Joel N. Lohr

Part of the best-selling Making Sense series, Making Sense in Religious Studies is an indispensable guide for writing and researching in the discipline. Maintaining the clear, straightforward style of the other books in the series, this book outlines topics such as writing essays and short assignments, doing comparative research, evaluating Internet sources, proper documentation, avoiding plagiarism, reading religious texts, learning foreign languages, and more.

Introductions to the Hebrew Bible (or Old Testament) tend toward extensive scholarly discussion with little to introduce the student to the tremendous influence this seminal collection has had on contemporary society or to the complexities of reading ancient religious literature today. Further, few books, if any, discuss the differing ways Jews and Christians approach this common scripture, or how each group appropriates its teachings in divergent, conflicting, and often complex ways. Related to this issue is the problem of how scholarly approaches to reading this literature often stand in stark contrast to popular and religious approaches. This disparity of methods usually startles the inexperienced student and can be alarming, indeed shocking, to religious practitioners. This book offers a critical yet sympathetic overview of the Hebrew Bible and the field of biblical studies, as well as introduces the reader to Jewish, Catholic, and Protestant interpretations of it. Avoiding jargon and convoluted prose, this highly accessible volume provides textboxes, charts, a timeline, a glossary, and regularly includes artistic renderings of biblical scenes to keep lay and beginning readers engaged.

The Bible has profoundly influenced the western world. Many of its characters and stories are well known and yet, oddly enough, wide swaths of the Bible are unknown and misunderstood. The laws and teaching contained within it have shaped contemporary thinking and jurisprudence in ways many do not realise. Equally important, two of the world's largest religions-Judaism and Christianity-consider the Hebrew Bible to be sacred and to contain enduring truths about beginnings and creation, life and death, the world, and what it means to be human. This introduction will introduce beginners to the Bible with simplicity and precision, in an engaging manner. It will provide a quick overview of the issues related to reading and studying the Bible as an academic discipline while simultaneously illustrating the importance of the Bible for religion, western jurisprudence, ethics, and contemporary conceptions of the family, morality, and even politics.

There is no question that the Torah is one of the most influential documents in Western civilization. It is the source of widely known characters like Joseph, Moses, and Noah, and timeless stories such as the Garden of Eden and the Exodus. Jointly authored by professors of Judaism and Christianity, The Torah: A Beginner's Guide takes a unique approach, exploring the interplay and dynamics of how these two religions share this common scripture. Drawing on both scholarly and popular sources, Kaminsky and Lohr examine the key debates, while simultaneously illustrating the importance of the Torah in western jurisprudence, ethics, and contemporary conceptions of the family, morality, and even politics.

Winner of the 2011 RBY Scott Award from the Canadian Society of Biblical Studies/Société canadienne des études bibliquesThe God of the Bible favors a national people, Israel, and this is at the cost of the other nations. In fact, not being Israel usually means humiliation or destruction or simply being ignored by God. Reading the text “with the grain” or placing oneself within the chosen’s perspective may seem very well until one considers the unchosen. There is much regarding the unchosen that has not been explored in scholarly research, but in this important work, Lohr attempts to make sense of the question of election and nonelection in the OT as a Christian interpreter and with a concern for the history of interpretation and Jewish-Christian dialogue.He also corrects a Christian tendency to read election and nonelection as love and damnation, respectively, a perception that is altogether foreign to the OT itself. The unchosen are important to the overall world view of Scripture and, although election entails exclusion, and God’s love for the one people Israel is a love in contrast to others, it does not follow that the unchosen fall outside of the economy of God’s purposes, his workings, or his ways. The unchosen often face important tests of their own and have a responsibility to God and the chosen, however much this idea defies modern-day notions of fairness. It is a central idea of Scripture that already appears in the original call of and promises made to Abram and something that, if ignored, places our larger understanding of God at risk.Equally important, if contemporary faith communities (both Jewish and Christian) form their understanding of “the other” on a faulty reading of Scripture regarding the unchosen, chaos and hatred can ensue. The political and religious climate of our contemporary world has never presented a more important time to get this matter right. Scholars and students alike are finding Chosen and Unchosen to be an indispensable resource as they mull over these difficult questions.