Hugenberger's mastery of all scholarship on the issue of marriage in the Bible and in the ancient near east is extremely impressive. Every argument in the book is well thought out and proven; every counter point that may be raised is present. This book is invaluable for a scholar wishing to deal with the particular issues of Biblical marriage as well as the broader topic of biblical law and theology. However, the book is a little difficult to read and I personally would not recommend it for the casual reader. Its density is however, a substantial benefit for the researcher.

"Are you saved?" evangelical Protestants ask. While salvation *from* sin, death, and condemnation is certainly crucial, it is only the beginning of Christian life. What are we saved *for*?Fr. George Maloney gives the ancient Catholic answer: we are saved for deification (divinization, theosis). The Mystery of Christ in You explores Saint Paul's mystical theology of deification. It is a brilliant, readable introduction to the Epistles of Paul, the doctrine of deification, and mystical theology.

This book was used to teach a New Testament Ethics Seminar at the Taiwan Baptist Theological Seminary in Taipei, Taiwan. The students found the author to be stimulating and fair in his handling of ethical issues related to the New Testament. Although the author made several suppositions based upon critical issues about dating, order and authorship, he insightfully presents a balanced comparative ethical summary of the material. He skillfully identifies key issues and then cogently presents them.

R. Maurice Hollingsworth, Ph.D. Taiwan Baptist Theological Seminary Taipei, Taiwan

This book represents an exhaustive and outstanding treatise in Pauline studies by J. Gresham Machen. Even after the better part of a century after these lectures were given, the book represents a monumental feat and is still one of the best studies of Paul in print.

Machen's lectures that are presented in this book were given at a time when Biblical criticism that rejected supernaturalism, Bible inspiration, and Biblical historicity was in full blossom. Many competing schemes had been developed to naturalize the musings of the Apostle Paul and to separate the Pauline epistles in every possible way from the alleged 'historical Jesus' of the naturalistic scholarship fad that prevailed in Biblical criticism at that time. This book represents a comprehensive rebuttal to many of these theories. Machen's critiques are complete; and they are devastating. By so thoroughly destroying the naturalistic theories that were forced onto Christianity in an effort to discredit it, Machen not only discredits these theories, he strongly affirms the orthodox tenets of the historic Christian faith in a very scholarly manner.

Machen, with relentless logic, systematically tackles several main thrusts of criticism and finds each of them wanting to the extreme. In the process, Machen discredits efforts to separate the religion of Paul from the religion of Peter, and thereby discrediting the view that the Christianity of Jerusalem and the Christianity of the dispersion were somehow different. This section was simply masterful, in my opinion. Machen then discredits theories that tried to contrast Paul and Jesus. These theories suggested that the Jesus of Paulinism was different than the real Jesus of Palestine. Again, Machen is relentless in discrediting this argument. Machen moves on to perhaps his best section, which is discussing the alleged pagan influences and/or origins of Paul's thought. Two complete chapters, and a portion of a third, are devoted to tackling this subject. In the process, the theories of Bousset, Bruckner, Reitzenstein and others are demonstrated to be an embarassment. Machen's treatment of the pagan influence issue here was probably the most resounding rebuke written until Nash's 'Gospel and the Greeks' was written in the late '80s. At a number of points, Nash draws significantly from Machen here, and put together, the two works represent a devastating case against pagan influences upon early Christianity.

Throughout this book, I was simply amazed at how thorough Machen was in considering so many objections and nuances that impact on the central question of the origin of Paulinism. I was also amazed that even though these lectures were given so long ago, they are extraordinarily relevant today. Yesterday's Boussets, Bruckners, and Reitzensteins are today's Crossans, Funks, and Borgs. The arguments are strikingly similar, and fueled by similar motivations - ie: to find a way to desupernaturalize Jesus Christ, the words of the Bible, and the Christian experience. This book by Machen, therefore, is truly timeless because it thoroughly discredited such arguments when they were in fashion 100 years ago, and can likewise be used by believers today to discredit the Jesus Seminar and other like minded contemporary 'scholars'.

This is not a book that the reader will be able to rush through. I found each chapter so engaging and so deep in its analysis that I needed to stop after each chapter because Machen had given my brain a serious workout. This is Reformed scholarship at its finest. Machen brilliantly shows that in an effort to 'demythologize' the Bible, naturalistic scholars are engaging in a great deal of myth-building themselves. The orthodox Christianity of the Apostle Paul is demonstrated to be in comprehensive harmony with the other apostles, the Old Testament writings, and the sayings of Christ Himself. An outstanding example of solid scholarship!

This is a great book for anyone who is truthfully looking for an account of the new testament, especially on Paul, in light of Judaism. The book is a compilation of a few essays in which Mr. Stendahl, a bishop from Sweden, displays an unusually gifted insight and discernment between Paul and the introspective Western conscience, which unfortunately plagues Christianity in America today. Anyone who reads this book will definitely be enlightened and will acquire a new, authoritative way of looking at Scripture.

