Irrevocable: The Name of God and the Unity of the Christian Bible
Digital Logos Edition
Overview
The Tetragrammaton, the traditionally unspoken proper name of God, is the most holy of all God’s names in the Bible. Despite its sacredness, Christian theology has often neglected the significance of this divine name, an omission that has fostered Christianityc’s supersessionist stance toward the Jewish people and created other problems for Christian theology as well.
In Irrevocable, author R. Kendall Soulen puts the Tetragrammaton back at the center of Christian theology to demonstrate the difference that God’s proper name makes for Christian faith, from the doctrine of the Trinity to the unity of the Christian Bible and Christianity’s relationship to Judaism and Islam.
In the end, Soulen reveals how something so holy and so unique can also be so important for all.
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- Puts the Tetragrammaton back at the center of Christian theology
- Demonstrates the difference that God’s proper name makes for Christian faith
- Reveals how something as holy and unique as the Tetragrammaton can also be so important for all
- Scripture: The Problem of Supersessionism
- Trinity: One Name in Three Inflections
- Election: The Proper Name of the Word Who Became Flesh
Part II: Covenant, Christ, Church
- Covenant: Why Did God Choose the Jews?
- Christ: Jesus and the Tetragrammaton
- Church: People of God, Body of Christ, Temple of the Spirit
- Christians and Jews: “They Are Israelites”
- Christianity, Judaism, and Islam: A Christian Perspective on the Abrahamic Faiths
- Christianity and the Powers: Why Empires Prefer a Nameless God
Part I: Scripture, Trinity, Election
Part III: Church and World
This book is a powerful witness to the vital significance of the divine name for the Christian tradition, showing how its rediscovery may serve as a linchpin in overcoming Christianity’s deepseated Israel-forgetfulness. Soulen’s retrieval is of fundamental doctrinal import, with far-reaching ramifications for the structure of Christian thought, not only in relation to the problem of supersessionism, but also in relation to the grammar of its doctrine of God.
—Susannah Ticciati, King’s College London
Kendall Soulen’s Irrevocable is a profound series of insights on what it means, first for Judaism and then for Christianity, to affirm that the God of Israel has a personal identity designated by a proper name. This enables both Christians and Jews to honestly speak of worshipping the same God, albeit with some significant differences, and not merging into an incoherent syncretism or dissolving into a vapid, post-religious universalism.
—David Novak, University of Toronto
Soulen makes a strong and timely case for the necessity of the Tetragrammaton in Christian theological language to identify the true God, who is the God of both biblical Testaments. This is a significant post-supersessionist theology that navigates how we read both Testaments freshly.
—Gavin D’Costa, University of Bristol
- Title: Irrevocable: The Name of God and the Unity of the Christian Bible
- Author: R. Kendall Soulen
- Publisher: Fortress Press
- Print Publication Date: 2022
- Logos Release Date: 2025
- Pages: 209
- Era: era:contemporary
- Language: English
- Resources: 1
- Format: Digital › Logos Reader Edition
- Subjects: Tetragrammaton; God (Christianity) › Name; Christianity and other religions › Judaism; Christianity and other religions › Islam
- ISBNs: 9781506481197, 1506481191, 9781506481180, 1506481183
- Resource ID: LLS:RRVCBLNMCHRSBBL
- Resource Type: Monograph
- Metadata Last Updated: 2025-11-03T20:44:29Z
R. Kendall Soulen has devoted much of his scholarship to showing that Christian faith becomes more authentically Christian as it overcomes its stubborn legacy of anti-Judaism. His most recent book is Irrevocable: The Name of God and the Unity of the Christian Canon (Fortress, 2022). His previous books include The God of Israel and Christian Theology (Fortress Press, 1996), Abraham’s Promise: Judaism and Jewish-Christian Relations (Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2004), and The Divine Name(s) and the Holy Trinity, vol. 1: Distinguishing the Voices (Westminster/JKP, 2011).
Soulen is the chair for Theological Studies in the Laney Graduate Division of Religion and president of The Society for Post-Supersessionist Theology. He served as the President of the American Theological Society in 2017, and serves on the editorial board of several academic journals, including Pro Ecclesia and Theology Today.
