This innovative, broad-ranging book by William Greenway unfolds a biblical spirituality centring on love for all creation and all creatures. Greenway rereads the creation and flood narratives in Genesis from an overtly creature-loving perspective that not only inspires care for creation and its creatures but also reveals sophisticated understanding
About the Author :
William Greenway is Associate Professor of Philosophical Theology at Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary.
Review :
The Presbyterian Outlook
"One of the finest and most clearly written books on biblical spirituality." Religious Studies Review
"An insightful and provocative (re)reading of the primeval history that questions our anthropocentrism."
Bill McKibben
-- author of Deep Economy and The End of Nature
"An intriguing addition to the growing literature about how our tradition relates to the larger world around us. This book is full of insights!"
Andrew Linzey
-- author of Animal Theology and Creatures of the Same God
"Reflective, scholarly, imaginative, and insightful. A tour de force in exploring animal theology."
Patricia K. Tull
-- author of Inhabiting Eden: Christians, the Bible, and the Ecological Crisis
"For the Love of All Creatures illuminates the earliest stories of Genesis from the perspective of philosophical theology, contrasting them with two other classic creation accounts -- the Enuma Elish from ancient Babylonia and Thomas Hobbes's early modern book Leviathan. Greenway unveils the power of Genesis to convey both the idyllic majesty of the created realm and the depth of evil and suffering that suffuses actual life on earth."
Patrick D. Miller
-- Princeton Theological Seminary
"Bringing theology, philosophy, and ethics to bear in this book, William Greenway opens up the Genesis stories in profound ways. Be prepared for fresh and compelling insights into how Genesis 1-11 shapes -- or should shape -- our life and our thinking about the world of which we are an intimate part. Greenway has written what is by far the most interesting and important book on this oft-studied biblical text that I have read in a long time."
Charles C. Camosy
-- author of For Love of Animals: Christian Ethics, Consistent Action
"William Greenway shows that love for all creatures lies at the very center of our primeval narrative tradition. If this point sinks into the heart of the church, animals in the United States may get a fighting chance to have their dignity respected."
Matthew C. Halteman
-- Calvin College and Oxford Centre for Animal Ethics
"The popular view of the seven-days-of-creation story in Genesis is that it offers human beings divine license to instrumentalize and dominate other creatures of lesser value. With prophetic passion and scholarly precision, but without sentimentality or undue idealism, Greenway unravels this tragically flawed interpretation and weaves in its place a grace-drenched vision of creation as primordially, ultimately, and entirely beloved of God. . . . If contemporary heirs to the seven-days narrative could find the spiritual imagination to read their primeval history as Greenway does and the moral courage to live toward this vision, the world would have a great deal more joy and delight and decidedly less needless suffering and death."
The Midwest Book Reviews
"An impressively written, organized and presented work of original scholarship, For the Love of All Creatures: The Story of Grace in Genesis is an inherently absorbing read. . . . Certain to be an enduringly popular addition to church, community, and academic library Christian Studies reference collections."
Sharing the Practice
"This book has important implications in our current politically charged discussions of global climate change and in light of Pope Francis's recent encyclical 'On Care for Our Common Home.'"
