Faculty Books and Book Chapters

Printing is not supported at the primary Gallery Thumbnail page. Please first navigate to a specific Image before printing.

Switch View to Grid View Slideshow

God question

James Porter Moreland

A leading evangelical thinker offers this brand-new way of addressing life's most important questions: Does God exist, and can we know Him? J.P. Moreland, distinguished professor of philosophy at Talbot School of Theology, abandons traditional didactic apologetics and entices skeptics and dissatisfied believers into a conversation about the emptiness and anxiety so many feel today. He invites them to the abundant life Jesus offers but that so few seem to be experiencing.

Moreland shows that people are created by a benevolent God and given a life-enhancing purpose. He empowers readers to...
- overcome obstacles to faith, including questions about science and religion
- embrace an enticing view of Jesus and the kingdom of God
- replace unhelpful images of God with the truth
Readers will find practical and effective ways to experience intimacy with God, an effective life of prayer, and a confident hope in life after death.
God question : an invitation to a life of meaning (Revised edition)

James Porter Moreland

What does it take to live a meaningful life? Why are so many people in affluent nations so anxious and unhappy? What difference does believing in God really make? And does belief in the God of the Bible truly make sense today?

In this revised edition of The God Question, philosopher J. P. Moreland invites us on a journey to a rich, flourishing life. He digs into the causes of our cultural crisis of unhappiness and considers how the God revealed in Jesus provides the most rational solution to our deepest needs. With special sensitivity to skeptics, seekers, and Christians who are disenchanted with their faith, he helps us see the Christian story - its reasonableness and its relevance - in fresh ways.

For anyone wrestling with big questions about life and faith, Moreland provides insight from his many years of philosophical studies and his own experience as a Christian. Filled with personal stories, this book explores evidence for the existence of God, the reliability of the Gospels, essentials of a flourishing Christian life, the reality of miracles, and more. This edition also features a new section on overcoming anxiety and depression. Wherever you are on your journey, The God Question will help you see anew what difference Jesus makes in a human life.
Grossmann on Existence and Property-Instances : Suarez’s Way Out

James Porter Moreland

Reinhardt Grossmann is one of the most sophisticated, knowledgeable and original contemporary metaphysicians. Although he was a student of Bergmann, he influenced the development of Bergmann's metaphysics considerably. No philosopher other than Grossmann defends perception to that degree against the persistent skeptical arguments. He characterizes his epistemological positions as radical empiricism and radical realism. By realism Grossmann mainly means the view that the material things we perceive exist. It is thus also an ontological position and closely related to his empiricism. Grossmann's empiricism is radical insofar as he claims that entities of all categories are perceptible, even numbers and universals. Grossmann's universal realism advocates a theory of abstract categories against the current naturalism. He distinguishes between the world and the physical universe. The latter is the domain of science; the former is the subject of ontology.

Ch. 7
Intelligent Design and Evolutionary Psychology as Research Programs : A Comparison of Their Most Plausible Specifications

James Porter Moreland

This volume highlights points of agreement and disagreement between two leading conversants on the subject of Intelligent Design and the sufficiency of a Darwinian explanation of evolution. The subject of Intelligent Design has raised considerable interest and controversy over the meaning and relationship of science and religious conviction.

Ch. 7
Life and Death Debate: Moral Issues of Our Time

James Porter Moreland

This work is an introductory treatment of issues and options in social and bioethics which center on the end of life. Moreland and Geisler have attempted to simplify and summarize various end-of-life topics without being simplistic or caricaturing different viewpoints, even though the authors' own viewpoints are made perfectly clear. A comprehensive bibliography, glossary, and subject and author index make this a valuable textbook as well as a resource for further study.

The major purpose of this book is to make the reader think more clearly and deeply about the important issues discussed between its covers. Beginning the work is an essay that introduces the dilemma of ethical decisions. The following chapters separately discuss the situations of abortion, infanticide, euthanasia, suicide, capital punishment, and war. The discussion concludes with a chapter of practical and theoretical guidance for making ethical decisions. A glossary, subject index, author index, and selected bibliography for each chapter make this a valuable text. This important work will not only appeal to experienced philosophers, but also to students of moral philosophy, theology, and ethics.
Love Your God with All Your Mind: The Role of Reason in the Life of the Soul

James Porter Moreland

We know that faith means “being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see” (Hebrews 11:1, NIV). Love Your God with All Your Mind explains the importance of using your mind not only to win others to Christ but also to experience personal spiritual growth. Author J. P. Moreland challenges you to use logic and reason to further God’s kingdom through evangelism, apologetics, worship, and vocation. This revised edition includes expanded appendixes and three new chapters that outline how to reason for the reality of God and the historicity of Jesus’ life teachings, death, and resurrection.
Neuroscience and Substance Dualism

