American historians, rhetoricians, sociologists, biblical scholars, and theologians, the collection questions assumed understandings and challenges accepted practices of established disciplines in ways that are both transgressive and transformative. Essays in the first section deal with the Bible’s role in constructing Asian American identity. The second section delves into how the Bible is read and interpreted in Asian American literature and churches. The third section includes a response. Contributors include Antony W. Alumkal, Rachel A. R. Bundang, Patrick S. Cheng, Peter Yuichi Clark, Eleazar S. Fernandez, Mary F. Foskett, Jane Naomi Iwamura, Russell M. Jeung, Eunjoo Mary Kim, Jung Ha Kim, Uriah (Yong-Hwan) Kim, Tat-siong Benny Liew, Leng Leroy Lim, Fumitaka Matsuoka, Russell G. Moy, Henry W. Rietz, Roy I. Sano, and Timothy Tseng.
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cover of The Bible in Greek: Translation, Transmission, and Theology of the Septuagint

The Bible in Greek

Translation, Transmission, and Theology of the Septuagint

Siegfried Kreuzer

SBL Press, 2015

Essential reading for scholars and students

This volume presents English and German papers that give an overview on important stages, developments, and problems of the Septuagint and the research related to it. Four sections deal with the cultural and theological background and beginnings of the Septuagint, the Old Greek and recensions of the text, the Septuagint and New Testament quotations, and a discussion of Papyrus 967 and Codex Vaticanus.

Features:

  • A complete list of Kreuzer’s publications on the text and textual history of the Hebrew Bible and the Septuagint
  • Criteria for analysis of the Antiochene/Lucianic Text and the Kaige-Recension
  • A close examination of the origins and development of the Septuagint in the context of Alexandrian and early Jewish culture and learning
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cover of The Bible in the American Experience

The Bible in the American Experience

Claudia Setzer

SBL Press, 2020

An interdisciplinary investigation of the Bible's place in American experience

Much has changed since the Society of Biblical Literature's Bible in American Culture series was published in the 1980s, but the influence of the Bible has not waned. In the United States, the stories, themes, and characters of the Bible continue to shape art, literature, music, politics, education, and social movements to varying degrees. In this volume, contributors highlight new approaches that move beyond simple citation of texts and explore how biblical themes infuse US culture and how this process in turn transforms biblical traditions.

Features

  • An examination of changes in the production, transmission, and consumption of the Bible
  • An exploration of how Bible producers disseminate US experiences to a global audience
  • An assessment of the factors that produce widespread myths about and nostalgia for a more biblically grounded nation
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cover of The Bible in the Public Square: Its Enduring Influence in American Life

The Bible in the Public Square

Its Enduring Influence in American Life

Mark A. Chancey

SBL Press, 2014

Explore perceptions and interpretations of scripture in American politics, identity, popular culture, and public education

Essays from the perspectives of American history, the history of ideas, film studies, visual studies, cultural studies, education, and church-state studies provide essential research for those interested in the intersection of the Bible and American culture. The contributors are Yaakov Ariel, Jacques Berlinerblau, Mark A. Chancey, Rubén Dupertuis, John Fea, Shalom Goldman, Charles C. Haynes, Carol Meyers, Eric M. Meyers, David Morgan, Adele Reinhartz, and David W. Stowe.

Features:

  • Ten essays and an introduction present research from professors of biblical studies, Judaism, English, and history
  • Articles relevant to scholars, students, and the general public
  • Analysis of the tensions in American society regarding the Bible and its role in public life.
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cover of The Bible in the Sixteenth Century

The Bible in the Sixteenth Century

David C. Steinmetz

Duke University Press, 1990

A distinguished group of authors here illuminate a broad spectrum of themes in the history of biblical interpretation. Originally published in 1990, these essays take as their common ground the thesis that the intellectual and religious life of the sixteenth century cannot be understood without attention to the preoccupation of sixteenth-century humanists and theologians with the interpretation of the Bible. Topics explored include Jewish exegesis and problems of Old Testament interpretation and the relationship between the Bible and social, political, and institutional history.

