The T & T Clark Blog

Editorial Interview for Poverty in the Early Church and Today

Professor Steve Walton and Dr. Hannah Swithinbank were recently interviewed about the starting point and development for their newly published book, Poverty in the Early Church and Today: A Conversation. The book examines key themes related to poverty in both ancient and modern contexts, with contributions on each issue from leading scholars of early Christianity and leading figures in fundraising and policy-making.

How would you describe your book in one sentence?

It is a conversation about poverty and its alleviation in a Christian context between the thinking and actions of the earliest believers and Christians today.

 

What drew to you writing about this subject?

The idea came out of an after-church conversation about the lack of engagement between the early churches’ and modern Christians’ responses to people in poverty. This thought led to a conference sponsored by the Centre for the Social-Scientific Study of the Bible at St Mary’s University, Twickenham (London), and two Christian agencies working in poverty alleviation, Tearfund and Caritas (Diocese of Westminster). The conference featured a creative conversation between experts in the earliest church and experts on Christian engagement with poverty today. The speakers worked in pairs, focusing on the same theme from these two perspectives, and the book contains revised versions of their talks and responses to each other, to convey some of the back-and-forth of the conversations.

Author Interview: “The Time Is Fulfilled”: Jesus’s Apocalypticism in the Context of Continental Philosophy

Dr. Lynne Moss Bahr discusses her analysis of the influence that messianism and the apocalyptic content of the New Testament has had on continental philosophy, in the recently published Library of New Testament Studies work, “The Time Is Fulfilled” Jesus’s Apocalypticism in the Context of Continental Philosophy.

How would you describe your book in one sentence?

This book interprets time and temporality in the Jesus tradition by situating four apocalyptic sayings of Jesus in their sociohistorical and literary context and also with respect to time and temporality in modern philosophical writings on the messianic.

Author Interview: Becoming John: The Making of a Passion Gospel

Professor Emeritus Kari Syreeni discusses the inspiration and goals behind one of our most recently published Library of New Testament Studies works, Becoming John: The Making of a Passion Gospel.

1. How would you describe your book in one sentence?

Obviously, a new hypothesis about the redaction - or the BECOMING - of the Gospel of John.

2. What drew to you writing about the Gospel of John, and how long has it been a part of your research?

I come from synoptic studies. My doctoral thesis was about the Sermon on the Mount, and since then I have studied Matthew and Luke in particular. I have been fascinated by John for more than ten years and have written several articles on John before the opportunity came to prepare a whole monograph. One intriguing problem which I confronted when studying Luke was how to explain the striking parallels between Luke-Acts and John. I hesitated long before finally making up my mind about the direction of the Luke-John influence. Moreover, I have always been interested in hermeneutics, and John was very much inviting of such issues.

Editor Interview: The Early Reception of Paul the Second Temple Jew: Text, Narrative and Reception History

Professor Isaac W. Oliver goes into detail on the inspiration for The Early Reception of Paul the Second Temple Jew: Text, Narrative and Reception History, co-edited with Professor Gabriele Boccaccini.

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1. How would you describe your book in one sentence?

The Early Reception of Paul the Second Temple Jews examines the different ways Christians from the first two centuries evaluated Paul’s Jewishness and views on Judaism in relation to their own Christian faith.  

Author Interview: The Hasmoneans and Their Neighbors: New Historical Reconstructions from the Dead Sea Scrolls and Classical Sources

For one of our recent publications, The Hasmoneans and Their Neighbors: New Historical Reconstructions from the Dead Sea Scrolls and Classical Sources, Dr. Kenneth Atkinson reveals the inspiration and research behind his latest book.

1. How would you describe your book in one sentence?

 My book offers a bold new reconstruction of the vital historical period in Palestine from 152 to 63 B.C.E., when the Hasmonean family of Jewish rulers changed the fates of their neighbors, the Roman Republic, the religion of Judaism, and created the foundation for the development of the nascent Christian faith.

2.What drew to you writing about this subject?

