An essential guide for Christians on how to achieve personal, ecclesial, and social transformation in the year of Jubilee.

How can creatures made from dust become members of God's household "forever"? In this New Studies in Biblical Theology volume, Michael Morales explores the narrative context, literary structure and theology of Leviticus, following its dramatic movement from the tabernacle to the temple—and from the earthly to the heavenly Mount Zion in the New Testament.

In light of numerous contradictions between passages in Jubilees, this study proposes a new, literary-critical method to understand the development of the book. This analysis is significant for the interpretation of the diverse ideological and theological viewpoints found in Jubilees.

God is radically dedicated to our ongoing growth in spiritual maturity and holiness. This is both glorious and terrifying. It is glorious because the Lord of heaven and earth is for us. But it is terrifying because we are idolaters. This means that when God brings greater redemption into our lives he also brings a death sentence to our fallen desires. In love, God will do whatever it takes - even tearing us to shreds if necessary - to replace our feeble pleasures with lasting desire for himself. Sadly, in our culture two false responses to suffering have become deeply embedded in the Church: deadly dualism and shallow stoicism. Each can effectively hijack God's good purpose in suffering. Torn to Heal equips us to understand and reject these false and self-defeating approaches to suffering, and to embrace God's good purpose in our trials.

Sharon H. Ringe, beginning with this Lukan text, addresses the Jubilee images and traditions in the Synoptic Gospels, especially in Jesus' proclamation of the reign of God. She illuminates how the Jubilee traditions served as a source for early Christian ethics and Christology: to confess Jesus as the Christ - herald of the Jubilee, messenger, and enactor of liberation - is to participate in acts of liberation. Ringe concludes that the agenda of liberation constitutes the very core of both the gospel message and biblical faith: the word of God fulfilled in the presence of Jesus of Nazareth is alive with images of liberation. In the final chapter, In Christ We Are Set Free, she explores further the implications of her findings for contemporary ethical and christological reflection.

How did the books of the Bible come to be recognized as Holy Scripture? After nearly nineteen centuries the canon of Scripture remains an issue of debate. Adept in both Old and New Testament studies, F. F. Bruce brings the wisdom of a lifetime of reflection and biblical interpretation to bear in addressing the criteria of canonicity, the canon within the canon, and canonical criticism.