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Since they were first discovered in the caves at Qumran in 1947, the Dead Sea Scrolls have aroused more fascination-- and controversy-- than perhaps any other archaeological find. Collins sheds light on the bitter conflicts that have swirled around the scrolls, and sheds lights on their true significance for Jewish and Christian history.

During its 2,500-year life, the book of Genesis has been the keystone to important claims about God and humanity in Judaism and Christianity, and it plays a central role in contemporary debates about science, politics, and human rights. The authors provide a panoramic history of this iconic book, exploring its impact on Western religion, philosophy, literature, art, and more.

Few biblical books are as revered and reviled as Revelation. Many view it as the pinnacle of prophetic vision and a key to understanding the past, present, and future, while others criticize it as the work of a disturbed individual whose violent dreams should never have been included in the Bible. Timothy Beal offers a concise cultural history of Revelation and the apocalyptic imaginations it has inspired. He traces the book's origins during the Christian persecutions of first-century Rome to its lasting impact on contemporary popular culture, media, and visual art. Beal examines how figures like Augustine and Hildegard of Bingen integrated Revelation into their mystical worldviews, and how its vivid artistic interpretations kept it relevant despite criticism from later church leaders like Martin Luther. Attributed to a mysterious prophet named John, Revelation possesses a unique voice within the Bible. Beal illustrates how the book serves as a multimedia constellation of stories and images that adapt and transform in new contexts, continually inspiring fresh interpretations of history, fantasies of rapture, and fears of abandonment in each generation.

The life and times of this iconic and enduring biblical book The book of Job raises stark questions about the meaning of innocent suffering and the relationship of the human to the divine, yet it is also one of the Bible's most obscure and paradoxical books. Mark Larrimore provides a panoramic history of this remarkable book, traversing centuries and traditions to examine how Job's trials and his challenge to God have been used and understood in diverse contexts, from commentary and liturgy to philosophy and art. Larrimore traces Job's reception by figures such as Gregory the Great, William Blake, and Elie Wiesel, and reveals how Job has come to be viewed as the Bible's answer to the problem of evil and the perennial question of why a God who supposedly loves justice permits bad things to happen to good people.

An introduction to Confessions, one of the most important books in the Christian and Western traditions. It tells the story of the Confessions - what motivated Augustine to dictate it, how it asks to be read, and the many ways it has been misread in the one-and-a-half millennia since it was composed.

From National Book Award-winning author Martin Marty, the surprising story of a Christian classic born in a Nazi prison cellFor fascination, influence, inspiration, and controversy, Dietrich Bonhoeffer's Letters and Papers from Prison is unmatched by any other book of Christian reflection written in the twentieth century. A Lutheran pastor and theologian, Bonhoeffer spent two years in Nazi prisons before being executed at age thirty-nine for his role in the plot to kill Hitler. Ever since it was published in 1951, Letters and Papers from Prison has had a tremendous impact on Christian and secular thought, and has helped establish Bonhoeffer's reputation as one of the most important Protestant thinkers of the twentieth century. In this, the first history of the book's remarkable global career, National Book Award-winning writer Martin Marty tells how and why Letters and Papers from Prison has been read and used in such dramatically different ways, from the Cold War to today.