Intermountain West Journal of Religious Studies Volume 8 Number 1 Fall 2017 Article 5 2017 Book Reviews Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/imwjournal Recommended Citation "Book Reviews." Intermountain West Journal of Religious Studies 8, no. 1 (2017): 84-89. https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/imwjournal/vol8/iss1/5 This Book Review is brought to you for free and open access by the Journals at DigitalCommons@USU. It has been accepted for inclusion in Intermountain West Journal of Religious Studies by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@USU. For more information, please contact [email protected]. 84 BOOK REVIEWS Book Reviews ‡ Culpepper, R. Alan, and Paul N. Anderson, regarding the authorship, composition, and eds. Communities in Dispute: Current historical background of the epistles, how Scholarship on the Johannine Epistles. the epistles should be approached, and how Society of Biblical Literature Early to interpret the various themes and Christianity and Its Literature 13. Atlanta: concepts found within the epistles. Yet the SBL Press, 2014. 316 pp. ISBN 978- multiplicity of perspectives is the great 1628370157. strength of the book. Since the field is so contested, the editors did a fine job of Communities in Dispute: Current providing the reader with an introduction Scholarship on the Johannine Epistles is a into the disputed material. Culpepper and volume which—as the subtitle states—aims Anderson deserve praise for showcasing the to “catch up” readers on the current state many complexities of the field, as well as of scholarship regarding the New for allowing both liberal and conservative Testament epistles of St. John. Alan perspectives to be heard. Culpepper and Paul Anderson have done The book is also well organized. contemporary students of Johannine There are three parts; but due to the nature literature an invaluable service by editing and size of each part, the book can be this admirable book and have succeeded in divided into two halves. The first half deals doing the very thing they set out to do. with issues related to textual criticism, Communities in Dispute lives up to order of composition, and the historical its title. Culpepper explains: “The title for setting of the epistles. The second half this volume conveys an obvious double explores the theology and ethics of the entendre…It signals both that the essays in epistles. This division is helpful as it enables this volume deal with the Johannine the reader to mentally organize the Epistles as artifacts of ancient communities different issues that need to be addressed in dispute…and that they represent the in studying the epistles of John. It also disputes in current scholarship over the enables the reader to see how one’s view of interpretation of these short letters.” (3) the origin and context of each epistle Bringing together a diverse group of experts influences how the content of the epistles is in the field, who each contribute a state of understood. the art study of a live issue in the epistles of The book, however, is quite limited John, the editors and contributors in what it can accomplish. As an demonstrate that the Johannine epistles are introduction to the state of scholarship on some of the most difficult and contested the Johannine epistles and of various books of New Testament. The reader learns perspectives on theological subjects found that there is little agreement among experts in the literature, it is tremendously useful, INTERMOUNTAIN WEST JOURNAL OF RELIGIOUS STUDIES but what it gains in breadth it lacks in appears to be a gaping hole in Johannine depth. The space each contributor has to scholarship (i.e., the precise meaning of the develop their ideas is only one chapter, and love of the brethren), Anderson seems although they make use of that space well, unaware that there is a problem. As far as the authors are inevitably limited by the the love of the brethren is concerned, he constraints of the book’s format. Therefore, only proposes that scholars seek to while technical and scholarly (it is not for understand how the love of the brethren the casual reader), the book is introductory. may be related to the mission of the Church This is, of course, the expressed goal of the to the world (which is a wonderful proposal editors—a goal accomplished with flying to be sure). colors. Readers who are looking for more Anderson’s understanding of the depth can consult the Works Cited located love of the brethren is revealed when— in the back of the book. earlier in the book—he makes the following Among the contributors, Urban von statement: “While some interpreters have Wahlde’s exposition of Raymond Brown’s distanced the appeal for love within the Johannine community hypothesis is community from the exhortation of the extremely helpful for understanding the Synoptic Jesus to love one’s enemies, in theory. Judith’s Lieu’s strictly inductive addition to loving God and neighbor, the study of the epistles was a refreshing difference is directional