Doctrine and Scripture in Early Christianity (2 vols.)

by Frances Young

Publisher:

Eerdmans

, 2023–2024

Overview

Historical criticism has revealed a gap between Scripture and the mainstream doctrines that define Christianity today. Not the least of these are the Trinity and two natures of Christ—widely accepted since the fifth century, but unfounded in historical readings of Scripture. How did these dogmas become so integral to the faith in the first place? Frances M. Young tackles this monumental question in a culmination of decades of biblical and patristic research.

The first of two volumes exploring the emergence of doctrine in the early church, Scripture, the Genesis of Doctrine reframes the relationship between Scripture and doctrine according to the intellectual context of the first few centuries CE. The second of two volumes, Scripture in Doctrinal Dispute illuminates the role of biblical hermeneutics in the debates that forged Christian dogma on the nature of God. Young shows how the theological commitments to God as the sole creator of all else from nothing shaped fourth- and fifth-century disputes over Christology and the Trinity.

Key Features

• Explores early Christians’ biblical hermeneutic, with an eye toward how we interpret the bible today
• Reframes the relationship between Scripture and doctrine according to the intellectual context of the first few centuries
• Situates the early Christians’ biblical hermeneutic within the context of Greco-Roman learning

Praise for the Doctrine and Scripture in Early Christianity Series

Scripture in Doctrinal Dispute is the culmination of Frances Young’s illustrious scholarly career. Her book is animated by an ambitious vision, to overcome contemporary estrangements between doctrine and scripture. To this end, she offers us a learned investigation of the role of scripture in the Trinitarian and Christological disputes of the fourth and fifth centuries. Here readers will find new glimpses into the past and stirring challenges to the present.

—Peter Martens, professor of early Christianity, Saint Louis University

This authoritative and accessible book exemplifies [Young’s] pre-eminence and skill in bringing a variety of partners into rich and productive dialogue, as well as the potential of an overtly postmodern approach to move beyond empirical differences in order to gain a fuller sense of the whole.

—The Expository Times