Cruciformity: Paul’s Narrative Spirituality of the Cross, 20th Anniversary ed.
Digital Logos Edition
Overview
When it was first published in 2001, Cruciformity broke new ground with a vision of Pauline spirituality that illuminated what it meant to be a person or community in Christ. Beginning with Paul’s express desire to “know nothing but Christ crucified,” Gorman showed how true spirituality is telling the story, in both life and words, of God’s self-revelation in Jesus, so that we might practice “cruciformity”—the impossible possibility of conformity to the crucified Christ.
Two decades later, Gorman’s seminal work is still a powerful model for combining biblical studies and theological reflection to make Paul’s letters more immediately relevant to contemporary Christian life. This twentieth-anniversary edition includes a new foreword by Nijay Gupta—a next-generation Pauline scholar heavily influenced by Gorman—as well as an afterword by the author, in which he reflects on the legacy of Cruciformity in the church and the academy, including his own subsequent work in Pauline theology.
- Provides a powerful model for combining biblical studies and theological reflection
- Explores the relevance of Paul’s letters to contemporary Christian life
- Includes a new foreword by Nijay Gupta
- Foreword by Nijay K. Gupta
- Introduction
- The Cruciform God: Paul’s Experience of “The Father of Our Lord Jesus Christ”
- The Exalted Crucified Messiah: “Apprehended by Christ to Be Conformed to Him”
- The Spirit of Cruciformity: Paul’s Experience of the Spirit of God, the Spirit of Christ
- The Triune God of Cruciform Love: Paul’s Experience of the Trinity
- The Word of the Cross: Narratives of the Cross, Patterns of Cruciformity
- Cruciform Faith (I): Paul, the “Fundamental Option,” and the Faith of Jesus Christ
- Cruciform Faith (II): The Character and Cost of Faith
- Cruciform Love (I): The Pattern of the Crucified Messiah
- Cruciform Love (II): Apostolic Cruciformity
- Cruciform Love (III): The Narrative Shape of the Faithful Community
- Cruciform Power: The Paradox of Weakness
- Cruciform Hope: The Future of Cruciformity
- Communities of Cruciformity: Paul’s Experience and Vision of the Church
- Cruciformity Today: Challenges to, and the Challenges of, the Cross
- Afterword by Michael J. Gorman
Top Highlights
“Yet for Paul, God is known in Christ; ‘Christ is determined by God himself as the place where God can be known.’4” (Page 11)
“‘narrative spirituality.’ By it I mean a spirituality that tells a story, a dynamic life with God that corresponds in some way to the divine ‘story.’” (Page 4)
“One standard definition of spirituality in a Christian context is ‘the lived experience of Christian belief.’” (Page 2)
“If the Christ of Paul’s experience was the faithful, obedient Son of God, then he acted in life and especially in death according to the will and character of God. That is to say, the Son’s act on the cross was an act of ‘family resemblance,’ of conformity to God. If so, Paul would have reasoned from his experience of Christ, God must be a God who by nature wills and does what the Son willed and did. God is, in other words, a God of self-sacrificing and self-giving love whose power and wisdom are found in the weakness and folly of the cross.” (Pages 15–16)
“Understanding Paul’s experience of the Spirit enables us to comprehend this paradox. The distinctive feature of Paul’s experience of the Spirit, and his resulting understanding of the essence of this Spirit, is the paradoxical symbiosis (union) of power and weakness, of power and cruciformity. The charismatic Spirit is also the cruciform Spirit.” (Page 52)
Michael Gorman has provided us with a splendid account of a forgotten factor in Pauline studies—the origin and meaning of the apostle’s spirituality. Clearly written and carefully researched, this work illustrates how the cross of Christ is the key to Paul’s spirituality—and to our own as well.
—Frank J. Matera, author of God’s Saving Grace: A Pauline Theology
In Cruciformity Michael Gorman rigorously works through the ways in which Paul narrates himself into the ongoing drama of God’s salvation revealed in the cross and resurrection. Gorman’s accessible prose nicely displays how Paul comes to understand and embody a life that seeks to be conformed to the cross of Christ. In an age when spirituality is often simply a mask for self-projection and self-assertion, Gorman’s Paul reminds Christians that such vital matters as faith, hope, love, and power should be shaped by the story of the crucified and resurrected one rather than by our own whims and desires. This book is readable and timely, and it will enhance the lives of contemporary Christians.
—Stephen E. Fowl, Loyola University Maryland
- Title: Cruciformity: Paul’s Narrative Spirituality of the Cross
- Author: Michael J. Gorman
- Edition: 20th Anniversary Edition
- Publisher: Eerdmans
- Print Publication Date: 2021
- Logos Release Date: 2021
- Pages: 455
- Era: era:contemporary
- Language: English
- Resources: 1
- Format: Digital › Logos Research Edition
- Subjects: Jesus Christ › Crucifixion--Biblical teaching; Bible. N.T. Epistles of Paul › Theology
- ISBNs: 9780802879127, 0802879128
- Resource ID: LLS:CRCFRMTY20NNDTN
- Resource Type: Monograph
- Metadata Last Updated: 2022-09-29T22:59:19Z