Contributors. Irena Backus, Guy Bedouelle, Kalman P. Bland, Kenneth G. Hagen, Scott H. Hagen, Scott H. Hendrix, R. Gerald Hobbs, Jean-Claude Margolin, H. C. Erik Midelfort, Richard A. Muller, John B. Payne, David C. Steinmetz

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cover of The Bible on the Question of Homosexuality

The Bible on the Question of Homosexuality

Innocent Himbaza

Catholic University of America Press, 2012

The Bible on the Question of Homosexuality addresses the hotly debated topic of whether the Bible condemns homosexuality by a close reading of the biblical texts without taboo or prejudice, without personal or church interpretation
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cover of The Big Questions in Science and Religion

The Big Questions in Science and Religion

Keith Ward

Templeton Press, 2008

Can religious beliefs survive in the scientific age? Are they resoundingly outdated? Or, is there something in them of great importance, even if the way they are expressed will have to change given new scientific context? These questions are among those at the core of the science-religion dialogue.

In The Big Questions in Science and Religion, Keith Ward, an Anglican priest who was once an atheist, offers compelling insights into the often contentious relationship between diverse religious views and new scientific knowledge. He identifies ten basic questions about the nature of the universe and human life. Among these are:

•Does the universe have a goal or purpose?
•Do the laws of nature exclude miracles?
•Can science provide a wholly naturalistic explanation for moral and religious beliefs?
•Has science made belief in God obsolete? Are there any good science-based arguments for God?

With his expertise in the study of world religions, Ward considers concepts from Buddhism, Confucianism, Taoism, Islam, Hinduism, Judaism, and Christianity, while featuring the speculations of cosmologists, physicians, mathematicians, and philosophers. In addition, Ward examines the implications of ancient laws and modern theories and evaluates the role of religious experience as evidence of a nonphysical reality.

Writing with enthusiasm, passion, and clarity, Keith Ward conveys the depth, difficulty, intellectual excitement, and importance of the greatest intellectual and existential questions of the modern scientific age.

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cover of The Birth of Doubt: Confronting Uncertainty in Early Rabbinic Literature

The Birth of Doubt

Confronting Uncertainty in Early Rabbinic Literature

Moshe Halbertal

SBL Press, 2020

A systematic attempt to understand the rabbinic world through its approach to confronting uncertainty

In the history of halakhah, the treatment of uncertainty became one of the most complex fields of intense study. In his latest book, Moshe Halbertal focuses on examining the point of origin of the study of uncertainty in early rabbinic literature, including the Mishnah, Tosefta, and halakhic midrashim. Halbertal explores instructions concerning how to behave in situations of uncertainty ranging from matters of ritual purity, to lineage and marriage, to monetary law, and to the laws of forbidden foods. This examination of the rules of uncertainty introduced in early rabbinic literature reveals that these rules were not aimed at avoiding but rather at dwelling in the midst of uncertainty, thus rejecting the sectarian isolationism that sought to minimize a community’s experience of and friction with uncertainty.

Features:

  • A thorough investigation of the principles concerning how to behave in cases of uncertainty
  • An examination of two distinct modes for coping with uncertainty
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cover of The Birth of Insight: Meditation, Modern Buddhism, and the Burmese Monk Ledi Sayadaw

The Birth of Insight

Meditation, Modern Buddhism, and the Burmese Monk Ledi Sayadaw

Erik Braun

University of Chicago Press, 2013

Insight meditation, which claims to offer practitioners a chance to escape all suffering by perceiving the true nature of reality, is one of the most popular forms of meditation today. The Theravada Buddhist cultures of South and Southeast Asia often see it as the Buddha’s most important gift to humanity. In the first book to examine how this practice came to play such a dominant—and relatively recent—role in Buddhism, Erik Braun takes readers to Burma, revealing that Burmese Buddhists in the colonial period were pioneers in making insight meditation indispensable to modern Buddhism.

Braun focuses on the Burmese monk Ledi Sayadaw, a pivotal architect of modern insight meditation, and explores Ledi’s popularization of the study of crucial Buddhist philosophical texts in the early twentieth century. By promoting the study of such abstruse texts, Braun shows, Ledi was able to standardize and simplify meditation methods and make them widely accessible—in part to protect Buddhism in Burma after the British takeover in 1885. Braun also addresses the question of what really constitutes the “modern” in colonial and postcolonial forms of Buddhism, arguing that the emergence of this type of meditation was caused by precolonial factors in Burmese culture as well as the disruptive forces of the colonial era. Offering a readable narrative of the life and legacy of one of modern Buddhism’s most important figures, The Birth of Insight provides an original account of the development of mass meditation.
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cover of The Birth of Purgatory

