In Religion Scholarship, New Takes on Timeless Topics

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OCTOBER 2014 VOL. 64

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Feature

Religion Update

Biblical Scholarship:
Old Characters, Fresh
Readings
By Kristin Swenson

heres a scene early in the recent

film Noah in which Noah plants
a seed from the garden of Eden.
It sprouts and spreads into a lush
and glorious forest as quickly as
critics scrambled to find biblical
precedent. The movie garnered righteous
indignation over its fast and loose use of
Genesis, but it reflects a two-part quest
that is evident this year even in the most
serious publishing on the Bible: to reconsider how we read and interpret biblical
texts, and to illuminate biblical characters who endure as subjects of interest.
THE PROBLEM OF THE
BIBLE
Fundamental to understanding the Bible
is appreciating its problematic nature. In
Short Stories by Jesus: The Enigmatic Parables
of a Controversial Rabbi (HarperOne,
Sept.), Amy-Jill Levine revisits the parables with an eye to how even these simple
and straightforward stories unsettle and
challenge. The success of Seriously Dangerous Religion: What the Old Testament Really
Says and Why It Matters (Aug.) by Iain
Provan might indicate that todays readers are especially willing to wrestle with
such problems; Carey Newman, director
of Baylor University Press, reports it has
been a popular textbook adoption.

In The Bible Tells Me So... Why Defending Scripture Has Made Us Unable to Read
It (HarperOne, Sept.), Peter Enns
addresses the problems of scripture from
the position of an evangelical Christian
who observes with candor and fresh
humor that too often faithful readers
approach the Bible with expectations it
is not set up to meet. Michael Maudlin,
senior v-p and executive editor at HarperOne, says that Enns deals with all the
problems [that come] with an overly literal understanding of the Bible without
sounding like he is being merely critical
or liberal.... Instead, [Enns] takes a C.S.
Lewislike stance of [asking], what
would any reasonable, faithful Christian
do when confronted with the facts?
THE BIBLES BEGINNINGS
The Bibles intriguing challenges and
promise for readers today are not unique
to our modern context, but reflect its
deepest past. A number of new books
discuss the Bibles origins during problematic times. Jennifer Banks, executive
editor at Yale University Press, calls Holy
Resilience: The Bibles Traumatic Origins by
David M. Carr (Nov.) a fascinating and
provocative reinterpretation of the
Bibles origins that tells of how the Jewish people and Christian community had
to adapt to survive multiple catastrophes. Paul N. Andersons From Crisis to
Christ: A Contextual Introduction to the
New Testament (Abingdon, Aug.) also
explores various historical crises that
provide the interpretive backdrop and
context for the faith of Israel and the
communities that produced the New
Testament texts, says David Teel, senior
editor at Abingdon.
In Reading Backwards: Figural Theology

and the Fourfold Gospel Witness (Baylor,

Nov.), Richard B. Hays investigates how
the gospel writers located Jesus identity
in the Hebrew scriptures. He pushes
readers to read backward with the
Evangelists to appreciate anew the mystery in Israels story. In The Gospel of the
Lord: How the Early Church Wrote the Story
of Jesus (Eerdmans, Aug.), Michael F. Bird
asks not only how the gospels took shape,
but also how they shaped the early Christian movement. And the development of
a single, favorite trope is at the heart of
The Good Shepherd: A Thousand-Year Journey from Psalm 23 to the New Testament by
Kenneth E. Bailey (IVP, Dec.) The book
is sure to get a lot of attention, says
Andrew Le Peau, associate publisher.
Reading anew for new times and
exploring how the Bible might illuminate issues of contemporary concern is at
the heart of N.T. Wrights Surprised by
Scripture: Engaging Contemporary Issues
(HarperOne, June). He asks, what does
the ancient text have to do with contemporary issues such as ordination of
women, environmental problems, and
terrorism? Race and class in modern
America receive thoughtful treatment in
Bonhoeffers Black Jesus: Harlem Renaissance
Theology and an Ethic of Resistance (Baylor,
Oct.). Author Reggie L. Williams shows
how Bonhoeffers experiences in Harlem
churches furthered the theologians
understanding of a Jesus who defies
racial supremacies in standing with the
oppressed.
STARRING ROLES
One notable current trend is reflected in
books about major characters in the biblical
narrative. The complexity of Herod the
W W W . P U B L I S H E R S W E E K LY. C O M 1

Religion Update
Great drives two new titles: The Many
Faces of Herod the Great by Adam Kolman
Marshak (Eerdmans, Nov.) and The True
Herod by Geza Vermes (Bloomsbury,
May). David, arguably the most developed human character in the Old Testaments sprawling cast, also
receives varying degrees of
attention in two new books.
David Wolpe contributes
David: The Divided Heart
(Sept.) to Yales Jewish Lives
series as a brief introduction.
Joel Baden writes that he
seeks to uncover the historical David by reaching back
through the accumulated
legend [and the] agenda of
the biblical text, into the
ancient world in which
David roamed. Roger Freet,
executive editor at HarperOne, says of Badens The Historical David: The Real Life
and Invented Hero (July) , now
in paperback, that he has
high hopes for course adoptions in the coming years.
Joseph of Arimathea: A Study in Reception
History by William John Lyons (OUP,
May) is one of the books in Oxfords new
Biblical Refigurations series, which associate editor Steve Wiggins explains are
not straightforward biographies. The
series seeks new angles of approach to
traditional characters, some of whom
have received less attention than the
usual suspects. Deborahs Daughters: Gender Politics and Biblical Interpretation by
Joy A. Schroeder (OUP, Mar.) investigates how the biblical Deborahs story
has driven and informed gender debates
throughout history.
Bart D. Ehrmans How Jesus Became
God: The Exaltation of a Jewish Preacher
(HarperOne, Mar.) has been a strong
success, says Freet. HarperOne distributed a pre-publication edition to evangelical scholar responders by mutual
agreement between all of the authors,
Freet reports, so that HarperOnes sister
imprint, Zondervan could publish a
counterargument, How God Became Jesus:

| Feature

The Real Origins of Belief in Jesus Divine

NatureA Response to Bart D. Ehrman
(Zondervan, Mar.). Jesse Hillman, senior
director of marketing at Zondervan, says,
This [conversation] will be a big topic
at the SBL.
Author Stephen J. Davis
writes that how memories of
the past are shaped by present
day concerns [italics in original] is at the heart of his
Christ Child: Cultural Memories of a Young Jesus (Yale,
May), which in exploring the
extrabiblical Paidika is not
so much about the Christ
child himself as about how,
and by whom, he was remembered.
Among biblical characters,
the winner for scholarly attention in 2014 appears to be
Paul. Thinking Through Paul:
A Survey of His Life, Letters, and
Theology by Bruce Longenecker and Todd D. Still
(Zondervan, Sept.) provides
an introduction, while Framing Paul: An Epistolary Biography by
Douglas A. Campbell (Eerdmans, Nov.)
asks not only what the letters might
reveal of Paul the historical man, but also
about the letters own biographies. Paul:
Apostle and Fellow Traveler by Jerry L.
Sumney (Abingdon, Nov.) also investigates the apostle through his letters, but
concentrates on what they reveal of Pauls
theology and beliefs. Remembering Paul:
Ancient and Modern Contests over the Image
of the Apostle by Benjamin L. White
(OUP, Oct.) shows how modern efforts to
recover the historical Paul reflect ancient
debates about the real Paul. And Barnabas vs. Paul: To Encourage or Confront? by
C.K. Robertson (Abingdon, Mar. 2015)
brings the lesser-known Barnabas into
conversation with Paul in an effort to
understand each man anew.
Noah director Darren Aronofsky
eschewed a literal reading of the biblical
text and allowed modern ecological concerns and contemporary preoccupations
to inform his screen adaptation of a mul-

2 P U B L I S H E R S W E E K LY O C T O B E R 6 , 2 0 1 4

In Reference to
Among the fall books publishers
hope will end up in personal and
university reference libraries:
The Fortress Commentary on the Bible
(Oct.), two hefty volumes, on the New
Testament and Old Testament.
Daniel: A Commentary (Westminster John
Knox, Nov.) by Carol A. Newsom.
Acquisitions editor Bridgett Green calls
it a powerhouse reference tool and textbook.
The New International Dictionary of New
Testament Theology and Exegesis, edited by
Moises Silva, revision editor (Zondervan,
Nov.), in five volumes.
The first of three volumes of The Acts of
the Apostles: A Newly Discovered Commentary by J.B. Lightfoot (IVP, Nov.), edited
by Ben Witherington III and Todd D.
Still.
The Oxford Handbook of the Psalms, edited
by William P. Brown (May), and The
Oxford Handbook of Apocalyptic Literature,
edited by John J. Collins (May) are volumes in a new Oxford Handbooks series
that provides critical background and
examines contemporary issues and current debates.
K.S.

tifaceted biblical narrative. However

critics evaluated the movie, there is general vindication for his approach in this
years crop of books about the Bible. Plasticity of characters and an earnest investigation of the ways we read the Bible
today can bring new insights to the
ancient book.
The Bible continues to matter, and
because the Bible is enormously complex, bears multiple meanings, and is as
dynamic as the world in which it lives,
biblical scholarship also matters.

Kristin Swenson is visiting associate professor

of religious studies at the University of
Virginia and the author of Bible Babel:
Making Sense of the Most Talked About
Book of All Time (Harper Perennial).

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Feature

Globalism and race are hot in history;

evangelicalism makes a comeback

From the Margins

By Jana Riess
to the Center

generation ago, church history

was the trending topic in American religious history books,
with Protestant titles dominating. Sidney Ahlstroms 1972
doorstopper, A Religious History
of the American People (Yale), was the
granddaddy of them all, exploring
American Christianity in a magisterial
fashion from its European antecedents to
its post-Puritan flowering. The tome
offered brief nods to Judaism and African-American religion, but next to nothing about Islam or Asian religions.
Ahlstroms approach hasnt entirely
disappeared from the landscape of scholarly publishing on American religious
history; in fact, the book is Yales all-time
bestselling backlist title in this category,
with more than 60,000 copies sold in all
editions. But the relative simplicity of
Ahlstroms narrative, which placed
mainstream Christianity at the center
and other forms of religion on the margins, has been turned on its head by a
crop of new titles that redefine the fields
scope and methodology.
The story of
American religious
history is now being
told both about those
who live at the margins and by those living at the margins,
says Carey Newman, Carey Newman
director of Baylor University Press.
Popular topics in American religious
history reflect that movement toward the
margins, with a new emphasis on globalism, expanded attention to race, and
growing interest in atheism and Islam
(see A Scholarly Boom in Islam in this
issue). Meanwhile, evangelical Christian

history titles are enjoying a comeback,

but with a twist.
A GLOBAL OUTLOOK
I get feedback from manuscript reviewers that while theyre interested in American history, our world is so connected,
and it has been for so longeven though
we havent always recognized itthat
global/transnational perspectives really
should be considered, even if a books
focus is more explicitly on the United
States, says Sarah Stanton, senior acquisitions editor at Rowman & Littlefield.
R&Ls fall book The Jesuits: A History from
Ignatius to the Present by John W. OMalley
(Oct.) takes just such a global approach,
emphasizing the international reach of
the Jesuits missionary work and the fact
that the Argentine Pope Francis is particularly Jesuit.
Elaine Maisner, senior executive editor
at University of North Carolina Press,
cites global movement of religions as a
topic where she is seeing lots of activity.
One of UNCs lead titles for fall, The Call
of Bilal: Islam in the African Diaspora
(Oct.), covers black Muslim experiences
in the Americas, northern Africa, the
Middle East, South Asia, and Europe.
Fred Appel, executive editor at Princeton University Press, agrees that
American religious history, like the
field of American history more generally,
has developed a much more global outlook in recent years. Younger, up-andcoming scholars are more inclined to
adopt transnational perspectives and
examine how key moments in American
history have been informed by people,
events, and networks that transcend the
boundaries of this country.
One of Princetons lead titles for fall

4 P U B L I S H E R S W E E K LY O C T O B E R 6 , 2 0 1 4

exemplifies this trend.

Robert Wuthnows
Rough Country: How
Texas Became Americas
Most Powerful BibleBelt State (Aug.) may
appear on the surface
to be a straightfor- Fred Appel
ward sociological study of red America,
but Wuthnows keen attention in this
book to issues of migration and immigrationand in particular how attitudes
toward new immigrants from the south
and overseas have shaped Texan culture
typify the more global perspective of
recent scholarship, says Appel.
There are advantages to a global outlook, according to Jennifer Banks, executive editor at Yale University Press. Thematically, she says, People seem to be
looking at how religion crosses borders,
both theoretically and in practice. Yales
winter title A Path in the Mighty Waters:
Shipboard Life and Atlantic Crossings to the
New World (Jan. 2015) explores the spiritual and cultural conversions that sometimes happened on board in the 18th
century.
Pushing the boundaries of American
religious history is not just better scholarship but better business, Banks says.
In an era of global publishing, we are
trying to find books that will work well
in our export markets, and we are slightly
less domestically focused. That said, we
do still see American history as a key part
of our publishing program.
RACE AND BORDER
CROSSINGS
Scholars are also looking to the topic of
race to investigate histories that have not
been told beforeor to rediscover old
stories through new lenses. For example,
there is practically a cottage industry of
historical books about WWII theologian
and martyr Dietrich Bonhoeffer, but virtually nothing until now about the critical period he spent studying at Union
Theological Seminary in New York,
where he attended the Abyssinian Baptist Church in Harlem week after week.
Reggie L. Williamss Bonhoeffers Black

