Eerdmans Miroslav Volf Collection (6 vols.)

In the challenging dialogue of this book, three of today’s most respected Christian thinkers explore the role of theology, the task of Christian learning, and the meaning of the self in our contemporary Western society. Jürgen Moltmann builds a case for the “public” nature of Christian theology and explores how expressions of faith from both the church and the academy relate to significant aspects of modernity. Responses by Nicholas Wolsterstorff and Ellen T. Charry provide a provocative engagement with Moltmann’s views.

Miroslav Volf’s writing beautifully points away from the pettiness and selfishness so prominent in our culture today and toward the love that Christians are called to exemplify. His insights in this volume will inform and inspire all who wish to follow that path of love.

Often the differences between the three Abrahamic religions—Judaism, Christianity, and Islam—seem more obvious than their commonalities, leading to the question “Do we worship the same God?” Can the answer be “yes” without denying our differences?

This volume brings Jewish, Christian, and Muslim philosophers and theologians together to answer this question, offering rare insight into how representatives of each religion view the other monotheistic faiths. Each of their contributions uniquely approaches the primary question from a philosophical perspective that is informed by the practice of worship and prayer. Concepts covered include “sameness” and “oneness,” the nature of God, epistemology, and the Trinity. Do We Worship the Same God? models serious-minded, honest, and respectful interreligious dialogue and gives us new ways to address an ongoing question.

Can one forget atrocities? Should one forgive abusers? Ought we not hope for the final reconciliation of all the wronged and all wrongdoers alike, even if it means spending eternity with perpetrators of evil? We live in an age when it is generally accepted that past wrongs—genocides, terrorist attacks, personal injustices—should be constantly remembered. But Miroslav Volf here proposes the radical idea that letting go of such memories—after a certain point and under certain conditions—may actually be the appropriate course of action.

While agreeing with the claim that to remember a wrongdoing is to struggle against it, Volf notes that there are too many ways to remember wrongly, perpetuating the evil committed rather than guarding against it. In this way, “the just sword of memory often severs the very good it seeks to defend.” He argues that remembering rightly has implications not only for the individual but also for the wrongdoer and for the larger community.

Volf’s personal stories of persecution offer a compelling backdrop for his search for theological resources to make memories a wellspring of healing rather than a source of deepening pain and animosity. Controversial, thoughtful, and incisively reasoned, The End of Memory begins a conversation hard to ignore.

Over the last three decades, a major cultural shift has taken place in the attitudes of Western societies toward the future. Modernity’s eclipse by postmodernity is characterized in large part by the loss of hope for a future substantially better than the present. Old optimism about human progress has given way to uncertainty and fear. In this book scholars from various disciplines—theology, the social sciences, and the humanities—explore the move from a “culture of optimism” to a “culture of ambiguity,” and they seek to infuse today’s jaded language of hope with a new vitality.

The Future of Hope offers a powerful critique of today’s stifling cultural climate and shows why the vision of hope central to Christian faith must be a basic component of any flourishing society. The first section of the book sets the context telling cultural criticism of modernity. The second section focuses on affinities between premodern Christian visions of hope and twentieth-century thought. The final section of the book examines the relationship between postmodern thought, Christian tradition, and biblical hope, addressing how Christians in a postmodern world can best articulate their faith.

Written by truly profound thinkers, these chapters are diverse in their content, methodologies, and temperament, yet they are united by a deep engagement with both the Christian tradition and the larger cultural and intellectual climate in which we live and work. The Future of Hope can thus be read not just as an attempt at retrieval of hope for today but as itself one small act of hope in an age when people too seldom take time to think critically and hopefully.

The essays in this volume attempt to revitalize theology as it confronts a difficult future. Despite the formidable obstacles that threaten the very survival of theology in the next century—religious and cultural plurality; the marginalization of theology in public discourse; increasing abstraction in the practice of theology; pressing issues of gender, race, poverty, and ecology; the seemingly archaic voice of theology in post-Christian societies—the contributors to this volume all believe in the future of theology as a vibrant discipline.

The Future of Theology is organized in three parts. “Challenges” deals with the external or internal problems that theology is facing. “Perspectives” offers proposals on how to meet the challenges. “Themes” concentrates on various issues that need special attention today. Together, these essays succeed in setting the theological agenda for the future of theology, and thereby serve as a fitting tribute to this volume’s esteemed honoree.