Poverty reduction is a worldwide concern, yet if the church is to play an effective role in its alleviation, an approach that is both biblical and contextual is required. In Poverty, the Bible, and Africa, Isaac Boaheng formulates a theology of poverty that engages Scripture, African traditional wisdom, and contemporary African concerns to create a paradigm for understanding and alleviating poverty in Africa. Boaheng highlights that, whatever our cultural context, God frowns upon materialism, extravagance, and love for riches; yet the author also demonstrates why a contextual theology must address people’s societal and cultural needs alongside spiritual ones. If we desire a model for poverty reduction that is both theologically sound and contextually appropriate, we must facilitate an encounter between the teachings of Scripture and the socio-economic, political, and religious realities of a particular context. Combining in-depth cultural analysis with careful exegetical reflection, this book offers refreshing insight into the challenge of confronting poverty in Africa. Boaheng’s approach, however, is relevant far beyond the continent and is transferable to any context where others are seeking to effectively understand and combat poverty.

A Ghanaian scholar of religion argues that poverty is a particularly complex subject in traditional African cultures, where holistic worldviews unite life’s material and spiritual dimensions. A South African ethicist examines informal economies in Ghana, Jamaica, Kenya, and South Africa, looking at their ideological roots, social organization, and vulnerability to global capital. African American theologians offer ethnographic accounts of empowering religious rituals performed in churches in the United States, Jamaica, and South Africa. This important collection brings together these and other Pan-African perspectives on religion and poverty in Africa and the African diaspora. Contributors from Africa and North America explore poverty’s roots and effects, the ways that experiences and understandings of deprivation are shaped by religion, and the capacity and limitations of religion as a means of alleviating poverty. As part of a collaborative project, the contributors visited Ghana, Kenya, and South Africa, as well as Jamaica and the United States. In each location, they met with clergy, scholars, government representatives, and NGO workers, and they examined how religious groups and community organizations address poverty. Their essays complement one another. Some focus on poverty, some on religion, others on their intersection, and still others on social change. A Jamaican scholar of gender studies decries the feminization of poverty, while a Nigerian ethicist and lawyer argues that the protection of human rights must factor into efforts to overcome poverty. A church historian from Togo examines the idea of poverty as a moral virtue and its repercussions in Africa, and a Tanzanian theologian and priest analyzes ujamaa, an African philosophy of community and social change. Taken together, the volume’s essays create a discourse of mutual understanding across linguistic, religious, ethnic, and national boundaries. Contributors. Elizabeth Amoah, Kossi A. Ayedze, Barbara Bailey, Katie G. Cannon, Noel Erskine, Dwight N. Hopkins, Simeon O. Ilesanmi, Laurenti Magesa, Madipoane Masenya, Takatso A. Mofokeng, Esther M. Mombo, Nyambura J. Njoroge, Jacob Olupona, Peter J. Paris, Anthony B. Pinn, Linda E. Thomas, Lewin L. Williams

Although the arrival of the Bible in Africa has often been a tale of terror, the Bible has become an African book. This volume explores the many ways in which Africans have made the Bible their own. The essays in this book offer a glimpse of the rich resources that constitute Africa's engagement with the Bible. Among the topics are: the historical development of biblical interpretation in Africa, the relationship between African biblical scholarship and scholarship in the West, African resources for reading the Bible, the history and role of vernacular translation in particular African contexts, the ambiguity of the Bible in Africa, the power of the Bible as text and symbol, and the intersections between class, race, gender, and culture in African biblical interpretation. The book also contains an extensive bibliography of African biblical scholarship. In fact, it is one of the most comprehensive collections of African biblical scholarship available in print. This publication has also been published in paperback, please click here for details.

Africa's heartrending picture begs the question: Is Africa cursed? In this book, the author conveys a winning message - that there can be hope for Africa. He unwraps Africa's place in the Bible, wards off superstition and advocates Christians' active engagement in transforming Africa.

Today, many thoughtful and compassionate Christians are addressing the challenge of alleviating poverty. But while much progress has been made, many well-intentioned efforts have led Christians to actions that are not only ineffective, but leave the most vulnerable in a worse situation than before. Is there a better answer? Combining biblical exegesis with proven economic principles, For the Least of These: A Biblical Answer to Poverty equips Christians with both a solid biblical and economic understanding of how best to care for the poor and foster sustainable economic development. With contributions from fifteen leading Christian economists, theologians, historians, and practitioners, it presents the case for why a multi-faceted approach is needed, and why a renewed focus on markets and trade are the world’s best hope for alleviating poverty and serving those in financial need.

The Africa Bible Commentary is a unique publishing event—the first one-volume Bible commentary produced in Africa by African theologians to meet the needs of African pastors, students, and lay leaders. Interpreting and applying the Bible in the light of African culture and realities, it furnishes powerful and relevant insights into the biblical text that transcend Africa in their significance. The Africa Bible Commentary gives a section-by-section interpretation that provides a contextual, readable, affordable, and immensely useful guide to the entire Bible. Readers around the world will benefit from and appreciate the commentary’s fresh insights and direct style that engage both heart and mind. Key features: · Produced by African biblical scholars, in Africa, for Africa—and for the world · Section-by-section interpretive commentary and application · More than 70 special articles dealing with topics of key importance in to ministry in Africa today, but that have global implications · 70 African contributors from both English- and French-speaking countries · Transcends the African context with insights into the biblical text and the Christian faith for readers worldwide

In this book Mark Noll makes the compelling case that how Americans have come to practice the Christian faith is just as globally important as what the American church has done in the world. He backs up this substantial claim with the scholarly attentiveness we've come to expect from him.