MICHELLE KOMIE

Religion Update

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Religion Update

| Feature

SBLs Publishing Program Evolves

DANIEL DUBOIS

The Society of Biblical Literature has long published

books, but on July 1, 2014, the society renamed its
publishing program SBL Press, creating a new identity as
a scholarly publishing house. The AAR/SBL conference in
San Diego marks the official launch of the new press.
SBL executive director John Kutsko says SBLs publishing program has always served its members by publishing
John Kutso
books that would help them get tenure and other promotions, as well as contribute to the work of the academy. But in 2013, we began to
see real growth, especially in the library market, Kutsko says, and SBL Press
will make our members work more visible in the wider book market.
From 2010 to 2014, SBL publications saw nearly 30% growth in net book sales
revenue. With the rebranding as SBL Press, a focused institutional strategy to
libraries, and the publication of every new frontlist title simultaneously in hardcover,
paperback, and digital formatsrather than only in paperback, as had been the case
beforeKutsko expects to build on that growth. In 2014, SBL Press will publish
37 new titles, almost twice the number the society published in 2010.
At this years AAR/SBL, SBL Press will debut the first critical edition of the
Hebrew Bible to follow an eclectic text-critical approach; it will also announce or
release books from several new series. And demonstrating that the moderns have
no corner on lustful stirrings, Peter Bing and Regina Hscheles translation of
Aristaenetuss Erotic Letters (Apr.) or, as SBL Press likes to call it, Fifty Shades of
Greekin the Writings from the Greco-Roman World series has already
received particular attention.
Henry L. Carrigan Jr.

Jesus: Harlem Renaissance Theology and the

Ethic of Resistance (Baylor, Sept.) traces
how Bonhoeffer was influenced by Adam
Clayton Powell Sr. to consider race and
justice, and how Bonhoeffer applied that
knowledge to his Christian life after he
returned to Germany.
At Penn State, a two-volume history
aims to chronicle the relationship
between gospel music and freedom in
American history. Robert Dardens Nothing but Love in Gods Water: Black Sacred
Music from the Civil War to the Civil Rights
Movement straddles several academic
fields (religion, African-American studies, music); the first volume releases in
October. Acquisitions editor Kathryn B.
Yahner says one of her greatest challenges
in the field of American religious history
today is to meet the growing demands
of readers looking for a more nontraditional telling of the story of religion in
the life of America.
Nontraditional could describe Roberto

Ramn Lint Sagarenas interdisciplinary

study Aztln and Arcadia: Religion, Ethnicity, and the Creation of Place, an innovative book from NYU Press (Sept.). After
the Mexican-American War, many different ethnic groups had to renegotiate their
sense of identity to make sense of their
place in North America, says NYU
senior editor Jennifer Hammer. The volume not only makes a contribution to the
growing field of Chicano/a religious studies but also to the study of religion and
race in America more broadly.
Immigration studies is a trend within
the overall study of race, say some editors.
Why, where, and when do people cross
borders? Once here, how do they respond
to existing residents and to other immigrants? At the University of Georgia
Press, Deborah Dash Moores Urban Origins of American Judaism (Oct.) is as much
about urban and immigrant experiences
as it is about Judaism in America, says
editor-in-chief Mick Gusinde-Duffy.

6 P U B L I S H E R S W E E K LY O C T O B E R 6 , 2 0 1 4

Overall, attention to race has paid off

for many presses. At Princeton, the bestselling backlist title in American religious
history continues to be Gods Long Summer:
Stories of Faith and Civil Rights by Charles
Marsh. First published in 1997 and
repackaged in 2008 with a new preface by
the author, the book has sold 16,700 copies in all editions. The civil rights movement is of course much studied at the college level, and the strong religious underpinning to the movement makes it a
popular object of study in departments of
religious studies and in seminaries and
divinity schools, says Princetons Appel.
And more recently, UNCs The Color of
Christ: The Son of God and the Saga of Race
in America by Edward Blum and Paul Harvey has sold around 8,000 copies since it
was released in fall 2012.
ATHEISM ON THE RISE
Although the trend is still small, books
on atheism and secularism are gaining
ground in scholarship on American religious history. NYU now has a Secular
Studies series edited by Phil Zuckerman,
whose 2008 book Society Without God:
What the Least Religious Nations Can Tell
Us About Contentment was a surprise
strong seller for the press, Hammer says.
The series first installment will be out
next year, examining how religiously
unaffiliated parents choose to address
religion in raising their children.
Stanford University Press has Faith as
an Option: Possible Futures for Christianity
(Sept.), Hans Joass argument for religious and secular perspectives to mutually enrich one another. But not all university presses are jumping on the secularism bandwagon. There is a slight
uptick in this area, says Georgias
Gusinde-Duffy, but in the U.S., many
booksellers, librarians, and citizens
remain deeply suspicious and uncomfortable around the topic of atheism.
EVANGELICALS ARE
BACK, WITH A TWIST
Books on evangelical history have never
gone away, but they did lose steam after
the upsurge in evangelical scholarship in

Feature |

Religion Update

Mormon Studies Sees

Steady Growth
Oxford has emerged as the major player in Mormon studies
and has been releasing several titles a year. Senior editor
Theo Calderara identifies Paula Kelly Harlines The Polygamous Wives Writing Club: From the Diaries of Mormon Pioneer
Women (June) as one of the presss top-selling religion
books of 2014.
Hes also excited about a new title from Terryl Givens (profiled in this issue),
whose previous Mormon studies books (By the Hand of Mormon; When Souls Had
Wings, etc.), have succeeded commercially and critically for Oxford. Givenss
November release takes Mormon studies into terra nova: theology. Terryl is
attempting to do for Mormonism what has been done for Christianity for centuries, to lay down in somewhat magisterial form the intellectual tradition of the
faith, Calderara says.
Also in the works at Oxford is historian W. Paul Reeves Religion of a Different
Color: Race and the Mormon Struggle for Whiteness (Feb.). Oxford calls the book the
most thorough telling to date of Mormonisms tortured relationship with blacknessincluding the religions racial priesthood ban, in place until 1978, as well
as white Mormons own struggle with being perceived as racially inferior. The
press also has the essay collection The Oxford Handbook to Mormonism in the pipeline for late next year.
Cambridge University Press published the multi-author book Seeking the Promised
Land: Mormons and American Politics (July). Editor Lewis Bateman says it is one of
the first books to analyze the impact of Mormons on politics, and it is timely given
the emergence of Mormons like Mitt Romney onto the national political scene.
The University of Georgia Press has a manuscript in development about a murdered Mormon missionary in Appalachia. According to editor-in-chief Mick
Gusinde-Duffy, it explores interesting questions of faith, class, and gender.
Meanwhile, Harvard has released the paperback version of John G. Turners 2012
biography, Brigham Young: Pioneer Prophet (Oct.). Joyce Seltzer, senior executive editor for history and contemporary affairs, says the cloth edition has sold around
10,000 copies and is the presss top-selling book in American religious history.
Whats next for Mormon studies? Calderara foresees disciplinary diversification
as the field expands from its core in American history to encompass international
perspectives, sociological research, and philosophy. 
Jana Riess

