Epilogues and Prayers

william-barclay

SCM Press

By 1808, both Britain and the United States had passed laws outlawing the transatlantic slave trade. Yet the trade covertly carried on. In the summer of 1813, in what is now Liberia, a compound of slave pens was bursting with sick and anguished captives, guarded by other African slaves. As a British patrol swooped down on the illicit barracoon, the slavers burned the premises to the ground, hoping to destroy evidence. This story can be told because of an exceptional trove of court documents that provides unparalleled insight into one small link in the great, horrific chain of slavery. Emma Christopher follows a trail of evidence across four continents to examine the lives of this barracoon's owners, their workers, and their tragic human merchandise. She reveals how an American, Charles Mason, escaped justice, while British subjects Robert Bostock and John McQueen were arrested. In court five African men―Tamba, Tom Ball, Yarra, Noah, and Sessay―courageously testified against their former owners/captors. They, and 233 other liberated men, women, and children, were relocated to Freetown, Sierra Leone. There they endured harsh lives of "freedom," while the punishment of Bostock and McQueen was fleeting. From the fragmented facts of these lives, Christopher sheds fascinating light on the early development of the nations of Sierra Leone, Liberia, and Australia (where Bostock and McQueen were banished) and the role of former slaves in combatting the illegal trade.

Unity and Diversity in the New Testament: An Inquiry into the Character of Earliest Christianity

History

DUNN, James D.G.

Africa

Michael Cooke examines the essential structure of Afro-American literature as it has developed in the twentieth-century, with special attention to works by Jean Toomer, Zora Neal Hurston, Richard Wright, Ralph Ellison, James Baldwin, Robert Hayden, and Alice Walker.

SCM Studyguide: Liturgy, 2nd Edition

Literature & Fiction

Burns, Stephen

History & Criticism

One of this century’s most important philosophers here focuses on Plato’s Protagoras, Phaedo, Republic, and Philebus and on Aristotle’s three moral treatises to show the essential continuity of Platonic and Aristotelian reflection on the nature of the good. “Well translated and usefully annotated by P. Christopher Smith…. Gadamer’s book exhibits a broad and grand vision as well as a great love for the Greek thinkers.”―Alexander Nehemas, New York Times Book Review “The translation is highly readable. The translator’s introduction and frequent annotation provide special elucidation on points of doctrinal complexity, giving ample references to other works and rival interpretations.”―Choice“This book is an important addition to the steadily growing number of Gadamer’s works available in English. In it, we see Gadamer at his best, that is, engaged in the practice of interpreting important texts from the philosophical tradition, and also at his most controversial…. I enthusiastically recommend this…challenging book as one that rewards all efforts to understand the important claims it makes on its readers.”―Francis J. Ambrosio, International Philosophy Quarterly Hans-Georg Gadamer is professor of philosophy emeritus at the University of Heidelberg. He is the author of numerous books, including two others translated by Smith: Dialogue and Dialectic: Eight Hermeneutical Studies on Plato and Hegel’s Dialectic: Five Hermeneutical Studies.

Jesus in the Trinity: A Beginner's Guide to the Theology of Robert Jenson

Politics & Social Sciences

Harvey, Lincoln

Philosophy

“A country that seems to lean into the void but never really falls into it may actually be firmly anchored there, like the Tower of Pisa.” –Joseph LaPalombara
The Italian republic, at forty, is alive and well. Some consider this fact a miracle; many more judge it a paradox. Italy is the country of permanent crisis, where there have been forty-five national governments in forty years. Tax evasion is a way of life, one adult in three votes “communist,” the citizens have no kind word to spare for their political leaders and instructions, and the state itself is simultaneously in conflict with the Vatican and at war with the Mafia and political terrorists. How could a democracy take root, to say nothing of grow robust, in such an improbable setting?
In Democracy, Italian Style, the foremost expert on the Italian political system unravels this puzzle and, in the process, suggests that the only real paradox is the failure of so many observers, including Italians themselves, to recognize that what may be pathological for democracy in one climate may actually work in democracy’s favor in Italy. Writes Joseph LaPalombara: 
--Although Italy seems rent by conflict, the leftists, laical, and Catholic political enclaves that contribute to these clashes also serve to keep them within bounds. Terrorism itself, far from weakening Italian democracy, has actually strengthened the people’s democratic backbone.
--Italy’s much-maligned political leaders have few peers among democracies, in part because few others have been as severely tested.
--Much of Italian politics turns out to be “spettacolo” and rich in nuance. Elections, the legislative process, contacts with public officials, tax evasion, and political patronage do not mean in Italy what they may mean elsewhere.
--More than other democracies, Italy is heavily dominated by its political parties, and many deplore this condition. But, far from being the bane of Italian democracy, the parties are its saving grace. For this reason, demands for radical reform of the present system should be resisted. 
Challenging the still-dominant picture of Italy, LaPalombara asserts that in a relatively short span, the Italians have managed to forge a remarkable democracy, one that reveals degrees of toleration, freedom, and sheer political inventiveness others should find enviable.
“A wonderful book. It opens an unusual window onto Italian politics, for one thing, but it is also a remarkably sensitive an intelligent introduction to Italian society in general.” –Kai Erikson

The Go-Between God: New edition

Taylor, John V.

