The Bible today is weaponized by both liberals and conservatives, each side cherry-picking their favorite verses. Have you ever wondered why the Bible lends itself to supporting contradictory positions in moral debates--why even the devil quotes Scripture? If so, you will enjoy this book. Haunted by Paradise reveals the unity and coherence of the Bible in the light of paradise. The Bible begins in Eden and ends in the new Jerusalem--in between, the Bible is haunted by the memory of paradise lost and the hope for paradise regained. With paradise as the interpretive key, Murphy unlocks biblical ethics. He shows that there is no Old Testament ethics or New Testament ethics--only a unified biblical ethics. In sixteen short chapters, this book addresses urgent moral questions about issues ranging from capital punishment to war, including divine justice, homosexuality, marriage, nature, racism, patriarchy, and work. In each chapter, Murphy shows how the Bible negotiates the tension between divine ideals and human realities.
Über den Autor James Bernard Murphy
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Graeme Garrard is the author of four books, most recently The Return of the State: And Why It Is Essential For Our Health, Wealth and Happiness (Yale University Press, 2022). He has published many scholarly journal articles and popular essays in newspapers and magazines. Dr Garrard is Professor of Politics at Cardiff University and a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society. He has taught at colleges and universities in Canada, Britain, France and the United States for 27 years, including 12 years at the Harvard Summer School. He is a graduate of the University of Toronto and Oxford University.James Bernard Murphy is Professor of Government at Dartmouth College, where he teaches political philosophy, jurisprudence, and ethics. Before becoming a professor, Murphy worked as an urban planner in the City of New York, where he was born. He received his Masters of City Planning from M.I.T. and his B.A. and Ph.D. from Yale University. Murphy's scholarly books include The Moral Economy of Labor (1993), Your Whole Life: Beyond Childhood and Adulthood (2020), and Deification in Classical Greek Philosophy and the Bible (forthcoming 2024). He has also written for a wider audience in his books How to Think Politically (with Graeme Garrard, 2019), Haunted by Paradise: A Philosopher's Quest for Biblical Answers to Key Moral Questions (2021), The Third Sword: On the Political Role of Prophets (forthcoming, 2023), and in essays for the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and the Washington Post.
