Calvinism And Revolution
Calvinism and the Political Order, edited by George L. Hunt (Westminster, 1965, 216 pp., $4.50), is reviewed by Dirk W. Jellema, professor of history, Calvin College, Grand Rapids, Michigan.
This compact book (essentially 150 pages plus summary and notes) gives an excellent and scholarly introduction to two main themes: the political theory of Calvinism in its heyday (roughly 1550–1700) and the influence this theory had in America. The title is somewhat misleading; this is not a systematic study. In format, it is a series of essays on leading figures whose political ideas illustrate these themes. The essays deal with Calvinism, Calvin, Mornay, Rutherford (from the “classic age” of Calvinism); with John Locke, and the Puritans (strongly influenced by Calvinist motifs); and with Witherspoon, Lincoln, and Wilson (as Americans sympathetic to Calvinist emphases). The essays, originally given as lectures under the Woodrow Wilson Lectureship of the United Presbyterian Church’s National Presbyterian Center, are by experts, and the scholarship is thoroughly competent.
How did Calvinist political theory influence America? In at least two important ways, it becomes clear. First, much of the theoretical justification for our American Revolution is drawn from arguments developed by men like Locke, Mornay, Rutherford, and Calvin himself. Second, Calvinism’s stress on the civic responsibility of the Christian led, through Puritanism, to the American’s strong sense of this duty. Further, as the editor notes in his summary essay, concern with political and social problems does not begin with the modern social gospel but is part of a long tradition. Many other points of interest are touched on, such as the religious background of American ideas of toleration and the continuity between ideas of the “godly commonwealth” (as in Geneva) and later conviction of America’s God-given destiny.
What were the main concerns of the Calvinist political theorists? To begin with, of course, they desired to work out what they considered God’s will to be in this field—more particularly, to strike a balance between order and freedom. What materials did they use? As several of the essays make clear, they drew heavily not only on Scripture but also on medieval political thought and on the Graeco-Roman idea of the “law of nature.” (One is led to suspect that evangelicals interested in building a contemporary political theory might examine these sources, both generally unfamiliar.)
Despite Calvinist concern with order and authority, the defense of revolt against tyranny struck the rising absolute monarchs of the time as radical and seditious (and, indeed, wherever Calvinism spread, revolution followed). Something of the impact of the emphasis on the right (nay, the duty) to revolt against tyranny may perhaps be recaptured by applying the emphasis to contemporary situations. Do the “inferior magistrates” of a country such as, say, Haiti or Paraguay have the God-given duty to revolt against their tyrant? Should evangelicals say so? Even if the State Department objects? The issues debated by Mornay and the others are by no means dead issues.
A lecture series devoted to a broad theme frequently results in a “scatter-gun” approach that gives no sense of continuity. This series avoids this danger more than most. Readable as well as scholarly, compact as well as meaty, interesting and thought-provoking, it deserves recommendation.
DIRK W. JELLEMA
Adventure
The Adventure of Living, by Paul Tournier, translated by Edwin Hudson (Harper and Row, 1965, 250 pp., $5.75), is reviewed by Orville S. Walters, director of health services and lecturer in psychiatry, University of Illinois, Urbana.
This is Paul Tournier’s ninth book. The popularity of his writings cannot be attributed to the new or the profound, for there is little of either. He is referred to as a psychiatrist, and many of his examples are drawn from psychogenic illness; but his expositions are elementary, and no theoretical orientation is identifiable, unless it be the nondirective therapy he professes to employ. At times, his invoking of the unconscious implies a broad acceptance of Freud. Again, his emphasis upon meaning suggests common cause with Viktor Frankl. And his stress upon the whole person is often reminiscent of Daseinsanalyse. But Tournier’s frank acceptance of the Bible as divine revelation and his recurrent references to God’s sovereignty set him outside all contemporary psychology.
The Swiss physician has become noted as the leading spokesman and advocate of “the medicine of the person,” which seeks to make medicine “more humane” and commits the doctor to man-to-man dialogue with his patient. In every age, he believes, the best doctors have understood that man needs help in becoming a person, as well as medicines. His earlier books have elaborated this view. This concern for the individual in a time when the art has been increasingly supplanted by the science of medicine doubtless accounts for some of his popularity. The chatty, discursive character of his writing, which seems to record a process of thought just short of free association, may also attract lay readers. The inclusion of many examples from his medical practice adds interest.