the 80s and 90s. Some publishers continue to reap the benefits of that renaissance period. Oxford, for example, says
its strongest backlist title in American
religious history is George Marsdens
Fundamentalism in American Culture, first
published in 1980, which has sold tens
of thousands of copies in two editions.
Also at Oxford, Randall Balmers popular Mine Eyes Have Seen the Glory: A Journey
into the Evangelical Subculture in America
has just been repackaged in a special
25th-anniversary edition (Sept.)

But todays books on evangelicalism

are as likely to focus on the ways that
evangelicals themselves, once on the
margins of the American religious establishment, have become consummate
insiders. Joyce Seltzer, senior executive
editor for history and contemporary
affairs at Harvard University Press, says
Americas Pastor: Billy Graham and the
Shaping of a Nation by Grant Wacker
(Nov.) will trace the evangelists enduring influence on American theology and
media. Another Harvard release, also

slated for November, American Apocalypse:

A History of Modern Evangelicalism by Matthew Avery Sutton, shows evangelical
prophecy beliefs becoming mainstream.
If books on evangelicalism are chronicling the overall movement from the
margins to the center, this especially
includes segments of evangelicalism that
have historically been even further out on
the periphery. UNCs Maisner observes
that Pentecostal studies is an up-andcoming field, and Baylors Newman predicts Pentecostal theology will be particularly important. Amos Yongs
Renewing Christian Theology (Baylor,
Aug.) vividly reflects the explosion and
creative influence of Pentecostalism in
America, he notes. The fortunes of the
Christian church in America are tied to
the future of what was once at the
edgesthe renewal movements of charismatic and Pentecostal traditions. Margins now matter.

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Religion Update

Feature

The Business of Scholarly Publishing

By Henry L. Carrigan Jr.

he shape of publishing continues to shift, but academic presses

still face the perennial questions: audience, sales, course
adoptions, a shrinking library
market. There are new issues,
too, such as how to use evolving digital
formats and how to price them. Although
a rarified enterprise in some ways, publishing scholarly books in religion is a
business like any otherits all about
identifying the customers and figuring
out how to get them to buy, all while running a commercially viable operation.
EVERYMAN VS. THE
PROFESSOR
As the library channel contracted and
online used booksellers began to raid sales
of course books, many scholarly presses
turned to publishing trade books, hoping
to reach general, nonspecialist readers and
expand their markets. Some continue that
enterprise, but others are refocusing on
their core audiences: scholars, libraries,
and students. As Jeff Crosby, associate
publisher and director
of sales and marketing at InterVarsity
Press, says, We are
virtually 50-50 academic versus trade,
and academic has
Jeff Crosby
grown as a percentage steadily over the past decade, with far
more emphasis now on textbook adoption. Patrick Alexander, director of Penn
State University Press, points to the
presss religion list as about 30% trade
and 70% scholarly.
Other publishers have broadened their
definition of trade to include church professionals. Westminster John Knoxs
executive editor, Robert A. Ratcliff, says
WJKs fall list is balanced pretty evenly
between books for academic, churchprofessional, and general-interest readers,
and title output for all three audiences

has grown in the past three years. Jon

Pott, editor-in-chief at Eerdmans, notes,
Our bona fide academic books are at
perhaps 60%, with most of the remaining targeted at a quite educated readership. Were very interested in bridging
the academy to the church.
About audiences, Carey Newman,
director at Baylor University Press, says,
We will do books in traditional subject
areas from senior scholars, but also from
emerging scholars, as well as books and
authors at the margins. We fold in a few
textbooks and then one or two surprises.
However, Newman says that after moving aggressively into the general trade
over the past several years, Baylor has
refocused its efforts. We believe in books
by scholars, for scholars.
HarperOne sells books into courses,
but doesnt segment its list into trade
and scholarly. Executive editor Roger
Freet says, Publishing the work of top
scholars remains a vital feature of our
program and core to our mission. All of
our projects are acquired, developed, and
promoted as books for the general
reader. Perhaps trying to move in that
direction, senior acquisitions editor Tony
Jones at Fortress Press says he is acquiring trade books written by scholars, but
also accessible to general readers; the new
line will be announced at the joint annual
meeting of the American Academy of
Religion/Society of Biblical Literature.
TO PRINT, OR NOT TO
PRINT?
As the emphasis swings between tradelike academic and formally academic
books for many religion publishers, and as
the demand for e-books slowly increases,
these presses seek ways to capture their
content in whatever format readers want
it. WJKs Ratcliff says, We now produce
all but a few of our books on a print-ondemand basis, and we continue to look for
more cost-effective ways to publish books

8 P U B L I S H E R S W E E K LY O C T O B E R 6 , 2 0 1 4

without sacrificing
quality. Jim Kinney,
associate publisher
and editorial director
of Baker Academic
and Brazos Press,
agrees: We think a
Jim Kinney
little more about the
tactile appeal of print editions. Our production departments attention to quality
is perhaps more important now than it
was 20 years ago, when readers had only
one choice of medium. He adds, We
start a few more books in hardcover than
we used to, so book lovers will be able to
own a really nice copy.
Religion presses also look more closely
now at prices and discounts. Penn States
Alexander says that with the drop in
library and institutional sales, Weve
had to print more copies to realize cost
savings, discount higher to allow others
to resell, and price lower to encourage
more individual sales. Eerdmanss Pott
says, Were having to be more aware
than we used to be to price in a way thats
savvy. Oxford senior editor Theo Calderara adds, We are more concerned about
list price than about discount. Getting
the price right is much more important
to the ultimate success of a book.
All scholarly religion publishers produce e-books and Web-based reference
products, but not all are convinced that
sales justify production costs. According
to Alexander, Were seeing more costs
for creating new formats and new workflows, but have not noticed a corresponding increase in purchasing for those new
formats. Users just dont seem to want
e-books for research. Newman states it
bluntly: We are just as e-innovative and
e-aggressive as any other publisher, but
we also remain committed to print,
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Religion Update

