The Religious Revolution of the 1970s: The Case of Israel

Last updated on: September 25, 2016 at 6:51 am By Philip Jenkins

I have been posting about the aggressive revival of religious politics during the mid-1970s, and suggested parallels between events in the United States and many other nations around the world in the very same years. Specifically, I offered a model for what was happening at this time, and which had led to discontent being expressed in those particular religious forms. I particularly stressed the after-effects of the 1973-75 economic crisis. The nation of Israel offers important analogies to US conditions... Read more

The 1970s and the Revenge of God

Last updated on: September 20, 2016 at 6:50 am By Philip Jenkins

In my last blogpost, I discussed the political and cultural transformations of the 1970s, a global shift not just to conservatism but particularly to religious traditionalism. In different forms, we see such a pattern in the US, but also in countries like Israel, Iran and India, and across the Islamic world. In the words of Gilles Kepel, these were the years of “The Revenge of God.” Academics, no less than policy makers, struggled to understand the new reality. In his... Read more

An Open Letter to the ESV Translation Committee

Last updated on: September 22, 2016 at 8:48 am By Kristin Du Mez

I’m not a biblical translator, or even a biblical scholar. I’m a historian. As a historian, I was intrigued when I heard the news that “the Permanent Text of the ESV Bible” had been released. (The English Standard Version, for those not in the know, is an “essentially literal” translation of the Revised Standard Version.) I confess that it seemed a bit audacious to me, this presumption that perfection had been achieved. I was so impressed, in fact, that I... Read more

Burning Witches in Medieval Europe?

Last updated on: September 21, 2016 at 2:19 am By Beth Allison Barr

Kilkenny lies deep in southern Ireland. Its history lies just as deep in the medieval past. The thirteenth-century cathedral of St. Canice stands next to a 9th-century monastic tower; a castle still sits on the site of William Marshall’s 12th-century Norman foundations; and a fourteenth-century inn, Kyteler’s Inn, still operates in the old town. The inn is more than a reminder of the medieval past, however. It stands sentinel to an infamous medieval event: the first witch burning in Europe. Robin... Read more

Beyond Books: “Come, Lord Jesus, Be Our Guest”

Last updated on: September 19, 2016 at 5:16 pm By Chris Gehrz

Chris Gehrz continues his series on types of Christian writing other than books by reflecting on table graces like "Come, Lord Jesus, Be Our Guest" Read more

Counting Down to the Reformation at 500

Last updated on: September 18, 2016 at 11:38 pm By Thomas Albert Howard

There’s an African proverb, I am told, that goes like this: “If I don’t beat my own drum, who will?” In this spirit, permit me to make known to Anxious-Bench readers two publications of mine. The first is recently out; the second will be out in a matter of weeks. It has been a delight working with Oxford University Press on both of them. The first is an edited book with Mark Noll, entitled Protestantism after 500 Years. Here is... Read more

The Anxious Bench at the Conference on Faith and History

Last updated on: September 16, 2016 at 3:15 pm By Chris Gehrz

Where you can hear Anxious Bench contributors at next month's 30th biennial meeting of the Conference on Faith and History Read more

When The Backwardness Came Back

Last updated on: September 16, 2016 at 8:35 am By Philip Jenkins

In a recent post, I referred to economic pressures, and particularly oil prices, as a factor driving social change. Over my next few entries, I will expand on that point with a focus on a particularly critical era, namely the 1970s. Economic crisis – specifically, the oil crisis – drove social changes, and radically reshaped religious life and thought. (I am adapting this from a paper I presented at the American Historical Association meeting this past January, under the title... Read more

Black Church, White Jesus

Last updated on: September 14, 2016 at 9:59 pm By johnturner

Jesus and I were the only white people in the room. When I was twenty years old, I went to Washington for an unpaid summer internship. The nonprofit arranged for me to stay in a small cottage behind a lawyer’s house in one of the area’s affluent suburbs. In the cottage, there was no air conditioning. I had no car. The summer was hot and lonely. The first Sunday, I walked across the street to church. When I went inside,... Read more

Mother Teresa, Eastern Kentucky, and Transnational Charity

Last updated on: September 13, 2016 at 11:16 pm By David Swartz

The canonization of Mother Teresa on September 4 was a global affair. The coronation occurred at the Vatican in front of 120,000 people. The people in her homeland of Macedonia rejoiced. So did the members of the Missionaries of Charity, the blue-and-white robed religious order she founded in 1950. At the original site of the Missionaries of Charity in Kolkata, balloons were strung from the rafters of Nirmal Hriday Home for the Dying Destitute, and a battered audience watched the... Read more

What does the Bible say about giving?