The Birth of Purgatory

Jacques Le Goff

University of Chicago Press, 1984

In The Birth of Purgatory, Jacques Le Goff, the brilliant medievalist and renowned Annales historian, is concerned not with theological discussion but with the growth of an idea, with the relation between belief and society, with mental structures, and with the historical role of the imagination. Le Goff argues that the doctrine of Purgatory did not appear in the Latin theology of the West before the late twelfth century, that the word purgatorium did not exist until then. He shows that the growth of a belief in an intermediate place between Heaven and Hell was closely bound up with profound changes in the social and intellectual reality of the Middle Ages. Throughout, Le Goff makes use of a wealth of archival material, much of which he has translated for the first time, inviting readers to examine evidence from the writings of great, obscure, or anonymous theologians.
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cover of The Black Church in the African American Experience

The Black Church in the African American Experience

C. Eric Lincoln and Lawrence H. Mamiya

Duke University Press, 1990

Black churches in America have long been recognized as the most independent, stable, and dominant institutions in black communities. In The Black Church in the African American Experience, based on a ten-year study, is the largest nongovernmental study of urban and rural churches ever undertaken and the first major field study on the subject since the 1930s.
Drawing on interviews with more than 1,800 black clergy in both urban and rural settings, combined with a comprehensive historical overview of seven mainline black denominations, C. Eric Lincoln and Lawrence H. Mamiya present an analysis of the Black Church as it relates to the history of African Americans and to contemporary black culture. In examining both the internal structure of the Church and the reactions of the Church to external, societal changes, the authors provide important insights into the Church’s relationship to politics, economics, women, youth, and music.
Among other topics, Lincoln and Mamiya discuss the attitude of the clergy toward women pastors, the reaction of the Church to the civil rights movement, the attempts of the Church to involve young people, the impact of the black consciousness movement and Black Liberation Theology and clergy, and trends that will define the Black Church well into the next century.
This study is complete with a comprehensive bibliography of literature on the black experience in religion. Funding for the ten-year survey was made possible by the Lilly Endowment and the Ford Foundation.
[more]
cover of The Black Heavens: Abraham Lincoln and Death

The Black Heavens

Abraham Lincoln and Death

Brian R. Dirck

Southern Illinois University Press, 2019

Winner, Lincoln Group of New York Award of Achievement 2019

From multiple personal tragedies to the terrible carnage of the Civil War, death might be alongside emancipation of the slaves and restoration of the Union as one of the great central truths of Abraham Lincoln’s life. Yet what little has been written specifically about Lincoln and death is insufficient, sentimentalized, or devoid of the rich historical literature about death and mourning during the nineteenth century. The Black Heavens: Abraham Lincoln and Death is the first in-depth account of how the sixteenth president responded to the riddles of mortality, undertook personal mourning, and coped with the extraordinary burden of sending hundreds of thousands of soldiers to be killed on battlefields.

Going beyond the characterization of Lincoln as a melancholy, tragic figure, Brian R. Dirck investigates Lincoln’s frequent encounters with bereavement and sets his response to death and mourning within the social, cultural, and political context of his times. At a young age Lincoln saw the grim reality of lives cut short when he lost his mother and sister. Later, he was deeply affected by the deaths of two of his sons, three-year-old Eddy in 1850 and eleven-year-old Willie in 1862, as well as the combat deaths of close friends early in the war. Despite his own losses, Lincoln learned how to approach death in an emotionally detached manner, a survival skill he needed to cope with the reality of his presidency.

Dirck shows how Lincoln gradually turned to his particular understanding of God’s will in his attempts to articulate the meaning of the atrocities of war to the American public, as showcased in his allusions to religious ideas in the Gettysburg Address and the Second Inaugural. Lincoln formed a unique approach to death: both intellectual and emotional, typical and yet atypical of his times. In showing how Lincoln understood and responded to death, both privately and publicly, Dirck paints a compelling portrait of a commander in chief who buried two sons and gave the orders that sent an unprecedented number of Americans to their deaths.
 
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cover of The Blood in Their Veins: The Kimballs, Polygamy, and the Shaping of Mormonism

The Blood in Their Veins

The Kimballs, Polygamy, and the Shaping of Mormonism

Kimball, Andrew

Signature Books, 2025

This meticulously documented, deeply engaging book represents a unique approach to Utah and Latter-day Saint history, drawing on previously untapped private letters and diaries of members of the large and widely known polygamist family of the prominent Latter-day Saint leader, Heber C. Kimball.

