'Justification by grace alone' facing Confucian self-cultivation : the Christian doctrine of justification contextualized to new Confucianism /
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Chinese contexts as influenced by the religious moral philosophy of New Confucianism are characterized by the idea of becoming a sage through self-cultivation. For Christian theology - with its emphasis on God's grace rather than on self-cultivation - Confucian teaching in this matter may appear as a problem. Chinese Christian theology may ask: How can the Christian doctrine of justification by grace alone be contextualized in Chinese contexts which are characterized by the contradicting idea of self-cultivation? Another question may be equally interesting for Christian theology in all contexts: Which insights can be attained from an attempt at contextualizing the Christian doctrine of justification to contexts influenced by New Confucianism? In this book professor Arne Redse contributes to answering these questions.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004302587 :
1876-1518 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Proverbs and the African tree of life : grafting Biblical proverbs on to Ghanaian Eve folk proverbs /
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In Proverbs and the African Tree of Life Dorothy BEA Akoto-Abutiate juxtaposes chosen sayings from Proverbs and selected Ewe Folk proverbs using the agricultural metaphor of "grafting," which she calls a "hermeneutic of grafting." Though these two sets of sayings come from completely different cultural contexts, Akoto argues that folk sayings/proverbs, which abound in Africa, should be considered as an already mature, established tree on to which a piece of the biblical tree is spliced or engrafted to produce hybridized fruits that have uniquely different tastes than the fruits of each tree individually. This metaphorical grafting process allows the message of the Bible (in Proverbs) to be understood, imbibed and appropriated in Africa.
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1 online resource (pages) :
9789004274471 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Ephraim Radner, Hosean Wilderness, and the Church in the Post-Christendom West : A Dialogue on the Shape of Waiting /
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Ephraim Radner, Hosean Wilderness, and the Church in the Post-Christendom West offers the first monograph-length treatment of the compelling and perplexing contemporary Anglican theologian Ephraim Radner. While unravelling his distinctive approach to biblical hermeneutics and ecclesiology, it queries the state of today's secularized church through a theological interpretation of an equally enigmatic writer: the prophet Hosea. It concludes that an eschatological posture of waiting and a heuristic of poesis should dictate the church's shape for an era in which God is stripping the church of its foregoing institutional forms.
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1 online resource. :
9789004420212
9789004420205
A theology of the church for the Third Millennium : a Franciscan approach /
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At the beginning of the new millennium, the Christian Churches are in a process of renewal. The Roman Catholic Church, since Vatican II, has been in a major stage of renewal. Contemporary globalization, multi-cultural interrelationships, and inter-religious dialogues have presented serious challenges to these renewal efforts. In this volume, I want to offer to the Catholic Renewal and from there to other denominational renewals, a view of the church from the rich tradition of Franciscan philosophy and theology. To date there are a only a few books which include small essays on this theme. This volume presents an in-depth Franciscan approach to ecclesiology.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references (p. [433]-440) and index. :
9789047430018 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Ubuntu, migration, and ministry : being human in a Johannesburg church /
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Ubuntu, Migration and Ministry invites the reader to rethink ubuntu (Nguni: humanness/humanity) as a moral notion in the context of local communities. The socio-moral patterns that emerge at the crossroads between ethnography and social ethics offer a fresh perspective to what it means to be human in contemporary Johannesburg. The Central Methodist Mission is known for sheltering thousands of migrants and homeless people in the inner city. Based on ethnographic fieldwork, primarily conducted in 2009, Elina Hankela unpacks the church leader's liberationist vision of humanity and analyses the tension between the congregation and the migrants, linked to the refugee ministry. While relational virtues mark the community's moral code, various regulating rules and structures shape the actual relationships at the church. Here ubuntu challenges and is challenged. Winner of the 2014 Donner Institute Prize for Outstanding Research into Religion.
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1 online resource (pages) :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004274136 :
1876-1518 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Divine being and its relevance according to Thomas Aquinas /
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Aquinas' theology can be understood only if one comes to grips with his metaphysics of being. The relevance of this perspective is exhibited in his treatment of topics like creation, goodness, happiness, truth, freedom of the will, the unity of the human being, prayer and providence, God's personhood, divine love, God and violence, God's unknowablility, the Incarnation, the Trinity, God's existence, theological language and even laughter. This book endeavors to treat these questions in a clear and convincing language. Is there a better method for improving one's own theology than by grappling with the arguments of Thomas Aquinas?.
