Rating: 
Summary: A fatal flaw. . .
Review: . . .seriously limits the usefulness of this book.I used "The Moral Vision of the New Testament" in seminary. The book provides an extremely valuable introduction to the concepts involved in Christian Ethics and Moral Theology. Moral implications of numerous current issues are discussed and analyzed in detail. Much positive supporting documentation is provided, as are numerous scholarly footnotes and references. However, in the opinion of this reviewer, there is a flaw so serious in this book that I cannot, in good conscience recommend it as a seminary text, nor would I use it myself as a primary source. Dr. Hays is a pacifist. By itself, this is no problem. Many, many Christians world-wide are pacifist and have been since the dawn of Christianity. However, Dr. Hays uses his pacifism to filter virtually every issue presented in this book, regardless of relevance. His view of Christian pacifism represents an extreme which cannot be justified by any careful examination of Church history. Yet he presents this issue as the "be all and end all" foremost issue facing the Church in the world today. My negative review is not based so much on my disagreement with Dr. Hays on this issue as it is with the pervasiveness with which he allows his view on this single issue to color the entire book. I am also dismayed by the single exception Dr. Hays makes in his anti-violence crusade. This is the issue of abortion. For someone whose pacifistic views color his understanding of all other moral issues, his complete retreat on the area of abortion (which, until the mid-20th century, was an issue of complete consensus in Christianity) seems to me to be hypocritical. The scholar can safely use this book as a secondary source. But I'll never teach from it.
Rating:
Summary: A fatal flaw. . .
Review: . . .seriously limits the usefulness of this book. I used "The Moral Vision of the New Testament" in seminary. The book provides an extremely valuable introduction to the concepts involved in Christian Ethics and Moral Theology. Moral implications of numerous current issues are discussed and analyzed in detail. Much positive supporting documentation is provided, as are numerous scholarly footnotes and references. However, in the opinion of this reviewer, there is a flaw so serious in this book that I cannot, in good conscience recommend it as a seminary text, nor would I use it myself as a primary source. Dr. Hays is a pacifist. By itself, this is no problem. Many, many Christians world-wide are pacifist and have been since the dawn of Christianity. However, Dr. Hays uses his pacifism to filter virtually every issue presented in this book, regardless of relevance. His view of Christian pacifism represents an extreme which cannot be justified by any careful examination of Church history. Yet he presents this issue as the "be all and end all" foremost issue facing the Church in the world today. My negative review is not based so much on my disagreement with Dr. Hays on this issue as it is with the pervasiveness with which he allows his view on this single issue to color the entire book. I am also dismayed by the single exception Dr. Hays makes in his anti-violence crusade. This is the issue of abortion. For someone whose pacifistic views color his understanding of all other moral issues, his complete retreat on the area of abortion (which, until the mid-20th century, was an issue of complete consensus in Christianity) seems to me to be hypocritical. The scholar can safely use this book as a secondary source. But I'll never teach from it.
Rating: 
Summary: A very convincing presentation of the NT's Ethics
Review: In this long-awaited volume, Richard Hays combines a close reading of the moral facets of multiple strands of the New Testament with hermeneutical conclusions for several pertinent issues for today. He combines this with a comparison between his approach and several other notable 20th C. theologians and ethicists, including a helpful list of diagnostic questions which readers can also apply to his own work. Though I differ with a few of his conclusions and even some of his methodological choices, there is no doubt of the incredible value of his work both on its own and as a classroom text. It is a real joy to wrestle and even, in places, to argue with a work of this scope and care.
Rating:
Summary: Sets the standard in the field!
Review: In this long-awaited volume, Richard Hays combines a close reading of the moral facets of multiple strands of the New Testament with hermeneutical conclusions for several pertinent issues for today. He combines this with a comparison between his approach and several other notable 20th C. theologians and ethicists, including a helpful list of diagnostic questions which readers can also apply to his own work. Though I differ with a few of his conclusions and even some of his methodological choices, there is no doubt of the incredible value of his work both on its own and as a classroom text. It is a real joy to wrestle and even, in places, to argue with a work of this scope and care.
