The T & T Clark Blog

New issue of Princeton Theological Review online!

The latest issue of the Princeton Theological Review is now available online. I carries among other stuff a review of Michael Allen's The Christ's Faith by Evan Kuehn. You can find it in the pdf on page 97-98. Enjoy!  

"Allen’s contribution to the question of Christ’s faith is both richly substantive and far-reaching. The thesis is carefully executed. Apart from merely arguing for a certain position, Allen recognizes the obstacles and concerns blocking an embrace of the human faith of Christ by Reformed theologians, and he seeks to allay these concerns through appeal to Scripture and ecumenical dialogue between Thomist and Reformed traditions. In this goal he is impressively successful. Even those personally unconvinced of the human faith of Christ will find a compelling account of the receptiveness of Reformed and Chalcedonian dogmatic commitments to such an affirmation."

Review in the Church Times

Canon Paul Bradshaw has kindly reviewed Laszlo Dobszay's book on the Restoration and Development of the Roman Rite in last week's edition of the Church Times. 

"A STEADILY growing body of literature is building up within Roman Catholic circles that claims that the liturgical reforms that have emerged within that Church are not what the Second Vatican Coun­cil originally in-tended. It is argued that the Roman Rite had previously always dev­eloped “organically”, whereas the new rite represents a complete rup­ture with that tradi­tion. In this stable László Dobszay’s book firmly belongs.

What is unique about his con­tribu­tion, however, is that he is not urging a “reform of the reform”, as others tend to do. He does not think “that the content of the post­conciliar reform liturgy can really be reformed”. Instead, what he advo­cates is that existing alongside this modern rite should be “a process of continuous and organic develop­ment of the classicalRoman Rite”, whose 1962 form has recently been authorised for use in Latin by Pope Benedict XVI. 

The bulk of this substantial book is a series of very detailed proposals for doing this within what the author believes to be the true spirit of the Second Vatican Council, even including a limited use of the ver-­nacular. His suggestions are not res­tricted to the eucharist alone, but also cover the daily office, the calendar and lectionary, Holy Week rites, and — as might be ex­pected from a musicologist — the chants of the mass."

Read the full review here. 

Guest post from Riemer Roukema on his book 'Jesus, Gnosis and Dogma'

Below is the first of a series of guest posts which Ive invited people to contribute to the T&T Clark blog. The idea is that authors can probably best introduce their own work. I hope you enjoy them.

Why did I write Jesus, Gnosis and Dogma?

Riemer Roukema, Theological University, Kampen, The Netherlands

There are two reasons why I wrote this book. First, I was (and am) annoyed by the suggestion that the real Jesus was a sort of teacher of Gnostic or esoteric wisdom that can be found, for example, in the Gospel of Thomas. To be sure, in some respect Jesus was a teacher of wisdom, and part of the sayings attributed to him in the Gospel of Thomas may be more or less trustworthy or in line with his own instruction. But in my book I argue that especially its esoteric, Gnosticizing teachings do not go back to Jesus of Nazareth, but have been attributed to him at a later stage, when certain Christians wanted to align him with religious views originating from other sources. For that reason in the Gospel of Thomas Jesus sometimes seems to propagate Hermetic and other religious views concerning, for example, the need to acquire self-knowledge, which means knowledge about the supracelestial origin and destination of one’s soul. His alleged devaluation of the Old Testament prophets and of common Jewish practices like prayer and almsgiving also fits in with this. One of the examples of a high, but uncritical esteem of the Gospel of Thomas can be found in Elaine Pagels’s book Beyond Belief: The Secret Gospel of Thomas. In my chapter 1, therefore, I critically discuss her interpretation of an esoteric version of Jesus’ conversation with his disciples about his own identity. Furthermore, I demonstrate that other apocryphal texts such as the Gospel of Judas, or related testimonies to Jesus’ alleged Gnostic teachings, are even less trustworthy from an historical point of view. I maintain that the most trustworthy records of Jesus’ own instruction can be found in the synoptic Gospels, and perhaps to a lesser extent in the Gospel of John. Still, I do not exclude the possibility that the Gospel of John contains Jesus’ own mystic teachings that are less prominent in (but not absent from) the synoptic Gospels. As far as Jesus had a secret teaching for the inner circle of his disciples, the gist of it can now be found in the canonical Gospels. There is no trace of early Gnosticism in his own teaching, although afterwards esoteric Christians could reinterpret his instruction in a Gnostic sense.

Ecological Hermeneutics: edited by Horrell, Hunt, Southgate, Stavrakopoulou

I have just received advance copies from the printer of 'Ecological Hermeneutics' a new book as part of Exeter's wider project in this area (there are a couple of other books from it, one's with Equinox I think).

This book is aimed at scholars, and a student audience, and at moving in systematic way towards developing a sound ecological hermeneutical approach. I think it will do well on courses as more and more institutions begin to consider this sort of approach. If anyone is teaching a course for which this might be useful do ask for an inspection widget of the full book.

Some top names in there - Francis Watson, John Barton, Richard Bauckham, John Rogerson

You can preview the book with the widget within this post.

Patricia Terrell, Paul's Parallels interview

Abby, who is our wonderful T&T Clark marketing manager has just alerted me to this interview with Patricia Terrell.

Patricia does a wonderful job of explaining her book to Nijay Gupta, who posts the interview on his blog.

There we are, Saturday on the bank holiday weekend and the T&T Clark blog doesn't rest. Either that means I'm very dedicated, or it's raining outside and I've got nothing much to do. Most likely, it's a bit of both.

I'm a huge fan of Patricia's book, and greatly enjoyed bringing it through the last part of the production process (it was a project I inherited). It's a wonderful resource for teaching and research.