Download or read book Divine Teaching written by Mark A. McIntosh and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2017-09-05 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This innovative work is an introduction to Christian theology with a difference. Not only does it interpret, with clarity and energy, fundamental Christian beliefs but it also shows how and why these beliefs arose, promoting an understanding of theological reflection that encourages readers to think theologically themselves. From Irenaeus and Aquinas to Girard, from Augustine to Zizioulas and contemporary feminist thought, Divine Teaching explores the ways in which major thinkers in the Christian tradition have shaped theology through the wide variety of their encounters with God. It makes theological study adventurous and interactive, not necessarily requiring a faith commitment from all, but allowing readers a thoughtful involvement in the subject that takes seriously the Christian vision of God as the ultimate teacher of theology. Divine Teaching: An Introduction to Christian Theology is an imaginative and lively analysis of the Christian way of thinking, offering vivid and informing insight into the history and practice of Christian theology.
Download or read book Divine Instruction in Early Christianity written by Stephen E. Witmer and published by Mohr Siebeck. This book was released on 2008 with total page 264 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Stephen E. Witmer investigates an important aspect of early Christian self-understanding: the conviction of some early followers of Jesus that they had been, and were being, taught by God, in fulfillment of Old Testament prophetic promises (especially Isa 54:13 and Jer 31:33-34). While concentrating upon the idea of divine instruction in the Johannine corpus, he also gives attention to the Pauline writings and to Matthew. This allows for an analysis of the way in which multiple early Christian communities understood the concept; both the unity and diversity of NT developments of the idea are noteworthy. The author argues that the early Christian communities re-interpreted the prophetic promise of eschatological divine instruction in light of the teaching of Jesus and the Spirit.
Download or read book Divine Scripture in Human Understanding written by Joseph K. Gordon and published by University of Notre Dame Pess. This book was released on 2019-03-15 with total page 575 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In six closely-reasoned chapters, Joseph Gordon presents a detailed account of a Christian doctrine of Scripture in the fullest context of systematic theology. Divine Scripture in Human Understanding addresses the confusing plurality of contemporary approaches to Christian Scripture—both within and outside the academy—by articulating a traditionally grounded, constructive systematic theology of Christian Scripture. Utilizing primarily the methodological resources of Bernard Lonergan and traditional Christian doctrines of Scripture recovered by Henri de Lubac, it draws upon achievements in historical-critical study of Scripture, studies of the material history of Christian Scripture, reflection on philosophical hermeneutics and philosophical and theological anthropology, and other resources to articulate a unified but open horizon for understanding Christian Scripture today. Following an overview of the contemporary situation of Christian Scripture, Joseph Gordon identifies intellectual precedents for the work in the writings of Irenaeus, Origen, and Augustine, who all locate Scripture in the economic work of the God to whom it bears witness by interpreting it through the Rule of Faith. Subsequent chapters draw on Scripture itself; classical sources such as Irenaeus, Origen, Augustine, and Aquinas; the fruit of recent studies on the history of Scripture; and the work of recent scholars and theologians to provide a contemporary Christian articulation of the divine and human locations of Christian Scripture and the material history and intelligibility and purpose of Scripture in those locations. The resulting constructive position can serve as a heuristic for affirming the achievements of traditional, historical-critical, and contextual readings of Scripture and provides a basis for addressing issues relatively underemphasized by those respective approaches.
Download or read book Cold Case Christianity written by J. Warner Wallace and published by David C Cook. This book was released on 2013-01-01 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Written by an L. A. County homicide detective and former atheist, Cold-Case Christianity examines the claims of the New Testament using the skills and strategies of a hard-to-convince criminal investigator. Christianity could be defined as a “cold case”: it makes a claim about an event from the distant past for which there is little forensic evidence. In Cold-Case Christianity, J. Warner Wallace uses his nationally recognized skills as a homicide detective to look at the evidence and eyewitnesses behind Christian beliefs. Including gripping stories from his career and the visual techniques he developed in the courtroom, Wallace uses illustration to examine the powerful evidence that validates the claims of Christianity. A unique apologetic that speaks to readers’ intense interest in detective stories, Cold-Case Christianity inspires readers to have confidence in Christ as it prepares them to articulate the case for Christianity.