Rating: 
Summary: A Fine Contribution to Biblical Ethics
Review: It may well be that the success or failure of Hays' book will boil down to whether or not one agrees with him that (1) Community, (2) Cross, and (3) New Creation are appropriate lenses through which one may view NT ethics. Hays does well to suggest reasons why these lenses are more appropriate than a more traditional lense such as "love": (1) Hays argues that any focal image needs to find a textual basis in all the canonical witness. "Love," according to Hays is not a central theme or ethical warrant in several important NT texts (Mark, Hebrews and Revelation, and Acts). According to Hays, the 3 metaphors he elevates well encapsulate essential claims in a much larger plurality of NT texts. (2) Love is itself not as much an image as it is the "interpretation of an image." "Love," in other words, is embodied concretely in the NT by the cross. Apart from the specific narrative context of the cross, "Love" loses any meaning. Thus, love in the NT is itself subsumed under the image of cross. (3) "Love" in contemporary ethics has become a fluid, debased concept that covers "all manners of vapid self-indulgence." From the perspective of contemporary culture, elevating love as a functional metaphor may do as much harm as it does good. My personal observation is that "kingdom" may be a more appropriate metaphor than "community," for Hays since "community" in many ways has becomed as distorted a concept as love. The notion of "kingdom" carries with it the idea of community united under the reign of God, embodied through the cruciform life of Christ. I find this a more helpful metaphor than "community," which today may carry the idea of a collection of self-interested individuals using the church to meet their own needs. Perhaps the greatest strenght of this book is the degree to which Hays struggles to allow scripture itself to take priority over other sources of authority (tradition, reason, and experience). The reason Hays comes out such an ardent pacificist is precisely because his exegesis of NT texts leads him to believe that the NT is nearly univocal in the ethical stance it takes regarding Christian non-violence. Jesus' teaching of his disciples (contra Niebuhr) in the Sermon on the Mount is intended as a real way of life to be embodied in faithful obedience, not an impossible ideal that must be dismissed by informed realists. According to Hays Jesus' own life of costly obedience to God functions as a paradigm for his own disciples, and the NT itself suggests that this is to be the case (this is a theme well-embodied in Paul's letters and in Mark's gospel). Even tradition would lead us to believe that the early church was consistently committed to non-violence at least until the time of Constantine; thus other sources of authority outside scripture seem to confirm Hays' argument that the church is to be a people committed to non-violent love of the enemy. The strength of Hays' pacifism is that he is attempting to root it firmly in his exegesis of the NT. Thus, one must do more than dismiss him as an unrealistic pacifist superimposing his views on the church. Rather, one must begin at the exegetical level to explain where Hays is mistaken, why his conclusion that the NT voice is univocal in advocating non-violence as the way of the church is incorrect. Or another way to deal with Hays' pacifism would be to say that other sources (tradition, reason, or experience) need to take precedence over scripture even if Hays is correct that the NT voice is consistently non-violent. This shifts the debate back to the hermeneutical level (and it is at this level where most theologians will conflict with Hays). There are two weaknesses of the book in my opinion. First, Hays does not spend enough time exploring the issue of how the OT is to function as a basis for Christian ethics. Admittedly, attention to this question would greatly expand an already large book. Still, the plurality of scripture is greatly expanded when one draws the OT into a discussion of Christian ethics. This makes an integrative study of OT and NT for Christian ethics all the more necessary. This becomes especially important for any non-violence reading of NT ethics. Second, I would have like Hays to give more attention to the general epistles and Hebrews. I'm afraid Hays brushes them off by saying that they essentially echo ethical themes he covers in his close reading of the gospels and Pauline literature. I think this case remains to be demonstrated.
Rating:
Summary: Buy this first - other books can wait...
