Note: I have posted an expanded audio version of this article as WM 87: 2017 Reading Highlights (listen here).
Otium sine litteris mors est. –Seneca
When thou comest bring with thee …
the books. –Paul to Timothy (2 Tim 4:13)
The end of
the year means another annual list of books read. Hard to believe that this is
the tenth year I’ve compiled such a list as a blog post (see previous lists
below):
Here are ten
highlights from 2017 reading, in no particular order:
1. William R. Farmer, The Last Twelve
Verses of Mark (Cambridge University Press, 1974): 124 pp.
Farmer is best known for challenging the reigning modern
scholarly consensus on Markan Priority with his revival of the Griesbach
Hypothesis, in favor of Matthean priority. Here he takes on another scholarly “consensus,”
by challenging the reigning rejection of the authenticity of the traditional
ending of Mark.
2. George Orwell, 1984 (original
1949; Signet reprint, 1980): 268 pp.
Orwell’s account of a dystopian socialist society marked by
the subversion of the historical record, Newspeak, and totalitarian conformity
is timely and frightening.
3. Christopher Hitchens, Hitch 22: A
Memoir (Twelve, 2010): 435 pp.
The memoir of this gifted, witty and irreverent writer,
political pundit, and anti-theist, whose life was cut down by cancer, is a
reminder that unbelievers can sometimes hold penetrating insights into the
world God has made, but that life means nothing apart from faith in Christ.
4. Robert Louis Stevenson, Kidnapped
(original 1886; Scribner’s 1940): 289 pp.
I read this book aloud with my family after supper over the
course of several weeks. I began each reading by rehearsing the extended title,
which my boys came to be able to recite by heart: “Kidnapped: Being memoirs of the adventures of David Balfour in the year
1751, how he was kidnapped and cast away; his sufferings in a desert isle; his
journey into the wild highlands; his acquaintance with Alan Breck Stewart and
other notorious highland Jacobites; with all he suffered at the hands of his
uncle, Ebenezer Balfour of Shaws, falsely so called; written by himself and now set forth by Robert Louis Stevenson.”
This edition also has ten striking full color illustration of various scenes
that we all found engaging.
5. Robert Letham, Through Western
Eyes: Eastern Orthodoxy: A Reformed Perspective (Mentor, 2007): 319 pp.
I read this work before making my August visit to Ukraine. It
helped me understand Eastern Orthodoxy better, as a branch of the Christian
tradition that never experienced a Reformation and was largely untouched by the
Enlightenment. Letham’s presentation is sympathetic at points but also clear in
tracing a Protestant critique of the Eastern Orthodoxy.
6. B. S. Poh, The Fundamentals of Our
Faith: Studies on the 1689 Baptist Confession of Faith (Good News
Enterprises, 2017): 147 pp.
I read this book just before Pastor Poh (along with his wife
Goody) came from Kula Lampur to preach at the 2017 Keach Conference and to
spend a week with our family. Pastor Poh is a choice servant of Christ with
much to say worth hearing. I have also found this work helpful in my ongoing
Sunday afternoon series through the 1689 confession.
7. Charles Bridges, Ecclesiastes (Banner
of Truth, 1800, 1961): 319.
I completed this classic commentary as I finished up a Sunday
morning sermon series through this wisdom book. This is a faithful, devotional work,
that is unequalled in piety and spiritual usefulness by modern commentaries.
8. Ibn Warraq, Why I am Not a Muslim
(Prometheus Books, 1995, 2003): 402 pp.
This critique of Islam from a dissident Pakistani
intellectual (writing under an assumed name) is the sort book that only a
former insider could have written. Very valuable. Sadly, however, Warraq
embraces atheism, so many of his naturalistic critiques of Islam could be
applied to other religions. One wonders what he might have written had he ever
stumbled upon a winsome and compelling understanding of Christianity.
9. Irving Hexham, Understanding World
Religions: An Interdisciplinary Approach (Zondervan, 2011): 512 pp.
I used this as a textbook in a college level “Religions of
the World” class that I taught last semester. Hexham is a Christian scholar who
teaches at the University of Calgary. From the book’s content I surmise that he
is a continuationist. Despite this and some progressive views on other topics,
I found this to be a quite helpful work in understanding various world
religions, especially African religions (Hexham’s speciality).
10. Fyodor Dostoyevsky, The Brothers
Karamazov (translated by Constance Garnett (original, 1879-1880; Garnet
translation, 1912): via LibriVox.
I continued to listen to a number of audio books this year on
LibriVox, a great free resource, including this classic. I had long wanted to
read this book, so I at least got to listen to it before my trip to Ukraine. It
really helped me get a better feel for Russian culture and for Eastern Orthodox
piety. This is a very theologically rich novel, not the least for the famed
“Grand Inquisitor” section.