Download or read book The Enigma about Divine Love and the Creation of Evil written by Ray Embry and published by iUniverse. This book was released on 2000 with total page 130 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The greatest puzzle in Christian theology is the difficulty encountered when someone makes an attempt to account for the strength of evil in the presence of an almighty God of love. How could corruption permeate the kingdom of such a perfect Creator? Many early Christians solved this dilemma by believing that the Designer of the old man is not the same One who fathered the new, spiritual man. The theologian~{!/~}s most difficult question is this: How could the God of love kill babies? This book solves this difficulty by documenting many distinctions between Israel~{!/~}s God of wrath and the Christian God of Love. Many early Christians were able to see that Abba, the Heavenly Father of Jesus, actually bore little resemblance to Israel~{!/~}s fearsome God. These early Christians believed the Heavenly Father was only revealed for the first time through Jesus, just like it is stated in Matthew. They also were aware of Jesus~{!/~} assertion about his Heavenly Father that he never desired the death of even one child. When they learned that Jehovah once killed a multitude of babies in Egypt, this became a significant example of one of the many clear contrasts between Jehovah and Abba.**The goal here is to create the "copy" for your book. Note that space is limited so please be concise. Look at other books and use them as examples. Be creative and think about what has drawn you to your favorite books.
Download or read book Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation written by Pope Paul VI. and published by . This book was released on 1965 with total page 30 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This document's purpose is to spell out the Church's understanding of the nature of revelation--the process whereby God communicates with human beings. It touches upon questions about Scripture, tradition, and the teaching authority of the Church. The major concern of the document is to proclaim a Catholic understanding of the Bible as the "word of God." Key elements include: Trinitarian structure, roles of apostles and bishops, and biblical reading in a historical context.
Download or read book In the Shadow of the Temple written by Oskar Skarsaune and published by InterVarsity Press. This book was released on 2008-10-28 with total page 455 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Oskar Skarsaune gives us a new look into the development of the early church and its practice by showing us the evidence of interaction between the early Christians and rabbinic Judaism. He offers numerous fascinating episodes and glimpses into this untold story.
Download or read book Divine Guidance written by John A. Jillions and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2020-01-24 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The twenty-first century opened with the religiously-inspired attacks of 9/11 and in the years since such attacks have become all too common. Over against the minority who carry out violence at God's direction, however, there are millions of believers around the world who live lives of anonymous kindness. They also see their actions as guided by the divine. How is divine guidance to be understood against the background of such diametrically opposed results? How to make sense of both Osama bin Laden and Mother Teresa? In order to answer this question, John A. Jillions turns to the first-century world of Corinth, where Jews, Gentiles, and early Christians intermixed and vigorously debated the question of divine guidance. In this ancient melting pot, the ideas of writers and poets, philosophers, rabbis, prophets, and the apostle Paul confronted and complemented each other. These writers reveal a culture that reflected deeply upon the realities, ambiguities, and snares posed by questions of divine guidance. Jillions draws these insights together to offer an outline for the twenty-first century and suggest criteria for how to assess perceived divine guidance. Jillions opens a long-closed window in the history of ideas in order to shed valuable light on this timeless question.
Download or read book The Spirit of Early Christian Thought written by Robert Louis Wilken and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 2003-01-01 with total page 406 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Focusing on major figures such as St. Augustine and Gregory of Nyssa, as well as a host of less well known thinkers, Robert Wilken (the author of The First Thousand Years: A Global History of Christianity) chronicles the emergence of a specifically Christian intellectual tradition. He provides an introduction to early Christian thought on topics including early Christian worship, Christian poetry and the spiritual life, the Trinity, Christ, the Bible, and icons, and shows that the energy and vitality of early Christianity arose from within the life of the Church. While early Christian thinkers drew on the philosophical and rhetorical traditions of the ancient world, it was the versatile vocabulary of the Bible that loosened their tongues and minds and allowed them to construct the world anew, intellectually and spiritually. These thinkers were not seeking to invent a world of ideas, Wilken shows, but rather to win the hearts of men and women and to change their lives. Early Christian thinkers set in place a foundation that has endured. Their writings are an irreplaceable inheritance, and Wilken shows that they can still be heard as living voices within contemporary culture.
Download or read book Destroyer of the Gods written by Larry W. Hurtado and published by . This book was released on 2016 with total page 290 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Silly," "stupid," "irrational," "simple." "Wicked," "hateful," "obstinate," "anti-social." "Extravagant," "perverse." The Roman world rendered harsh judgments upon early Christianity--including branding Christianity "new." Novelty was no Roman religious virtue. Nevertheless, as Larry W. Hurtado shows in Destroyer of the gods, Christianity thrived despite its new and distinctive features and opposition to them. Unlike nearly all other religious groups, Christianity utterly rejected the traditional gods of the Roman world. Christianity also offered a new and different kind of religious identity, one not based on ethnicity. Christianity was distinctively a "bookish" religion, with the production, copying, distribution, and reading of texts as central to its faith, even preferring a distinctive book-form, the codex. Christianity insisted that its adherents behave differently: unlike the simple ritual observances characteristic of the pagan religious environment, embracing Christian faith meant a behavioral transformation, with particular and novel ethical demands for men. Unquestionably, to the Roman world, Christianity was both new and different, and, to a good many, it threatened social and religious conventions of the day. In the rejection of the gods and in the centrality of texts, early Christianity obviously reflected commitments inherited from its Jewish origins. But these particular features were no longer identified with Jewish ethnicity and early Christianity quickly became aggressively trans-ethnic--a novel kind of religious movement. Its ethical teaching, too, bore some resemblance to the philosophers of the day, yet in contrast with these great teachers and their small circles of dedicated students, early Christianity laid its hard demands upon all adherents from the moment of conversion, producing a novel social project. Christianity's novelty was no badge of honor. Called atheists and suspected of political subversion, Christians earned Roman disdain and suspicion in equal amounts. Yet, as Destroyer of the gods demonstrates, in an irony of history the very features of early Christianity that rendered it distinctive and objectionable in Roman eyes have now become so commonplace in Western culture as to go unnoticed. Christianity helped destroy one world and create another.