James Porter Moreland

The world’s leading authorities in the sciences and humanities—dozens of top scholars, including three Nobel laureates—join a cultural and intellectual battle that leaves no human life untouched. Is the universe self-existent, self-sufficient, and self-organizing, or is it grounded instead in a reality that transcends space, time, matter, and energy?
Recalcitrant Imago Dei : human persons and the failure of naturalism

James Porter Moreland

The Veritas Series refuses to accept disciplinary isolation: both for theology and for other disciplines. The Recalcitrant Imago Dei offers a critical discussion of naturalism, the idea that all phenomena can be explained by the physical sciences.
Running in Place or Running in its Proper Place

James Porter Moreland

A unique anthology of essays exploring the philosophical wisdom runners contemplate when out for a run. It features writings from some of America’s leading philosophers, including Martha Nussbaum, Charles Taliaferro, and J.P. Moreland.
- A first-of-its-kind collection of essays exploring those gems of philosophical wisdom runners contemplate when out for a run
- Topics considered include running and the philosophy of friendship; the freedom of the long distance runner; running as aesthetic experience, and “Could a Zombie Run a Marathon?”
- Contributing essayists include philosophers with athletic experience at the collegiate level, philosophers whose pasttime is running, and one philosopher who began running to test the ideas in his essay
Ch. 14
Scaling the Secular City: A Defense of Christianity

James Porter Moreland

This volume offers up-to-date arguments for God's existence and for Jesus's deity and resurrection, answers to objections to Christian theism, and discussions of four key issues.
Simple Guide to Experience Miracles: Instruction and Inspiration for Living Supernaturally in Christ

James Porter Moreland

Does God Still Do Miracles Today? A Simple Guide to Experience Miracles will give you confidence in and awareness of the supernatural realm as you learn how to flourish spiritually by experiencing more miraculous interventions in your life and ministry. Internationally renowned philosopher J. P. Moreland looks at the nature of miracles and explains why bearing and receiving credible testimony to God's miraculous acts is a crucial feature of a mature Jesus-follower. He also shows how to distinguish a real miracle from a mere coincidence. Miracles bring comfort to believers, strengthening faith in God and creating boldness in our lives.

While miraculous healings have occurred frequently throughout church history, Moreland provides data showing how the last fifty years have seen a massive outbreak of miracles and supernatural activity. Today, he argues, the church should humbly expect to see more of these miraculous works of God than we do.

Moreland looks at topics like:
- The relationship between sickness and suffering, along with two different ways to pray for healing
- How to discern clearly the difference between a genuine miracle and a mere coincidence
- How to increase your faith that petitionary prayer really works and what to make of unanswered prayer
- Six ways God speaks to us and advice for hearing God wisely and biblically
- The role angels play in our lives, how they appear to us, and how to combat demonic influence
- The biblical basis for most Near-Death Experiences and what we can learn from them
A Simple Guide to Experience Miracles increases your expectation and hope that God can and often does miraculously intervene to bring help and comfort. Moreland shows that it makes rational sense to step out and engage in employing Kingdom power and to strengthen courage to witness and act on behalf of the gospel of Jesus. Filled with inspiring, credible, motivating accounts of miracles, he covers five different kinds of supernatural activities and provides practical wisdom about how to begin practices such as healing prayer and learning to deal with the demonic.
Soul and near death experiences: a case for substance dualism

James Porter Moreland

Chapter 2 p. 15+

Raised on the Third Day approaches these questions with critical and believing eyes. A variety of contributors―including J. P. Moreland, William Lane Craig, Craig A. Evans, Beth M. Sheppard, and Sean McDowell―evaluate scriptural, historical, moral, and apologetic issues related to Christ’s death and resurrection. Readers will better appreciate how Gary Habermas has shaped the discussion and how scholarship can be moved forward. Study of Christ’s resurrection is far from exhausted.

Gary R. Habermas is one of the most influential Christian philosophers and apologists of the later twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. His life’s work has focused on matters pertaining to the historicity of the resurrection of Jesus, and it is widely agreed that Habermas is the foremost authority on the subject. This festschrift is a tribute to that work.
Soul : how we know it's real and why it matters

James Porter Moreland

In a culture in which science is believed to hold the answers to every question, spiritual realities like the soul are often ignored or ridiculed. We are told that neuroscience holds the key to explaining every aspect of human behavior. Yet Christian philosopher J. P. Moreland argues that Scripture, sound philosophical reasoning, and everyday experience all point to the reality of an immaterial soul. Countering the arguments of both naturalists and Christian scholars who embrace a material-only view of humanity, Moreland demonstrates why it is both biblical and reasonable to believe humans are essentially spiritual beings. He also describes the various components of the soul and how Christians can nurture their souls as disciples of Christ. Moreland shows that neuroscience and the soul are not competing explanations of human activity, but that both coexist and influence one another.
Substance dualism and the diachronic/synchronic unity of consciousness