Troubled neither by psychology’s rejection of the general concept of instincts nor by the limited acceptance of another well-known dual-instinct personality theory, Tournier postulates that man possesses an inborn instinct for adventure that is opposed by a second instinct for repose or fixity. This concept, more poetic and inspirational than scientific, provides the framework for the present book.
Since man is made in the image of God, Tournier reasons, the spirit of adventure exists in God himself. The creation of man in his own image was the great adventure for God, resulting in the tragedy of the Fall and continuing in the adventure of salvation. Jesus, too, was an adventurer, flouting the codes of his contemporaries, denouncing the hypocrisy of their morality, accepting the crucifixion. The Bible must be read as a volume of adventure.
The book is divided into chapters and sections, but there are few clear lines of division. Tournier ranges freely in and out of medicine, psychology, psychotherapy, and theology, unbound by precise definition or construction. There are fewer of the pat success stories that occur in his earlier writings, and he gives numerous warnings against oversimplification. References to literature are usually meant to give credit to a contemporary for some approved idea, rather than to lay the foundation for an orderly synthesis of psychology and Christian faith. Critics will find some of his positions inadequately developed, as when he asserts that “man is in a state of perpetual natural neurosis,” or when he seems to accept a situational ethic—“answers … depend upon the circumstances of the time.” Others will consider his reasoning superficial, as when he decided to resume smoking as an antidote to his own Pharisaism.
Tournier’s most valuable contribution in all his writing is his warm-hearted Christian testimony, “If is my own personal experience of God’s power that gives me the certainty that he can transform my patient’s life just as he transformed mine.” This fervid account of Paul Tournier’s zestful adventures with God is sure to inspire many of his leaders to break out of “fixity” and mediocrity to launch a similar spiritual adventure.
ORVILLE S. WALTERS
It’S A Hit
Sensei: The Life Story of Irene Webster-Smith, by Russell T. Hill. (Harper and Row, 1965, 250 pp., $3.95), is reviewed by D. Bruce Lockerbie, chairman, Department of English, The Stony Brook School, Stony Brook, New York.
I first read about the remarkable ministry of Irene Webster-Smith, whom her friends know as “Sensei” or “teacher,” in Richard Gehman’s Let My Heart Be Broken. That book, a cursory glimpse into the work of World Vision, treated Miss Webster-Smith as an important tog in the machinery of Christian social services cooperating with Dr. Bob Pierce’s organization. The treatment given “Sensei” was necessarily sketchy.
Not so in this fuller portrait drawn by Russell T. Hitt. Sensei is the newest volume in Harper and Row’s “Missionary Classics” series, narrated in very human terms. The books in this series are not treatises on the philosophical implications of foreign missions, nor psychological studies of the missionary. The “Missionary Classics” attempt only to answer the layman’s questions: “Why does the missionary go? What does she do?”
In the case of Sensei, the first question requires an explanation of the early life and training of Irene Webster-Smith. Born into an aristocratic Irish home, the young woman had every reason to anticipate a useful life of service at home. Perhaps she would become the wife of a pastor, for she was loved by a young ministerial student whom she had all but agreed to marry. But the need for someone to help in the unenviable labor of rescuing Japanese girls from the life of a geisha compelled this dynamic woman to offer her life to God.
To the second question Russell Hitt devotes most of his book. “Sensei,” like George Mueller before her, operates homes for children by trusting God for his provision. Having begun by trying to reach the young prostitutes, she quickly decided that “it is better to place a fence at the top of the cliff than an ambulance at the bottom.” Her approach, therefore, has been to ransom little girls before they are sold to the merciless tutors who will train them for immorality.
Some of “Sensei’s” stories are not unique: they are the reiterated evidences of God’s grace upon many faithful servants—the provision of food, clothing, or gifts of money at the crisis point. In other respects Irene Webster-Smith’s ministry has been unique. It was she whom General Douglas MacArthur invited to be the first missionary to return to Japan during the occupation; she who turned the Sugamo prison, full of Japanese war criminals, from a place of despair into a place of shining hope by her direct witness to the conquered and condemned Nipponese soldiers.