I discovered the remarkable story of the family of Jewish rulers known as the Hasmoneans (a.k.a. Maccabees) when I first read the writings of the Jewish-Roman historian Josephus (37 B.C.E.-ca. 98 C.E.). His accounts of how the Hasmoneans forged an independent state, maintained power, fought numerous enemies, and lost their independence to the Romans, is a gripping narrative with many Shakespearian qualities. Josephus’s chronicle of King Judah Aristobulus is perhaps the best example. It is reminiscent of Macbeth with its tales of matricide, sibling strife, and madness. Although Josephus’s descriptions of him and his ruthless brother, Alexander Jannaeus, make compelling reading, I was astonished at his sections about Queen Shelamzion Alexandra. The only legitimate female ruler in Jewish history and the sole woman named in the Dead Sea Scrolls, she emerged during a time of chaos to preserve her family’s kingdom and change her religion. Her reign is one of history’s most fascinating and least known stories. After reading Josephus’s books, I became so interested in the Hasmonean family that I decided someday to document their history in an academic publication accessible to scholars in a variety of disciplines, students, and interested laypersons. It ended up being a much greater project than I had anticipated.

My previous book, The History of the Hasmonean State: Josephus and Beyond (T and T Clark Jewish and Christian Texts in Contexts and Related Studies, 23 [London: Bloomsbury T and T Clark, 2016]), used all extant data to reconstruct the history of the Hasmonean State as documented in Josephus’s works. This was the only book I had planned to publish about the Hasmoneans. However, while writing it, I discovered a vast quantity of unused literary, archaeological, and numismatic sources that document relations between the Hasmoneans and their neighbors, as well as how the family affected the Dead Sea Scrolls community. I also found that these ancient manuscripts discovered along the Dead Sea help us to understand Greek and Latin classical writings about this period. These works, moreover, contain a wealth of untapped resources for reconstructing previously unknown events in Hasmonean history. The Hasmoneans and their Neighbors uses this evidence to reveal how the Hasmonean family changed the fates of their neighbors, the Roman Republic, the religion of Judaism, and created the foundation for the development of the nascent Christian faith. I am confident readers will find it a fascinating book.

3. How long have you been researching it? How did you come to study it?

This book has a rather long history that precedes my academic career. I first encountered the Hasmoneans during the Cold War when I spent four years as a soldier in the U.S. Army (1983-1987). Assigned to the former West Berlin, I transported classified documents through the Berlin Wall across the former East Germany and the Iron Curtain. Because of my military status, I was able to cross through Check Point Charlie—the border between East and West Berlin and the infamous “Berlin Wall”—to see the great historical and archaeological museums in the former Communist sector. I was particularly fascinated with the biblical artifacts there, which led me to visit many of the countries where archaeologists found them. My experiences in the army, coupled with my independent study and travels, stimulated my desire to pursue a career in academia specializing in the period of the Hasmonean state. Before I began my academic training, I wanted to see more in my quest to learn about the Hasmoneans and the ancient world first-hand.

After my military discharge (honorable I am happy to say!), I spent nearly three years traveling full-time to historical and archaeological sites in several Middle Eastern and European countries. Equipped only with a backpack, I retraced portions of Jesus’ travels, Paul’s journeys, Xenophon’s march of the ten thousand, Lucullus’ Armenian campaign, and Crusader routes—a good portion of them by foot! My journeys shaped nearly every chapter of The Hasmoneans and Their Neighbors, especially my reconstructions of historical events based on my visits to numerous archaeological sites. This is perhaps most evident in chapter three, where I use my trip to the ancient kingdom of Commagene and neighboring regions to uncover new information about a possible Hasmonean campaign there. Upon my return home and throughout my graduate school education, I continued my studies of the Hasmoneans. Readers will find much new information throughout The Hasmoneans and Their Neighbors that my varied life experiences allowed me to uncover. Like my previous book, it contains many original historical reconstructions not available anywhere else.