James Porter Moreland

On the heels of the advance since the twentieth-century of wholly physicalist accounts of human persons, the influence of materialist ontology is increasingly evident in Christian theologizing. To date, the contemporary literature has tended to focus on anthropological issues (e.g., whether the traditional soul / body distinction is viable), with occasional articles treating physicalist accounts of such doctrines as the Incarnation and Resurrection of Jesus cropping up, as well. Interestingly, the literature to date, both for and against this influence, is dominated by philosophers. The present volume is a collection of philosophers and theologians who advance several novel criticisms of this growing trend toward physicalism in Christian theology. The present collection definitively shows that Christian physicalism has some significant philosophical and theological problems. No doubt all philosophical anthropologies have their challenges, but the present volume shows that Christian physicalism is most likely not an adequate accounting for essential theological topics within Christian theism. Christians, then, should consider alternative anthropologies.

Ch. 3
Theistic evolution : a scientific, philosophical, and theological critique

James Porter Moreland

Many prominent Christians insist that the church must yield to contemporary evolutionary theory and therefore modify traditional biblical ideas about the creation of life. They argue that God used—albeit in an undetectable way—evolutionary mechanisms to produce all forms of life. Featuring two dozen highly credentialed scientists, philosophers, and theologians from Europe and North America, this volume contests this proposal, documenting evidential, logical, and theological problems with theistic evolution—making it the most comprehensive critique of theistic evolution yet produced.
Truth, Contemporary Philosophy, and the PostmodernTurn

James Porter Moreland

Four widely read evangelical scholars have crafted a superb expose and antidote to the mind-set and cultural ills of postmodernism and those who accommodate it, while issuing a clarion call to remain vitally committed to the truth of God's revelation in Christ and the Bible. The original lectures, both stimulating and refreshing, were masterfully delivered to large audiences. Now, having them in hand allows even greater reflection and absorption of the truths they expound

Ch. 3
Universals

James Porter Moreland

Universals begins with a taxonomy of extreme nominalist, moderate nominalist, and realist positions on properties, outlining the way each handles the phenomena of predication, resemblance, and abstract reference. The debate about properties and philosophical naturalism is also examined. Different forms of extreme nominalism and minimalist realism are critiqued. Later chapters defend a traditional realist view of universals and examine the objections to realism from various infinite regresses, the difficulties in stating identity conditions for properties, and problems with realist accounts of knowledge of abstract objects. The debate between Platonists and Aristotelians is examined in the context of the relationship between properties and an adequate theory of existence. The book's final chapter explores the problem of individuating particulars. Universals makes a difficult topic accessible while maintaining the sophistication of argument required by a more advanced readership, providing an authoritative treatment of the subject for both students and scholars.
Blackwell companion to natural theology

James Porter Moreland and William Lane Craig

With the help of in-depth essays from some of the world's leading philosophers, The Blackwell Companion to Natural Theologyexplores the nature and existence of God through human reason and evidence from the natural world.
- Provides in-depth and cutting-edge treatment of natural theology's main arguments
- Includes contributions from first-rate philosophers well known for their work on the relevant topics
- Updates relevant arguments in light of the most current, state-of-the-art philosophical and scientific discussions
- Stands in useful contrast and opposition to the arguments of the 'new atheists'
Philosophical foundations for a Christian worldview

James Porter Moreland and William Lane Craig
- Winner of a 2004 ECPA Gold Medallion Award
- Winner of an Award of Excellence in the 2003 Chicago Book Clinic
- What is real?
- What is truth?
- What can we know?
- What should we believe?
- What should we do and why?
- Is there a God?
- Can we know him?
- Do Christian doctrines make sense?
- Can we believe in God in the face of evil?
These are fundamental questions that any thinking person wants answers to. These are questions that philosophy addresses. And the answers we give to these kinds of questions serve as the the foundation stones for consrtucting any kind of worldview. In Philosophical Foundations for a Christian Worldview J.P. Moreland and William Lane Craig offer a comprehensive introduction to philosophy from a Christian perspective. In their broad sweep they seek to introduce readers to the principal subdisciplines of philosophy, including epistemology, metaphysics, philosophy of science, ethics and philosophy of religion. They do so with characteristic clarity and incisiveness. Arguments are clearly outlined, and rival theories are presented with fairness and accuracy. Philosophy, they contend, aids Christians in the tasks of apologetics, polemics and systematic theology. It reflects our having been made in the image of God, helps us to extend biblical teaching into areas not expressly addressed in Scripture, facilitates the spiritual discipline of study, enhances the boldness and self-image of the Christian community, and is requisite to the essential task of integrating faith and learning. Here is a lively and thorough introduction to philosophy for all who want to know reality.
God conversation : using stories and illustrations to explain your faith

