Robert W. Jenson

What happens to a culture shaped by the Bible, if the culture ceases to believe that the Bible tells truth?” This was the question asked by my initiation paper for a liberal arts discussion group that met more than fifty years ago. In the meantime, we have been finding out the answer. It is not my . . . . Continue Reading »

Ethics with Barth  by Matthew Rose Ashgate, 226 pages, $89.95 This is a necessary book, whether one is concerned to understand Barth or to understand the moral life. Matthew Rose has seen, with clarity and depth, what Barth is really up to, a rare achievement—even, for his precise topic, . . . . Continue Reading »

. . . . Continue Reading »

In the February issue First Things published the Erasmus Lecture of 2000, “Papacy and Power,” by George Weigel. The monumental political influence of the pontificate of John Paul II, Weigel argued, is the result of a long and complicated history in which the papacy has successfully contended . . . . Continue Reading »

Some time ago I published in this journal an essay on “How the World Lost Its Story” (October 1993). Modernity’s project, I said with great unoriginality, was the attempt to maintain the Bible’s grasp of reality while dispensing with the Bible’s God. The long reading of Scripture in the . . . . Continue Reading »

Farewell to an Idea: Episodes from a History of ModernismBy T. J. Clarke.Yale University Press. 451 pp. $45. I had better put the news right up front: this is a wonderful book, by a Marxist art critic. To be sure, Professor Clark is Marxist in the way of the offended consciousness––he is Marxist . . . . Continue Reading »

Sometimes the phrase became so intolerably ubiquitous that entire comedy routines were made around it. But neither political leaders nor the press nor furrowed-brow academics nor editors of prestigious journals nor indeed “the American people” have seemed able to desist. All parties to . . . . Continue Reading »

Systematic Theology: Volume 3 By Wolfhart Pannenberg, Translated by Geoffrey Bromiley Eerdmans. 713 pp. $49 Authors often await reviews with considerable anxiety, knowing that their work’s impact and survival much depend on them. We may not picture Wolfhart Pannenberg so awaiting this piece. . . . . Continue Reading »

The Ordinary Transformed: An Inquiry into the Christian Vision of Transcendence By R.R. Reno Eerdmans, 222 pages, $19 paper Professor Reno’s book can be taken, and could then be reviewed, in several ways. For a first possibility, it can be taken as a revisionist reading of the theology of Karl . . . . Continue Reading »

Systematic Theology: Volume 2 By Wolfhart Pannenberg, Translated by Geoffrey Bromiley Eerdmans, 449 pages, $39.99 Whenever I am asked to comment on Wolfhart Pannenberg’s work, I begin with the same admonition: If we wish to understand any part or aspect of his thinking, we must always remember . . . . Continue Reading »