Slip into a pew at a Catholic church almost anywhere in the world on a Sunday morning, and you'll likely find something missing: the Bible. More than five hundred years after the Bible came off the first printing press, why does the world's largest biblical religion often not have a printed Bible in the room? And if not, how is it that the life of Catholics is shaped by the Bible? In How Catholics Encounter the Bible, award-winning biblical scholar and historian Michael Peppard ex...

Death and rebirth was of vital importance to early Christians in late antiquity. In late antiquity, death was all encompassing. Mortality rates were high, plague and disease in urban areas struck at will, and one lived on the knife’s edge regarding one’s health. Religion filled a crucial role in this environment, offering an option for those who sought cure and comfort. Following death, the inhumed were memorialized, providing solace to family members through sculpture, painting, and epigr...

Michael Peppard provides a historical and theological reassessment of the oldest Christian building ever discovered, the third-century house-church at Dura-Europos. Contrary to commonly held assumptions about Christian initiation, Peppard contends that rituals here did not primarily embody notions of death and resurrection. Rather, he portrays the motifs of the church’s wall paintings as those of empowerment, healing, marriage, and incarnation, while boldly reidentifying the figure of a ...

Slip into a pew at a Catholic church almost anywhere in the world on a Sunday morning, and you'll likely find something missing: the Bible. More than five hundred years after the Bible came off the first printing press, why does the world's largest biblical religion often not have a printed Bible in the room? And if not, how is it that the life of Catholics is shaped by the Bible?In How Catholics Encounter the Bible, award-winning biblical scholar and historian Michael Pep...

A profound exploration of the Bible's most controversial book—from the bestselling author of Beyond Belief and The Gnostic GospelsThe strangest book of the New Testament, filled with visions of the Rapture, the whore of Babylon, and apocalyptic writing of the end of times, the Book of Revelation has fascinated readers for more than two thousand years, but where did it come from? And what are the meanings of its surreal images of dragons, monsters,...

What if everything we have been told about the origins of Christianity is a lie?What if a small group had always known the truth and had kept it hidden . . . until now?What if there is evidence that Jesus Christ survived the crucifixion?In Holy Blood, Holy Grail Michael Baigent and his co-authors Henry Lincoln and Richard Leigh stunned the world with a controversial theory that Jesus Christ and Mary Magdalene married and founded a...

"A first-ever English translation and detailed analysis of [an] . . . eighth-century text uncovers a far more substantial version of the wise men story." — USA TodayTheologian Brent Landau presents the ancient account of Melchior, Caspar, and Balthazar, the three "wise men" who journeyed to Bethlehem to greet the birth of Jesus. The Revelation of the Magi offers the first-ever English translation of an ancient Syriac manuscript written in the secon...

New York Times–bestselling author Garry Wills provides a provocative analysis of the theological and historical basis for the priesthoodIn a riveting and provocative tour de force from the author of What Jesus Meant, Pulitzer Prize winner Garry Wills poses the challenging question: Why did the priesthood develop in a religion that began without it and, indeed, was opposed to it? Why Priests? argues brilliantly and persuasively fo...

The Meaning of the Nag Hammadi, now in paperback opens the with the thrilling adventure story of the discovery of the ancient Papyrii at Nag Hammadi. Muhammad Ali, the fellahin, discovered the sealed jar, he feared that it might contain a jinni, or spirit, but also had heard of hidden treasures in such jars. Greed overcame his fears and when he smashed open the jar, gold seemed to float into the air. To his disappointment, it was papyrus fragmenst, not gold, but for scholars around the wor...

After 2,000 years of flawed history, here at last is a magnificent new biography of Mary Magdalene that draws her out of the shadows of history and restores her to her rightful place of importance in Christianity.Throughout history, Mary Magdalene has been both revered and reviled, a woman who has taken on many forms—witch, whore, the incarnation of the eternal feminine, the devoted companion (and perhaps even the wife) of Jesus. In this brilliant new biography, Bruce Chilton, a re...

An "intriguing" study of how early Christianity caught on and converted much of the world, rooted in archaeological and statistical evidence ( Kirkus Reviews, starred review).How did the preaching of a peasant carpenter from Galilee spark a movement that would grow to over two billion followers? Who listened to this "good news," and who ignored it? Where did Christianity spread, and how? Based on quantitative data and the latest scholarship, this book prese...

Unity, joy, simplicity, beauty, truth-these are the hallmarks of the three Persons in one God, the Trinity. In Contemplating the Trinity, Fr. Raniero Cantalamessa, the preacher to the papal household, invites readers to turn to the Trinity so that they can enter into and experience the relationship of love that the divine Persons share with one another. Convinced that Christians today need a spirituality that is more clearly trinitarian, Fr. Cantalamessa draws from theology, spirituality, ...