James Porter Moreland and Tim Muehlhoff

Think of it this way . . . Our beliefs are challenged from many directions. Every day it seems more difficult to explain to our friends, families, and neighbors what we believe and why. When our ideas and arguments fail to persuade them, what then? Is there another approach we can take? Veteran apologists and communicators J. P. Moreland and Tim Muehlhoff say that the best way to win over others is with a good story. Stories have the ability to get behind our preconceptions and defenses. They appeal to the whole person rather than just to the mind. This expanded edition includes new chapters and updated stories and illustrations throughout. In these pages the authors enhance the logic and evidence found in other books defending the faith with things that your friends, relatives, or coworkers will ponder long after a conversation is over. Here is sound, empathetic coaching for those of us who long to communicate our faith more effectively.
Body & soul : human nature & the crisis in ethics

James Porter Moreland and Scott B. Rae

While most people throughout history have believed that we are both physical and spiritual beings, the rise of science has called into question the existence of the soul. Many now argue that neurophysiology demonstrates the radical dependence, indeed, identity, between mind and brain. Advances in genetics and in mapping human DNA, some say, show there is no need for the hypothesis of body-soul dualism. Even many Christian intellectuals have come to view the soul as a false Greek concept that is outdated and unbiblical. Concurrent with the demise of dualism has been the rise of advanced medical technologies that have brought to the fore difficult issues at both edges of life. Central to questions about abortion, fetal research, reproductive techologies, cloning and euthanasia is our understanding of the nature of human personhood, the reality of life after death and the value of ethical or religious knowledge as compared to scientific knowledge. In this careful treatment, J. P. Moreland and Scott B. Rae argue that the rise of these problems alongside the demise of Christian dualism is no coincidence. They therefore employ a theological realism to meet these pressing issues, and to present a reasonable and biblical depiction of human nature as it impinges upon critical ethical concerns. This vigorous philosophical and ethical defense of human nature as body and soul, regardless of whether one agrees or disagrees, will be for all a touchstone for debate and discussion for years to come.
Christians in the Argument Culture: Apologetics as Conversation

Tim Muehlhoff

Do seekers' questions and criticisms catch you unaware? Here's your go-to resource for defending the Christian faith in our changing culture. Targeting the pressing issues of our time, more than 20 leading apologists address controversial topics including transgender lifestyles, the rise of Islam, economic and political realities, religious freedom, and more.

Ch. 1
Eyes to see : recognizing God's common grace in an unsettled world

Tim Muehlhoff

When we encounter human suffering or personal tragedy, Christians and non-Christians alike utter the same refrain: Where is God? If God exists, then where in the world is he? Why doesn’t he show himself? And how can we tell if God is really working or not?

Tim Muehlhoff gives us insight into recognizing how God is at work in the world. He unpacks the doctrine of common grace to uncover how God works in ways that we don't always realize. If we have a limited idea of what divine action looks like―dramatic answers to prayer, healings with no medical explanation, financial needs being met unexpectedly―then we miss seeing how God acts through common grace in ordinary, everyday ways such as antibiotics, financial planners, and thoughtful friends. Muehlhoff offers dozens of illustrations from contemporary culture to help us understand and communicate how God is present and acting in the world today.

Discover how God cares for our troubled world as he gives you the eyes to see.
He Started it! : Everyday Communication in Parenting

Tim Muehlhoff

The routine interactions we have day-in, day-out are the ones that most decisively shape our identities and the quality and durability of our relationships. In COMPOSING RELATIONSHIPS: COMMUNICATION IN EVERYDAY LIFE (WITH INFOTRAC) you'll see how relationships grow primarily out of so-called small talk between friends and romantic partners, rituals in families, and commonplace norms in organizations.

Ch. 4
I beg to differ : navigating difficult conversations with truth and love

Tim Muehlhoff

How do we communicate with people who disagree with us? In today's polarized world, friends and strangers clash with each other over issues large and small. Coworkers have conflicts in the office. Married couples fight over finances. And online commenters demonize one another's political and religious perspectives. Is there any hope for restoring civil discourse? Communications expert Tim Muehlhoff provides a strategy for having difficult conversations, helping us move from contentious debate to constructive dialogue. By acknowledging and entering into the other person's story, we are more likely to understand where they're coming from and to cultivate common ground. Insights from Scripture and communication theory provide practical ways to manage disagreements and resolve conflicts. We can disagree without being disagreeable. And we can even help another see different points of view and learn from one another.