Broad overviews are found in Owen Chadwick, The Pelican History of the Church, 6 vol. (1960–70, reprinted 1985–86); Kenneth Scott Latourette, A History of Christianity, rev. ed., 2 vol. (1975); and John McManners (ed.), The Oxford Illustrated History of Christianity (1990, reissued 2001).
Guides to the first centuries include W.H.C. Frend, The Rise of Christianity (1984); Robert M. Grant, Augustus to Constantine: The Thrust of the Christian Movement into the Roman World (1970, reissued 2004); and Adolf Harnack, The Mission and Expansion of Christianity in the First Three Centuries, trans. from the German and ed. by James Moffat, 2 vol. (1904, reprinted 1998; also published as The Mission and Expansion of Christianity in the First Three Centuries, 1908, reissued 1972). Rodney Stark, The Rise of Christianity: A Sociologist Reconsiders History (1996), provides a sociological perspective on Christianity’s emergence.
Discussions of special topics are presented in Henry Chadwick, Early Christian Thought and the Classical Tradition: Studies in Justin, Clement, and Origen (1966, reprinted 1984); Robin Lane Fox, Pagans and Christians (1986, reprinted 1995); Wayne A. Meeks, The First Urban Christians: The Social World of the Apostle Paul, 2nd ed. (2003); and J.M. Hussey, The Orthodox Church in the Byzantine Empire (1986, reissued 1990).
In addition to the relevant volumes of the histories cited above, the church in the Middle Ages and the Reformation is treated in Peter R.L. Brown, The Rise of Western Christendom: Triumph and Diversity, ad 200–1000, 2nd ed. (2003); John Bossy, Christianity in the West, 1400–1700 (1985); Joseph H. Lynch, The Medieval Church: A Brief History (1995); Diarmaid MacCullough, The Reformation: A History (2004); Steven Ozment, The Age of Reform (1250–1550): An Intellectual and Religious History of Late Medieval and Reformation Europe (1980); and J.M. Wallace-Hadrill, The Frankish Church (1983).
Modern church history is covered in the general histories cited above; in the works cited in the sections below on Christian missions and ecumenism; and in Kenneth Scott Latourette, Christianity in a Revolutionary Age: A History of Christianity in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, 5 vol. (1958–62, reissued 1973); and Glen T. Miller, The Modern Church: From the Dawn of the Reformation to the Eve of the Third Millennium (1997). Martin E. Marty Henry Chadwick Jaroslav Jan Pelikan The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica Christian doctrine
On the New Testament period, C.H. Dodd, The Apostolic Preaching and Its Developments (1936, reprinted 1980), retains its value; H.E.W. Turner, The Pattern of Christian Truth (1954, reissued 2004), investigates orthodoxy and heresy in the early church; and John Behr, The Way to Nicea (2001), and The Nicene Faith (2004), discuss the development of Trinitarian doctrine in particular. Important issues in medieval Christianity are treated in Jeffrey Burton Russell, Dissent and Order in the Middle Ages (1992); and Per Erik Persson, Sacra Doctrina: Reason and Revelation in Aquinas (1970; originally published in Swedish, 1957). Jaroslav Pelikan and Valerie Hotchkiss (eds.), Creeds & Confessions of Faith in the Christian Tradition, 4 vol. (2003), provides the official documents from the patristic, medieval, Reformation, and modern periods; while Jaroslav Pelikan, Credo (2003), is Pelikan’s “historical and theological guide” and companion volume to these creeds. Yves-M.