rather than approach that counterbalanced the Brown qualitative. Indeed, it can be more difficult hypothesis and yielded useful insights. The to love those with whom one is close than missional nature of the Johannine epistles to love a more distanced adversary.” (91) In was skillfully traced by Peter Rhea Jones other words, for Anderson, the love of the and then profoundly contemplated in the brethren is not at all different than the love superb chapter by David Rensberger. for our neighbors; it is rather the prime Andreas Köstenberger’s chapter on the example of it (simply due to our brethren’s cosmic trial motif in John’s writings was closer proximity)! This statement is brilliant, showing the deeper theological representative of a great oversight in unity within the entire Johannine corpus Johannine scholarship: the failure to see the (i.e., Gospel of John to Revelation), thus exclusive and intra-fraternal nature of the providing a significant argument for love of the brethren in John (i.e., the love of common authorship. the brethren is not the love of our The state of scholarship on the neighbors, but something quite different). Johannine epistles leaves much to be While other contributors in the book do not desired. In the opinion of this reviewer the miss the exclusive nature of the love of the failure of contemporary scholars to brethren, they too fail to give a satisfying incisively probe the crucial question of what explanation of what precisely this love of precisely John means by his concept of the the brethren is. In this particular area within intra-fraternal love of the brethren is the field of Johannine scholarship, the particularly remarkable. In the final chapter, harvest is plentiful but the laborers are few. Anderson summarizes the contributions of Communities in Dispute delivers on the book and performs the welcome task of its promise to inform readers about current underscoring and recommending areas that scholarship on the Johannine epistles. I Johannine scholars need to focus upon and highly recommend this book for anyone further develop. However, despite what desiring to learn the latest developments 86 BOOK REVIEWS within this exciting field of biblical studies. traditional.” American Christianity, in This is a valuable book and an ideal Herbel’s eyes, is characterized by this launching pad for the enthusiastic aversion to traditional religion and the Johannine scholar. continual fracturing and reforming of Eli Brayley Christianity, often in the pursuit of Utah State University “restoring” the early Christian church. (4) Therefore, American conversion to Orthodoxy is seen as keeping within that tradition of anti-tradition, as converts seek to Herbel, D. Oliver. Turning to Tradition: both to reject their previous traditions and Converts and the Making of an American restore the early church by, paradoxically, Orthodox Church. Oxford: Oxford turning to the tradition of the ancient church. University Press, 2014. 244 pp. ISBN For Herbel, each of his examples utilizes 9780199324958 this “anti-traditional tradition” in their own D. Oliver Herbel obtained his Ph.D. contexts to deal with their own issues. in historical theology from the Saint Louis For St. Alexis Toth, an Eastern University. He currently ministers as a priest Catholic priest from the Subcarpathian in the Diocese of the Midwest at the Holy region of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Resurrection Orthodox Church in Fargo, Herbel sees his conversion to Orthodoxy as North Dakota, and also serves as a military serving two ends. First, Toth rejects his chaplain in the North Dakota Air National previous tradition of Roman Catholicism for Guard. In the eyes of most Americans, the its oppressive (and at times racist) treatment Orthodox Church is either unnoticed or seen of Eastern Rite Catholics, especially his own as ethnic enclaves for various immigrant Carpatho-Russians. Second, Herbel argues groups such as Greeks (popularized in films that Toth perceived his own personal and his such as My Big Fat Greek Wedding). parishioner’s conversion to Orthodoxy not However, with increasing interest in this so much as arriving at a new faith, but rather ancient faith, scholars have questioned what a return to the faith of their ancestors, as the is drawing people to a faith so foreign to Carpatho-Russians were once Orthodox, but traditional American Protestantism? Herbel had converted in mass to Roman answers this question by arguing that we can Catholicism in 1646 (29). Thus, Toth is seen understand this phenomenon as being very as a form of restorationism, albeit not a much at home within American cultural typical one. This chapter also introduces two traditions. In his monograph Turning to themes Herbel expands on further in the Tradition: Converts and the Making of an following two chapters: the role American Orthodox Church, Herbel uses a race/ethnicity plays in conversion and the variety of published and unpublished turning to tradition as a means to escape sources and analyzes the stories of St.