Drama of the Divine Economy

Paul M. Blowers holds the Ph.D. in patristics and early Christian studies from the University of Notre Dame, and since 1989 has taught church history and historical theology at Emmanuel Christian Seminary in Johnson City, Tennessee, where he is currently the Dean E. Walker Professor of Church History. He is principally a scholar of Greek and Byzantine patristics, and particularly of the theology of Maximus the Confessor, but he has also taught broadly in the field of church history and Christian thought. He is a Past President of the North American Patristics Society and is currently an Associate Editor of the Journal of Early Christian Studies. Author, editor, or translator of six books in early church history, he has published numerous journal articles.

• 1. Introduction ; 2. Legacies of Greco-Roman Cosmological Wisdom ; 3. Legacies of Hellenistic Jewish Cosmological Wisdom ; 4. The Shaping of Normative Discourse about Creator and Creation in Pre-Nicene Christianity ; 5. Creation in the Mirror of Scripture I: Patristic Approaches to the Genesis Creation Story ; 6. Toward a Christian Theology of the Beginning (and End) of the World ; 7. Creation in the Mirror of Scripture II: Patristic Approaches to the Biblical Witnesses beyond Genesis ; 8. Christ the Creator and the Creator Spirit: The Drama of the Incarnation and the Remaking of Creation ; 9. Performing Faith in the Creator: The Drama of the Divine Economy as the Framework of Devotional and Ritual Practices in the Early Church ; Epilogue: Drama of the Divine Economy

Blower has responded to the need for an overarching and articulate treatment of early Christian doctrines of creation. The book he has produced shows us that a sound knowledge of these doctrines is crucial to thinking about theology more generally, both ancient and modern.