Digital Commons Network^™

A Rabbi And Twelve-Hundred Missionaries Walk Into A Conference: Philo-Semitism And Anti-Semitism At Edinburgh, 1910, George Faithful

Collected Faculty and Staff Scholarship

Had a rabbi attended the World Missionary Conference at Edinburgh in 1910, that rabbi’s ambivalence may have been equaled only by that of the delegates. This presentation will demonstrate how the conference’s first commission report expressed both philo- and anti-Semitism, affirming the value of the world’s Jewish population while portraying it as a threat. This juxtaposition reveals the conference as ahead of its time, in some regards, and an event rooted in the values of its time, in others.

~Presentation excerpt~

Lieser On Stevens, 'Radical L.A.: From Coxey's Army To The Watts Riots, 1894-1965', Jordan Lieser

Collected Faculty and Staff Scholarship

The city of Los Angeles can be a controversial and polarizing topic. In modern times, it has been criticized as a culturally shallow town filled with Hollywood starlets; however, at the same time, others praise the vast metropolis as a home for political, social, and cultural diversity. Errol Wayne Stevens, the former head of the Seaver Center for Western History Research at the Los Angeles County Natural History Museum, peels back the historical layers of Los Angeles in Radical L.A., presenting it as a battleground between staunch left- and rightwing coalitions. The very idea of chronicling radicalism is a difficult …

Trust, Repentance, And Apocalyptic Zionism: Basilea Schlink And The Evangelical Sisterhood Of Mary Respond To War, George Faithful

Collected Faculty and Staff Scholarship

Wars past, present, and future have shaped the development of the Evangelical Sisterhood of Mary. Mother Basilea Schlink wrote that her sisterhood was “a child of the last war,” referring to the Second World War. Her vision for her sisterhood was equally shaped by the Cold War and by her expectations of the imminent nuclear world war that would usher in the Apocalypse. To these wars Mother Basilea and her sisterhood responded with a radical trust in God, daily individual and corporate repentance, and unwavering support for God’s Old Testament people, the Jews, and, by extension, the State of Israel. …

Prayer As Science In Early America, George Faithful

Collected Faculty and Staff Scholarship

Even Jesus might need more than a few days to resurrect Cotton Mather. After three centuries of public malediction for his apparent inconsistencies, moralism, political meddling, and perceived complicity in the Salem Witch Trials, his rehabilitation will be slow in coming if it comes at all. Lovelace’s American Pietism of Cotton Mather could have marked the beginning of a Mather renaissance, but now, thirty years after the fact, Lovelace’s work remains the most recent comprehensive study of Mather’s theology.

Lovelace suggests that Mather’s approach to piety was one of synthesis rather than of incongruity. While Lovelace applies this idea to …

Protestants Protesting Protestantism: 20th Century Experiments In Monasticism, George Faithful

Collected Faculty and Staff Scholarship

Contrary to popular belief, there have often been monastic sisterhoods and brotherhoods in Protestantism. In Germany, Möllenbeck, Loccum, and Marienberg all contained cloisters that embraced the Lutheran Reformation but retained much of their monastic practice. That such groups are relatively unknown may reflect the ambivalence of those in positions of power toward potential holdovers from Catholicism. Protestant monasticism has never been normative; therefore, its occurrence might best be understood as an implicit critique of the mainstream confessions. For the purposes of this paper I will not define monasticism as a vague and flexible lifestyle of contemplation and asceticism, as have …

Gina Bonakdar Nahai: Fantasies Of Escape And Inclusion, Mojgan Behmand

Collected Faculty and Staff Scholarship

Cry of the Peacock, Moonlight on the Avenue of Faith, and Caspian Rain are the enticing titles of Gina Bonakdar Nahai’s Iran-focused novels, published in 1991, 1999, and 2008 respectively. And the titles hold true: the narratives reflect the pain, melancholy and dream-like beauty conveyed in the titles as they divulge characters who strive to escape the restrictions of their community, religion, government, and gender. In the meantime, as the author depicts these fantasies of escape and attempts at flight –and frequently harshly punishes them–, the characters achieve a hitherto unknown feat, namely the depiction of Jewish Iranian main characters …