Engaging the Doctrine of Israel: A Christian Israelology in Dialogue with Ongoing Judaism

by Matthew Levering

Publisher:

Wipf and Stock

, 2021

Overview

This book is the dogmatic sequel to Levering's Engaging the Doctrine of Marriage, in which he argued that God's purpose in creating the cosmos is the eschatological marriage of God and his people. God sets this marriage into motion through his covenantal election of a particular people, the people of Israel. Central to this people's relationship with the Creator God are their Scriptures, exodus, Torah, Temple, land, and Davidic kingship. As a Christian Israelology, this book devotes a chapter to each of these topics, investigating their theological significance both in light of ongoing Judaism and in light of Christian Scripture (Old and New Testaments) and Christian theology. The book makes a significant contribution to charting a path forward for Jewish-Christian dialogue from the perspective of post-Vatican II Catholicism.

Key Features

• Provides extensive meditations on biblical texts drawn from the entirety of Christian Scripture
• Undertakes, within Catholic dogmatics, a full-fledged treatment of the central realities of God’s biblical people Israel
• Engages the following topics: Jewish/Chistian dialogue, creation and Scripture, the exodus, the Torah, the temple, the promised land, and the Davidic kingship

Contents

• Jewish-Christian Dialogue
• Creation and Scripture
• Exodus
• Torah
• Temple Land
• King

Praise for Engaging the Doctrine

Some years ago, the late cardinal Avery Dulles, the most distinguished American Catholic theologian, told me he considered Matthew Levering ‘the most up-and-coming young Catholic theologian in the world.’ This new book shows us once again that Cardinal Dulles’s prediction was not exaggerated. This new book is a testament to Matthew Levering’s faith, his learning, his insightfulness, and his commitment to a theologically vibrant relationship with ‘ongoing Judaism.’ Well done!

—David Novak, University of Toronto

This is systematic and biblical theology at its best, thought through in the company of some of the greatest modern Jewish thinkers. Levering manages to keep intact fulfillment without supersessionism, reverence and respect toward the Jewish people with a deeply confessional Catholic-ecumenical approach. Levering does this walking a daring tightrope addressing the most difficult topics that are unresolved between Jews and Catholics. A landmark book.

—Gavin D’Costa, author of Catholic Doctrines on the Jewish People after Vatican II

In this deeply learned and religiously sensitive volume, the reader will enter a discussion like no other about the place of Israel within the domain of Christian theology. The place of Judaism within the theological work of the church will look different after working through these illuminating pages.

—Gary A. Anderson, University of Notre Dame

Product Details

• Title: Engaging the Doctrine of Israel: A Christian Israelology in Dialogue with Ongoing Judaism
• Author: Matthew Levering
• Publisher: Wipf and Stock
• Print Publication Date: 2021
• Pages: 558
• Language: English
• Resources: 1
• Format: Digital › Logos Reader Edition
• Resource ID: LLS:NGGNGDCTRNNJDSM
• Resource Type: Monograph
• Metadata Last Updated: 2022-03-08T22:10:29Z

About Matthew Levering

Dr. Matthew Levering is James N. Jr. and Mary D. Perry Chair of Theology at Mundelein Seminary, and Co-Director of the Chicago Theological Initiative. He holds a B.A. from University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; M.T.S. from Duke University; and a Ph.D. from Boston College. He is the author or co-author of over thirty-five books including such works as Scripture and Metaphysics, Participatory Biblical Exegesis, Biblical Natural Law, Proofs of God, Aquinas’s Eschatological Ethics and the Virtue of Temperance, Did Jesus Rise from the Dead?, The Abuse of Conscience, and Reconfiguring Thomistic Christology. He is currently at work on a multi-volume dogmatics, whose first five volumes have appeared (most recently Engaging the Doctrine of Israel). He is the editor or co-editor of over twenty books including such works as The Oxford Handbook of Sacramental Theology, Aristotle in Aquinas’s Theology, and The Reception of Vatican II. He is the translator of Gilles Emery, O.P.’’s The Trinity. He co-edits two quarterly journals, Nova et Vetera and the International Journal of Systematic Theology. He is the past president (2021-22) of the Academy of Catholic Theology, and served as its founding Chair of the Board from 2007-2016. He has been a member of Evangelicals and Catholics Together since 2004. With Thomas Joseph White, O.P., he co-edits the Thomistic Ressourcement series for Catholic University of America Press. He is a Distinguished Fellow of the St. Paul Center, and he edits the Renewal within Tradition series for Emmaus Academic Press.