Feature

A Scholarly Boom
on Islam
By Marcia Z. Nelson and Jana Riess

ne rarely uses the term booming

in publishing these days, but
its fair to say that academic
publishing about Islam is
doing just that. New books are
diverse in subject matter and
house of origin, as this major religions
world-shaping influence is being more
closely examined.
University of North Carolina Press
has three installments in its Islamic
Civilization and Muslim Networks
series. Sahar Amers What Is Veiling?
(Sept.) will be joined in April 2015 by
Ebrahim Moosas What Is Madrasa? and
Bruce Lawrences Who Is Allah? Elaine
Maisner, senior executive editor at the
press, says more books are in the works
to join this series. Islamic studies is continuing to trend, she notes. We are
interested in Islamic studies beyond the
conventional link with fundamentalism,
and we are finding some interesting work
in the area of lived religion, and of progressive Islam.
For publishers that can successfully hit
the sweet spot in books on Islam in
Americathey need to be fresh enough
to merit scholarly attention, but also
mainstream enough for course adoptionthe rewards can be great. At NYU,
the 1998 title Servants of Allah: African
Muslims Enslaved in the Americas has sold
nearly 20,000 copies and was reissued in
2013 in a 15th-anniversary edition.
Oxford University Press has long had a
deep list on the subject, and several key
themes characterize its new titles in the
field. Senior editor Theo Calderara says
OUPs newest releases investigate the history of Islam (In Gods Path: The Arab Conquests and the Creation of an Islamic Empire
by Robert G. Hoyland, Oct.) and consider
the complex relationships of Islam and
politics (What Is an American Muslim?

Embracing Faith and Citizenship by Abdullahi

Ahmed An-Naim, Feb.). In addition to
producing its signature hefty handbooks
on aspects of Islam, the press is adding to
its Quranic studies program with such
titles as Feminist Edges of the Quran by
Aysha A. Hidayatullah (May).
The International Quranic Studies
Association, which will meet for the second time November 2124 as the American Academy of Religion and the Society
of Biblical Literature hold their concurrent conferences on November 2225 in
San Diego, signals a vigorous global
interest in Quranic studies. At Baylor
University Press, Michael Birkels Quran
in Conversation (Aug.) is a lead title for fall.
According to press director Carey Newman, the author tags along with younger
American Muslim scholars and clerics as
they read and interpret Islams sacred
text. The result is to watch the Quran
become an American scripture right
before your eyes. Trade publisher White
Cloud Press, which offers an Islamic
Encounters series, is releasing Structure
and Quranic Interpretation: A Study of Symmetry and Coherence in Islams Holy Text by
Raymond Farrin (Oct.), who teaches at
the American University of Kuwait.
Sharmila Sen, executive editor-at-large
at Harvard University Press, says American scholarship takes only one of many

10 P U B L I S H E R S W E E K L Y O C T O B E R 6 , 2 0 1 4

possible approaches to global Islam. I

see a new focus emerging on the concept
of the global public sphere, she says. The
Lives of Muhammad by Kecia Ali (Oct.;
Reviews, p. 20; Profiles, p. 12), an associate
professor of religion at Boston University, examines the ways in which stories
about Muhammads character and life
have repurposed early materials for
new cultures and circumstances. Sen
also has observed in the past decade a
turn away from Arab-centered scholarship to the study of Islam in other
regions where the faith has flourished.
Harvard has a book forthcoming on
Islamic influence in West Africa, Timbuktu and Beyond: Rethinking African
Intellectual History by Ousmane Kane,
who teaches contemporary Islamic
religion and society at Harvard Divinity
School.
Sarah Stanton, senior acquisitions editor
at Rowman & Littlefield, agrees on the
importance of assessing Islams global
impact. The press is publishing Reasoning
with God: Reclaiming Shariah in the Modern Age by Khaled Abou El Fadl (Oct.),
who chairs the Islamic studies program
at UCLA. The hefty book (580 pages)
takes readers into an in-depth discussion of ethics in Islam, she says, weaving
into the narrative personal stories about
Islamic jurisprudence.
The wave of publishing about Islam is
likely to keep building as a cohort of new,
younger scholars comes of age in the
academy. Amir Hussain, editor of the
Journal of the American Academy of Religion, remembers his first time at AAR in
1992, when fewer than 100 people were
specializing in Islamic studies. Fast forward 20 years, and now there are 400 of
us specialists in Islam, he says. Some of
those scholars will undoubtedly produce
informed yet accessible books for the
general trade. How do you tell that
story and write in a way thats engaging? asks Hussain, who is himself working on a book for Baylor University Press
about Muslim contributions to American history and culture. What you need
are authors who have the training and

expertise.

JEWISH LIGHTS

Religion Update

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Profiles

Depending on whom you ask, Muhammad may be either the last prophet or
merely an ambitious man. Now, in The
Lives of Muhammad (Harvard, Sept.;
Reviews, p. 20), Kecia Ali, associate professor of religion at Boston University,
tries to fill in the missing pieces and
shape a complete portrait of the founder
of Islam.
The book has two target audiences, Ali
sayscolleagues who study religion and
Islam, and laypeople, Muslim and otherwise. Muslims and non-Muslims often
view each other as decadent or repressive, but they really are speaking the same
language, says Ali. They just dont know
it, because so many of todays ideas about
Muhammad have been influenced over the
past two centuries by Western thought.
Supporters and critics both assume
they know the story of his life, says Ali,
adding that her purpose isnt to prove
anyone wrong, but to show the diverse
aspects of Muhammads life and how the
story has changed over time.
For early Muslim authors, for example,
Muhammads first marriage to the prosperous widow Khadija served as a key
point on his journey to becoming a
prophet, while non-Muslim authors
cited it as evidence of his calculating
ambition, says Ali, noting that today the
marriage is seen instead, by both Muslim
and non-Muslim authors, as a portrait of
Muhammad as a man and husband.
Ali, who converted to Islam in college,

is president of the Society for the Study of

Muslim Ethics, and previously published
Sexual Ethics and Islam (2006); Marriage
and Slavery in Early Islam (2010); and
Imam Shafii: Scholar and Saint (2011).
Though scholars debate whether drawing an accurate picture of the historical
Muhammad is possible, a standard narrative, drawing on a handful of early
Muslim sources, has come to dominate
nearly all accounts of his life, she says.
Previously, Muslim thinkers wrote about
Muhammad in a variety of genres with
attention to his cosmic role and glory.
Christian writers did not attempt to retell
his life in full, but tried to refute his doctrines by denigrating his reputation.
From medieval speculation about
whether Muhammad was demon possessed to early modern questions about
whether he actually received divine revelation, views of Muhammad changed
dramatically over the centuries. The
Enlightenment led to a new perspective
on religious figures, she says, and from
about the mid-19th century on, accounts
of his life, both pro and con, are virtually
indistinguishable.
Todays Muhammad, she writes, is a
shared creation illustrating not a clash
of civilizations but a common, if contested, modernity.  Lauren Yarger