-J. Congar, Tradition and Traditions (1966, reissued 1998; originally published in French, 2 vol., 1960–63), investigates the recurrent question of the relationship between scripture and tradition. Berard L. Marthaler, The Catechism Yesterday and Today (1995), traces “the evolution of a genre.” Lamin Sanneh, Translating the Message, 2nd ed. (2009), discusses issues of inculturation in West Africa. Joseph Ratzinger (later Pope Benedict XVI), Principles of Catholic Theology (1987; originally published in German, 1982), lays “building stones” for the discipline. Avery Dulles, Magisterium (2007), discusses the office of “teacher and guardian of the faith” in the Catholic tradition. Communal exercises in theology are discussed from various perspectives in Patrick Henry (ed.), Schools of Thought in the Christian Tradition (1984); and William A. Christian, Sr., Doctrines of Religious Communities: A Philosophical Study (1987). An individual example of systematic theology with an ecumenical orientation and in a liturgical perspective is Geoffrey Wainwright, Doxology: The Praise of God in Worship, Doctrine, and Life (1980); a more informal systematics with reflections on theological method is Rowan Williams, On Christian Theology (2000). Christian doctrine The meaning of dogma
Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics, trans. by G.W. Bromiley, 5 vol. (1961, reissued 2004; originally published in German, 4 vol. in 12, 1932–59); Yves-M.-J. Congar, A History of Theology, trans. from French by Hunter Guthrie (1968); Jaroslav Pelikan, The Christian Tradition: A History of the Development of Doctrine, 6 vol. (2002); and Wolfhart Pannenberg, Systematic Theology, 3 vol. (1991–98), are important introductions to the history of doctrine and major doctrinal issues by prominent Protestant and Roman Catholic historians and theologians. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit
Different scholarly perspectives on Jesus Christ as the second person of the Trinity are Walter Kasper, The God of Jesus Christ, trans. by Matthew J. O’Connell (1984; originally published in German, 1982); Albert Schweitzer, The Quest of the Historical Jesus: A Critical Study of Its Progress from Reimarus to Wrede, trans. by W. Montgomery et al., 3rd ed. (1954, reissued 2001; originally published in German, 1906); and Edward Schillebeeckx, Christ, the Sacrament of the Encounter with God, trans. by Paul Barrett (1963, reprinted 1977; originally published in Dutch, 1960). Yves-M.-J. Congar, I Believe in the Holy Spirit, trans. by David Smith, 3 vol. (1983, reissued 1997; originally published in French, 1979–80); Karl Rahner, The Trinity, trans. by Joseph Donceel (1970, reissued 1997; originally published in German); and Michael O’Carroll, Trinitas: A Theological Encyclopedia of the Holy Trinity (1987), are useful introductions to the contemporary understanding of the persons of the Trinity. Anthropology
Excellent studies of Christian views on human nature are Reinhold Niebuhr, The Nature and Destiny of Man: A Christian Interpretation, 2 vol. (1941–43, reissued 1996); and Wolfhart Pannenberg, What Is Man?: Contemporary Anthropology in Theological Perspective (1970, reissued 1975; originally published in German, 1962). The church
Works on various aspects of church doctrine include, on the church, Hans Küng, The Church (1967, reissued 1976; originally published in German, 1967); on the formation of the biblical canon, Bruce M. Metzger, The Canon of the New Testament: Its Origin, Development, and Significance (1987, reissued 1997); on Christian creeds and confessions, Philip Schaff, Biblioteca Symbolica Ecclesiae Universalis: The Creeds of Christendom, 6th ed., 3 vol. (1919, reissued 1977); and Jaroslav Pelikan and Valerie R. Hotchkiss, Creeds and Confessions of Faith in the Christian Tradition, 4 vol. (2003); on the liturgy, Frank C. Senn, Christian Liturgy: Catholic and Evangelical (1997); and James F. White, Introduction to Christian Worship, 3rd ed. rev. and expanded (2000); on monasticism, David Knowles, Christian Monasticism (1969, reissued 1977); and Jean Leclercq, The Love of Learning and the Desire for God: A Study of Monastic Culture, trans. by Catharine Misrahi, 3rd ed. (1982, reissued 2000; originally published in French 1957); and, on Christian art and iconography, Emile Mâle, Religious Art from the Twelfth to the Eighteenth Century (1949, reissued 1982; originally published in French, 1945); Leonid Ouspensky and Vladimir Lossky, The Meaning of Icons, trans. by G.E.H. Palmer, 2nd ed. (1982; originally published in German, 1952); and Robert Milburn, Early Christian Art and Architecture (1988). Eschatology