Review: Recently several important projects have emerged challenging the myths of secular reason and an autonomous realm of 'ethics' (eg Charles Taylor, Milbank, Oliver O'Donovan), seeking to disentangle the constitutive moral and theological threads from the 'mainstream' narrative(s) of modernity, illuminating the theological forgetfulness of the secular mind. While these projects have a host of favourable outcomes, not the least of which is a new and confident engagement with modernity on Christian terms, before one becomes too enamoured of such projects, much more needs to be done biblically and theologically. Here Richard Hays' impressive new work in NT ethics can help us. Hays' own project is concerned principally with the Christian community and its ability to live "under the Word", to hear Scripture speaking to us today. Such an aim is only controversial depending upon where one stands in the NT Studies guild. If one adopts the approach of Jack T. Sanders, for example, any appeals to the NT can only founder due to historical distance, alien contexts and questions - and can even be downright immoral! Otherwise, Hays can be seen to be engaging in a classical Christian practice, joining the many volumes written in Christian ethics, and complimenting the experience and activity of Christians and their communities worldwide. In evangelical circles where the Bible is "taken seriously", the 'Constantinian' mindset is dominant (and there are many superficial treatments). Hays' approach shares the same (or greater) biblical 'seriousness' but is radically ecclesiocentric - something that is possibly clearer to a NT professor than a professional 'ethicist' or systematic theologian. Alongside the work of James McClendon, Hays' book stands as a detailed, systematic challenge to a prevalent way that Christians 'do ethics'. Hays sees Christian ethics as consisting of four interrelated, interpenetrating tasks (distinguishable for "heuristic purposes") - descriptive, synthetic, hermeneutical and pragmatic. The descriptive task is primarily exegetical, dealing with the texts without an immediate concern for harmonising, seeking the specific concerns and interests of each literary unit. He says: "Our descriptive work cannot be confined, however, to the explicit moral teachings of the NT texts; the church's moral world is manifest not only in didache but also in the stories, symbols, social structures, and practices that shape the community's ethos." Hays highlights that NT moral exhortations must be seen in connection with their theological warrants (and not as freestanding 'ethics' desired by analytic philosophers). From these diverse materials, Hays moves (beyond Meeks) to the synthetic task. This broad harmony is not sought in some 'ethical theme' such as 'love' (which, once again, is more akin to the modern disjunction of fact and value, or, theologically, doctrine and ethics, than to the NT traditions); nor is a theological theme such as 'creation', 'eschaton' or 'covenant' considered suitable. This is due to Hays' (more than formal) appreciation of narrative; that the various traditions tell and re-tell the same basic story with different focuses on themes and events. Hays finds a continuity across the NT in three main themes; shorthand descriptions of vital elements of God's redemptive drama, not abstract ideas. COMMUNITY: "The church is a countercultural communtiy of discipleship, and this community is the primary addressee of God's imperatives." CROSS: "Jesus death on a cross is the paradigm for faithfulness to God in this world." NEW CREATION: "The church embodies the power of the resurrection in the midst of a not-yet-redeemed world." Within these themes there are many tensions not 'resolved' through some false harmonisation or balancing out. The diversity of the materials is respected while a strong narrative-thematic unity is maintained. The hermeneutical task asks the familiar question: How do we use the NT in Christian ethics? He surveys five ethicists - Barth, Reinhold Niebuhr, Yoder, Hauerwas, and Elizabeth Shussler Fiorenza - summarising and analysing them through his four-fold description of the ethical task. Barth is criticised, for example, for his over-stress on God's commands that leads to an extraordinary statement seemingly denying the role of hermeneutics - apparently, an overworked Reformation theme damaging some old-fashioned common sense! Yoder is praised for exegetical sensitivity especially in his treatment of Romans 13 but is considered overreaching the mark in his "revolutionary subordination" interpretation of the household codes. An interesting comparison is also made between Yoder and Hauerwas on the relative priority of Scripture and/or community. Hays' ". . . central point is this: the use of the NT in normative ethics requires an integrative act of the imagination, a discernment about how our lives, despite their historical dissimilarity to the lives narrated in the NT, might fitly answer to that narration and participate in the truth that it tells... [Whenever] we appeal to the authority of the NT, we are necessarily engaged in metaphor-making, placing our community's life imaginatively in the world articulated by the texts." The pragmatic task is an exercise in discerning the NT moral vision in relation to five issues: Violence in Defence of Justice, Homosexuality, Divorce and Remarriage, Anti-Judaism, and Abortion. The choice of these is interesting as they range from explicit issues of Scripture, an issue that stems from Scripture itself (anti-Judaism) to those barely or not touched on. Although they may be marked as 'positions' that Hays takes, the purpose of the exercise is to follow through the methodology. Any disagreement with Hays must follow through as carefully as he has done and he has set a high standard even if they are not the final word but that of one particularly skillful and persuasive voice in an ongoing conversation. It is refreshing to read such a book which, while attentive to theoretical issues, is focused on the concrete and which is itself a concrete exemplification of MacIntyre's description of a healthy moral tradition. The riches available in such a text and the community from which it arises would be, so you'd think, an attractive reality to explore in an age of ethical crises for those working in philosophical ethics and political theory, and not only in theology.
