This book offers a fresh and accessible approach to Bible study. Divine Symmetries engages thoughtful readers by revealing the astonishing symmetrical patternings and shaping techniques of the biblical writers. It invites the Bible to speak on its own terms, offering the key to remembering and interpreting Scripture. It asks and answers these questions: How did the oral world communicate? With what mnemonic conventions was Scripture conveyed in a largely oral world, and can those methods still be effective? The Bible was fashioned for the ear using popular symmetrical patterns and rhetorical devices that helped listeners remember without a ready 'text' for reference. These astonishing literary 'shapes' are both mnemonic devices and interpretative aids. They offer ideal paradigms for teaching the books, yet they have remained largely dormant under the guise of an alien medium the printed page. This book offers a captivating and highly visual approach that represents the cutting edge of contemporary biblical study."

When scientists peer through a telescope at the distant stars in outer space or use a particle-accelerator to analyze the smallest components of matter, they discover that the same laws of physics govern the whole universe at all times and all places. Physicists call the eternal, ubiquitous constancy of the laws of physics symmetry. Symmetry is the basic underlying principle that defines the laws of nature and hence controls the universe. This all-important insight is one of the great conceptual breakthroughs in modern physics and is the basis of contemporary efforts to discover a grand unified theory to explain all the laws of physics. Nobel Laureate Leon M. Lederman and physicist Christopher T. Hill explain the supremely elegant concept of symmetry and all its profound ramifications to life on Earth and the universe at large in this eloquent, accessible popular science book. They not only clearly describe concepts normally reserved only for physicists and mathematicians, but they also instill an appreciation for the profound beauty of the universe’s inherent design. Central to the story of symmetry is an obscure, unpretentious, but extremely gifted German mathematician named Emmy Noether. Though still little known to the world, she impressed no less a scientist than Albert Einstein, who praised her "penetrating mathematical thinking." In some of her earliest work she proved that the law of the conservation of energy was connected to the idea of symmetry and thus laid the mathematical groundwork for what may be the most important concept of modern physics. Lederman and Hill reveal concepts about the universe, based on Noether’s work, that are largely unknown to the public and have wide-reaching implications in connection with the Big Bang, Einstein’s theory of relativity, quantum mechanics, and many other areas of physics. Through ingenious analogies and illustrations, they bring these astounding notions to life. This book will open your eyes to a universe you never knew existed.

This work examines Thomas Forsyth Torrance's concern for the modern re-entrenchment of dualism as it has negatively affected the Christian faith and the realist knowledge of God in Christ. Additionally, an analysis is made of Torrance's program to faithfully restore theological thinking, theological science, and true objectivity out of the Christocentric-Trinitarian self-disclosure of God via the modern return to critical realist epistemology in the physical sciences (e.g., Einstein, Polanyi). The study concludes with a critical examination of the adequacy and completeness of Torrance's endeavor (the problem of residual dualism) in the light of his own theological and redemptive concerns.

The futures seems to be full of promise and excitement. Certainly at no time for nearly a millenium and a half has the opportunity for genuine theology been greater, since the ground has been cleared in the remarkable way of the old dualist and atomistic modes of thought that have plagued theology for centuries. It is, therefore, up to us as theologians to develop theology on its own proper ground in this scientific context, if only because this is the kind of life and culture, and the kind of theology that can support the message of the Gospel to mankind, as, in touch with the advances of natural science, theology comes closer and closer to a real understanding of the creation as it came from the hand of God.