Europe

“Why did none of the devout create psychoanalysis? Why did it have to wait for a completely godless Jew?” Freud once asked. In this book, the eminent historian and Freud scholar Peter Gay enters the long-running controversy about the relationship between religion and psychoanalysis. Gay takes seriously Freud’s claim that he was an atheist and argues that atheism was an essential stance for the making of psychoanalysis. He contends, in fact, that Judaism was not essential and that psychoanalysis is not a “Jewish science,” as both anti-Semites and ardent Freudians have often assumed. Peter Gay begins by discussing why psychoanalysis could only have been conceived by an atheist. According to him, Freud saw science and religion as absolutely at odds with each other. While some theologians and analysts have attempted to forge an alliance between psychoanalytic and religious positions, these attempts at accommodation have failed and must fail. Psychoanalysis is not a religion, and the two comprise wholly incompatible styles of thinking about the world. Gay then deals with the question of whether Freud’s Jewish background contributed to the creation of psychoanalysis and describes Freud’s secular Judaism: while Freud was very much aware of his Jewishness and was in fact proud of it, this had nothing to do with the making of psychoanalysis itself. True, Freud himself saw a possible link between his Jewishness and his daring: as a Jew he was treated ass an outsider and therefore, he thought, could approach delicate topics such as sexuality more boldly than he would have if he had been thoroughly lodged on the inside. However, Gay maintains that this is at best a weak statement. Writing with his customary wit and charm, Gay not only discusses Freud’s life and personality as they affected his ideas on religion but also compares Freud’s thoughts on religion to those of William James, Charles Darwin, Paul Tillich, and a host of Enlightenment figures. The result is a book that will richly reward ever reader.

Young, Woke and Christian: Words from a Missing Generation

Turner, Victoria

Biographies & Memoirs

This book is a major contribution to theological discussion about the place of animals in the world and the way in which Christian theology can contribute to a morally just treatment of them by human beings.

Animal Theology

Religion & Spirituality

Linzey, Andrew

Christian Books & Bibles

In this important study, two active field archaeologists, one Jewish and the other Christian, combine in an attempt to draw an accurate picture of rabbinic Judaism and Christian origins in Roman Palestine on the basis of both historical literature and archaeological findings. Their work includes important material previously accessible only in other languages, including modern Hebrew. Writing for students and others concerned to arrive at a balanced understanding of Palestine in the first century AD, the authors are concerned to establish a general picture rather than to argue for particular hypotheses; above all, they document by archaeology and epigraphy the great diversity there was in early Palestinian ,Judaism and early Christianity. They also make out a case for far more contact between,Jewish and Christian communities than has ordinarily been assumed possible. After examining the cultural setting of Galilee and the question of regionalism, together with the context of early Christianity and Palestinian Judaism in Jerusalem, Nazareth and Capernaum. they look in detail at the languages of Roman Palestine, Jewish burial practice and views of afterlife, evidences of-Christianity in Palestine and synagogues, art and the world of the sages. There are maps, drawings and diagrams of synagogues, and a final chapter discusses the place of Palestine in Jewish and Christian theology.

Archaeology, the Rabbis and Early Christianity

Meyers, Eric M.

Strange, James F.

World

This well-documented survey summarizes important findings of archaeological research in the Holy Land. Translated from the original Modern Hebrew edition, this comprehensive work by renowned archaeologist Yohanan Aharoni examines Israelite life from its prehistoric beginnings through the fall of the First Temple in the early sixth century B.C.F. Extremely useful as an introductory textbook, this survey with its clear maps and diagrams offers the results of generations of archaeological work and presents well-founded challenges to many currently held positions. Invaluable for both students and scholars, THE ARCHAEOLOGY OF THE LAND OF ISRAEL sheds a new light on recent controversies, findings, and research. YOHANAN AHARONI served as Chairman of the Department of Archaeology and Ancient Near Eastern Cultures and founded the Institute of Archaeology at Tel Aviv University. He was well known for his extensive archaeological excavations, his atlases, and his textbook The Land of the Bible.

The Archaeology of the Land of Israel

Aharoni, Yohanan

Ancient Civilizations

The aim of lifework into present for theological consideration the Old Testament witness to the nature of man. It contains detailed studies of the way in which Israelite man was thought of, and of the ways in which the Old Testament describes his physical being. Part two then goes on to look at the context in which Hebrew man lived out his existence, and its notion of time and of the created universe, in which man both worked and found leisure. Part three moves on to the social aspect of man's life, with its institutions, pattems of relationship and moral demands. A concluding chapter sums up the overall picture given in the Old Testament of man's destiny. The book is well translated and readable, and has a very great usefulness for the general reader of the Bible, because of the way in which it fills out the picture of what life was like in Old Testament times. While it is primarily aimed at a theological readership, ft will prove to be an indispensable tool for any study of Old Testament ethics. At a host of points it describes very lucidly the context of moral behaviour in the life of ancient Israel. In line with this it reveals very clearly the possibilities which life offered, and serves in a number of ways to illuminate the reasoning behind Israelite laws. All in all it impresses the reader with a recognition of the inextricable way in which culture, religion and morality are intertwined in the Old Testament. Only by attention to this can biblical morality and the biblical conception of man be understood.

Anthropology of the Old Testament

Wolff, Hans-Walter

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