4. What does your book focus on that hasn’t been explored elsewhere?

The Hasmoneans and Their Neighbors shows that Jewish sectarianism and messianism played greater roles in the Hasmonean state than indicated in the writings of Josephus. It also proposes that we cannot understand the history and theological beliefs of Jews during the period of the Hasmonean state without a close investigation of the histories of the Egyptian Ptolemaic and the Syrian Seleucid Empires, as well as the Roman Republic. By bringing together evidence from the Dead Sea Scrolls and classical sources, I offer a new reconstruction of this vital historical period when the Hasmoneans not only shaped Middle Eastern history, but transformed the classical world as well. The Hasmoneans and Their Neighbors also contains many new reconstructions of classical history, including the most detailed examination of Pompey the Great’s assassination in light of Jewish sources. This section on his death reveals new information that explains the discrepancies in the classical accounts of this pivotal event that shaped Middle Eastern and Roman history, and which ended the Roman Republic. The Hasmoneans and Their Neighbors is a truly exciting story that will interest scholars from many fields, as well as anyone interested in learning about one of history’s most amazing, influential, and dysfunctional families.

 

Author Interview - Understanding Affections in the Theology of Jonathan Edwards: “The High Exercises of Divine Love”

In anticipation of Understanding Affections in the Theology of Jonathan Edwards: “The High Exercises of Divine Love”, Dr Ryan J. Martin goes into further detail on the creation of his monograph.

 

How would you describe your book in one sentence?

My book is a focused look at how Jonathan Edwards defined affections and other movements of the human soul, and how his understanding of human anthropology was incorporated into his theology as a whole. 

               

What drew to you writing about this subject?

I was already interested in affections as a category, and especially in the ways older Christians thought about them as a psychological phenomenon. It seems--even on the surface--that Christian thought on the soul's movements have shifted and morphed in recent times. I wanted to understand better some of the older models of thought on their own terms, rather than looking at them through the prism of contemporary categories and assumptions. Finally, the opportunity to study a master theological mind like that of Edwards was itself immensely appealing. 

 

How long have you been researching Jonathan Edwards? How did you come to study him?

During my Master of Divinity at Central Baptist Theological Seminary in Minnesota, U.S.A., I started reading Jonathan Edwards's Religious Affections, a classic work on Christian affection and devotion. I read just a couple of pages per day, early each morning before starting the day. I really didn't start studying Edwards's thought in earnest until after I began my Ph.D., however. I assumed that everything that could be written on Edwards had already been written, so I looked at my making any worthwhile contribution to Edwards's thought to be a fool's errand. Nevertheless, my doktorvater and friend, Kevin T. Bauder, pushed me to explore more deeply this area of Edwards's thought through the work of the scholar Thomas Dixon. Ken Minkema also encouraged me to continue my work in Edwards's affective thought. 

 

What does your book focus on that hasn’t been explored elsewhere?

I'd highlight especially three areas of development. My book emphasizes both the way Edwards thought about affections, especially in contrast with other movements of the soul. I pay special attention to Edwards's distinction between "affections" and "passions," showing how he maintained this distinction throughout his career as a pastor and theologian. A second focus is the way I tie those ideas throughout Edwards's greater theological endeavors. I try to show that affections were a perennial concern for Edwards, from his early days at New Haven, to his later writings against the theological progressives of his day. Finally, I make the case that the way Edwards thought about affections has little in common with more recent emphases on emotions found in popular Christian religious thought. 

 

What do you hope readers will gain from the book?

I hope they'll gain an appreciation of Christian theology, the remarkable genius of Jonathan Edwards, and the necessity of gracious affections for the Triune God. 

Understanding Affections in the Theology of Jonathan Edwards: “The High Exercises of Divine Love” is available for pre-order now, and is due for release on 15th November 2018!

 

 

Celebrating the book launch of the new paperback edition of Beginnings: Interrogating Hauerwas

Stanley Hauerwas, Brian Brock and Kevin Hargaden are thrilled to announce the roaring success of the launch party for Beginnings: Interrogating Hauerwas, one of the latest paperback editions from T&T Clark.

