The Oxford Handbook of the Trinity ed. by Gilles Emery and Matthew Levering (review)

BOOK REVIEWS 341 times, it will likely be because Lagrange got himself tangled in knots due to his very high ideals of honor, obedience, truthfulness, and the duty of apologetics (for example, resisting the pseudepigraphic character of 2 Peter, Ephesians, and the Pastoral Epistles). One might also tire of Vincent’s mention of Lagrange’s devotion to the Blessed Mother on every fifth page. For historians the work is a godsend. For others it is a survey of biblical studies covering over a century. BENEDICT VIVIANO University of Fribourg Fribourg, Switzerland The Oxford Handbook of the Trinity. Edited by GILLES EMERY and MATTHEW LEVERING. New York: Oxford University Press, 2012. Pp. 648. $128.00 (cloth). ISBN: 978-0-19-955781-3. Since the series was begun some years ago, Oxford Handbooks have been providing students and theologians with outstanding resources. In one single volume, they offer panoramic views of important theological topics. They give readers not only a wide-ranging sense of a topic, but also a good grasp of the state of contemporary scholarship. This volume is no exception. In fact, its quality is particularly outstanding. This is due, of course, to the individual contributors, but much credit must also be given to the editors, well known to anyone working in the field of Trinitarian theology. Neither of them contributed any of the chapters (beyond the introduction and postscript, each well worth reading), but the topics they chose, and the contributors they gathered, manifest judicious discernment and, implicitly, a compelling vision of Trinitarian theology. Oxford Handbooks generally solicit articles from a very wide range of scholars—this one includes 43 separate chapters and runs 648 pages—and their sheer length ensures a certain range and breadth. They also tend to attract contributions from leaders in the field. These considerable natural advantages would ensure some amount of success for any editor. Emery and Levering, however, did not rely on them alone. They structured their handbook in a way that maximizes the range and coherence of the contributions. As they explain, “We have sought to offer readers essays that do justice to this diversification of points of view [present in contemporary Trinitarian theology], while also offering, in so far as possible, a coherent ensemble. The present Handbook is not a theologically neutral encyclopaedia, 342 BOOK REVIEWS but rather presents contributions from scholars who differ on many points but who generally agree in working out their Trinitarian theology in relation to the Nicene faith” (4-5). Perhaps the editors’ most striking decision was to emphasize Scripture and the history of Trinitarian theology. Of the 43 chapters, 24 concern Scripture or historical studies. This emphasis reflects developments among Scripture scholars and the growth in historical studies within the larger discipline of theology; it also manifests the editors’ evident conviction that contemporary Trinitarian theology requires deep engagement with the history of Trinitarian thought. The editors divide the contributions into seven sections: (1) The Trinity in Scripture (6 chapters), (2) Patristic Witnesses to the Trinitarian Faith (4 chapters), (3) Medieval Appropriations of the Trinitarian Faith (5 chapters), (4) The Reformation to the Twentieth Century (9 chapters), (5) Trinitarian Dogmatics (8 chapters), (6) The Trinity and Christian Life (7 chapters), and (7) Dialogues (4 chapters). Each chapter runs around 5-15 pages and includes a bibliography and a list of suggested reading. All of the contributors are well qualified, some are acknowledged experts on the topics they write about, and together they span a range of religious confessions. Between the topics selected and the contributors themselves, this handbook can claim to cover the full spectrum of Catholic, Protestant, and Orthodox Trinitarian theology. It assembles the largest and most complete survey of Trinitarian theology currently available in English. The quality is generally excellent throughout. Two sorts of chapters are especially notable, namely, those that survey neglected historical periods and those that offer contemporary syntheses of central doctrinal themes. In the first category, we find titles like: “Trinitarian Theology from Alcuin to Anselm” (Lauge Nielsen), “Medieval Trinitarian Theology from the late Thirteenth to the Fifteenth Centuries” (Russell Friedman), “The Development of the Trinity Doctrine in Byzantium (Ninth to Fifteenth Centuries)” (Karl Christian Felmy), “The Trinity in the Early...