The story includes compelling accounts of Helen Kimball Whitney, who married Joseph Smith polygamously at fourteen and became, according to Emmeline B. Wells, “one of the best known and most estimable women of the Church,” and of her son Orson F. Whitney, who forswore his embrace of reincarnation only six years before his call as an apostle of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Another daughter, Alice Kimball Smith, married a man who was tracked to a brothel and arrested for armed robbery and assault in 1883, after which Alice turned to family friend and apostle Joseph F. Smith and became his fifth wife. Heber’s son, J. Golden Kimball, one of the most beloved and colorful personalities in Mormon and Utah history, is brought to life in another sketch. The Kimballs had to navigate the ticklish business of explaining or obfuscating polygamy to disapproving family in the East, including the extended claim by Heber’s wife Christeen to her New Jersey family that she had married a Mr. Chase monogamously. Two of Heber’s sons, both stake presidents, contemplated plural marriage in the first decade of the twentieth century, well after the church publicly disavowed the practice.

Additional light is shone on the now-defunct Latter-day Saint practices of adult adoptions and speaking in tongues, Mormon-settler relations with the Utes and Pahvants, the 1856 handcart rescue, the John Hyrum Koyle “Dream Mine,” the Jackson County, Missouri, Temple Lot suit of 1892, and federal pursuit of polygamists.

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cover of The Bodo of Assam: Revisiting a Classical Study from 1951

The Bodo of Assam

Revisiting a Classical Study from 1951

Halfdan Siiger

National University of Singapore Press, 2015

The Bodo (or Boros) are one of the indigenous tribal peoples of Assam. During colonial times they resisted Christianization and in recent decades they have been involved both in interethnic violence and separatist insurgencies. Much research has gone into understanding the Boros and their aspirations but an issue has been that earlier accounts of this once-animist people are meagre and date from the colonial period. The rediscovery and publication of the ethnographic material based on fieldwork carried out by Halfdan Siiger among the Boros in 1949–50 is thus hugely important. Siiger’s manuscript is unique, offering detailed descriptions of the social and ritual life of the Boros and new insights into the traditions and myths as they were told in the village he studied before the transformation of religious life in recent decades. Thanks to Siiger’s diligent translation and interpretation, the manuscript also preserves a number of ritual formulas and songs in the Boro language. Siiger’s manuscript is given even greater relevance by the inclusion of more recent material contributed by the editors and other contemporary scholars. In addition, his original photos are augmented by new photos from the village and by rare images from the collections of the National Museum of Denmark.
[more]
cover of The Body of Faith: A Biological History of Religion in America

The Body of Faith

A Biological History of Religion in America

Robert C. Fuller

University of Chicago Press, 2013

A groundbreaking account of American religious history that highlights the important role played by the physical body 

The postmodern view that human experience is constructed by language and culture has informed historical narratives for decades. Yet newly emerging information about the biological body now makes it possible to supplement traditional scholarly models with insights about the bodily sources of human thought and experience.

The Body of Faith is the first account of American religious history to highlight the biological body. Robert C. Fuller brings a crucial new perspective to the study of American religion, showing that knowledge about the biological body deeply enriches how we explain dramatic episodes in American religious life. Fuller shows that the body’s genetically evolved systems—pain responses, sexual passion, and emotions like shame and fear—have persistently shaped the ways that Americans forge relationships with nature, to society, and to God.

The first new work to appear in the Chicago History of American Religion series in decades, The Body of Faith offers a truly interdisciplinary framework for explaining the richness, diversity, and endless creativity of American religious life.
[more]
cover of The Bonds of Love: St. Peter Damian's Theology of the Spiritual Life

The Bonds of Love

St. Peter Damian's Theology of the Spiritual Life

Gordon Mursell

Catholic University of America Press, 2022

St Peter Damian (1007-1072) is an exceptional example of a paradox that is found in many saints and thinkers through the ages (St Jerome, St Bernard, St Bridget of Sweden, St Teresa of Avila and Thomas Merton come to mind) – of a lifelong tension between two competing vocations: the call to solitude and holiness and the call to prophetic social and ecclesial engagement. The author has explored this tension throughout his adult life, both in his published work and in his own life as an Episcopalian/Anglican priest and later bishop. Damian’s “The Book of ‘The Lord be with you’” is a profound exploration of the spirituality of solitude, whereas his “Book of Gomorrah” is an intense attack on clerical sexual abuse which has helped to give Damian a new recent prominence in the light of the huge challenges facing the Church today. The Bonds of Love shows that the paradox at the heart of Damian's life and everything he cared about was rooted in the remarkable theology of love which finds expression across the whole of his work and gives it both coherence and dynamism. His life and spirituality are of far more than academic interest, and will make a major contribution, not only to those committed to ecclesial reform and renewal, but to all who struggle to live with the kind of competing tensions that made St. Peter Damian who he was.
[more]
cover of The Book of Acts