 

Hodges and Figgis - the foremost and largest bookshop in Dublin - played host to the event, with an introduction by Professor Siobhán Garrigan and a chance for the eighty or so guests to have a very lively discussion with Hauerwas, Brock and Hargaden. And the crowning achievement; the new edition found pride of place on the shop’s bestseller wall for the next week – apparently the first time a theology book has been there in living memory!

On top of this event, Hauerwas and Brock also had the chance to sit down with Pat Coyle and Jesuits in Ireland for an interview, addressing multiple topical issues such as pacifism and non-violence:

 

When it is put to him that everything he writes as a theologian is rooted in the person of Jesus he concurs but challenges the phenomenon of an over-reliance on ‘a personal encounter’ with the Lord, particularly as expressed in America. He says he meets Jesus in the many fine people who are part of his church community, and then goes on to note that in fact Jesus has made his life ‘dysfunctional’ – a comment which naturally leads on to a discussion about how he views words.  Theology is all about words, he says, and faith is “working with words in the light of Christ.”

 

They also explain the creation, purpose and building of the book, a two year conversation between the two men that eventually became the ‘interrogation’ featured in the title. Originally broadcast on radio, the interview can now be found online here: http://www.jesuit.ie/news/theologian-stanley-hauerwas-dysfunctional-life/

 

The paperback edition of Beginnings: Interrogating Hauerwas was published on 28^th June 2018, and is now available for purchase from Amazon and the Bloomsbury website.

Author Interview - Gregory R. Lanier on Old Testament Conceptual Metaphors and the Christology of Luke’s Gospel

In anticipation of the publication of Old Testament Conceptual Metaphors and the Christology of Luke’s Gospel, one of the latest upcoming volumes in the Library of New Testament Studies,  Professor Gregory R. Lanier explains the backstory of this volume.

 

How would you describe your book in one sentence?

This book contributes to the fields of early NT Christology as well as OT-in-the-NT by examining the transformation of messianic and divine metaphors in Luke’s Gospel.

 

What drew to you writing about this subject?

Early Christology has interested me for a while, and it continues to be an active area of research. I have been influenced both by the “high Christology” cadre (Bauckham, Hengel, Hurtado, Hays, Gathercole, and others) as well as the “low(er) Christology” cadre (Dunn and a host of others). Examining how the NT authors arrived at their conclusions about the person and work of Jesus, especially in their interaction with Israel’s Scriptures, is fascinating and fruitful both for the academy and the religious community. In particular, the Synoptic Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke) present unique challenges in terms of the tug-of-war over early Christology.

 

How long have you been researching it? How did you come to study it?

The core of the project took three years, though some of the research (particularly on the “stone” passages and the Parable of the Tenants) goes back further. The book is a lightly edited version of my Cambridge Ph.D. thesis.  

 

What does your book focus on that hasn’t been explored elsewhere? 

The book takes a particular approach to Luke (and early Christology) that involves the study of “conceptual metaphors,” that is, root or foundational ways of thinking about abstract things using concrete experiences. For instance, “God is a strong tower” is not merely a poetic turn-of-phrase, but a foundational way in which an Israelite (or a Jew or Christian today) actually conceptualizes and interacts with God (e.g., as someone who protects you from harm, etc.). Scripture—and everyday life—is full of such metaphors. Within the field of Hebrew Bible, there has been a lot of activity involving conceptual metaphor theory in the past decade or so, but it is only beginning to make headway in NT studies. This book contributes to that endeavor by developing a clear method of examining a collection of conceptual metaphors used for (a) an eschatological deliverer (e.g., the “star” of Num 24:17) and (b) God himself, and then demonstrating how, in this case, they are being appropriated/transformed/re-mapped in Luke’s gospel in conceptualizing Jesus. In particular, I study four such OT/Jewish metaphors (Luke 1:68–69; 1:78–79; 13:34; 20:17–18), offering a different way to examine these texts which have often proved difficult to pin down. 

