“We no longer need to separate Paul from Judaism in order to claim his Christianness,” writes Gabriele Boccaccini, “nor do we need to separate him from the early Jesus movement in order to state his Jewishness.” With this guiding principle Boccaccini unpacks the implications of Paul’s belonging simultaneously to Judaism and Christianity to arrive at the surprising and provocative conclusion that there are in fact three paths to salvation: For Jews, adherence to Torah. For gentiles, good works according to conscience and natural law. For all sinners, forgiveness through faith in Jesus Christ. Paul’s Three Paths to Salvation is an attempt to reconcile the many facets of Paul’s complex identity while reclaiming him from accusations of intolerance. Boccaccini’s work in reestablishing Paul as a messenger of God’s mercy to sinners is an important contribution to the ongoing conversation about Paul’s place in the contemporary pluralistic world.

The decades-long effort to understand the apostle Paul within his Jewish context is now firmly established in scholarship on early Judaism, as well as on Paul. The latest fruit of sustained analysis appears in the essays gathered here, from leading international scholars who take account of the latest investigations into the scope and variety present in Second Temple Judaism. Contributors address broad historical and theological questions—Paul’s thought and practice in relationship with early Jewish apocalypticism, messianism, attitudes toward life under the Roman Empire, appeal to Scripture, the Law, inclusion of Gentiles, the nature of salvation, and the rise of Gentile-Christian supersessionism—as well as questions about interpretation itself, including the extent and direction of a “paradigm shift” in Pauline studies and the evaluation of the Pauline legacy. Paul the Jew goes as far as any effort has gone to restore the apostle to his own historical, cultural, and theological context, and with persuasive results.

"Besides Jesus, no one has kept me from despair, or taken me deeper into the mysteries of the gospel, than the apostle Paul." —John Piper No one has had a greater impact on the world for eternal good than the apostle Paul—except Jesus himself. For John Piper, this impact is very personal. He does not just admire and trust Paul. He loves him. Piper gives us thirty glimpses into why his heart and mind respond this way. Can a Christian-killer really endure 195 lashes from a heart of love? Can a mystic who thinks he was caught up into heaven be a model of lucid rationality? Can an ethnocentric Jew write the most beautiful call to reconciliation? Can a person who lives with the unceasing anguish of empathy be always rejoicing? Can a man's description of the horrors of human sin be exceeded by his delight in human splendor? Can a man with a backbone of steel be as tender as a nursing mother? If we know this man—if we see what Piper sees—we too will love him. Paul's testimony is a matter of life and death. Piper invites you into his relationship with Paul in the hope that you will know life, forever.

From the author of the bestselling novel The Shack and the New York Times bestsellers Cross Roads and Eve comes a compelling, conversational exploration of twenty-eight assumptions about God—assumptions that just might be keeping us from experiencing His unconditional, all-encompassing love. In his wildly popular novels, Wm. Paul Young portrayed the Triune God in ways that challenged our thinking—sometimes upending long-held beliefs, but always centered in the eternal, all-encompassing nature of God’s love. Now, in Wm. Paul Young’s first nonfiction book, he invites us to revisit our assumptions about God—this time using the Bible, theological discussion, and personal anecdotes. Paul encourages us to think through beliefs we’ve presumed to be true and consider whether some might actually be false. Expounding on the compassion fans felt from the “Papa” portrayed in The Shack—now a major film starring Sam Worthington and Octavia Spencer—Paul encourages you to think anew about important issues including sin, religion, hell, politics, identity, creation, human rights, and helping us discover God’s deep and abiding love.

Promotes an exciting new idea: Paul's gospel of Gentile inclusion is intrinsic to Israel's salvation promised in the Hebrew Bible.

In this volume Joshua Paul Smith challenges the long-held assumption that Luke and Acts were written by a gentile, arguing instead that the author of these texts was educated and enculturated within a Second-Temple Jewish context. Advancing from a consciously interdisciplinary perspective, Smith considers the question of Lukan authorship from multiple fronts, including reception history and social memory theory, literary criticism, and the emerging discipline of cognitive sociolinguistics. The result is an alternative portrait of Luke the Evangelist, one who sees the mission to the gentiles not as a supersession of Jewish law and tradition, but rather as a fulfillment and expansion of Israel’s own salvation history.

Religious pluralism is the greatest challenge facing Christianity in today's Western culture. The belief that Christ is the only way to God is being challenged, and increasingly Christianity is seen as just one among many valid paths to God. In Four Views on Salvation in a Pluralistic World, four perspectives are presented by their major proponents: Normative Pluralism: All ethical religions lead to God (John Hick) Inclusivism: Salvation is universally available, but is established by and leads to Christ (Clark Pinnock) Salvation in Christ: Agnosticism regarding those who haven't heard the gospel (Alister McGrath) Salvation in Christ Alone: Salvation depends on explicit personal faith in Jesus Christ alone (R. Douglas Geivett and W. Gary Phillips) This book allows each contributor to not only present the case for his view, but also to critique and respond to the critiques of the other contributors. The Counterpoints series presents a comparison and critique of scholarly views on topics important to Christians that are both fair-minded and respectful of the biblical text. Each volume is a one-stop reference that allows readers to evaluate the different positions on a specific issue and form their own, educated opinion.

The Epistle to the Romans remains the centerpiece of all serious Pauline theological research. Each of the major sections of Romans has received significant attention in recent scholarship, yet no consensus has emerged about how to read the opening chapters of Paul's most important letter, Romans 1-4. This collection of essays returns to the beginning of Paul's theological masterpiece to probe longstanding puzzles and to offer new readings and fresh insights on some of the most cherished chapters in the entire Pauline corpus.

For more than twenty years Douglas Moo’s NICNT volume on Romans has been providing pastors, students, and scholars with profound insight into Paul’s most famous letter. In this thorough revision of his commentary, Moo deals with issues that have come into prominence since the first edition (1996), incorporating the latest research and rewriting the text throughout for better comprehension. Exegetically astute and theologically minded, Moo interacts critically with the new perspective on Paul, highlights the emphasis in Romans on “practical divinity,” and traces the theme of the gospel throughout the letter. His Letter to the Romans in this second edition will inform and enlighten a new generation of serious Bible readers.

Covenant and the People of God gathers twenty-four essays from friends and colleagues of Messianic Jewish theologian and New Testament scholar Mark S. Kinzer, in honor of his seventieth birthday. The essays are organized around two central themes that have animated Kinzer’s work: the nature of the covenant and what it means to be the people of God. The volume includes fascinating discussions of some of the most sensitive areas related to Jewish-Christian dialogue, post-supersessionist interpretation of Scripture, and the theological shape of Messianic Judaism. Among the contributors are scholars working in North America, Europe, and Israel. They include: Gabriele Boccaccini, Douglas A. Campbell, Holly Taylor Coolman, Gavin D’Costa, Jean-Miguel Garrigues, Douglas Harink, Richard Harvey, Vered Hillel, Jonathan Kaplan, Daniel Keating, Amy-Jill Levine, Antoine Lévy, Gerald McDermott, Michael C. Mulder, David M. Neuhaus, Isaac W. Oliver, Ephraim Radner, Jennifer M. Rosner, David J. Rudolph, Thomas Schumacher, Faydra L. Shapiro, R. Kendall Soulen, Lee B. Spitzer, and Etienne Vetö.