Rating:
Summary: Buy this first - other books can wait...
Review: Recently several important projects have emerged challenging the myths of secular reason and an autonomous realm of `ethics' (eg Charles Taylor, Milbank, Oliver O'Donovan), seeking to disentangle the constitutive moral and theological threads from the `mainstream' narrative(s) of modernity, illuminating the theological forgetfulness of the secular mind. While these projects have a host of favourable outcomes, not the least of which is a new and confident engagement with modernity on Christian terms, before one becomes too enamoured of such projects, much more needs to be done biblically and theologically. Here Richard Hays' impressive new work in NT ethics can help us. Hays' own project is concerned principally with the Christian community and its ability to live "under the Word", to hear Scripture speaking to us today. Such an aim is only controversial depending upon where one stands in the NT Studies guild. If one adopts the approach of Jack T. Sanders, for example, any appeals to the NT can only founder due to historical distance, alien contexts and questions - and can even be downright immoral! Otherwise, Hays can be seen to be engaging in a classical Christian practice, joining the many volumes written in Christian ethics, and complimenting the experience and activity of Christians and their communities worldwide. In evangelical circles where the Bible is "taken seriously", the `Constantinian' mindset is dominant (and there are many superficial treatments). Hays' approach shares the same (or greater) biblical `seriousness' but is radically ecclesiocentric - something that is possibly clearer to a NT professor than a professional `ethicist' or systematic theologian. Alongside the work of James McClendon, Hays' book stands as a detailed, systematic challenge to a prevalent way that Christians `do ethics'. Hays sees Christian ethics as consisting of four interrelated, interpenetrating tasks (distinguishable for "heuristic purposes") - descriptive, synthetic, hermeneutical and pragmatic. The descriptive task is primarily exegetical, dealing with the texts without an immediate concern for harmonising, seeking the specific concerns and interests of each literary unit. He says: "Our descriptive work cannot be confined, however, to the explicit moral teachings of the NT texts; the church's moral world is manifest not only in didache but also in the stories, symbols, social structures, and practices that shape the community's ethos." Hays highlights that NT moral exhortations must be seen in connection with their theological warrants (and not as freestanding `ethics' desired by analytic philosophers). From these diverse materials, Hays moves (beyond Meeks) to the synthetic task. This broad harmony is not sought in some `ethical theme' such as `love' (which, once again, is more akin to the modern disjunction of fact and value, or, theologically, doctrine and ethics, than to the NT traditions); nor is a theological theme such as `creation', `eschaton' or `covenant' considered suitable. This is due to Hays' (more than formal) appreciation of narrative; that the various traditions tell and re-tell the same basic story with different focuses on themes and events. Hays finds a continuity across the NT in three main themes; shorthand descriptions of vital elements of God's redemptive drama, not abstract ideas. COMMUNITY: "The church is a countercultural communtiy of discipleship, and this community is the primary addressee of God's imperatives." CROSS: "Jesus death on a cross is the paradigm for faithfulness to God in this world." NEW CREATION: "The church embodies the power of the resurrection in the midst of a not-yet-redeemed world." Within these themes there are many tensions not `resolved' through some false harmonisation or balancing out. The diversity of the materials is respected while a strong narrative-thematic unity is maintained. The hermeneutical task asks the familiar question: How do we use the NT in Christian ethics? He surveys five ethicists - Barth, Reinhold Niebuhr, Yoder, Hauerwas, and Elizabeth Shussler Fiorenza - summarising and analysing them through his four-fold description of the ethical task. Barth is criticised, for example, for his over-stress on God's commands that leads to an extraordinary statement seemingly denying the role of hermeneutics - apparently, an overworked Reformation theme damaging some old-fashioned common sense! Yoder is praised for exegetical sensitivity especially in his treatment of Romans 13 but is considered overreaching the mark in his "revolutionary subordination" interpretation of the household codes. An interesting comparison is also made between Yoder and Hauerwas on the relative priority of Scripture and/or community. Hays' ". . . central point is this: the use of the NT in normative ethics requires an integrative act of the imagination, a discernment about how our lives, despite their historical dissimilarity to the lives narrated in the NT, might fitly answer to that narration and participate in the truth that it tells... [Whenever] we appeal to the authority of the NT, we are necessarily engaged in metaphor-making, placing our community's life