The publication of the King James version of the Bible, translated between 1603 and 1611, coincided with an extraordinary flowering of English literature and is universally acknowledged as the greatest influence on English-language literature in history. Now, world-class literary writers introduce the book of the King James Bible in a series of beautifully designed, small-format volumes. The introducers' passionate, provocative, and personal engagements with the spirituality and the language of the text make the Bible come alive as a stunning work of literature and remind us of its overwhelming contemporary relevance.

St. Matthew Passion is Hans Blumenberg's sustained and devastating meditation on Jesus's anguished cry on the cross, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" Why did this abandonment happen, what does it mean within the logic of the Gospels, how have believers and nonbelievers understood it, and how does it live on in art? With rare philological acuity and vast historical learning, Blumenberg unfolds context upon context in which this cry has reverberated, from early Christian apologetics and heretics to twentieth-century literature and philosophy. Blumenberg's guide through this unending story of divine abandonment is Johann Sebastian Bach's monumental Matthäuspassion, the parabolic mirror that bundled eighteen hundred years of reflection on the fate of the crucified and the only available medium that allows us post-Christian listeners to feel the anguish of those who witnessed the events of the Passion. With interspersed references to writers such as Goethe, Rilke, Kafka, Freud, and Benjamin, Blumenberg gathers evidence to raise the singular question that, in his view, Christian theology has not been able to answer: How can an omnipotent God be so offended by his creatures that he must sacrifice and abandon his own Son?

The NIV is the world's best-selling modern translation, with over 150 million copies in print since its first full publication in 1978. This highly accurate and smooth-reading version of the Bible in modern English has the largest library of printed and electronic support material of any modern translation.

Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition with Introduction and notes by theology staff of the University of Navarre. Accompanied by New Vulgate Text.

This book provides an in-depth look at the most well structured gospel record originally designed to address Jewish questions about Jesus but later used by the early church as a primer for new Christians.

The Good News according to Matthewis a brilliant, passage-by-passage investigation of the longest Gospel. By comparing Matthew with his sources--Mark, the Saying Source, early liturgies, and with parallels like Luke, earlier wisdom literature, and Qumran texts, Schweizer is able to isolate Matthew's distinctive view of Christ.

Preliminary Material /Robert Horton Gundry -- Introduction /Robert Horton Gundry -- Chapter One: Examination of the Text-Form /Robert Horton Gundry -- Chapter Two: Explanation of the Text-Form /Robert Horton Gundry -- Chapter Three: The Question Of Historicity /Robert Horton Gundry -- Chapter Four: The Problem of Legitimacy /Robert Horton Gundry -- Bibliography /Robert Horton Gundry -- Author Index /Robert Horton Gundry -- Index of Scripture References /Robert Horton Gundry.