Sensei, told with all the warmth it deserves, is more than a typically inspiring missionary biography; it is a searching examination of the reader’s own dedication.
D. BRUCE LOCKERBIE
It Is A Bit Awkward
Teen-Agers and Sex: A Guide for Parents, by James A. Pike (Prentice-Hall, 1965, 146 pp., $3.95), is reviewed by Bernard E. Pekelder, college chaplain, Calvin College, Grand Rapids, Michigan.
This book was written not for the teenager but for his parents. The author, who is the Episcopal bishop of California, is convinced that there is no substitute for direct parental involvement in sex education.
In the sexual revolution of our day, youth face two conflicting standards of sexual conduct. The first the author describes as conventional, authoritarian, absolutistic; the other, the “new morality,” as existential and situational.
But Bishop Pike’s concern is not the right or wrong of these conflicting norms of conduct. He tries to detach himself from the role of ethical judge. In fact, he affirms that “though it would appear that as to sex ethics there is a distinct cleavage between absolutists and existentialists, in application there actually is not.” Thus in his role as mentor he feels he must take into account both sets of convictions if he is to give a “sensible plan of instruction and guidance.”
Yet this effort at ethical detachment does not come off very successfully. When the bishop describes his counseling role with a pregnant college girl, his existential slip shows rather noticeably (p. 84). He spends much more effort warning about chuck-holes on the conventional road (and the warnings are appropriate!) than about the rockiness of the existential road. His stance is unmistakable; one wishes he had stated it as clearly as he has in other writings.
This is not to criticize the bishop for lack of candor; indeed, one has come to expect candor from him. But in this book his effort to help people who stand at both ends of the moral spectrum is at best ambiguous, and at worst confusing. Don’t get this book if you expect clear guidance out of the moral confusion of our day; it is not written for this purpose (p. 3).
There are, however, good insights into the psychological and social factors influencing parent and child. Parents are given good advice about their own embarrassment and reluctance in this counseling role. Bishop Pike offers practical suggestions about approaching the child from age five on. Relevant issues are faced: sexual identity, petting, masturbation, premarital coitus, homosexuality, alcohol and sex.
But I was disappointed with this book. It is no better or worse than many other books available to parents who wish some social and psychological insights into proper sex education for their children. Undoubtedly my disappointment is the result of expectations I have when a Christian minister serves notice that he will be a guide in an age of moral confusion. I cannot see this role fulfilled by one who, facing the fork in the road, tries on proceed with one foot on each path. As I watch him do the split, meanwhile hearing him offer to show me the way down either or both paths. I do not only think he looks awkward; I begin to doubt his value as a guide.
BERNARD E. PEKELDER
The Old Modern Problem
God and World in Early Christian Theology, by Richard A. Norris, Jr. (Seabury, 1965, 177 pp., $4.95), is reviewed by Geoffrey W. Bromiley, professor of church history and historical theology, Fuller Theological Seminary, Pasadena, California.
This modest book is a valuable and important attempt to bring some of the pioneers of Christian theology into relation to the philosophical world of their day. It begins with a rapid but lucid and informative presentation of Greek thought from its beginning to Middle Platonism. It then studies in turn Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Tertullian, and Origen in their varying interactions with Platonism and Gnosticism. A concluding chapter is devoted to an assessment of the achievements of these fathers.
The size of the book naturally precludes any detailed discussion. Only selected aspects of the writers can be dealt with, and even within these bounds the author has to seize on what he takes to be the essentials. This means that the reader not well acquainted with the field has to take a good deal on trust. On the other hand, Dr. Norris proves to be a reliable guide, and he is able to support his statements with apt quotations or references that are easily verified and amplified in the many available English editions of the works of the four writers.