The Book of Acts

Charles Raith II

Catholic University of America Press, 2019

The Book of Acts brings together leading Catholic, Orthodox, and Evangelical theologians to read and interpret the book of Acts from within their ecclesial tradition, while simultaneously engaging one another in critical dialogue. Combining both theological exegesis and ecumenical dialogue, each chapter is uniquely structured to facilitate a rich reading of Scripture and an engaging though critical dialogue across the traditions. Each chapter begins with a main essay by either a Catholic, Orthodox, or Evangelical theologian on a section of the book of Acts; the main essay is followed by responses from theologians of the other two traditions. The chapter concludes with a final response from the main author. Readers are thus provided with not only a deep and engaging reading of the book of Acts but also the unfolding of a rich theological-ecumenical dialogue centered on Scripture. Anyone interested in understanding how our ecclesial traditions inform our reading of Scripture would do well to read this book, as would anyone interested in the book of Acts, ecumenical dialogue, and the theological interpretation of Scripture
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cover of The Book of Before and After: The Liturgy of the Hours of the Church of the East

The Book of Before and After

The Liturgy of the Hours of the Church of the East

Andrew Younan

Catholic University of America Press, 2025

The Book of Before & After is the traditional name given to the book of commonly-used portions of the liturgy of the hours of the Church of the East (the branches of which are now the Chaldean Catholic Church, the Assyrian Church of the East, the Ancient Apostolic Assyrian Church of the East, and the Malabar Catholic Church). This volume will present, for the first time, a complete English translation (from the original Aramaic/Syriac) of all the Ordinaries and Commons of the Liturgy of the Hours used by all the Churches of this Tradition. It will also include a complete translation of the Psalter as included in the liturgical books (with antiphons and prayers between sets of Psalms), the full collection of the famous “Martyr Hymns,” and extensive selections of the Propers for each week of the Liturgical Year. Finally, the volume will also include translations of the Introductions written by the various Chaldean and Assyrian Patriarchs who published editions of the Hudhra (the full liturgy of the hours) over the past two centuries, as well as a comprehensive Introductory Essay by Younan. Many of the hymns translated in this volume will be singable according to their original melody.
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cover of The Book of Divine Works

The Book of Divine Works

Nathaniel M. St. Hildegard of Bingen

Catholic University of America Press, 2018

Completed in 1173, The Book of Divine Works (Liber Divinorum Operum) is the culmination of the Visionary’s Doctor’s theological project, offered here for the first time in a complete and scholarly English translation. The first part explores the intricate physical and spiritual relationships between the cosmos and the human person, with the famous image of the universal Man standing astride the cosmic spheres. The second part examines the rewards for virtue and the punishments for vice, mapped onto a geography of purgatory, hellmouth, and the road to the heavenly city. At the end of each Hildegard writes extensive commentaries on the Prologue to John’s Gospel (Part 1) and the first chapter of Genesis (Part 2)—the only premodern woman to have done so. Finally, the third part tells the history of salvation, imagined as the City of God standing next to the mountain of God’s foreknowledge, with Divine Love reigning over all.
[more]
cover of The Book of Hours of the Armenian Church Zamagirk: English Translation, Contexts and Perspectives

The Book of Hours of the Armenian Church Zamagirk

English Translation, Contexts and Perspectives

Michael Daniel Findikyan

Catholic University of America Press, 2027

The Book of Hours of the Armenian Church (Žamagirk‘): English Translation, Contexts, and Perspectives offers the first critically grounded English rendering of one of the central liturgical books of the Armenian Christian tradition—and, as such, the first complete translation of this text into any language. Long central to the daily cycle of prayer, the Žamagirk‘ preserves a rich and layered inheritance reaching back to the formative centuries of Christian worship, even as it bears the marks of later historical development. Prepared by a leading scholar of Armenian liturgy, with broader expertise in eastern Christian liturgical traditions, the translation attends closely to the structure, language, and internal logic of the text. It is designed not only to make the Žamagirk‘ accessible to English-speaking readers, but also to reflect, as faithfully as possible, the texture and rhythm of the original, and will be of interest not only to scholars but also to those who wish to engage the text for devotional use. The translation is accompanied by an extensive analytical study that situates the work within its historical, theological, and liturgical contexts. Particular attention is given to the distinctive features of the Armenian Liturgy of the Hours: its organization of psalmody and hymnography, its unique combinations of biblical and poetic materials, and its preservation of elements that point to early Jerusalemite practice. At the same time, the study explores the ways in which the tradition has remained dynamic, incorporating new layers while retaining older forms in often surprising configurations. More than a reference work, this volume opens a window onto the spiritual world embodied in the Armenian daily office, a world marked by a striking interplay of solemnity and lyricism, scriptural depth and poetic imagination, penitential gravity and buoyant hope. It will be of interest to scholars and students of liturgy, historians of Christianity, and all readers seeking to encounter one of the great yet comparatively little-known traditions of Christian prayer.
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cover of The Book of Jonah: A Social Justice Commentary