imaginatively in the world articulated by the texts." The pragmatic task is an exercise in discerning the NT moral vision in relation to five issues: Violence in Defence of Justice, Homosexuality, Divorce and Remarriage, Anti-Judaism, and Abortion. The choice of these is interesting as they range from explicit issues of Scripture, an issue that stems from Scripture itself (anti-Judaism) to those barely or not touched on. Although they may be marked as `positions' that Hays takes, the purpose of the exercise is to follow through the methodology. Any disagreement with Hays must follow through as carefully as he has done and he has set a high standard even if they are not the final word but that of one particularly skillful and persuasive voice in an ongoing conversation. It is refreshing to read such a book which, while attentive to theoretical issues, is focused on the concrete and which is itself a concrete exemplification of MacIntyre's description of a healthy moral tradition. The riches available in such a text and the community from which it arises would be, so you'd think, an attractive reality to explore in an age of ethical crises for those working in philosophical ethics and political theory, and not only in theology.
Rating:
Summary: Hay's Book is Ambitious But Insufficient
Review: Richard Hays book, The Moral Vision of the New Testament: Community, Cross, New Creation is an ambitious work. Its primary objective is to demonstrate to readers the implications of making the Holy Scripture a norm for Christian morality. In four distinct sections Hays attempts to show that a Christian ethics must be based on the New Testament read in light of there foundational images, community, cross, and new creation. The first section of the book is described by Hays as the descriptive task. In it he attempts to survey the major ethical teachings of representative texts in the New Testament. He begins his discussion of each text by discussing the central theological claims of each book and he then shows how the ethical teachings follow from these theological claims. The second section of Hays book is his attempt at a synthetic task; he attempts to show that there is a basis for unity in New Testament ethics. In this section he argues that "no single principle can account for the unity of the New Testament writings; instead, we need a cluster of focal images, to govern our construal of New Testament ethics," (5). Hays argues that in order for this to be accomplished in a way that if faithful to the scripture the interpreter must "confront the full range of canonical witnesses"; "Let the tensions stand"' and "attend to the literary genre of the texts," (189-190). He believes that-once these three things are done faithfully-the interpreter will see that there are three "key images that all the different canonical tellings share," (194). These images are community, cross, and new creation. The third section of the book is Hay's hermeneutical task, his attempt to determine what strategies should be adopted to allow these "ancient writings to continue speaking nineteen hundred years after their composition," (207). Before launching into his own proposal, Hays examines the method of five ethicists: Reinhold Niebuhr, Karl Barth, John Yoder, Stanley Hauerwas, and Elisabeth Schuessler Fiorenza. Rather than looking at how these ethicists handle a plethora of issues, he examines the way each handle war and violence. He attempts to pull from this specific case the general method of each thinker. The final section of Hays' book is the pragmatic task. It consists of five chapters in which methods developed in the earlier sections are applied to five current moral issues. A chapter each is devoted to violence, divorce, homosexuality, abortion, and racism. On each subject Hays begins by discussing a selected relevant text, he then brings the text's teaching together into a "synthesis" of the subject in a canonical context by looking at the way the images of community, cross, and new creation focus the individual problems. Hays then attempts the hermeneutical tasks, he looks at how the witness of the texts are to be received. And he concludes each case study by giving practical suggestions for what it means for the church to "live the text". These five issues are chosen not because they are the most pressing concerns facing the church today, but because they illustrate how his methodology works with different kinds of data. He attempts to show not only how the New Testament deals with issues such as violence and divorce, which he believes it to share a unified vision of, but also how it deals with issues where the New Testament vision is not as adequate and/or unified. For instance, the evidence in the New Testament on the issue of homosexuality, according to Hays, is univocal and stands in direct tension with other serious moral arguments. Anti-Semitism, according to Hays, is dealt with in mixed ways in the New Testament. Many of these texts stand in irreconcilable tension with one another (314). And abortion, according to Hays, is not dealt with in New Testament texts at all. The greatest contribution of Hays book is his attempt at synthesizing a coherent "moral vision" for the New Testament