 

In short, I ask the question: “If the conceptual metaphors behind these texts are firmly rooted in Jewish soil (and, in fact, reflect broader ways of conceptualizing the deity in the ancient world), what does it imply about Luke’s Christology if they are being transformed and applied to Jesus?"

 

What do you hope readers and scholars will gain from reading this book?

My hope is that the book will benefit readers and scholars in three ways: 

(a) providing new insights into these particular texts in Luke; 

(b) contributing to the toolkit of biblical intertextuality (or OT-in-the-NT), particularly where normal criteria for tracing allusions/echoes/citations start to break down (that is to say, what sort of methodological controls are there for studying a NT passage that is clearly drawing on the OT but not a specific passage?);

(c) developing a more robust way to navigate the “low” vs. “high” Christology dichotomy by showing how, at least for Luke, “both” perspectives sit side-by-side

Old Testament Conceptual Metaphors and the Christology of Luke’s Gospel is available for pre-order now, and is due for release on 26th July 2018.

Editor interview for Ethnicity, Race, Religion

Professor David G. Horrell gives us a preview of the upcoming volume, co-edited with Dr. Katherine Hockey: Ethnicity, Race, Religion: Identities and Ideologies in Early Jewish and Christian Texts, and in Modern Biblical Interpretation.

1. How would you describe this book in one sentence?

Our book offers a wide-ranging examination of the intersections between ethnicity, race, and religion in biblical interpretation, moving from ancient (and textual) constructions of ethnicity through selected studies in the history of interpretation, to conclude with various proposals for moving beyond the white, Western tradition that has dominated this field.

 

2. What drew you to this subject?

In part it was the realisation that I had spent much of my career in New Testament studies without reflecting explicitly or critically on how my own racialized identity (as white) shaped and influenced my approach to interpretation. It struck me that this lack of reflection was possible for me (as a “white” scholar) in ways that would probably not be possible for those of other racialized or ethnic identities. This struck me as a failing which I should seek to address, and which would require attending to the voices and perspectives of others. I also began to think about the suspicion that the constructions of “Jewish” and “Christian” identities in much biblical study were likely to be influenced and shaped by the religious and ethnic or racial location of the interpreters – many of whom (like me) stand in an essentially Western, Christian tradition of scholarship, whether or not they are Christians themselves.

 

3. How long have you been researching it? How did you come to study it?

I came to this area of research initially through studying 1 Peter, and specifically the use of “people”-terms in 2.9-10, and through the stimulus of Denise Kimber Buell’s much discussed book Why This New Race, published in 2005. After some work on 1 Peter, I began to outline a broader project on this theme, and received funding from the UK’s Arts and Humanities Research Council from 2015-17. This funding enabled Katherine Hockey to be employed to work with me on the project, and also allowed us to invite various scholars to a series of workshops and a conference at Exeter, from which this edited volume emerged. I plan to complete a monograph on the subject within the next year or so.

 

4. What does your book focus on that hasn’t been explored elsewhere?

There are two features of the book I’d point to in particular. First, it deliberately spans both historical investigations into the construction of ethnic and religious identities and critical reflections on traditions and perspectives in interpretation – including proposals for moving beyond what one contributor calls “biblical studies’ race problem”. Second, it brings together an exceptional team of scholars who represent a wide diversity of contexts, traditions, and areas of expertise. But it does not label any of them specifically as “minority” scholars, nor claim to represent minoritized voices. This is because it seeks to embody an attempt precisely to move beyond the situation in which biblical studies is characterised by a dominant core (of “unlabelled” approaches, often historical in orientation, and traditionally dominated by white, Western, Christian scholars) and a “periphery” of alternative – and explicitly labelled - approaches, including those practised by scholars of other racial or ethnic identities. Instead, these various scholars and their work are presented as equally significant and pertinent contributions to the broad field of biblical studies – in ways that, I hope, as we say in the Preface, help “towards the emergence of biblical studies from its Eurocentric origins into a truly global discipline”.