Download or read book Early Christianity written by and published by . This book was released on 2002-01-01 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Healing in the Early Church written by Andrew Daunton-Fear and published by Wipf and Stock Publishers. This book was released on 2009-07-01 with total page 211 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This monograph presents the most comprehensive investigation yet made into the healing activity of the Early Church. In contrast to early skeptics like B. B. Warfield, the author is convinced there was a vigorous healing ministry in the centuries that followed the apostles, though it fluctuated somewhat and changed its mode. Exorcism is prominently attested throughout the period. The pre-Nicene Fathers recognized its great apologetic value as a dramatic demonstration of the superiority of Jesus Christ over pagan gods. Interest in healing miracles per se appears to have been particularly characteristic of the less educated members of the Church and those who were chaste in their devotion to the cause of Christ. Amongst these groups gifts of healing were found, becoming rare it seems by the mid-third century, but well attested again later in monastic circles. In the pre-Nicene period anointing with oil (in the name of Christ) was clearly an avenue of healing and, though mentioned comparatively rarely, may have been widespread as part of the regular ministry of local clergy to the sick. Baptismal healing, physical as well as spiritual, also took place. In the post-Nicene Church the shrines of the martyrs became a prominent locus of healing. Devotion to this cult may have been encouraged by Church Fathers as an acceptable alternative to magical practices. But evidence suggests syncretism did occur and martyr's relics could be invested with quasi-magical awe. Most Fathers were positive about the medical profession, seeing it as an avenue of God's work, and in the late fourth century one pioneered the hospital which then spread throughout the eastern Mediterranean. In an appendix to his work, the author sets down nine pointers from the healing activity of the Early Church, and his own experience, to assist those engaged in the healing ministry today.
Download or read book The Art of Listening in the Early Church written by Carol Harrison and published by OUP Oxford. This book was released on 2013-07-05 with total page 313 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How did people think about listening in the ancient world, and what evidence do we have of it in practice? The Christian faith came to the illiterate majority in the early Church through their ears. This proved problematic: the senses and the body had long been held in suspicion as all too temporal, mutable and distracting. Carol Harrison argues that despite profound ambivalence on these matters, in practice, the senses, and in particular the sense of hearing, were ultimately regarded as necessary - indeed salvific -constraints for fallen human beings. By examining early catechesis, preaching and prayer, she demonstrates that what illiterate early Christians heard both formed their minds and souls and, above all, enabled them to become 'literate' listeners; able not only to grasp the rule of faith but also tacitly to follow the infinite variations on it which were played out in early Christian teaching, exegesis and worship. It becomes clear that listening to the faith was less a matter of rationally appropriating facts and more an art which needed to be constantly practiced: for what was heard could not be definitively fixed and pinned down, but was ultimately the Word of the unknowable, transcendent God. This word demanded of early Christian listeners a response - to attend to its echoes, recollect and represent it, stretch out towards it source, and in the process, be transformed by it.
Download or read book The Return of Jesus in Early Christianity written by John T. Carroll and published by . This book was released on 2000 with total page 268 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The goal is not to construct a systematic eschatology for today that will convince everyone - an impossible task - but to understand the diversity of Christian teaching by illuminating the historical, social, and theological settings of the early Christian writings on the topic."--BOOK JACKET.
Download or read book A Practical View of Christian Education in Its Earliest Stages written by Thomas Babington and published by . This book was released on 1818 with total page 200 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Early Church at Work and Worship Volume 2 written by Everett Ferguson and published by Wipf and Stock Publishers. This book was released on 2014-06-27 with total page 364 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is the second volume of Ferguson's collected essays, and includes some of his most memorable work, especially on "laying on of hands."
Download or read book Doctrine and Practice in the Early Church written by Stuart George Hall and published by Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing. This book was released on 1992 with total page 276 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: There has long been a need for a succinct and up-to-date account of the major doctrines and practices of the early church. This book fulfills that need in clearly tracing the emergence of the distinctive elements of the Christian tradition.