The main importance of the work, however, is topical rather than historical. The questions raised are in every way modern. Was early theology right in making as much use as it sometimes did of philosophical materials and categories? How is a reasoned presentation of the Christian faith to relate to contemporary non-Christian modes of thought? How far may one safely go in making the Gospel relevant to the modern intellectual scene? All the great theologians of the day are in fact wrestling with these questions, though from different angles, and every preacher faces them when he attempts to present the revealed message to modern man.
Norris himself has some important insights to offer as he contemplates the successes, and especially perhaps the failures, of these early writers. In particular, he points out that in this accommodation there is always an element of tension or imbalance. Something has to go, and the danger is that it will be the essential matter of the revealed Gospel. If there is a criticism to be made of the study, it is perhaps that Norris tends to accept too easily the legitimacy of the attempt at fusion, of the transformation of the Gospel itself into a world-picture comparable with those offered by philosophy. Does a linguistic translation really have to be accompanied by this type of material transposition? In the measure that the fathers created a Christian theology in terms of contemporary philosophy, did they not perhaps introduce an inescapable element of falsification that has plagued Christian theology ever since? On the other hand, the mere fact that these deep issues are raised is a testimony to the value of the study, and the historical data Norris provides should give substance to many modern discussions of these problems.
It is a great pity, by the way, that the mixed letters of the jacket (e.g., CHRiSTiaN) give an air of the kindergarten to this serious work, and we trust that they do not give evidence of another of the stupid fads that the search for novelty initiates and that common sense fortunately brings to a just and speedy end.
GEOFFREY W. BROMILEY
The Fire And The Word
World Aflame, by Billy Graham (Doubleday, 1965, 267 pp., $3.95), is reviewed by David Allan Hubbard, president, Fuller Theological Seminary, Pasadena, California.
It would be hard to imagine a better summary of the major themes and central emphases of Mr. Graham’s preaching ministry. The combinations of law and Gospel, of judgment and grace, and of exhortation and invitation that stamp his evangelistic sermons have left their mark on his latest book.
The writing is simple and straightforward. Graham begins with an analysis of the human predicament, strikingly illustrated by the political, social, emotional, and moral chaos of our times. Next he shows how various human attempts to cope with this predicament have plunged twentieth-century man into even darker despair. The great gulf between man’s aspirations and his achievements cannot be bridged by cunning or muscle.
The answer to the rash of fires that has set our world aflame is symbolized by the burning bush—the revelation of God. What we could not discover for ourselves, God has made clear in his Word. The central figure of the written Word is Jesus Christ, the living Word. Three key chapters deal with his uniqueness, the meaning of his cross, and the importance of his resurrection.
Having laid the doctrinal foundation in the saving acts of Christ, Graham proceeds to explain conversion and the new life that flows from it. One of the fruits of the new life is a new social concern, to which the book gives about twenty pages—not as much as some might want to see, but enough to lay the ghost of the false accusations that Graham is interested in personal conversion only and not in the great social issues of the day. The book concludes with several chapters on the Second Coming and the full redemption and awful judgment which that event triggers.
All in all, World Aflame brings to the printed page what we have learned to expect and appreciate in Mr. Graham’s ministry: directness, simplicity, clarity, and conviction. Man’s inner needs are painfully exposed, and the healing grace of Jesus Christ is skillfully applied. One would be hard pressed to think of a better book to give a friend who wanted to know what the Christian message was all about. The compelling preaching that God has used to bring thousands to conversion in the arenas and stadiums of the world will now be heard in the family rooms and dens of our land. The impact, one feels, will be much the same.
DAVID ALLAN HUBBARD
On Saints And Sinners
Man’s Nature and His Communities: Essays on the Dynamics and Enigmas of Man’s Personal and Social Existence, by Reinhold Niebuhr (Scribners, 1965, 125 pp., $5.95), is reviewed by James Daane, assistant editor,CHRISTIANITY TODAY.
I have wondered—in idle moments—whether the Reformed doctrine of common grace was developed to account for the empirical fact that sinners sometimes act more like saints than sinners. But if this were the motive, then existence, as Tillich maintained, would raise the questions to which Christian theology was then only permitted, belatedly, to provide the required answers. Such a theology of common grace would not be an authentic theology of revelation but merely the kind that Niebuhr calls a theology of “realism.”