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1 online resource :
9789004413993
Is theology a science? the nature of the scientific enterprise in the scientific theology of Thomas Forsyth Torrance and the anarchic epistemology of Paul Feyerabend /
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When Barth and Scholz clashed over the scientific status of theology, Barth drew the conclusion that if natural science was to be drawn up in such positivistic terms, theology had much to lose and little to gain by engagement with it. A generation later Barth's translator and pupil Thomas Torrance maintained that science had changed enough to make an engagement more fruitful. In works such as Theological Science , Torrance sketched out the contours of such and engagement. However at the same time the anarchic philosopher of science, Paul Feyerabend, in books such as Against Method , sought to deconstruct any notion of 'science' as ultimately the protection of vested interests. This book analyses whether Torrance's notion of science can withstand this newer post-modern threat.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references and (p. [283]-293) and index. :
9789004194601 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Confronting Confucian understandings of the Christian doctrine of salvation : a systematic theological analysis of the basic problems in the Confucian-Christian dialogue /
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A complete exploration is the first systematic analysis ever comparing the central religious doctrinal aspects of Christianity with those in Confucianism. Huang's work carefully covers the whole history of the Confucian-Christian tradition, and ends up with genuinely new insights. He elaborates on the idea of transcendence in the Confucian tradition in a manner which enables an interpretation of the Christian means of salvation. His explanation of transcendence, and its connection with the means of salvation, is new and unique, offering a clue to the special understanding of salvation germane to the specifically Chinese intellecual history. Huang's book is a must for anyone interested in the Sino-Western cultural encounter.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references (p. [301]-319). :
9789047430704 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Learning the Language of Scripture : Origen, Wisdom, and the Logic of Interpretation /
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In Learning the Language of Scripture , Mark Randall James offers a new account of theological interpretation as a sapiential practice of learning the language of Scripture, drawing on recently discovered Homilies on the Psalms by the influential early theologian Origen of Alexandria (2nd-3rd c. C.E) Widely regarded as one of the most arbitrary interpreters, James shows that Origen's appearance of arbitrariness is a result of the modern tendency to neglect the role of wisdom in scriptural interpretation. James demonstrates that Origen offers a compelling model of a Christian pragmatism in which learning and correcting linguistic practice is a site of the transformative pedagogy of the divine Logos.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004448544
9789004448537
The veiled God : Friedrich Schleiermacher's theology of finitude /
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In The Veiled God , Ruth Jackson Ravenscroft offers a detailed portrait of Friedrich Schleiermacher's early life, ethics, and theology in its historical and social context. She also critically reflects on the enduring relevance of his work for the study of religion. The book analyses major texts from Schleiermacher's early work. It argues that his experiments with literary form convey his understanding that human knowledge is inherently social, and that religion is thoroughly linguistic and historical. The book contends that by making finitude (and not freedom) a universal aspect to human life, Schleiermacher offers rich conceptual resources for considering what it means to be human in this world, both in relations of difference to others, and in relation to the infinite.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004397828 :
1876-1518 ;
Pneumatology and the Christian-Buddhist dialogue : does the Spirit blow through the middle way? /
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Recent thinking in Christian theology of religions has taken a "pneumatological turn" which asks how the doctrine of the Holy Spirit can contribute to the interreligious dialogue and to the emerging discourse of comparative theology. Pneumatology and the Christian-Buddhist Dialogue. Does the Spirit Blow through the Middle Way? tests the viability of this approach as applied to the Christian-Buddhist dialogue. Various Christian and Buddhist traditions are compared and contrasted within a pneumatological framework. Is the Holy Spirit to be found along the Buddha's middle way? Some Christians say yes, while others demur. The thesis of this volume is that such a pneumatological perspective opens up possibilities for the deepening and transformation of Christian theology in the religiously plural world of the twenty-first century.
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1 online resource (xx, 301 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references and indexes. :
9789004231245 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
An intercultural theology of migration : pilgrims in the wilderness /
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Migration has long been associated with the social sciences. However, as a phenomenon that provides windows into possibly new forms of oppression and, at the same time, paths toward human liberation a systematic theological look at contemporary migration is long overdue. Building on the emerging interest on migration in theology this book presents an intercultural theology of migration drawn from the experience of Filipino women domestic workers in Hong Kong in dialogue with theological ethics and liberationist theologies. The result is a new look at the phenomenon of contemporary migration.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004193673 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Diversity in the structure of Christian reasoning : interpretation, disagreement, and world Christianity /
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Diversity in the Structure of Christian Reasoning examines the effect of Christian commitments on rationality. When Christians read scripture, traditions supply concepts that shape what counts as normal, good, and true. This book offers an account of how different communities produce divergent readings of the Bible. It considers two examples from World Christianity, first a Bakongo community in central Africa, and then a Tamil bishop in southern India. Each case displays a relation between tradition and reason that reconfigures the hermeneutical picture developed by Martin Heidegger and Hans-Georg Gadamer. To see what transpires when readers decide about a correct interpretation, this book offers theologians and scholars of religion a fresh strategy that keeps in view the global character of modern Christianity.
