Kenneth E. Bailey draws on his expertise in both the New Testament and Middle Eastern culture to interpret the parable of the prodigal son from a Middle Eastern perspective. When we approach it with the correct cultural lens, Bailey argues, the parable's true Christological character is revealed.

The New York Times bestselling author of The Prodigal Prophet uncovers the essential message of Jesus, locked inside his most familiar parable. Newsweek called renowned minister Timothy Keller "a C.S. Lewis for the twenty-first century" in a feature on his first book, The Reason for God. In that book, he offered a rational explanation of why we should believe in God. Now, in The Prodigal God, Keller takes his trademark intellectual approach to understanding Christianity and uses the parable of the prodigal son to reveal an unexpected message of hope and salvation. Within that parable Jesus reveals God's prodigal grace toward both the irreligious and the moralistic. This book will challenge both the devout and skeptics to see Christianity in a whole new way.

During his many years in the Middle East, Kenneth Bailey often lived in villages, thus experiencing peasant life first hand. In getting to know the local people, his understanding of the original meaning of the parables of Christ was greatly enriched. In The Cross and the Prodigal, Kenneth Bailey draws on these insights to bring out not only the literary meaning of the Parable of the Prodigal Son, but also its emotional impact on the original hearers.In the one-act play, 'Two Sons Have I Not', contained in the second part of the book, the author brings into the open the parable's underlying conflicts: Law versus love, servanthood versus sonship, preservation of family honour versus restoration of family fellowship. These conflicts are brought to a climax in the banquet scene that ends the parable.With this reprint, the author's insights into the Parable of the Prodigal Son are made available to a new generation. Kenneth Bailey's writings on the parables of Jesus continue to be brilliantly illuminating.

Drawing on a lifetime of study in both Middle Eastern culture and the Gospels, Kenneth E. Bailey compares the Old Testament saga of Jacob and the New Testament parable of the prodigal son, offering a fresh view of how Jesus interpreted Israel's past, his present, and their future.

OVER TWO MILLION COPIES SOLD! It's the most powerful force in the universe, our only hope for love and forgiveness, and a foretaste of eternal life: amazing, radical, life-changing grace. Millions of lives have been changed by award-winning author Philip Yancey's startling exploration of grace at street level. Grace is the one thing the world can't duplicate, the healing force we need, and the key to transforming a broken world. In this revised and updated edition of his personal and provocative book, Yancey offers true portraits of grace's life-changing power. These stories, set in the midst of life's stark realities, evoke such questions as: If grace is God's love for the undeserving, how do I get it? How well are we dispensing grace to a world that knows far more of strife and unforgiveness than it does of mercy? Can grace make a difference in the midst of such atrocities as the Nazi holocaust, and how can it withstand the brutality of hate? With powerful stories, rich theology, and practical suggestions, Yancey challenges us to become living answers to a world that desperately needs to know, What's So Amazing About Grace?

Methodology - Analysis of four parables - Exegesis of Luke.