In this book Niebuhr, who for thirty-two years taught Christian ethics at Union Seminary in New York, takes inventory from the perspective of his years and presents us with a final testament of his theology. As I read his book, I experienced a number of distinct feelings.
The first was that Niebuhr’s theology of man and his communities lacks the dimension of a transcendent revelation. His description of the nature of man is not derived from what the divine Word discloses man to be but from a very shrewd and astute observation of saints and sinners as they go marching along through history.
Niebuhr admits that in his Nature and Destiny of Man he made a “rather unpardonable pedagogical error.” He used the symbol of original sin, he says, after he had “taken pains to deny the historicity of the primitive myth of the fall of Adam in the garden, which Paul associated the doctrine of original sin.” He later discovered that the use of “original sin” as a symbol was a mistake: the modern world cannot be reached by such a symbol because it does not believe in a historic fall of man. Such a misreading of the empirical situation would seem to be an almost fatal flaw in a theology committed to the method of realism.
Secondly, as I read this book I had the feeling that, had it been written by a conservative Reformed theologian, it would be a book about common grace, i.e., a book that attempted to show how and why sinners often act and look like saints. Niebuhr is at pains in this book to show that man, the self-seeking sinner, nevertheless shows some altruism in life, for he learns that seeking the self absolutely is self-defeating. Similarly, nations, always moved by self-interest, do not in fact seek their own good absolutely, without overtures of good to other nations, because also on the national level, as on every other level of human community, absolute self-seeking is self-defeating. Sinful men and sinful communities ordinarily learn this hard truth from life itself, and therefore do not ordinarily seek to absolutize themselves in their exercise of freedom. Hence they take on the appearance of saints. The saints, on the other hand—and just because they deal with absolutes—tend to absolutize their self-interests and fall into idolatry. There is, therefore, according to Niebuhr, no essential difference between saints and sinners; the saints are simultaneously sinners, and sinners are usually somewhat saintly.
Knowing that Niebuhr is not a conservative Reformed theologian, I was surprised to observe that he does conclude his book with a discussion of common grace. But I was not surprised when he contended that the Reformers erred in insisting on an essential difference between common and special (saving) grace, nor was I surprised when he raised common grace to special grace status, thus reducing the greater to the lesser grace. This blurring of the distinction between common and special grace corresponds to his blurring of the distinction between saints and sinners, between regenerate and unregenerate man. When a theology of realism takes its symbols from the Christian revelation and then derives what they symbolize from a reading of empirical man and society, it is indeed likely not only to misread the empirical situation, as Niebuhr admits doing in the case of the modern mind’s reaction to “original sin,” but also to fail to uncover the essential difference between saints and sinners, and between common and special grace. Moreover, such a theology cannot issue a summons to evangelize the world; it can only urge a better intellectual understanding of what the world is—and must remain.
According to Niebuhr, the distinctive essence of man is freedom, but a freedom within limits, limits that all men have defied, some men “absolutely,” as was done in Hitlerian Nazi Germany, but most men more relatively. Hence most men and societies reveal a form of conduct that suggests a combination of saint-sinner, or of sinner-saint.
Theologically speaking, Niebuhr’s theology of realism is a sub-Christian, common-grace theology. It lacks the dimension of transcendent revelation, one which discloses that things are not what they seem to be, whether these things be sinner, saint, or the moral nature of human communities.
Nonetheless, Niebuhr’s analysis of man and his communities and the behavior of both is brilliant and profoundly enlightening. And it is easy to see why his thinking has had such a great influence on American secular and religious thought. In actual life neither men nor their manifold types of community are in fact wholly saint or wholly sinner. That they are not is to be attributed, however, to other theological causes than those to which Niebuhr attributes them. Nonetheless, the ambiguities of individual and communal behavior which Niebuhr brilliantly analyzes are real, and he is helpful in pointing out on the basis of real evidence in actual life that, for example, Communists are not wholly and absolutely evil and incapable of change, and that the people of a free, democratic society are not always absolutely right and on the side of the angels. It is only regrettable that a more conservative theology did not understand and apply its own resources to the achievement of the same social and political understanding. Had this been done, the attention given to a realistic theology that owes its force to Christian sources but never really recognizes this, would have been directed toward its actual source.