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Religion Update
instructed to reject, among people you
might have been taught to think of as
morally inferior. Imagine no longer
belonging in the company of those who
claim to embody the will of God by their
words and actions. This is the experience
of those who find themselves no longer
able to obey the dictates of their Haredi
(ultra-Orthodox) communities and must
come out, leaving behind everything
and everyone they have known.
In her new book, Becoming Un-Orthodox:
Stories of Ex-Hasidic Jews (Oxford, Nov.),
Lynn Davidman, the Robert M. Beren
Distinguished Professor of Modern
Jewish Studies and professor of sociology
at the University of Kansas, reports a
series of conversations with defectors
from Hasidic and other ultra-Orthodox
communities. What causes the dissonance
between their personal worldview and the
idealized worldview of their community?
What makes them abandon their
obedience to sacred communal rules and
compels them to leave their communities?
In Becoming Un-Orthodox, Davidman
concludes that the things that define us
religiouslywhich can shift and fail
are not just beliefs but habitual practices
that symbolize the values of the community, such as ritual bathing, particular
modes of dress, and rules of comportment. She observes that those who leave
ultra-Orthodoxy go through similar
stages of divesting themselves of such
observances. Those practices no longer
make sense, and they begin to adjust their
behavior to the rules of the wider culture.
Davidmans interest in the topic is
deeply personal: she is herself ex-Orthodox, although she was raised Modern
Orthodox in the 1950s and 60s, in a
denomination that was then more liberal
than any form of Orthodoxy is today.
When her mother died when Davidman
was very young, she began to question
her faith and over time became vocal
about the moral hypocrisy she saw in the
community. Finally, during her undergraduate years at Barnard, Davidman
decided to live in the dormitories, as
many other college students did. She
says, I wanted a life of my own, but to

14 P U B L I S H E R S W E E K L Y O C T O B E R 6 , 2 0 1 4

| Profiles

my father this choice amounted to leaving my family, and he believed I was

already too heavily influenced by general
culture. Her decision finalized the break
in Davidmans own commitment to
Orthodoxy. She was disowned and disinherited, left to navigate life on her own.
Her courage must have been considerable, but as wrenching as her situation
was, says Davidman: I had not grown up
isolated from the general culture like
Haredi Jews were. I knew how to comport myself and could negotiate a way to
finish my education. By contrast,
Davidman writes of one young Haredi
woman who told her, It wasnt clear to
me how you left. I mean how you physically did it. Where you went. How you
got money. How you even had the right
clothes to go.... I didnt know a soul outside of my community. Davidmans own
struggles inform this moving collection
of stories of those who, in leaving their
ultra-Orthodox life behind, needed courage of an even higher order.

Chana Thompson Shor

Terryl Givens

Unlikely
Messenger of
Mormonism
If anyone had told Terryl Givens 30 years
ago that he would one day be a renowned
scholar of Mormon thought, he might
have laughed. But while his articles on
Byron and Romanticism seem like distant memories, Givenss early work in
comparative literature laid the groundwork for a flourishing career as an intellectual historian of Mormonism. His new
book, Wrestling the Angel: The Foundation
of Mormon Thought: Cosmos, God, Humanity
(Oxford, Nov.; Reviews, p. 20), is the culmination of that groundbreaking work.
In his first book, The Viper on the Hearth,

by

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Religion Update
published in 1997, Givens, professor of
religion and literature and James A.
Bostwick Chair of English at the
University of Richmond, plumbed how
depictions of Mormonism in popular fiction shaped cultural understandings of
the faith and its vexed relationship to
American society. That book altered the
trajectory of my career, Givens says, for
I realized I could use the tools of literary
analysis to begin to look at religious
texts, especially the Book of Mormon,
and their impact on culture.
In the years since, Givens has
approached the history of the Mormon
faith not through the lens of theological
analysis but with close readings of the
scriptures of Mormonism, producing such
books as By the Hand of Mormon: The
American Scripture That Launched a New
World Religion (2003) and The Book of
Mormon: A Very Short Introduction (2009).
In contrast to his earlier books, which
focused on the history and development

| Profiles

of the Book of Mormon itself, Wrestling

the Angel Givens unearths in that scripture key elements of Mormon theology
a cosmology that locates human identity
in a premortal world; a view of human life
as an enlightening ascent rather than a
catastrophic fall
Theology has never found a comfortable
place in Mormon thought, Givens points
outthe religion is focused more on prophets and revelation than on dogma. But
through his close readings of the Book of
Mormon, Givens says it became apparent it
contained any number of theological topics.
Mormonism doesnt have a magisterium
or an official catechism, he says. I had to
sift out doctrines, dogmas, and practices.
Wrestling the Angel is Givenss examination of Mormon religious history and
theological development through the
Book of Mormon. [It] is the most widely
distributed book in American history, he
notes, and by looking at its reception and
its impact on culture we can have a better

informed study of Mormon thought.

Wrestling the Angel is an intellectual history, Givens says, an attempt to situate the
development of that thought in the wider
history of ideas of the 19th century.
Givens says his training in comparative
literature equips him to ask broad questions about the relationship of scriptural
stories to cultural ideas, and his work in
literary analysis of texts enables him to
probe specific themes and meanings
embedded in the stories. Im really
happy that my training as an intellectual
and literary historian allows me to be at
the intersection of such an exciting and
growing interest in the Mormon faith.
Henry L. Carrigan Jr.

