New or Forthcoming Books to Note

Lutheran pastor, blogger, and seminary student Jordan Cooper has written a book called The Righteous One: An Evaluation of Patristic Soteriology in Light of the New Perspective on Paul. I think patristic perspectives can show just how much of the NPP is not new and how many of our concerns can be quite foreign. For my mind, Augustine and Chrysostom are good examples of folks who engaged in theological and social readings of Romans. Justin Martyr’s debates with Trypho highlight the role of the law as a social separator. The Epistle of Diogentus has a strong forensic and participationist view of justification. Jordan has a little video about his book here. Sounds interesting.

T. Michael Halcomb edits a festschrift for Ben Witherington called Kingdom Rhetoric with contributors such as Craig Keener and others.

Vernon K. Robbins has a book on Gospels, canonical and non-canonical, called Who Do People Say I Am? Rewriting Gospels in Emerging Christianity.  Once blogger and now Emory Ph.D student Brandon Wason is mentioned in the preface! I think I called it right when I predicted few years ago that a resurgence in Gospels research was about to boon upon us. Here’s the blurb: “Who Do People Say I Am? shows how second-and third-century Christian authors of additional Gospels and Gospel-like writings expanded and elaborated on Jesus’ divinity in the context of his earthly existence. According to Robbins, these Christian authors thought that the New Testament Gospel writers could and should have emphasized the divinity of Jesus more than they did.”