The Book of Jonah

A Social Justice Commentary

Rabbi Dr. Shmuly Yanklowitz

Central Conference of American Rabbis, 2020

The Book of Jonah is a unique text in the Jewish canon. Among the shortest books in the Bible, it is also one of the most mysterious and morally ambiguous. Who is this prophet running from God, hiding at the bottom of the ocean? Why does he struggle with God's mission to save and forgive Israel's enemies? In this volume, Rabbi Dr. Yanklowitz shows that the Book of Jonah delivers a message of human responsibility in a shared world. Illuminating such contemporary ethical issues as animal welfare, incarceration, climate change, weapons of mass destruction, and Jewish-Muslim relations, this social justice commentary urges us to join in repairing a broken world--a call that we, unlike Jonah, must hasten to answer.
[more]
cover of The Book of Margins

The Book of Margins

Edmond Jabès

University of Chicago Press, 1993

The death of Edmond Jabès in January 1991 silenced one of the most compelling voices of the postmodern, post-Holocaust era. Jabès's importance as a thinker, philosopher, and Jewish theologian cannot be overestimated, and his enigmatic style—combining aphorism, fictional dialogue, prose meditation, poetry, and other forms—holds special appeal for postmodern sensibilities.

In The Book of Margins, his most critical as well as most accessible book, Jabès is again concerned with the questions that inform all of his work: the nature of writing, of silence, of God and the Book. Jabès considers the work of several of his contemporaries, including Georges Bataille, Maurice Blanchot, Roger Caillois, Paul Celan, Jacques Derrida, Michel Leiris, Emmanuel Lévinas, Pier Paolo Pasolini, and his translator, Rosmarie Waldrop. This book will be important reading for students of Jewish literature, French literature, and literature of the modern and postmodern ages.

Born in Cairo in 1912, Edmond Jabès lived in France from 1956 until his death in 1991. His extensively translated and widely honored works include The Book of Questions and The Book of Shares. Both of these were translated into English by Rosmarie Waldrop, who is also a poet.

Religion and Postmodernism series





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cover of The Book of Mormon: A Reader's Edition

The Book of Mormon

A Reader's Edition

Edited by Grant Hardy

University of Illinois Press, 2003

Regarded as sacred scripture by millions, the Book of Mormon -- first published in 1830 -- is one of the most significant documents in American religious history. This new reader-friendly version reformats the complete, unchanged 1920 text in the manner of modern translations of the Bible, with paragraphs, quotations marks, poetic forms, topical headings, multichapter headings, indention of quoted documents, italicized reworkings of biblical prophecies, and minimized verse numbers. It also features a hypothetical map based on internal references, an essay on Book of Mormon poetry, a full glossary of names, genealogical charts, a basic bibliography of Mormon and non-Mormon scholarship, a chronology of the translation, eyewitness accounts of the gold plates, and information regarding the lost 116 pages and significant changes in the text.
The Book of Mormon claims to be the product of three historical interactions: the writings of the original ancient American authors, the editing of the fourth-century prophet Mormon, and the translation of Joseph Smith. The editorial aids and footnotes in this edition integrate all three perspectives and provide readers with a clear guide through this complicated text. New readers will find the story accessible and intelligible; Mormons will gain fresh insights from familiar verses seen in a broader narrative context. This is the first time the Book of Mormon has been published with quotation marks, select variant readings, and the testimonies of women involved in the translation process. It is also the first return to a paragraphed format since versification was added in 1879.
[more]
cover of The Book of Once-Mormon Women

The Book of Once-Mormon Women

Katie Stringham, Sue Johnson

Signature Books, 2026

The Book of Once-Mormon Women compiles the compelling voices of thirty women reflecting on their complex transitions away from Mormonism. Each piece is raw, heart-­wrenching, and sublime. A compilation of expressive forms and perspectives, this book explores many issues faced by women in Mormonism: gender, race, agency, sexual orientation, faith, authority, and belonging. The authors add complexity—and answers—to the question: Why do people leave the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints? The book also examines the myriad paths taken by the writers on their journey out of the faith—and the hope, peace, and restoration they’ve found beyond it. 

