Christianity and Other Faiths
Oddbjørn Leirvik’s Interreligious Studies: A relational approach to religious activism and the study of religion explores theory and practice. Subjects addressed include different dialogical philosophies, secular language, identity politics, types of activism, religious education, hermeneutics, theology of religions, and academic studies (Bloomsbury, £65 (£58.50); 978-1-4725-2449-2).
Biblical Languages
The T & T Clark Hebrew Primer is designed as a revision and consolidation guide to the language for those who have followed a standard course, recently or years ago. Its authors — Andrew Macintosh and Cynthia Engle — note that it includes what is considered to be absolutely essential, rather than absolutely everything (Bloomsbury, £12.99 (£11.70); 978-0-567-45657-1).
Psychoanalysis
The separation of men from their mothers can lead to melancholy, out of which a perceptiveness for religion may develop. Donald Capps takes a number of paintings (reproduced in the text as black-and-white images) which, he argues, were produced out of the artist’s experience of melancholia, and looks at the ways that male viewers have responded to them. At Home in the World: A study in psychoanalysis, religion, and art sets out his case (The Lutterworth Press, £17.50; 978-0-7188-9322-4).
Church history
A small community of Native Hawaiian Mormon was established in the later 19th century in Utah, and named after Joseph Smith. It lasted for only around 30 years before most of those living there returned home. Matthew Kester tells its story, connecting it to the histories of other Hawaiian migrants in Remembering Iosepa: History, place and religion in the American West (OUP, £37; 978-0-19-984491-3).
Theology and philosophy
The essays in Stephen Plant’s Taking Stock of Bonhoeffer: Studies in biblical interpretation and ethics have, with one exception, been previously published elsewhere but are now brought together in one volume to enable a wider readership (Ashgate, £30 (£27); 978-1-4094-4106-9).
Martin Poulsom delves into The Dialectics of Creation as found in the work of Edward Schillebeecx and David Burrell, and offers an interpretation for today of their work in the relationship between Creator and created (Bloomsbury, £65 (£58.50); 978-0-567-35652-9).
Though much has been written on the theology of religions, little of it has come from the Evangelical stable. Daniel Strange seeks to address this in ‘For their Rock is not as our Rock’, arguing that it is a key area of understanding for effective 21st-century mission (Apollos, £19.99 (£17.99); 978-1-78359-100-8).