Ethnicity, Race, Religion is available for pre-order now, and will be published on 28th June 2018!

Author Interview - The Daily Discoveries of a Bible Scholar and Manuscript Hunter: A Biography of James Rendel Harris (1852–1941)

Dr. Alessandro Falcetta has been most kind in giving us some insight into his research and exploration of the life of James Rendel Harris, published in The Daily Discoveries of a Bible Scholar and Manuscript Hunter: A Biography of James Rendel Harris (1852–1941)

1. How would you describe your book in one sentence?

This book is the first full biography ever written of one of the major New Testament and patristic scholars Britain has produced in the Victorian period, a collector of ancient manuscripts, a man who in his time played an important part in the history of the Society of Friends and of the Christian church at large, and who, among his many travels, risked his life in Eastern Turkey to bring relief to the Armenians during the Abdul Hamit massacres.

2. What drew to you writing a biography of James Rendel Harris?

This piece of research was an unexpected gift. Many years ago, as I walked under the porticos of Bologna towards the office of prof. Pier Cesare Bori, I had a secret hope, that he might ask me to write my final BA dissertation in Britain, a country where I had previously had a great time. However, the only project I could think of was a biography of an Italian priest and church historian, Ernesto Buonaiuti, which meant travelling to Rome at most. Bori dismissed my proposal at once and instead he asked me if I was willing to write a biography of one James Rendel Harris; a very interesting scholar, yes, but also one whose papers, he warned me, were kept in Britain. I could not quite believe my luck and accepted the offer. Then, curiously enough, years later I found among the papers of Rendel Harris unpublished letters from Buonaiuti. Even more curious is the fact that some time ago, when I moved for personal reasons to Stavanger in Norway, I discovered there a thriving little Quaker community, whose leader was closely connected to Rendel Harris’ college. Both his grandfather and his father had in fact seen Rendel Harris and the latter had even sent home a report on one of his lectures. As if the surprises were not enough, I also found out that the wife of another character of my book, Alphonse Mingana, was buried in a local cemetery. Like me, Mingana had married a woman from Stavanger.    

3. How long have you been researching your book?

I began researching the book in 1994 and finished writing it in 2017. Obviously, I have not been working on it all these years, but there is no doubt that it was a very time-consuming project. I lived in Britain for a while and travelled a deal, both in Britain, in Pennsylvania, and in the Middle East, looking for sources and visiting some of the places Rendel Harris went to. I also met many interesting people, from a grand-nephew who drove Rendel Harris in a car to see antiquities in Devon to an Armenian historian whose grand-mother had survived the genocide.

4. What does this biography focus on that hasn’t been explored elsewhere?

Scholars are aware that Rendel Harris was a very peculiar man full of discoveries and adventures. However, not so much about him was known. One could find some information in the beautiful biography of two friends of his, Agnes S. Lewis and Margaret D. Gibson, written by Janet Soskice some years ago, in reference works, and in a slim biography privately published by his secretary. Now, this new book contains plenty of new material about the life of Rendel Harris, some of which is sourced from private archives. It also throws new light on other people as well; in particular his wife, Helen Balkwill Harris, a Quaker missionary, relief worker and writer who deserves a biography of her own, and Alphonse Mingana, whose collection of oriental Christian and Muslim manuscripts is one of the largest in the western world.

5. Which aspects of this book do you find more interesting?

Rendel Harris had an amazing life. He wrote countless books and articles on early Christianity, discovered and collected Syriac, Greek, and Armenian manuscripts, travelled repeatedly to the Middle East and together with his wife rescued thousands of Armenians from death and destitution. His life reads more like a novel than history. Moreover, since he was a man of many contacts and multifarious activities, his papers make a significant contribution to our knowledge of the scholarly and religious life of Britain in the Victorian era.

The Daily Discoveries of a Bible Scholar and Manuscript Hunter is available in hardback and epub formats from today!