3,000 years of ideas about the nature of love in Western culture are brought together in this concise history. By blending the works of many scholars and examining the significant lives, works, and movements associated with love, Love: A Brief History Through Western Christianity traces the evolution and impact of this timeless topic.

• Takes the reader on a lightning but enlightening journey through 3,000 years of the idea of love
  
• Examines the influential movements, people, and work that have helped shape our notion of love in Western...

3,000 years of ideas about the nature of love in Western culture are brought together in this concise history. By blending the works of many scholars and examining the significant lives, works, and movements associated with love, Love: A Brief History Through Western Christianity traces the evolution and impact of this timeless topic.

• Takes the reader on a lightning but enlightening journey through 3,000 years of the idea of love
  
• Examines the influential movements, people, and work that have helped shape our notion of love in Western...

Exploring how Christianity became a world religion, this brief history examines Christian missions and their relationship to the current globalization of Christianity.

• A short and enlightening history of Christian missions: a phenomenon that many say reflects the single most important intercultural movement over a sustained period of human history
• Offers a thematic overview that takes into account the political, cultural, social, and theological issues
• Discusses the significance of missions to the globalization of Christianity, and broadens our understanding of...

Drawing on examples from literature, art, and popular culture, as well as theology, this engaging book reveals the importance of the question, -whose was he?- in fully understanding the life and legacy of Jesus.

• A concise, accessible and engaging exploration of Jesus's life and enduring influence
• Charts the changing global status and influence of Jesus, a Galilean Jew born when the ancient Roman Empire ruled the Mediterranean world, and how he has come to be honored as the Christ and recognized by billions of people around the world
• Traces the reception history of...

Exploring how Christianity became a world religion, this brief history examines Christian missions and their relationship to the current globalization of Christianity.

• A short and enlightening history of Christian missions: a phenomenon that many say reflects the single most important intercultural movement over a sustained period of human history
• Offers a thematic overview that takes into account the political, cultural, social, and theological issues
• Discusses the significance of missions to the globalization of Christianity, and broadens our understanding of...

This engaging book by one of today's best-known Christian writers explores the history of heaven, from its origins in biblical writings to its most recent representations.

• A short, accessible book on the history of heaven.
  
• Draws together representations of heaven by a wide range of writers, theologians, politicians and artists.
  
• Covers literary works such as Dante's Divine Comedy, Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress, and the poems of George Herbert.
  
• Considers discussions by Marx and Freud of heaven's role in...

This accessible and enlightening history provides insights into the fascinating genre of apocalyptic literature, showing how the apocalypse encompasses far more than popular views of the last judgment and violent end of the world might suggest.

• An accessible and enlightening history of the -apocalypses---ancient Jewish and Christian works -- providing fresh insights into the fascinating genre of literature
• Shows how the apocalypses were concerned not only with popular views of the last judgment and violent end of the world, but with reward and punishment after death, the...

This accessible guide to the development of Japan's indigenous religion from ancient times to the present day offers an illuminating introduction to the myths, sites and rituals of kami worship, and their role in Shinto's enduring religious identity.

• Offers a unique new approach to Shinto history that combines critical analysis with original research
• Examines key evolutionary moments in the long history of Shinto, including the Meiji Revolution of 1868, and provides the first critical history in English or Japanese of the Hie shrine, one of the most important in all...

The Reformation: A Brief History is a succinct and engaging introduction to the origins and history of the Protestant Reformation.

• A rich overview of the Reformation, skillfully blending social, political, religious and theological dimensions
• A clearly and engagingly written narrative which draws on the latest and best scholarship
• Includes the history of the Reformation in Scandinavia and Eastern Europe, areas that are rarely covered in any detail
• The Reformation is placed in the context of the entire history of Christianity to draw out its...

This brief history connects the past and present of utopian thought, from the first utopias in ancient Greece, right up to present day visions of cyberspace communities and paradise.

• Explores the purpose of utopias, what they reveal about the societies who conceive them, and how utopias have changed over the centuries
• Unique in including both non-Western and Western visions of utopia
• Explores the many forms utopias have taken - prophecies and oratory, writings, political movements, world's fairs, physical communities - and also discusses high-tech and cyberspace...