This is the third volume in the Single Monad Model of the Cosmos series. The second volume introduced the Duality of Time Theory, which provided elegant solutions to many persisting problems in physics and cosmology, including super-symmetry and matter-antimatter asymmetry. In addition to uniting the principles of Relativity and Quantum theories, this theory can also explain the psychical and spiritual domains; all based on the same discrete complex-time geometry. Super-symmetry, and quantum gravity, are realized only with the two complementary physical and psychical worlds, while the spiritual realm is governed by hyper-symmetry, which mirrors the previous two levels together, and all these three realms mirror the ultimate level of absolute oneness that describes the symmetry of the divine presence of God and His Beautiful Names and Attributes. This "ULTIMATE SYMMETRY" is a modern scientific account of the same ancient mystical, and greatly controversial, theory of the "Oneness of Being" that is often misinterpreted in terms of "pantheism", but it is indeed the concluding gnostic knowledge of God and creation. Otherwise, how can we understand the origin of the cosmos, with both or either of its corporeal and incorporeal realms, without referring to its Originator! In the literal sense, ultimate or perfect symmetry may seem to be trivial, because it means that all possible transformations in such a symmetric system are invariant. The system we are talking about here is the whole Universe that we are watching and experiencing its immense and sometimes shattering changes every moment of time. Yet many great philosophers, such as Parmenides and Ibn al-Arabi, maintained their firm belief that reality is unchanging One and existence is timeless and uniform, while all apparent changes are mere illusions induced by or in our sensory faculties. Nevertheless, since we are living inside it, this illusion is as good as reality for us. Therefore, we still need to explain how the Universe is being formulated. Only when are able to transcend beyond the current chest of time, we shall discover that we were living a dream, and we shall be able to see the whole Universe as unchanging symmetry. The Single Monad Model and the resulting Duality of Time Theory provide the link between this apparent dynamic multiplicity of creation and the ultimate metaphysical oneness. In fact, the complex-time geometry concludes that we are imagining the reality because we are observing it from a genuinely imaginary time dimension. Since the ultimate reality is One, we cannot view it from outside, because there is none! Thus, as we quoted in the Introduction, in the Book of Theophanies, Ibn al-Arabi ascribes to God as saying: Listen, O My beloved! I am the conclusive entity of the World. I am the center of the circle (of existence) and its circumference. I am its simple point and its compound whole. I am the Word descending between heaven and earth. I have created perceptions for you only to perceive Me. If you then perceive Me, you perceive yourself. But don't ever crave to perceive Me through yourself! It is through My Eyes that you see Me and see yourself. But through your own eyes you can never see Me! This Theophany of Perfection summarizes the Ultimate Symmetry between the single point and the encompassing space. It also summarizes the instantaneous process of creation, or re-creation, which is breaking this symmetry into the two arrows of time, that produce particles and anti-particles, and then restoring it through each subsequent annihilation. This reunion is also the fundamental cause of motion, which is formulated as the Principle of Love that leads to the stationary action that is the initial assumption of most physics theories including Relativity and Quantum Field theories.

Two questions regarding contemporary theological and philosophical studies are often overlooked: “Is God infinite or finite?” and, “What does it mean to say that God is infinite?” In The Infinity of God, Benedikt Paul Göcke and Christian Tapp bring together prominent scholars to discuss God’s infinitude from philosophical and theological perspectives. Each contributor deals with a particular aspect of the infinity of God, employing the methods of analytic theology and analytic philosophy. The essays in the first section examine historical issues from a systematic point of view. The contributors focus on the Cappadocian Fathers, Thomas Aquinas, Leibniz, Kant, Hegel, Bolzano, and Cantor. The second section deals with particular issues concerning the relation between God's infinity and both the finitude of the world and the classical attributes of God: eternity, simplicity, omnipresence, omnipotence, omniscience, and moral perfection. There are some books that deal with the notion of infinity in mathematics and in general philosophy, but no single text brings together the best analytic philosophers and theologians tackling the various aspects of the infinity of God and the correlated problems. This book will interest students and scholars in philosophy of religion, theology, and metaphysics. Contributors: Benedikt Paul Göcke, Christian Tapp, Franz Krainer, Adam Drosdek, William E. Carroll, Christina Schneider, Ruben Schneider, Robert M. Wallace, Bruce A. Hedman, Bernhard Lang, Richard Swinburne, Kenneth L. Pearce, William Hasker, Paul Helm, Brian Leftow, Ken Perszyk, Thomas Schärtl, and Philip Clayton.

Focused Biblical Scholarship to Teach the Text The Teach the Text Commentary Series utilizes the best of biblical scholarship to provide the information a pastor needs to communicate the text effectively. The carefully selected preaching units and focused commentary allow pastors to quickly grasp the big idea and key themes of each passage of Scripture. Each unit of the commentary includes the big idea and key themes of the passage and sections dedicated to understanding, teaching, and illustrating the text. The newest Old Testament release in this innovative commentary series is Kenneth C. Way's treatment of Judges and Ruth.

Two questions are braided together in Luke’s Gospel. Who is Jesus, and what does it mean to be his student and apprentice? The church has spent much of its intellectual energies on the first question, but not so much on the second. We are precise in our Christology and vague in our Discipleology (my new word!). Of the four biographies that open the New Testament, Luke is perhaps the best equipped to answer the question of what it means to follow Jesus along with others, and what we can expect in the process. Luke’s Gospel is dense with story after story about Jesus’s stumbling, goofy, persistent disciples. And his second volume—Acts—continues the tale. There is a deep continuity, as Luke teaches, between Jesus’s original disciples and the ones who later declared their allegiance to him after his resurrection. We walk in the footsteps of pioneers in this new way of living with a Jesus who is always near but just beyond sight. The aim of this book is to plunder the fruits of New Testament scholarship, especially the tools of rhetorical and narrative criticism, to highlight what an incredible adventure came with the call to follow me.