The T & T Clark Blog

Angela Shier-Jones R.I.P

It is with great sadness that I report the death of Angela Shier-Jones last week. I knew she was seriously ill for some time. I have known her for many years, having first met her at Wesley College Bristol when she was training for the ministry while I did my research there as a guest student from Germany. Angela was a brave, inspiring, engaging and sometimes controversial theologian, passionate and vigorous, never making compromises on the urgency of preaching God's love and grace. Even during her last weeks, while already being in hospital, she posted some very moving reflections on her own blog - and a photograph with a halo!

Hope Cup Cakes and Candles

May she rest in peace and rise in glory!

God, Humanity and the Cosmos – 3rd Edition

A few months ago I have posted three author’s blog posts – all three form the Biblical Studies list. I have received some advance copies of God, Humanity and the Cosmos – 3rd Edition and then I thought that it would be good if Christopher Southgate could write a blog for this collection of essays – and here it is!

I hope you’ll enjoy reading this post and do follow it till the end as I have also included three endorsements, which are simply great:

‘This textbook for students of science and religion came originally out of meetings of those UK scholars who had won awards in the Science and Religion Course Program funded by Templeton. It became clear that there was no one book that offered a clear, lively and student-friendly account of the debate. In 2005 the book was strengthened by the inclusion of a new historical chapter, and additional material on the theology of creation. For the 2011 edition, further strengthening includes new chapters on climate change and the new atheism, as well as extensive updating of the other material and the bibliography. As the co-ordinating editor I am really grateful to my co-authors for all their insights, and for their loyalty to the book - fifteen years on from its original genesis. I'm also grateful to the members of the UK Science and Religion Forum who spent a whole day last year bombarding the authors with suggestions! Evolutionary psychology, transhumanism, and the 'dappled world' of Nancy Cartwright all get more attention as a result of their suggestions. The book has become an industry standard in countries all over the world. Check out the new edition, and feed back what you think!’ Christopher Southgate.

Is your (T&T Clark) book having a panel review/discussion at AAR/SBL?

... or do you know of any T&T Clark books which are? If so, I'd be most grateful if you'd drop us a line or post a comment below. We are putting together our booklist and need to know which titles to take a lot of! We always end up missing something - usually because we haven't been told, or it's been impossible to find in the programme book.

Currently we know that the following are receiving attention at the conference:

Psychological Analyses and the Historical Jesus - Bas Van Os

Land of Our Fathers - Francesca Stavrakopoulou

The Fourth Gospel in First-Century Media Culture - Anthony Le Donne and Tom Thatcher

Dialogue Not Dogma - Raj Nadella

Rethinking Mission in the Postcolony - Marion Grau

Lost Intimacy in American Thought - Edward F. Mooney

Methodist Theology - Kenneth Wilson

Pneumatology - Simeon Zahl

But do let us know if you know of any others and we'll do our best to make sure they're represented at the booth.

In other news... I have three appointments for SBL scheduled already. It looks like the old dance card is going to be as full as ever!

C.K. Barrett (1917-2011) RIP

Lots of others on the blogosphere have posted about the death of CK Barrett on the 26th August. This is very sad news. Barrett's many standard works have contributed and continue to contrbitute to the world of New Testament scholarship. Many are indeed cornerstones of the T&T Clark list. For example his ICC on Acts.

I've had a scout around the internet and can't find an obit in any of the national papers. I jolly well hope there will be some. Barrett certainly deserves it.

 

A summer of conferences...

The conference season is over! Well, the conference season is over for me at least. So here's a diary of my conference activities.

 
[The stand at ISBL]

It all began with ISBL at King's, an excellently run conference for which T&T Clark sponsored some rather dashing t-shirts for the team of conference helpers. Thanks to Richard Burridge (Dean of King's for giving us that opportunity). I had lots of productive meetings - including one with Library of New Testament Series Editor Mark Goodacre. It was a time to reflect on the sign-ups in LNTS over the last year, which were divided in equal thirds between PhDs, strong and focussed edited collections, and books by established scholars. This is a really great mix to have. We have turned down some really solid work in the last year because we simply do not have space for it in the LNTS programme. So we must be doing something right! At ISBL I also had a great meeting with Andrew Mein and John Lyons which I hope will develop into something quite exciting - more details anon.

Next-up was SOTS, which was good fun as ever... particularly as it was joined with BAJS. I really enjoyed Joe Blenkinsopp's paper on 'Remembering Josiah'. David Gunn gave a tour de force on the 'Amazing Copperplate Bible' - plates from an 18th Century volume in which a German (or Swiss?) scientist uses the bible to explain science. It's interesting to have a snapshot of a time when science could take its lead from the bible - of course at the time there was no need to question the bible's account of things. Tessa Rajak (during the shared day with BAJS) gave an interesting paper on the vestments of the High Priest, but whilst we had manifold insights from Josephus and the Second Temple Period we needed more on the biblical side of things, I think. This was made very clear to me in a question from Margaret Barker. We had a nice visit to the KJV exhibition at the Bodleian Library, and from a publisher's perspective it was great to see the 'Wicked Bible', and edition printed in 1631 which contained the misprint 'Thou shalt commit adultery'. The publisher was fined £300 and deprived of his printer's licence.