Anyone who is interested in a more balanced and Biblical understanding of "eternal security" or "perseverance of the saints" should consult this book. Gundry-Volf does an excellent job presenting the traditional Reformed view of perseverance and security through the writings of Paul. The exegesis and detailed analysis of difficult warning passages are outstanding. The book is divided into four sections that deal with Paul's perspective on how believers continue in the salvation already given to them through faith in Christ. The first section deals with the various passages that speak of Paul's understanding of soteriological security. Passages that are examined include: Romans 8:29-30; Philippians 1:6; 1 Corinthians 1:8-9, and several others. According to Gundry-Volf, Paul strongly argued FOR eternal security throughout his letters. The second section deals with how immoral conduct affects Christians' security according to Paul. According to Gundry-Volf, ethical failure among true believers does NOT jeopardize their salvation as proven by passages in Romans 14:1-23; 1 Corinthians 8:7-13; 11:27-34, but can lead to spiritual impoverishment and divine chastisement (even leading to physical death). However, certain more "grievous" sins practiced as a lifestyle can call into question the reality of salvation among certain members of the visible church (1 Corinthians 5:1-5; 6:9-11; and Galatians 5:19-21). Therefore, sin cannot interrupt the continuance of a believer's salvation, but serious sins practiced as a lifestyle demonstrate an unregenerate heart. The third section deals with Paul's understanding of Israel's election and how Israel fits into Paul's understanding of eternal security, and how professing Christians show themselves to be unsaved by abandoning the true Gospel. Gundry-Volf does an excellent job showing that Paul believed that Israel as a whole would someday convert to Christ before the Parousia (Romans 11:26), and that Paul doesn't hold out hope for salvation to those who turn away from or resist the Gospel presenting by him (Galatians 5:1-4). The last section deals with how Paul understood his calling as an Apostle and how his readers would be affected by his Apostolic mission. According to Gundry-Volf, Paul wished to "win the race" for approval, not for salvation (1 Corinthians 9:27). He wanted to successfully bring as many people into the Kingdom so that he may receive an eschatological reward on top of his salvation. He didn't question his salvation, but only his effectiveness as an Apostle. However, he feared that his labour would be in vain if his readers didn't respond to the Gospel he presented in a favourable way. Yet, he didn't question the salvation of those who responded positively; only those who rejected the Gospel and his Apostleship were in danger of proving themselves as unregenerate. Gundry-Volf's book lacks the shallow proof-texting of some who have written books on the same topic (e.g., Dan Corner). This book is very scholarly and thoroughly exegetical. Every difficult passage is examined and explained. However, I would recommend readers to learn some Biblical Greek and modern German before tackling this book since Gundry-Volf tends to use many Greek phrases and cite many German scholars. Overall, this is an excellent book for those wanting a better understanding of this very important issue.

Donaldson sets out on an ambitious enterprise: to reexamine Paul's conception of the role Gentiles should be given and what their relationship to Judaism should be. Drawing upon an impressive range of scholarly work from Luther to Schweitzer to Bultmann to the history of religions school to E.P. Sanders, the author offers a way beyond the traditional scholarly renderings of Paul's mission and core convictions. The traditional way placed judicial language of faith and works as central; it saw Paul's Damascus experience as a turning away from Judaism to the Gentiles; it understood "Israel" in Romans 11 as nonethnic and universal. Donaldson calls into question all the old assumptions and, to put it crudely, puts the Jew back into Paul. This is an outstanding book and I believe will be referred to as the standard for understanding Paul's relationship to the Gentile world for many years. I highly recommend it. Thomas Jay Oord

Thielman's book is one of the most helpful treatments on this crucial area of biblical studies. His introduction, wherein he gives a thorough and concise treatment on the history of the debates, is alone worth the price of the book. He then takes the reader through all of the Pauline letters, examining their background, presuppositions, and arguments as it relates to Paul's both positive and negative view of the law. Thielman is a master at arguing convincingly for his position without wasting ink--and he is almost always a sure-footed guide through much rocky terrain. In my opinion, this is the best book available today on Paul's view of the law (with Tom Schreiner's _The Law and Its Fulfillment_ as a close second).

A compilation of for the most part excellent articles dealing with the topic, the Apostle Paul and the Mosaic Law. Some of the articles are not for the novice and presume some knowledge of biblical Greek. However, the book does provide a good introduction to what James Dunn refers to as, "the new perspective on Paul." This school of thought is making good headway in resolving longstanding tensions and apparent "contradictions" in Paul's treatment of the Jewish law versus justification by faith. Evangelicals in particular should be paying attention to such works though doing so necessitates reexamining certain presuppositions of Reformed theology, especially those relating to first century Palestinian Judaism. I recommend this to anyone wishing to explore this topic.

This book proposes that there was a lively sense of the individual self in persons in the Hellenistic world of the urban centres in which Paul lived and ministered, whereby individualistic behaviour was not unknown and where individuals were not simply determined by their culture and the group of which they were a part. This is in contrast to many recent sociological approaches to the New Testament which emphasise the collective over the individual. Hence it is argued that the individual is a central feature of Paul's letter to the Romans.
This book challenges the very strong emphasis put upon the collective in recent approaches to Paul's letter to the Romans, especially by sociologically based NT research, but also within the wider body of Romans research. It suggests that it is possible to maintain that Paul was vitally interested in the salvation of the individual, without having to revert to traditional Lutheran interpretations of the text.