Adventist Society for Religious Studies Publishes Two New Books
8 December 2023 |
Scholars of the Adventist Society for Religious Studies (ASRS) have published two books based on the themes of the yearly conferences held in 2020 and 2022. The publisher is Oak & Acorn Publishing, Westlake Village, California. The books are major contributions to Sabbath theology, and to the ministry of healing.
The title of the first book is, Remembering: It Matters How We Tell the Sabbath Story. The book has been edited by Mathilde Frey (WWU), Ed Allen (UC), Denis Fortin (AU), and Sigve Tonstad (LLU) with Mathilde as the senior editor.
The book’s title reflects Mathilde’s presidential address at the ASRS meetings in 2020, and contains 17 chapters organized into four sections: Biblical Studies Background, Sabbath and Ecology, Sabbath and Social Justice, and Rest and Restoration. As we are witnessing a resurgence of interest in the Sabbath in religious and theological studies, there is even a greater awareness about the significance of the Sabbath in the public realms of culture, environment, and society. Regarding needs, modern civilization is at a loss; it offers productivity, but not plenitude; commerce, but not connection; recreation, but not rest; pleasure and distraction, but not fellowship and peace. The social glue of shared time has dried up, and the connective tissue of generational memory has shriveled. Greed and reckless predation have catastrophic ramifications for the climate and for the earth we inhabit. The insights in this volume about the divine gift of the seventh-day Sabbath offer hope and remedies for the needs of our world. In response to the despair of climate change and the tragedy of unjust economics, Sabbath as a shared day of rest includes care for the earth, rest for the land, reprieve for the destitute, and a stop to ruthless acquisition. In a time of unparalleled alienation and loneliness, remembering and sharing the story of the Sabbath in a fresh way is an art that holds transformative power. Relationships might begin to heal, communities may find ways to reconnect, trust could be restored, and hope would begin to blossom again.
Section 1— Biblical Studies Background
The Art of Remembering: It Matters How We Tell the Sabbath Story
Mathilde Frey, Walla Walla University
The Sabbath as a Sign of Holiness: In the Context of Babylonian Days and Theology
Jean Sheldon, Pacific Union College
To Fight or Not to Fight: The Sabbath and the Maccabean Revolt
Sigve K. Tonstad, Loma Linda University
The Rabbinic Sabbath: Re-Creating Paradise
David Kraemer, Jewish Theological Seminary
Paul’s Observance of the Sabbath in Acts of the Apostles as a Marker of Continuity Between Judaism and Early Christianity
Denis Fortin, Andrews University
The Sabbath and Her Sisters: Circumcision, Sacrifice, Ceremony and Sabbath in Justin’s Dialogue with Trypho
Edward Allen, Union College
How Did the Jewish Sabbath Become the Christian Sunday? A Review of the Reviews of Samuele Bacchiocchi’s From Sabbath to Sunday
Edward Allen, Union College
Section 2 — Sabbath and Ecology
The People of God in the Sabbath Psalm: An Eschatological Study of the Shirim Shel Yom
Melissa Brotton, La Sierra University
“Remember the Sabbath”: An Anchor to Hold an Earth-Sustaining Theological Metanarrative
Ginger Harwood, La Sierra University
Sabbath to the Rescue: Finding Respite from Ecological Despair
Sigve K. Tonstad, Loma Linda University
Section 3 — Sabbath and Social Justice
Equality Through the Lens of Sabbath Hermeneutics
Mathilde Frey, Walla Walla University
Re-member Shabbat: The Call to Come Out of Babylon
Olive J. Hemmings, Washington Adventist University
Prophecy, Sabbath, and Jubilee: The Social Justice Implications of an Eschatological Sabbath Message
Nicholas Miller, Andrews University
Section 4 — Rest and Restoration
The Sabbath Healings and Biblical Sabbath Ethics: An Interpretation
Andrews Blosser, Loyola University, Carthage College
Being, Holiness, and Freedom: On the Sacramental Character of the Sabbath
Daryll Ward, Kettering College
Disabling Sabbath: A Practice in Shaping Livable Presents
Vaughn Nelson, Boston University School of Theology
Jewish Shabbat, Christian Sabbath: A Practical Theological Study of Contemporary Clergy Practice
Erik C. Carter, Loma Linda University
Remembering: It Matters How We Tell the Sabbath Story is available at this link.
The second book is Restored!: Mediating Wholeness in a Broken World, and is based on the theme of the ASRS conference in 2022. The editor of the book is Zdravko Plantak (Loma Linda University).
The book invites a robust conversation about the obviously malfunctioning world, ancient and contemporary; to see how God has desired to restore the brokenness and chaos; and to ask how we may be involved as participants in such wholeness-building. Contributors to this volume offer a polyphony of voices coming from various perspectives and disciplines within religious studies—from theological, historical, ethical, philosophical, and practical theology—and explore through multiple genres the importance of the wholeness that God desires and what it may look like in a broken world. These are not utopian or programmatic essays; rather, they are attempts to paint a picture of what God intends for the suffering and imperfect world here and now and how we can become more motivated to participate with God in such restoration.
Section One: States of Brokenness
Remember That We Are Dust: Following Jesus in Seeing Our Broken World Through the Eyes of Weakness
Ann Collier-Freed
Restoring the Broken: The Function of Military Language in the Feeding of the Five Thousand Narrative (Mark 6:30–44)
Oleg Kostyuk
Deceived, Broken, Whole: How the Garden Explains the Cross
Thomas Toews
Jeremiah’s Rebuilding of the Destroyed City Without Brick and Mortar
Oliver Glanz
Section Two: Pathways to Wholeness
When Healthcare Gets Sick: Epaphroditus, the Parabalanis, and Broken Hallelujahs
Kendra Haloviak Valentine
For the Healing of the Nations
John Brunt
Social Locations At the Margins: A Path to Wholeness in Theological Interpretation of Scripture
Iriann Marie Irizarry
Spiritual Wholeness: Sustainable Spiritual Resilience in a Conflicted, Destabilizing World
Ben Holdsworth
Section Three: Brokenness (Un)acknowledged
Self-Evident Truths: A Critical Race Informed Adventist Apocalyptic
Keith Augustus Burton
Women Who Shaped Adventism: Eight Who Cracked the Glass Ceiling
James Wibberding
Human Nature and Human Flourishing: Adventism’s Wrong-Headed Obsession With Binary Sexuality
Mark Carr
The Double-Sided Mirror: Wholeness as Integrity; Wholeness as Connectivity
John R. Jones and Patricia S. Jones
Sections Four: Visions of Healing
The Minister and the Mother Wound: Trauma Conversations Between Jeremiah 13 and 31
Mathilde Frey
Humility as a Key to Mediating Wholeness in a Broken World
Nicole Parker
Mending Collegial Relationships: An Intentional Process
Boubakar Sanou and Petr Cincala
Reconciliating the Two Sides of the Wall of Separation: The Sanctuary Tension and Its Missiological Implications Based On Ephesians 2:14–18
Lian Chuanshan
Esther: The Beauty of Perishing as Revolutionary Practice
Ramona Hyman
Afterword
Sigve Tonstad
Restored!: Mediating Wholeness in a Broken World is available at this link.
