Book reviews for Spring 2023
Knowing Me, Knowing God: Six Theological Keys to Scripture
Richard Brash (InterVarsity Press, 2021) 165 pp.
Brash, Assistant Professor of Theology at Christ Bible Seminary in Nagoya, presents a theological framework for interpreting Scripture focusing on three foundational pairs of principles in the Bible designed to help us grow in knowing both God and ourselves. The first pair (God is not like us/God has made us like himself) is about identity or being. The second pair (we cannot comprehend God/God makes himself know to us) is about knowing or epistemology. The third pair (our sin separates us from God/God overcomes sin and makes us his own) relates to ethics and salvation. Brash gives the biblical foundations for each pair and then looks at the implications of each set of principles.
Each chapter ends with questions for reflection or discussion, making this an ideal text for group study. The book has a helpful glossary of theological terms and includes an index of subjects and Bible references. Brash’s wife Yuko translated the book into Japanese and it is part of the CBS Theological Series published by Word of Life Press. I will be using this incisive study in my teaching and highly recommend it as a great study for church discipleship groups.
Reviewer rating is 5 of 5 stars ★★★★★
Yasukuni Fundamentalism: Japanese Religions and the Politics of Restoration
Mark R. Mullins (University of Hawai’i Press, 2021) 258 pp.
Mullins, Professor of Japanese Studies at the University of Auckland and previously professor at Meiji Gakuin University and Sophia University, is a keen observer of developments in Japanese society. Mullins focuses on the relationship between organized religions and the postwar rise of neonationalism. He also writes about how the right wing of the Liberal Democratic Party, the National Association of Shrines, and the Japan Conference (Nippon Kaigi, an ultra-conservative, and nationalistic far-right non-governmental organization) are trying to reshape public life and institutions.
Part One, “Postwar Religious Nationalism,” looks at the restructuring of religion and society in Occupied Japan (1945-1952) and Shinto responses to the Occupation. Mullins shows how the disasters and social crisis in 1995 (Kobe earthquake and the Aum Shinrikyo attack) and the triple disaster of 2011 were used to mobilize a restoration movement. Part Two, “The Neonationalist Agenda Contested,” looks at the politics of Yasukuni Shrine (official visits and postwar enshrinements), patriotic education (civic duties versus religious rights), and constitutional revision (where the LDP is seeking to normalize nonreligious Shinto).
Mullins has engaged in thorough research—there are 23 pages of notes and a 29-page bibliography which lists numerous sources in Japanese—and argued his case well. For those seeking a deeper look at what is happening in Japanese society and politics, this is essential reading. Mullins has prophetically alerted us to the “clash between the values of global civil society, which give priority to individual rights and freedoms, and those values embraced by the . . . coalition supporting the LDP proposal, which regards the rights of the individual to be secondary and subservient to the needs of the nation or group” (p. 192). Reading this book will inform our prayers for Japan and its leaders.
Reviewer rating is 5 of 5 stars ★★★★★
Cultural Identity and the Purposes of God: A Biblical Theology of Ethnicity, Nationality, and Race
Steven M. Bryan (Crossway, 2022) 286 pp.
Bryan, Professor of New Testament at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, served as a theological educator in Ethiopia for over 20 years and writes from a wealth of experience and deep study of Scripture. This book is full of deep wisdom on the hotly debated topic of racism. Bryan grounds his discussion of cultural identity in careful exegesis of both the Old and New Testaments. His fresh insights remind us that just as every human being images the glory of God, so does every culture. God’s plan from the beginning was to fill the earth with diverse families, clans, and nations who would share in God’s rule. One day “the beauty of each culture in all its uniqueness will fulfil its true purpose in magnifying the glory of the Lord” (p. 247).