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1 online resource (x, 242 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004298057 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
A Protestant theology of passion : Korean Minjung theology revisited /
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Minjung Theology is introduced here through theological biographical sketches of its main representatives. They formulated a protestant liberation theology under the South Korean military dictatorship of the 1970s and 80s. Their strong emphasis on the suffering (han) of the people (minjung) led them to the formulation of a genuine theology of the cross in Asia. Volker Küster explores the reception of Minjung Theology and raises the question what happened to it during the democratization process and the rise of globalization in the 1990s. Interpretations of art works by Minjung artists provide deep insights into these transformation processes. Prologue and epilogue abstract from the Korean case and offer a concise theory of contextual theology in an intercultural framework.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789047428688 :
1876-1518 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
African theology as liberating wisdom : celebrating life and harmony in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Botswana /
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In African Theology as Liberating Wisdom; Celebrating Life and Harmony in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Botswana , Mari-Anna Pöntinen analyses contextual interpretations of the Christian faith in this particular church. These interpretations are based on the special wisdom tradition which embraces monistic ontology, communal ethics in botho , and the indigenous belief in God as the Source of Life, and the Root of everything that exists. The constructing theological principle in the ELCB is the downward-orientated and descending God in Christ which interprets the 'Lutheran spirit' in a liberating and empowering sense. It deals with the cultural mythos which brings Christ down into people's existence, unlike Western connotations which are considered to hinder seeing Christ and to prevent existential self-awareness.
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1 online resource (xiv, 419 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004245976 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Theology as improvisation : a study in the musical nature of theological thinking /
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In Theology as Improvisation , Nathan Crawford reimagines the possibilities for how theology thinks God within a postmodern world. He argues that theology is improvisation by analyzing the nature of attunement within theological thinking and how this opens certain possibilities for theology. He does so by engaging a number of thinkers, including Martin Heidegger, Jacques Derrida, David Tracy, and Saint Augustine. He navigates the nature of thinking God in a postmodern world by using these thinkers to offer critiques of onto-theological thinking and totalizing systems while also following their embrace of the fragment and focus upon the nature of thinking as attunement. The result is a unique way of approaching theological thinking in our contemporary context.
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1 online resource (ix, 235 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004245983 :
1876-1518 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Constructing irregular theology : bamboo and Minjung in East Asian perspective /
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The project of constructing Asian irregular theology in East Asian perspective, based on life-word of Bamboo and social political reality of minjung, embraces Dr. Chung's cross-cultural existence as he develops his long-standing interest and expertise in Christian minjung theology in new ways with the image of bamboo as a symbol for the theological perspective of grass roots marginality. Using the ancient Chinese story "The Seven Sages of the Bamboo Grove," Dr. Chung engages with Christian eschatological discourse to support an aesthetical-utopian theological ethics that is opposed to an ethics concerned with legitimation of a socio-economic status quo. In addition, Dr. Chung's develops his deep commitment to the Lutheran theology of the cross and the suffering Christ through the Buddhist concept of dukkha (suffering) to create, in the end, a genuinely East Asian contextual theology
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references (p. [217]-223) and index. :
9789047444497 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Hermeneutics of Doctrine in a Learning Church : The Dynamics of Receptive Integrity /
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In Hermeneutics of Doctrine in a Learning Church , Gregory A. Ryan offers an account of the dynamic, multi-dimensional task of interpreting Christian tradition. He integrates doctrinal hermeneutics, the 'pastorality of doctrine' exemplified by Pope Francis, and a systematic appraisal of Receptive Ecumenism to provide an original perspective on this task. The book focuses on three contemporary Catholic theologians (Francis Schüssler Fiorenza, Ormond Rush, and Paul D. Murray), highlighting how each recognises the dynamic interaction of multiple perspectives involved in authentic ecclesial interpretation. Christian tradition, whether passed on in teaching, scripture, practices, or structures, needs to be continually received and interpreted. This book offers theologians, ecumenists, and church workers a fresh model for receptive ecclesial learning in which doctrinal hermeneutics and pastoral realities are dynamically integrated.
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1 online resource. :
9789004436404
9789004436398
Interpreting Proverbs 11:18-31, Psalm 73, and Ecclesiastes 9:1-12 in light of, and as a response to, Thai Buddhist interpretations : a contribution to Christian-Buddhist dialogue /
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This book discusses how three Old Testament wisdom texts can be interpreted in light of, and as a response to Thai Buddhist interpretations. Its central aim is to explore a new method in Buddhist-Christian dialogue that has three steps. First, Buddhists are asked to reflect on biblical texts, second, the texts are analyzed by placing Christian and Buddhist perspectives side by side, and finally points of convergence and difference are established in order to provide a platform for further dialogue. The study succeeds in demonstrating that the method explored is a fruitful approach to interreligious dialogue which takes interpretations of biblical texts by the religious 'other' seriously, and manages to both affirm commonalities and face religious difference.
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1 online resource (vii, 345 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references and indexes. :
9789004227125 :
1876-1518 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Encountering cruelty the fracture of the human heart /
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Interest in recent years in reconciliation and conflict transformation has witnessed a great deal of attention to building a future through forgiveness and preventative measures in order to impede egregious wrongdoing. This effort for a reconciled future is absent reflection on the nature of cruelty. Cruelty has always been apparent in massive acts of wrongdoing and yet is repeatedly concealed in our assessment of the acts themselves. This book is a theologically honest and deep-structure exploration of cruelty in its personal, communal and institutional encounters in human life. Drawing on Nietzsche's challenge of cruelty to the western tradition, the work offers a comprehensive study of how cruelty undermines care, trust, respect and justice - all those elements of human reciprocity that mark our lives as interdependent beings. The work concludes with a tightly written Epilogue on interpreting the theological meaning and accessibility of reconciliation today.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004205598 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.