John Eldevik, "Reading Prester John: Cultural Fantasy and Its Manuscript Contexts" (Arc Humanities Press, 2024)
Reading Prester John: Cultural Fantasy and its Manuscript Contexts by John Eldevik
During the Middle Ages, many Europeans imagined that there existed a powerful and marvel-filled Christian realm beyond the lands of Islam ruled by a devout emperor they called “Priest John,” or “Prester John.” Spurred by a forged letter that mysteriously appeared around 1165 and quickly “went viral” in hundreds of manuscripts across Western Europe, the legend of Prester John and his exotic kingdom was not just a utopian fantasy, but a way to bring contemporary political and theological questions into sharper focus. In this new study, John Eldevik shows how the manuscripts that transmitted the story of Prester John reflect the ways contemporary audiences processed ideas about religious conflict and helped them imagine a new, global dimension of Christianity. It includes an appendix with a new translation of the B recension of The Letter of Prester John.
John Eldevik is Professor of History at Hamilton College in Clinton (New York State), and has previously published on medieval social and religious history.
Morteza Hajizadeh is a Ph.D. graduate in English from the University of Auckland in New Zealand. His research interests are Cultural Studies; Critical Theory; Environmental History; Medieval (Intellectual) History; Gothic Studies; 18th and 19th Century British Literature.
YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/a48266/videos
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Wang Yi, Hannah Nation ed., "Faithful Disobedience: Writings on Church and State from a Chinese House Church Movement" (IVP Academic, 2022)
In this important body of theology, key writings from the Chinese house church movement have been compiled, translated, and made accessible to English speakers. The documents in Faithful Disobedience: Writings on Church and State from a Chinese House Church Movement (IVP Academic, 2022) give readers an inside look at how the unregistered churches of China have endured despite government pressure and cultural marginalization. Wang Yi, the primary writer, is the pastor of a house church in Chengdu, China. He is currently serving a nine-year prison sentence for refusing to comply with People’s Republic of China (PRC) regulations regarding church registration. There are also works by prominent voices such as Jin Tianming, Jin Mingri, and Sun Yi.
In our conversation, editor Hannah Nation proves to be an engaging and appreciative guide to these leaders’ theological, political and pastoral perspectives which are both uniquely Chinese and rooted in the historical doctrines of the Christian faith.
Dave Broucek is a lifelong student of and participant in the global mission of the church. He values research into the lesser-understood aspects of mission (singular) and missions (plural) as well as scholarship that addresses the big questions of mission theory and practice.
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Jonathon Stuart Wright, "Joseph and Aseneth After Antiquity: A Study in Manuscript Transmission" (de Gruyter, 2025)
Joseph and Aseneth: A Study in Manuscript Transmission (de Gruyter, 2025) expands a few verses from the book of Genesis into a novella-length work. It is increasingly used as a source for Judaism and Christianity at the turn of the Common Era. Scholarly attention has largely focused the work's provenance, the priority of a longer or shorter text version, and the implications for interpretation. But few have engaged with the work's manuscript witness and transmission.
This study returns to the sources. It considers how the redaction and translation of Joseph and Aseneth affected its interpretation, and looks at the interests of the redactors and copyists. Its findings warn against placing too much weight on details that lack such an importance in the manuscript tradition.
Important contributions made in this monograph include: a detailed study of the two earliest versions, the Syriac and Armenian translations; focus on the Greek manuscripts of the three longest families (f, Mc, a); analysis of four abridged versions (family d, E, Latin 1 and so-called "early modern Greek"); the first available synoptic edition of the Greek versions of the story, including the first edition of manuscript E.
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Abeneazer G. Urga et al., "Reading James Missiologically: The Missionary Motive, Message, and Methods of James" (William Carey, 2025)
While books on a New Testament theology of mission abound, most of them focus on tried-and-true Scripture passages from the Gospels and the Acts of the Apostles while ignoring the contribution of the General Epistles. Reading James Missiologically: The Missionary Motive, Message, and Methods of James (William Carey, 2025) addresses this gap in missiological and biblical scholarship. Eighteen scholars and practitioners from a variety of nations and cultural backgrounds give a global perspective to James’s call to action among the poor. Their writing aims to inspire the church toward holistic engagement with the world as “doers of the word, not hearers only.” Reading James Missiologically is part of a series that includes Reading Hebrews Missiologically, Reading 1 Peter Missiologically, soon-to-be-released Reading Revelation Missiologically and other projected volumes.
Dave Broucek is a lifelong student of and participant in the global mission of the church. He values research into the lesser-understood aspects of mission (singular) and missions (plural) as well as scholarship that addresses the big questions of mission theory and practice.
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Jonathan Teubner, "Charity After Augustine: Solidarity, Conflict, and the Practices of Charity in the Latin West" (Oxford UP, 2025)
Jonathan Teubner, Charity After Augustine: Solidarity, Conflict, and the Practices of Charity in the Latin West (Oxford UP, 2025)
Through a unique blend of the personal and historiographical, Charity after Augustine is an exploration of why the Augustinian tradition’s attempts to build solidarity or social cohesion in the societies of the Latin West have ended in disaster just as often as they have brought about justice. The conceit at the heart of the book is that the concrete practices of love or charity—almsgiving, works of mercy, good works—can tell us much about how religious leaders attempted to bind and hold communities together while also, in fits and starts with some startling reversions, attempting to expand the community and incorporate others. The first part probes the ways Augustine’s understanding of love is put into practice and how this understanding informs a tradition of political action inspired by Christian concepts of love and enacted through practices of charity. In a second, more expansive part, the book turns to the ways in which the Benedictine tradition as illustrated by Gregory the Great and Bernard of Clairvaux receives this vision, invigorates it with new visions of care and leadership, and puts it into practice in radically different contexts from those of Augustine’s age. At the heart of Charity after Augustine is an attempt to find a non-idealized vision of love that can inform thick, meaningful relations within a community that are not diluted by the inclusion of others
New Books in Late Antiquity is Presented by Ancient Jew Review
Jonathan D. Teubner is a Research Associate at the Human Flourishing Program at Harvard. This book is something of a sequel to his first, Prayer after Augustine: A Study in the Development of the Latin Tradition.
Michael Motia teaches in the classics and religious studies department at UMass Boston
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Interviews with Scholars of Christianity about their New Books
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