Narrative Theology is still with us, to the delight of some and to the chagrin of others. 'Why Narrative?Ó is in reprint because it represents what is still a very important question. This diverse collection of essays on narrative theology has proven very useful in university and seminary theology classes. It is also of great use as a primer for the educated layperson or church study group. Jones and Hauerwas have done an excellent job of selecting representative essays that deal with appeals to narrative in areas such as personal identity and human action, biblical hermeneutics, epistemology, and theological and ethical method.

Hans W. Frei (1922-1988) was one of the most influential American theologians of his generation. This collection provides an unrivaled introduction to Frei's work.

This book is an experiment in systematic theology. It is an attempt to see if a particular interpretation of Christian narrative speaks to the situation of Christians in affluent western cultures, a context in which Christian identity is increasingly problematic. Stroup's work purposes to determine if the use of narrative in theology casts any new light on what Christians mean by Òrevelation,Ó the doctrine some Christian theologians have appealed to as the basis for what Christians know and confess about God.

Reflects what traditional proverbs used in Christian catechetical, liturgical, and ritual contexts reveal about Tanzanian appropriations of and interpretations of Christianity.

Moral thinking today finds itself stranded between the particular and the universal. Alasdair MacIntyre's work on narrative, discussed here along with that of Stanley Hauerwas and H. T. Engelhardt, aims to undo the perceived damage done by the Enlightenment by returning to narrative and abandoning the illusion of a disembodied reason that claims to be able to give a coherent explanation for everything. It is precisely this - a theory that holds good for all cases - that John Rawls proposed, drawing on the heritage of Emmanuel Kant. Who is right? Must universality be abandoned? Must we only think about morality in terms that are relative, bound by space and time? Alexander Lucie-Smith attempts to answer these questions by examining the nature of narrative itself as well as the particular narratives of Rawls and St Augustine. Bound and rooted as they are in history and personal experience, narratives nevertheless strain at the limits imposed on them. It is Lucie-Smith's contention that each narrative that points to a lived morality exists against the background of an infinite horizon, and thus it is that the particular and the rooted can also make us aware of the universal and unchanging.

Dr. Jacob L. Goodson will be doing a book signing for Narrative Theology and the Hermeneutical Virtues: Humility, Patience, Prudence at Eighth Day Books in Wichita, KS, on Saturday March 21, 2015, at 4:00pm. In Narrative Theology and the Hermeneutical Virtues: Humility, Patience, Prudence, Jacob L. Goodson offers a philosophical analysis of the arguments and tendencies of Hans Frei’s and Stanley Hauerwas’ narrative theologies. Narrative theology names a way of doing theology and thinking theologically that is part of a greater movement called “the return to Scripture.” The return to Scripture movement makes a case for Scripture as the proper object of study within Christian theology, philosophy of religion, and religious ethics. While thinkers within this movement agree that Scripture is the proper object of study within philosophy and religious studies, there is major disagreement over what the word “narrative” describes in narrative theology. The Yale theologian, Hans Frei, argues that because Scripture is the proper object of study within Christian theology and the philosophy of religion, Scripture must be the exclusive object of study. To think theologically means paying as close attention as possible to the details of the biblical narratives in their “literal sense.” Different from Frei’s contentions, the Christian ethicist at Duke University, Stanley Hauerwas claims: if Scripture is the proper object of study within Christian theology, then the category of narrative teaches us that we ought to give our scholarly attention to the interpretations and performances of Scripture. Hauerwas emphasizes the continuity between the biblical narratives and the traditions of the church. This disagreement is best described as a hermeneutical one: Frei thinks that the primary place where interpretation happens is in the text; Hauerwas thinks that the primary place where interpretation occurs is in the community of interpreters. In order to move beyond the dichotomy found between Frei’s and Hauerwas’ work, but to remain within the return to Scripture movement, Goodson constructs three hermeneutical virtues: humility, patience, and prudence. These virtues help professors and scholars within Christian theology, philosophy of religion, and religious ethics maintain objectivity in their fields of study.