Resident Theologian

"This short history of the twentieth century is not a philosophical treatise. But at this point I am compelled to add two brief digressions. The first is a summary of my view of history, which goes contrary to the still very widely accepted categorical beliefs of why and how history happened and happens, of course including that of the Second World War. The current, often deemed 'scientific' belief is that history, perhaps especially in the democratic age, is the result of great material and economic factors, of which the lives, acts, and thoughts of people are largely the consequences. That is less than a half-truth. In 1933, Hitler came to power in Germany not just because of the economic crisis of 1930–1933, but because of the political mood of many Germans at that time. It was not the state of the British economy that made the British government reluctant to resist Hitler in the Thirties. It was not inferiority of materials or armaments that led to the collapse of Fra…

"In short, if the doctrine of creation from nothing means ... that even prior to being created, creatures are not absolutely nothing insofar as they are grounded in the Word, it also implies that creatures, as created, are absolutely nothing apart from God. The richness of divinity not only lies behind creation's diversity as its presupposition (nothing but God), but also is an active presence that underlies and sustains every feature of that diversity at every moment of its existence (nothing apart from God). Not can this perspective be charged with compromising the integrity of creatures' relationship with God, as though that which has absolutely no existence part from God is reduced to the status of a puppet. Once again, the Trinitarian framework of the Christian doctrine of creation is crucial here, since the existence of creatures is rooted in the Word, whose very being establishes, within the divine life itself, a set of relationships whose constituent terms (viz., …

On Twitter yesterday I made an observation followed by a question. I said that Paul Griffiths' Decreation is, in my view, the most thought-provoking, stimulating, exhilarating work of systematic theology written since the first volume of Robert Jenson's systematics was published in 1997. Then I asked: What are other plausible candidates from, say, the last two decades?

I thought of half a dozen off the top of my head, then started adding others' replies to the list. See the (lightly curated) resulting list below.

A few preliminary comments, though. First, everything on the list was published (for the first time) in 1998 or later. That's arbitrary, but then, all lists are; that's what makes them fun.

Second, your mileage may vary, as mine does; I think some of these books are in a league of their own compared so some of the others. But I've tried to be broader than just my own preferences.

Third, candidates for this list are works of Christian systematic theo…