JAMES DAANE
How Christian Croups Score
Faith and Prejudice: Intergroup Problems in Protestant Curricula, by Bernhard E. Olson (Yale University, 1963, 451 pp., $7.50), is reviewed by Jakob Joez, professor of systematic theology, Wycliffe College, Toronto, Canada.
This is a sociological approach to theological attitudes in so far as these impinge upon intergroup relations. The material is provided by the textbooks of four religious groups in the United States. The author follows the method of statistical analysis with a carefully worked-out scale of reference. Let it be said at once that this doctoral dissertation for Yale University represents prodigious effort and is a monument to Dr. Olson’s industry.
The main part of this work is an analysis of curricula published by the Beacon Press (Unitarian-Universalist), described as liberal; by the United—Presbyterian Church in the U. S. A., described as neo-orthodox; by the Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod, described as conservative; and by Scripture Press, described as fundamentalist. The rest of the book consists of explanatory appendices, charts, bibliography, and an index.
Those not familiar with statistical analysis will find the scoring in terms of positive and negative percentages somewhat complicated. But the evidence produced and the conclusions arrived at are easily grasped. The thesis carries the disturbing proof how theological prejudices can affect ordinary human relations.
Olson tries to assess his material impartially and goes out of his way to show understanding even to those who appear in the least favorable light. He is fully aware of the complex pattern underlying human attitudes, and he knows that religious ideology is often conditioned by sociological factors. In this respect conservatives and fundamentalists are specially vulnerable, for their minority status dictates an attitude of defensiveness. In addition, their approach to Scripture frequently acts as a restrictive element in intergroup relations. The danger lies in applying attitudes derived from the past to altered conditions in the present.
The most negative scoring falls to the conservative group. Olson gives as a reason the uncritical acceptance of inherited attitudes toward Jews and Roman Catholics. In relation to the Jews the score is at its lowest. Both fundamentalists and conservatives tend to emphasize “the inimical qualities of the Jews in the biblical drama,” with the result that Jewish persons assume a sinister quality quite out of keeping with experience in daily life. The real Jew disappears, and his place is taken by a “theological-exegetical abstraction.” Unless the negative aspect is sufficiently balanced by more positive material, the child carries away the impression that Jews are more wicked than everyone else. This impression is fortified by the age-old myth that the whole Jewish people is guilty of deicide and therefore under a curse.
Olson allows for the difference between the theology of conservatives and that of fundamentalists. The latter still hold to the election of Israel as God’s special people, while the former find no place for the Jews in their theology. It occurs to this reviewer that the conservative attitude may well be determined by Luther’s scurrilous expletives against the Jews.
The most positive scorers are the neo-orthodox. With considerable evidence Olson shows the advantage of a dialectical approach to sociological problems. By insisting upon the Christian’s share in sin, the neo-orthodox make it impossible for the educator to blame others without personal incrimination. This specially applies to the story of the Crucifixion, which forms the crucial test of the curriculum.
To the neo-orthodox, anti-Semitism is a form of atheism, for it is veiled rebellion against the God of the Jews. Behind anti-Semitism is the anti-Semite’s worship of his own race and people. Such an attitude can be achieved only by a complete lack of self-criticism.
Jews have always complained that Western anti-Semitism has its roots in the Christian Church. More recently, Jules Isaac’s pamphlet Has Anti-Semitism Roots in Christianity? (1961), to which Dr. Olson contributed one of the introductory essays, and Isaac’s later work: The Teaching of Contempt: Christian Roots of Anti-Semitism (1964), have raised the issue all over again. Dr. Olson’s study now verifies the rightness of the Jewish complaint. The question arises: Can children be taught the New Testament, in particular the Crucifixion story, without contempt for the Jew? Olson has shown that this is possible and that from a Christian point of view the whole attempt misses its purpose unless it is achieved. To present the Jewish people as especially culpable is a betrayal of the Christian message and a misrepresentation of man’s position before God. Olson maintains that a sub-Christian attitude towards others ultimately results in a sub-Christian church.