Contributors: Tia Levings, Julie de Azevedo, Lindsay Hansen Park, Chelsea Homer, Gina Colvin-Ruwhiu, Celeste Davis, Sue Johnson, Alanna Argudo, Sara Bybee Fisk, Katie Stringham, Saane Siale, Samantha Shelley, Wendy Montgomery, Dee-Dee Darby-Duffin, Stephanie Brinkerhoff, Sarah Newcomb, Lili Ribeira, Mariama Nadworna, Jana Spangler, Megan McOmber, Meredith Peterson, Margaret M. Toscano, Sal Osborne, Lena Osborne, Amanda Scott, Ashmae Hoiland, Amy McPhie Allebest, Laurie Lee Hall, Sandra Violet, Claudine Foudray, Natasha Helfer, and Brittney Hartley

[more]
cover of The Book of Proverbs: A Social Justice Commentary

The Book of Proverbs

A Social Justice Commentary

Rabbi Dr. Shmuly Yanklowitz

Central Conference of American Rabbis, 2022

The Book of Proverbs, attributed to King Solomon, is a profound collection of Jewish wisdom, song, and inspiration. Yet to contemporary readers, the text can appear vague, ambiguous, and contradictory. In this refreshing and relevant commentary, Rabbi Dr. Shmuly Yanklowitz challenges us to find modern meaning in this ancient text. Using his signature blend of social justice practice and Jewish thought from throughout history, Rabbi Yanklowitz shows how the words of Proverbs are strikingly pertinent to issues we face today. Drawing on a wide range of sources, Rabbi Yanklowitz explores such topics as income inequality, feminism, animal rights, environmentalism, and many more. The author’s commentary is paired with the full text of Proverbs—in both Hebrew and an updated, gender-accurate translation—so readers can glean their own insights.
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cover of The Book of Queer Mormon Joy

The Book of Queer Mormon Joy

Pray, Kerry Spencer

Signature Books, 2024

The story of queer Mormons is one that some might not expect to be joyful. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has traditionally asserted that queerness is counter to God’s plan and that gender as determined at birth is eternal. Any marriage other than a monogamous pairing of male and female is “counterfeit.” So called “wickedness,” we are told, “never was happiness.”

But queer Mormons tell different stories—stories filled with joy. This collection includes essays by queer Mormons across the LGBTQ spectrum who, when they looked inside themselves, found divinity rather than sin. Stories by people who are made exactly as they are meant to be, and live accordingly.

Queer Mormons who feel forced out of the institutional church don’t typically find despair on the outside or abandonment by the divine. Instead, their lives are rich and beautiful—made all the more so by the struggle. The Book of Mormon tells us, “Men are that they might have joy.” The Book of Queer Mormon Joy affirms that trans, nonbinary, intersex, asexual, bisexual, polyamorous, and gay people have joy. Joy is for everyone.

[more]
cover of The Book of the Twelve and Beyond: Collected Essays of James D. Nogalski

The Book of the Twelve and Beyond

Collected Essays of James D. Nogalski

James D. Nogalski

SBL Press, 2017

A critical collection for specialists and serious students of prophetic literature

This book contains a collection of essays dealing with texts in the Book of the Twelve written by James D. Nogalski beginning in 1993. Essays use various methodological approaches to prophetic literature, including redaction criticism, form criticism, text criticism, intertextuality, and literary analysis. The variety of methods employed by one scholar, as well as the diverse texts treated, makes this volume useful for exploring changes in the field of prophetic studies in the last quarter century.

Features

  • A helpful entry into the issues surrounding the historical and literary interpretation of the Book of the Twelve as a redacted corpus
  • A collection of sixteen essays using a variety of methods
  • Bracketed page numbers coordinating these essays with the pages in original publications
[more]
cover of The Book of the Twelve and the New Form Criticism

The Book of the Twelve and the New Form Criticism

Mark J. Boda

SBL Press, 2015

An exploration of genre questions for scholars and students

Contributors to this volume explore the theoretical issues at stake in recent changes in form criticism and the practical outcomes of applying the results of these theoretical shifts to the Book of the Twelve. This volume combines self-conscious methodological reflection with examination of specific texts illustrating the value of certain methodological approaches.

