Book Reviews

[1] At an Ash Wednesday Service a few years back, the Dean of an Episcopal Cathedral in the South began his sermon by apologizing for what he deemed to be a “conservative” element in his homily. I braced myself for a torrent of reactionary, Bible-thumping, “hell-fire and damnation” rhetoric with women and children covering their […]

[1] In Paths Not Taken: Fates of Theology from Luther to Leibniz1 Paul Hinlicky seeks to retrieve a number of features from Leibniz’s (1646-1716) philosophy for today’s theology, particularly his metaphysics, his doctrine of the compatibility of divine freedom and human freedom, and his theodicy (this world as the best of all possible worlds) in […]

See The Core of Lutheran CORE: American Civil Religion and White Male Backlash by Jon Pahl Ah, how to respond to a rant? Especially by an author (Pahl) who thinks his new book (Empire of Sacrifice) is so brilliant that it provides the analytical key to everything that Lutheran CORE is about. It is so […]

o the honor of the Most High alone, and for my neighbor, to be enlightened from it…. – Inscription from Orgelbüchlein by J. S. Bach, Weimar, c. 17141 The Ethical Overtones of a Famous Inscription [1] Searching for an ethical tone in the life of Johann Sebastian Bach is difficult but not impossible. It is […]

[1] Kudos to the JLE and July authors who responded to The Shock Doctrine. [2] When I first arrived at Bread for the World in 1978, the commonly held wisdom was that the cause of hunger was poverty. Simply stated, “If people had money or other resources (e.g. arable land) they would feed themselves.” As […]

[1] It seems to me that Michael Root is off base in three claims that undergird his “Communion and Difference.” 1. His claim for “normative ethical teaching” in the church of the Augsburg Confession. 2. His claim that a “consensus of the wider church” exists about homosexuality–a clear “no”–and that this consensus is itself “normative” […]

[1] Christians need some criteria, some body of thought on war, in order to make sense of and to judge their own country’s policies. Two positions on war — the war realist position and the classic pacifist position — have serious deficiencies. The war realist position makes war an intrinsic part of a nation’s culture. […]

[1] In this book, Gary M. Simpson, Professor of Systematic Theology at Luther Seminary, offers a thorough and instructive introduction to a vital aspect of our public life together as Christians. War, Peace, and God presents a timely reminder that the just-war tradition handed down to us by our forefathers bears striking dissimilarities to the […]

[1] Like other books in the Lutheran Voices series, Gary Simpson’s War, Peace, and God: Rethinking the Just War Tradition appears intended for use in classroom and congregation. It aims to stimulate broader discussion on the morality of war. To that end the book certainly succeeds, and I would like to contribute to the discussion […]

[1] Gary Simpson, a professor of systematic theology at Luther seminary, has titled his new book WAR, PEACE and GOD: Rethinking the Just-War Tradition. He says that he uses the word tradition, rather than theory, because “a tradition is a historically extended, socially embodied argument about the common goods that comprise and sustain a community […]