One particular chapter in this book will prove of special interest to missionaries among Jews. Theirs is a delicate task that makes them specially vulnerable to misunderstanding. In this area of Christian witness there is a pressing need for new insights and attitudes, and Olson raises some important questions.
The reviewer has greatly benefited from this important study. His criticism concerns only some minor points: repetition is inevitable considering the nature of the material, but a more stringent organization would greatly enhance this work; that humanists are reckoned among Protestants is puzzling to the reader and may even be a surprise to them; “Israel” cannot be an “it” and is certainly not a “she” in spite of modern usage (cf. Ps. 25:22 in Hebrew and English).
It is the reviewer’s hope that educators will take the challenge of this book to heart and realize the responsibility before God and man before they sow in the hearts of children prejudice that will ultimately become hatred. The sad part of the story is that so much of this is done innocently and unconsciously.
A shorter and cheaper edition of this work would make it more accessible to a wider public.
J. JOCZ
Book Briefs
The Two Faces of Apartheid, by Paul Giniewski (Regnery, 1965, 373 pp., $5.95). A French journalist tells both sides of the “apartheid” policy in South Africa.
The Christian View of Life: Meditations on the Meaning of Life in Christ, by Theodore Hoyer (Concordia, 1965, 112 pp., $1.50). Good.
Revell’s Minister’s Annual 1966, by David A. MacLennan (Revell, 1965, 363 pp., $3.95). Fifty-two complete sermons, many of them quite perceptive; fifty-two evening sermon outlines, communion meditations, suggestions for mid-week services—and much else. Contains many ideas that may suggest even more.
The Unreformed Church, by Robert E. McNally, Jr. (Sheed and Ward, 1965, 216 pp., $4.50). A discussion of four problems that confronted the Council of Trent. A good background for understanding present developments in the Roman Catholic Church.
Mastery in the Storm, by George B. Duncan (Christian Literature Crusade, 1965, 149 pp., $2.75). A book of Keswick (Britain) sermonettes.
The Oxford Annotated Bible with the Apocrypha: Revised Standard Version, edited by Herbert G. May and Bruce M. Metzger (Oxford, 1965, 1,928 pp., $10.50). The combined edition contains a special article, “The Number, Order and Names of the Books of the Bible,” by Bruce M. Metzger; a list of differences between the Roman Catholic Douay Version and the Revised Standard Version; an alphabetical index to the books of the Bible and the Apocrypha; and full-color maps, with index, to go with the Apocrypha.
Things Which Become Sound Doctrine, by J. Dwight Pentecost (Revell, 1965, 159 pp., $3.50). Essays on fourteen biblical concepts; popular, generally biblical, and sometimes imprecise, as, for example, in the contention that grace is an “intrinsic quality” of God’s essence which accounts for the fact that God is “spontaneously favorable.”
In the Beginning: Paintings of the Creation by Boys and Girls around the World, by World Council of Christian Education (Nelson, 1965, 32 pp., $3.50). Delightful paintings.
Today and Tomorrow: Devotions for People Who Are Growing with the Years, by Charles W. Behnke (Concordia, 1965, 120 pp., $2.95).
Paperbacks
Christian Marriage Today: A Comparison of Roman Catholic and Protestant Views (Revised Edition), by Mario Colacci (Augsburg, 1965, 204 pp., $1.95). A thorough analysis of the complex problems involved in Protestant-Roman Catholic marriages. First published in 1958.
A New Introduction to Moral Theology, by Herbert Waddams (Seabury, 1965, 240 pp., $2.25). A seasoned and mature attempt to revive and reform moral theology, with a counter-blast against the new morality.
The Ark of the Covenant from Conquest to Kingship, by Marten H. Woudstra (Presbyterian and Reformed, 1965, 152 pp., $3.50). A scholarly evangelical treatment. For serious students.
A Bibliographic History of Dispensationalism, compiled by Arnold D. Ehlert (Baker, 1965, 110 pp., $1.50).
The Strategy of Evangelism: A Primer for Congregational Evangelism Committees, by Charles S. Mueller (Concordia, 1965, 96 pp., $1.25).