Jennifer Harvey

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Those Still Longing for Racial Reconciliation (Eerdmans, Nov.). Anyone who is white and
working within a set of visibly anti-racist
commitments worries about getting it
wrong, says Harvey, who is an associate
professor of religion at Drake University
in Des Moines, Iowa, and an ordained
minister in the American Baptist Church.
My job is to show as much authenticity
as I can. If Im wrong, someone will tell
me, and Ill respond.
Harveys title, Dear White Christians, is
intended to be a direct challenge. In the
book, she says, Im urging people to stop
asking the same questions weve been

Religion Update

asking for 40 years, like, How can white

Briggs distinguished professor of systemcommunities become more diverse? If we
atic theology at Union Theological Seminary
knew our history wed know that the
in New York City. That prompted her to
African-American community answered
attend Union, where she began to contend
this back in the 60s. Instead, Harvey
with her whiteness. I had teachers and
encourages church communities to
student peers who said, Thats great you
engage in what she calls concrete repair
love liberation theology and want to talk
of racial harm, which might mean that
about the Black Christ. But youre white.
white churches in Ferguson, Mo., give
What does that mean to you? You cant
their time and energy to holding the
talk about it the same way we do.
police department accountable.
Harvey does worry about the excessive
Harveys interest in issues surrounding
attention given to white people who write
race began while she was an undergraduabout race; it is misplaced, in her opinion.
ate in the late 80s and early 90s. I
White scholars willing to talk about race
became very serious about what it meant
get attention for saying the same things
to follow Jesus, she says. To me, followthat scholars of color have been saying for
ing Jesus meant thinking about homea long time, she notes.
lessness, and racial and gender justice. By
Writing about race and whiteness has
the time I graduated, racial justice was
often pulled Harvey into controversy,
something that kept me awake at night,
because of the events in Ferguson most
and Ive never stopped thinking about it.
recently, but also because some of her
During college Harvey encountered
Huffington Post blog posts have gone viral,
liberation theology and fell in love with
particularly the August 2013 post, For
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tracing
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evolution
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n
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of
the
worlds
most
famous
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n
of the worlds most famous
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time
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of
the
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Religion Update

Wisdom Publications
Wisdom Publications

$19.95
$19.95
TWENTY-FIRST-CENTURY
TWENTY-FIRST-CENTURY
BUDDHISTS IN
BUDDHISTS IN
CONVERSATION
CONVERSATION
Edited by Melvin McLeod

got 10s of thousands of likes and hundreds of comments. Addressing Dear

Parents of White Children, Harvey
argued that white parents must stop
using the sugary language of color
blindness with their kids. Children can
see that people are not all the same, and
parents should stop pretending they are,
she wrote.
Harvey has decided to expand those
thoughts: My next project is underway
and its a book for the parents of white
children. Asked whether shell ever tire
of the subject, Harvey says, I suspect Ill
be writing about race and whiteness for
the rest of my life. Donna Freitas

Peter Kreeft

9781614290865
pages
| March 2015
Edited by| 300
Melvin
McLeod
9781614290865 | 300 pages | March 2015

Todays leading Buddhist voices on the

issues
imperative
our modern
With
Todays
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on the
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Sharon
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John Tarrant,
Bhante
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and
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Sharon
Salzberg,
John
Tarrant,
Jack Kornfeld, and many more.

$34.95
$34.95

AUTHORIZED LIVES
AUTHORIZED
LIVES
Biography
and the Formation
Biography
the Identity
Formation
of Earlyand
Geluk
of Early
Geluk
Identity
Elijah S. Ary

Elijah
S. pages
Ary | April 2015
9781614291640
| 240
9781614291640 | 240 pages | April 2015

Uncover the evolution of the status of

Uncoverone
theofevolution
of the
status ofsaints
Tsongkhapa,
Tibets most
celebrated
Tsongkhapa,
one ofofTibets
mostLamas
celebrated
saints
and the founder
the Dalai
lineage.
and the founder of the Dalai Lamas lineage.

Philosophical
Persuasion
A philosophy professor meets a Christian
woman at a religious conference. During
their brief conversation, she says she is
worried about her brother, a young man
who is smart, kind, inquisitiveand an
atheist. Would the professor please write
to her brother and try to persuade him of
the existence of God?
So begins the imagined conversation,
known in academic lingo as a supposal,
between Peter Kreeft and the young man
he calls Michael in his new book, Letters
to an Atheist: Wrestling with Faith
(Rowman & Littlefield, Oct.). The young
man is real, as was the encounter between
Kreeft and Michaels sister. Although he
never contacted Michael personally, and
the letters that compose the book never
got posted, emailed, received, or
answered, Kreeft offers them to readers,
who he invites to become Michael, to
read and consider for themselves.
Kreeft is a professor of philosophy at
Boston College, where he has taught
since 1965. He is also the author of more

| Profiles

than 70 books, about half of which are for

a general audience (the other half are for
scholars).
Raised an evangelical Christian in the
Dutch Reformed branch of
Protestantism, Kreeft converted to
Catholicism at age 21. Though he has
questioned God, both intellectually
and personally, he says he has never
stopped being a theist, or one who
believes in God. There was no rebellion
or disillusionment at the root of his
conversion, Kreeft notes. In fact, I am
more, not less, evangelical as a Catholic
than I ever was as a Protestant.
But despite his consistent belief,
there were many times when I questioned God, both intellectually and personally, he says. The two are not mutually exclusivedoubts are the ants in the
pants that keep faith alive and moving.
Kreefts comfort with doubt led him,
in Letters to an Atheist, to dive into some
of the most difficult-to-resolve reasons
many people dont believe in God, such
as the existence of evil in the world and
violence committed in the name of religion. He also delves into reasons to
believe, such as miracles, love, and what
he sees as a highly compatible relationship between religion and science.
The tone of the book is conversational,
warm, and intended to read as an exchange
between friends, something Kreeft says
distinguishes his book from the work of
the popular but controversial new atheists, whose writing he calls purely
polemical and shallow and unmoving
compared with the classic atheists Hume,
Voltaire, Nietzsche, and Sartre.
Kreefts book is, he says, simply the
result of a request he received at a conferencea request he took very seriously
because he believed he could be of help
to this young man and others on the idea
of God, which he says is the most important in human history.
We dont know the stakes of the
theist-atheist debate, he says. Thats
why they are infinitely high: because
they may bewe just dont knowthe
difference between heaven and hell.
Holly Lebowitz Rossi