Features:

  • Essays that demonstrate the practical consequences of theoretical decisions
  • Contributions that illustrate new interpretations
  • Focused attention to genre in the Book of the Twelve
[more]
cover of The Bop Apocalypse: The Religious Visions of Kerouac, Ginsberg, and Burroughs

The Bop Apocalypse

The Religious Visions of Kerouac, Ginsberg, and Burroughs

John Lardas

University of Illinois Press, 2000

Blending biography, cultural history, and literary criticism, The Bop Apocalypse explores the religious concerns, metaphysical realities, and spiritual pursuits that undergirded the early friendship and literary collaborations of Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg, and William S. Burroughs.
 
Presenting a religious biography of the Beats from the mid-1940s to the late 1950s, John Lardas shows that in rejecting many of the cultural tenets of postwar America, Kerouac, Ginsberg, and Burroughs created new visions of both self and country, visions they articulated through distinctive literary forms. Lardas examines how the Beat writers distilled a theology of experience--a religious vision that animated their everyday existence as well as their art--from a flurry of disparate influences that included the saxophone wails of Charlie Parker and Lester Young, the psychology of Wilhelm Reich, the linguistic theories of Alfred Korzybski, the hipster dialects of New York City, and especially the prophecies of Oswald Spengler. Revisiting the major works the Beats produced in the 1950s in terms of critical content, Lardas considers how their lived religion was incorporated into the way they wrote.
 
The first sustained treatment of Beat religiosity, The Bop Apocalypse takes a sophisticated look beyond the cartoonish reductions of the Beat counterculture. The Bop Apocalypse takes the Beats at face value, interpreting their sexual openness, drug use, criminality, compulsion to travel, and madness as the logical, physical enactments of a religious representation of the world. Far from dallying irrelevantly on the fringes of society, Lardas asserts, the Beats engaged America on moral grounds through the discourse of public religion.
 
 
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cover of The Boundaries of Pluralism: The World of the University of Michigan’s Jewish Students from 1897 to 1945

The Boundaries of Pluralism

The World of the University of Michigan’s Jewish Students from 1897 to 1945

Andrei S. Markovits & Kenneth Garner

Michigan Publishing Services, 2020

This is a highly original and intriguing book which should attract a good deal of interest. It is based on exhaustive, quite remarkable archival research and includes a sophisticated prosopographical analysis of Jewish enrollment over several decades. Most intriguing, the book unearths hitherto unknown information about the growing influence on University policy of the famously anti-Semitic Henry Ford and figures in Ford’s orbit. Despite the contentious nature of their research topic, the authors maintain a consistently detached, non-judgmental, yet intellectually incisive perspective. The result is an entirely credible, well written, often quite exciting chronicle of a minority, most of whose families had been in America for only one or two generations, striving to define themselves, and the response of the Gentile community to those aspirations. Given the centrality of immigration politics in the US and Europe at the present moment, this story has wide contemporary relevance.
Victor Lieberman,
 Raoul Wallenberg Distinguished University Professor of History, 
University of Michigan
 
This is a deeply researched and strikingly original study of Jewish students at an important place in an important time. Its focus on both the lives of the students and their institutional situation yields deep insight and new, subtle understandings of the complicated interactions of Jewish identity and anti-semitism in a state which, in those years, was the virtual capital of the latter and at a university which struggled with both. Required reading for anyone interested in this topic.
Terrence J. McDonald,
 Arthur F. Thurnau Professor, University of Michigan,
 and Director, Bentley Historical Library
[more]
cover of The Breeze Behind the Breeze

The Breeze Behind the Breeze

Joseph Donahue

Duke University Press, 2027

The Breeze Behind the Breeze calls up a world on the edge of a revelation, where the unseen furtively and fervently composes the seen. Unexpected emotions arise in the flow of a poetry that slides between the surreal and the real, from a search for a lost dog in Cincinnati to sunken continents, a rehab clinic to an Egyptian tomb, and onward into the life to come. From a breeze behind a breeze comes word of celestial origins and earthly motions. Drawing on a range of aesthetic and spiritual traditions, Joseph Donahue asks us to consider the world behind the world we see, a world revealed in vivid particulars, in various voices, and in dreams that propose we begin, end, and perhaps continue in an ever-expanding cosmos.
[more]
cover of The Broken Covenant: American Civil Religion in Time of Trial

The Broken Covenant

American Civil Religion in Time of Trial

Robert N. Bellah

University of Chicago Press, 1992

This Second Edition represents Bellah's summation of his views on civil religion in America. In his 1967 classic essay "Civil Rights in America," Bellah argued that the religious dimensions of American society—as distinct from its churches—has its own integrity and required "the same care in understanding that any religion."

This edition includes his 1978 article "Religion and the Legitimation of the American Republic," and a new Preface.
[more]