A Layman’s Guide to Baptist Beliefs, by Harold L. Fickett, Jr. (Zondervan, 1965, 184 pp., $1.50). A popular writing in which Baptist speaks to Baptist.
Student’s Bible Atlas, by H. H. Rowley (World, 1965, 40 pp., $1.75). Includes maps illustrating the history and expansion of the Church, with introduction, glossary, and index.
A Good Steward, by George A. E. Salstrand (Baker, 1965, 76 pp., $1). A discussion of the Christian stewardship of time and talents, with a shaky attempt to build a case for tithing from the New Testament.
The Cross of Christ—The Throne of God, by F. J. Huegel (Bethany Fellowship, 1965, 143 pp., $1.50). A challenging and inspiring study showing the vast significance and utter centrality of the Cross in the great purposes of God.
Passion and Marriage, by Constance Robinson (SPCK [distributed by Morehouse-Barlow], 1965, 86 pp., $1.50). One rarely sees so distinguished a discussion of sex. It touches sex with a radiance that the modern world knows little of.
New Forms of Ministry, edited by David M. Paton (Edinburgh House Press, 1965, 102 pp., 9s. 6d., also Friendship, $1.50). With special attention given to whether a minister ought also, for the sake of his ministry, to have a secular occupation.
They Welcomed the Child: Sermons for Advent and Christmas, by John Schmidt (Augsburg, 1965, 128 pp., $1.95). Good and stimulating reading, brightly written.
Contemporary Existentialism and Christian Faith, by J. Rodman Williams (Prentice-Hall, 1965, 180 pp., $3.50). A good layout and critique of existentialism from the perspective of the Christian faith. One would have to look far for a more lucid and concise critique of the existentialism of Sartre, Jaspers, Heidegger, Bultmann, and Tillich. Highly recommended.
Living Witnesses: Studies in Personal Evangelism, by Odd Gornitzka (Augsburg, 1965, 87 pp., $1.50). A direct and plain-spoken consideration of how to bear a Christian witness and how to meet the many ways in which people react to such a witness. Worth reading.
Family, State, and Church: God’s Institutions, by Paul Woolley (Baker, 1965, 48 pp., $1). Brief but pithy discussions of the nature and functions of family, church, and state, followed by a discussion of many modern socio-religious problems, among them tax exemptions, Sunday laws, censorship, and aid to private schools. A sane and solid treatment, worthy of wide reading and careful study. Recommended.
Vatican Diary 1964: A Protestant Observes the Third Session of Vatican Council II, by Douglas Horton (United Church Press, 1965, 205 pp., $3).
The Irreversible Decision, 1919–1950, by Robert C. Batchelder (Macmillan, 1965, 306 pp., $2.45). The story of the bomb that changed the world and the problems that came with it.
Learning in Theological Perspective, by Charles R. Stinnette, Jr., edited by C. Ellis Nelson (Association, 1965, 96 pp., $2.50). An examination of the learning process.
The Interpretation of Religion: An Introductory Study of Theological Principles, by John Baillie (Abingdon, 1965, 477 pp., $2.45). First published in 1928.
A Short Baptist Manual of Polity and Practice, by Norman H. Mating and Winthrop S. Hudson (Judson, 1965, 160 pp., $1.75). A briefer edition of Edwin H. Tuller’s A Baptist Manual of Polity and Practice.
The Hiscox Standard Baptist Manual, by Edward T. Hiscox (Judson, 1965, 144 pp., $1.75). Eight chapters of The Hiscox Guide for Baptist Churches, plus the New Hampshire Confession of Faith.
Peace Corps and Christian Mission, by Roger D. Armstrong (Friendship, 1965, 126 pp., $1.75). A discussion of the possibility of exercising a Christian witness within the Peace Corps.
Mission in the New Testament, by Ferdinand Hahn (Alec R. Allenson, 1965, 184 pp., $4.50). A very substantial study of mission, as it relates to, among other things, the Jewish-Gentile question in Jesus, in Paul, and in the early Church.
Church Library Manual, prepared by Charlotte Newton (self-published [892 Prince Avenue, Athens, Georgia), 1965, 22 pp., $.50). Advice and instructions for church librarians.