Profiles |

Religion Update

New in religion from

Lerone A.
Martin

Pulpits of Wax
joe angeles

In the early half of

the 20th century,
many black preachers discovered a new
toolthe phonograph. Sermons recorded on vinyl (or, at
first, wax) enabled them to reach beyond
their local churches and market their sermons to other eager
listeners. The records often outstripped the sales of those by
popular blues singers like Bessie Smith and Ma Rainey, and
while many preachers went to places like Chicago to get record
deals, record company executives began traveling from church
to church in the rural South in search of the next celebrity
preacher. In Preaching on Wax: The Phonograph and the Shaping of
Modern African American Religion (NYU, Nov.; Reviews, p. 20),
Lerone A. Martin illuminates this little-known chapter in
American cultural history.
Martin, a postdoctoral research fellow at the John C. Danforth
Center on Religion and Politics at Washington University in
St. Louis, understands this desire for the spoken word. I grew
up in a home where we watched preachers on TV, and my mom
would always be ordering tapes of the sermons to listen to over
and over again, says Martin. When he got to graduate school,
Martin was so intrigued by the pioneering use of media by black
preachers that he focused his dissertation on Rev. James Gates
and the phonograph records that made him a celebrity beyond
his home church in Atlanta in the 20s and 30s.
In Preaching on Wax, Martin widens his view from one preacher
to analyze the culture-shifting technology of vinyl recordings: I
tried to make the phonograph the main character, he says. In
the years before WWII, especially in the rural South, a number
of forces drove black preachers to records rather than the radio to
reach listeners, Martin says. Most people could afford a phonograph, and it did not need electricity to run. Radios were expensivethey might cost around $50and many people did not
yet have electricity. In addition, most radio stations worried they
would lose revenue if advertisers found their products associated
with black preachers.
The phonograph and the preachers records helped shaped
modern African-American religion in significant ways, Martin
argues. Examining this phenomenon helps us to see that our
own contemporary experience of religion, media, and commodification is not new, he says. A preacher like T.D. Jakes,
for example, uses television, film, books, and audio not only to
reach a lot of consumers, but also to ground his authority as the
pastor of a larger flock beyond his own church. Looking at the
advent and development of preaching on phonograph records,
Martin says, helps us to think about celebrity and the way it
bestows authority upon these religious leaders.

Henry L. Carrigan Jr.

September 2014

October 2014

978-1-4422-3271-6
$19.95 Cloth

978-1-4422-3475-8
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Alban Books are now available from R&L

www.rowman.com | 800-462-6420

Religion Update

Reviews

Religion in Review
A New Heaven and a
New Earth: Reclaiming
Biblical Eschatology
J. Richard Middleton. Baker Academic,
$26.99 trade paper (304p) ISBN 978-08010-4868-5

heologian Middleton tackles a huge

question: is a glorious afterlife the best
hope Christianity can offer, or does the
promise of a new, redeemed Earth give
humans hope for today? His biblically
grounded answer is the latter. To make a
convincing argument for what he calls
holistic eschatology, he goes through
both testaments of the Bible, deep down to
its Greek- and Hebrew-language roots, and
also takes on the received wisdom of many
a Christian hymn that extols the far-off
heavenly shore, provocatively calling the
latter singing lies in church. Most of the
book is more carefully footnoted than provocatively put, in keeping with the rules for
academic persuasion. But the implications
for lived faith are bold, and the air this
brings into theological discourse about
what God intends for human creation is
fresh and bracing. (Dec.)

Wrestling the Angel:

The Foundations of
Mormon Thought
Terryl Givens. Oxford Univ., $34.95
(416p) ISBN 978-0-19-979492-8

ivens (By the Hand of Mormon), possibly the most significant voice in the
field of Mormon studies, has previously
explained Mormonism by way of scripture,
history, and philosophy. Here, he turns his
attention to theology, a more difficult proposition than it sounds, since Mormons tend
to emphasize practical living rather than
theological speculation and believe in continuing revelation. Although scholars will
appreciate the sweeping way in which Givens (Profiles, p. 14) provides context to
Mormon cosmology, rank-and-file LDS
members will likely resonate more with the
books brief, discrete chapters on what Mormon leaders have taught about specific

issues: the Godhead, theosis, Heavenly

Mother, the Fall, premortal life, the Holy
Ghost, salvation and the afterlife, and other
topics. What emerges is a complex, nuanced
picture of a dynamic faith. (Nov.)

Preaching on Wax:
The Phonograph and the
Shaping of Modern African
American Religion
Lerone A. Martin. NYU, $24 trade paper
(240p) ISBN 978-1-4798-9095-8

lthough histories of American religion have focused on the relationship

of radio to the growth of preaching in
America, especially among white clergy,
there has been no study of the impact of the
phonograph on the development of black
preaching in the mid-20th century. Martin
(Profiles, p. 19) draws deeply on record
company archives to explore how the phonograph sermons of black Protestant
preachers between 1925 and 1941 significantly shaped African-American religion
and culture. With no access to radio, more
than 100 black clergymen teamed up with
Columbia, Paramount, and RCA-Victor,
among other labels, to record and sell their
sermons, creating records that sold in numbers often rivaling those of Bessie Smith and
Ma Rainey. Martin demonstrates that
preaching on wax made black Christianity
a mass-produced commodity, and phonograph religion laid the foundations of modern religious broadcasting in black Christianity. Martins vital study contributes significantly not only to the history of religion,
but also to the lively, ongoing discussion of
race records by African-American musicians in early 20th-century America. (Nov.)

The Lives of Muhammad

Kecia Ali. Harvard Univ., $29.95 (342p)
ISBN 978-0-674-05060-0

li, an associate professor of religion

at Boston University (Profiles, p.
12), takes an innovative approach to a biography of Muhammad, comparing the various accounts of his life in what is probably

20 P U B L I S H E R S W E E K L Y O C T O B E R 6 , 2 0 1 4

the only book to do so comprehensively.

She concludes that, as sensibilities evolved
in the time since Muhammads life, the
biographies of the prophet expanded or
even altered in keeping with prevailing
mores. Ali refrains from assessing the
veracity of the variant readings, although
some of the more obvious sinkholes would
stun even the moderate Muslim reader or
casual Islamic scholar. (For example, the
man named Muhammad probably originally had a pagan-sounding name that was
whitewashed by later historians.) Such
views shatter the standard and much-cherished life story of the prophet, which, as Ali
herself argues, has grown organically from
the moment Muhammad died. This book
calls into question most of Muhammads
biography, leaving the frustrated believer
to wonder what really is true if such core
understandings are shaky. (Oct.)

Life After Faith:

The Case for Secular
Humanism
Philip Kitcher. Yale Univ., $25 (200p)
ISBN 978-0-300-20343-1

ales annual Terry Lectures have

yielded another elegant book that
addresses contemporary concerns. Kitchers
well-organized presentation ranges widely
in drawing together sources from literature, philosophy, and the sciences to
respectfully make a persuasive case that a
secular outlook on life can produce value,
meaning, and solace, all functions that
religion has traditionally filled. He reasons
sans broadsides, finding that religion is not
so much violent or evilas many of todays
atheists argueas it is improbable and,
more important, unnecessary. He is a kind
critic of religion, conceding that refined
religion, the highest form of belief and
practice, has at least the advantage of
being better organized to act for human
improvement, since there are as yet no
numerous or vast bodies of secular humanists doing disaster relief. (Give it time, he
suggests.) Kitchers real strength is his
sensitivity to human suffering and mortality, and the ways in which those concerns
must be addressed by a robust secular ethic.
(Oct.) 

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