This volume... has emerged from a small scholarly conference... on the relationship between Christianity and Greco-Roman civilization, above all, that civilization's characteristic patterns of philosophical thought... The field of investigation [is] the neo-Calvinist current within Dutch protestantism and the elaboration in the 1920s and 1930s of 'Calvinistic' philosophy as one of its most distinctive effects... this 'parish tale' has more to recommend it than might appear at first blush. For there is a good argument to be made why such a thoroughly local study can benefit a much broader...

Tracing the Lines takes on the project of what Christian scholarship is, and should be, today. It does so, however, with an eye to locating similarities in the rich tradition the last nearly two thousand years of Christian scholarship has given birth to. With humility and a sympathetic ear, Sweetman traces the way certain lines of thought have developed over time, showing their strengths, their weaknesses, and their motivation for shaping Christian scholarship in particular ways. Though he locates his own thought within a particular one of these streams, he shows how all of them have...