Here are some other things I completed reading this year:
Biblical studies, text
criticism, early Christianity:
Richard N. Longenecker, The
Ministry and Message of Paul (Zondervan, 1971): 130 pp.; Jason Harris, The Doctrine of Scripture (In Focus,
2006, 2013): 182 pp.; John D. Currid, Ecclesiastes:
A Quest for Meaning (Evangelical Press, 2015): 155 pp.; Joseph Hoffman, Celsus on the True Doctrine: A Discourse
Against Christians (Oxford, 1987): 146 pp.; Debating the Text of the Word of God: Douglas Wilson vs. James R. White
(Simposio, 2017): 103 pp.; Harry Freedman, The Murderous History of Bible Translations: Power, Conflict, and the
Quest for Meaning (Bloomsbury Press, 2016): 248 pp.; Robert Haldane, The Books of the Old and New Testaments
Proven to be Canonical (1830; Sprinkle, 2014): 176 pp.
Eastern Orthodoxy:
Archbishop Paul of Finland, The Faith We Hold (St. Vladimir Seminary, 1978, 1980): 96 pp.;
Vitaly Klos, St. Michael’s Golden Domed
Monastery: Guidebook (N. D.): 57 pp.; Archpriest Josiah Trentham, Rock and Sand: An Orthodox Appraisal of the
Protestant Reformers and Their Theology (New Rome Press, 2015): 401 pp.
Theological and
Pastoral studies:
Wade Burleson, Fraudulent
Authority: Pastors Who Seek to Rule Over Others (Istoria Ministries, 2017):
166 pp.; Herman Hanko and David J. Engelsma, The Five Points of Calvinism (British Reformed Fellowship, 2008):
119 pp.; David J. Engelsma and Herman Hanko, The Reformed Worldview: The Word of God for Our Generation (British
Reformed Fellowship, 2012): 142 pp.; Rod Dreher, The Benedict Option: A Strategy for Christians in a Post-Christian
Nation (Sentinel, 2017): 262 pp.; Peter Enns, The Sin of Certainty: Why God Desires Our Trust More Than Our “Correct”
Beliefs (HarperOne, 2016): 230 pp.; Thomas Howard, Evangelical Is Not Enough: Worship of God in Liturgy & Sacrament
(Ignatius, 1984): 162 pp.
Politics, Religion, Philosophy:
Sam Harris, Free Will
(Free Press, 2012): 83 pp.; Roger Scruton and Mark Dooley, Conversations with Roger Scruton (Bloomsbury, 2016): 213 pp.; R. B.
Blackney, Ed. and Trans., The Way of
Life: Lao Tzu (Mentor, 1955): 134 pp.; George Grant, Technology and Empire (Anasi, 1969): 143 pp.; Alvin Plantinga, Knowledge and Christian Belief (Eerdmans,
2015): 129 pp.; Gordan H. Clark, Religion,
Reason, and Revelation (Craig Press, 1961): 241 pp.; Patrick J. Buchanan, The Death of the West (St. Martin’s
Press, 2002): 308 pp.; Peter Hitchens, The
Cameron Delusion (Continuum, 2010): 204 pp.
Literary Essays,
Poetry, Fiction:
Adam Zagajewski, A
Defense of Ardor, Trans. By Clare Cavanagh (Farrar, Straus, and Giroux,
2004): 198 pp.; Christian Wiman, My
Bright Abyss: Meditations of a Modern Believer (Farrar, Straus, and Giroux,
2013): 182 pp.; Madeleine L’Engle, The
Weather of the Heart (Harold Shaw, 1978): 96 pp.; David Whyte, The House of Belonging (Many Rivers
Press, 2011): 98 pp.; David Whyte, Everything
is Waiting For You: Poems by David Whyte (Many Rivers Press, 2003): 102
pp.; David Whyte, Pilgrim: Poems by David
Whyte (Many Rivers Press, 2014): 95 pp.; Hannu Rajaniemi, The Quantum Thief (Tom Doherty
Associates, 2010): 370 pp.; Owen Stanley, The
Missionaries (Castiglia House, 2016): 199 pp.; George Eliot, Middlemarch (1872): via LibriVox; Henry
Melville, Moby-Dick; or The Whale
(1851): via LibriVox; Gaius Petronius Arbiter, Satyricon (c. 1st century AD): via LibriVox; Thomas
Moore, Utopia, trans. Gilbert Burnet,
ed. Henry Morley (Latin original 1516): via LibriVox; Henry Adams, Democracy: An American Novel (1880): via
LibriVox; Henry James, Daisy Miller
(1879): via LibriVox.
Biographies:
Mark Galli, Karl Barth:
An Introductory Biography for Evangelicals (Eerdmans, 2017): 176 pp.; D. T.
Max, Every Love Story is a Ghost Story: A
Life of David Foster Wallace (Viking, 2012): 356 pp.; Ian Smith, Bitter Harvest: Zimbabwe and the Aftermath
of its Independence (John Blake, 1997, 2001, 2008): 442 pp.; Robert
Spencer, The Truth About Muhammad:
Founder of the World’s Most Dangerous Religion (Regnery, 2005): 224 pp.; Einhard,
The Life of Charlemagne (University
of Michigan Press, 2011): 98 pp.
For past annual reading reviews look here:
JTR
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