from discussion with contemporary ethicists, contemporary biblical scholarship, and his utilization of case studies. Hays ultimately fails in his endeavor, however. There are three principle reasons for this failure: (1) his selection and use of biblical texts is engendered to meet his purpose, (2) Hays does not properly prove his three focal images of community, cross, and new creation are the only images substantial for a basic unity in New Testament ethics, and (3) he is inconsistent in his methodology. The first of these criticisms has already been mentioned. Hays claims to bear extreme faithfulness to the existing canon, yet he does include significant discussion of many pivotal texts, including James, Hebrews, 2 Peter and Colossians. His unwillingness to discuss these texts seems to be because they do not properly coalesce with his overall emphases. This selective biblical emphasis becomes more apparent in a discussion of the second criticism. Hays does not adequately show that the three focal images of community, cross, and new creation are the only or main images appropriate for New Testament ethics. He is not willing to claim concepts such as love, which-despite his argument to the contrary-is borne extensive witness to in the New Testament canon. Furthermore, Hays does not properly qualify his use of these images. He does effectively tackle the reader's concern that all three of these images are confirmed or dealt with in a uniform fashion in each biblical text. Some texts have little concern with any of these images and others deal with them in significantly different ways. My most severe criticism is regarding Hays' application of his own method. Hays' uses the different sources of theological inquiry (scripture, tradition, reason, experience) inconsistently. Hays is incredibly inconsistent and does not always fully qualify his positions. The work ultimately falls into the trap of being more about Richard Hays' perceptions than the New Testament's.
Rating: 
Summary: Comprehensive but flawed and frustrating
Review: Richard Hays does a commendable job of meticulous research about the New Testament witness to vital ethical issues. He attempts to demonstrate the continuing relevance and importance of the New Testament towards pressing contemporary issues like war/peace, sexuality, divorce and abortion. The greatest strength of Hays' book is that it is a comprehensive work of reference; he really gets into the detailed text of much of the New Testament. However, in my view, Hays' contemporary application is disappointing. As another reviewer has commented, Hays basically throws in the towel on abortion, even though he concludes that it is wrong from a Christian ethical perspective. He simply dismisses any action by the Church to modify or change the current permissive abortion regime as it exists under Roe v. Wade. This is the one public issue that the Church apparently has no business addressing in the "public square," unlike race, poverty, and so on. Hays does not explain why the Church should adopt this stance, other than repeating the tired liberal cliche about not legislating morality (or something like that). Further, Hays adopts a nasty, mean-spirited tone in his refutation of pro-life Scriptural exegesis. Hays may well be correct, but there is no reason for his arrogant personal attacks on people with different views. Hays seems to have a strong dislike of pro-lifers in general, which I believe warps his discussion of abortion. I am also disappointed by his limp conclusion to the issue of homosexuality. After marshalling considerable evidence that the New Testament does not approve of homosexuality, Hays refuses to draw the necessary conclusions regarding church discipline. Just like with abortion, on the issue of sexuality, Hays adopts the shopworn liberal approach of saying "I don't approve of this, but I won't impose my views on others." Of course, this again begs the question as to why it is OK to legislate morality in some ethical areas but not in others. In short, this book deserves a "4" or "5" for its Biblical studies, but a "1" or "2" for its contemporary application.
Rating:
Summary: Comprehensive but flawed and frustrating
Review: Richard Hays does a commendable job of meticulous research about the New Testament witness to vital ethical issues. He attempts to demonstrate the continuing relevance and importance of the New Testament towards pressing contemporary issues like war/peace, sexuality, divorce and abortion. The greatest strength of Hays' book is that it is a comprehensive work of reference; he really gets into the detailed text of much of the New Testament. However, in my view, Hays' contemporary application is disappointing. As another reviewer has commented, Hays basically throws in the towel on abortion, even though he concludes that it is wrong from a Christian ethical perspective. He simply dismisses any action by the Church to modify or change the current permissive abortion regime as it exists under Roe v. Wade. This is the one public issue that the Church apparently has no business addressing in the "public square," unlike race, poverty, and so on. Hays does not explain why the Church should adopt this stance, other than repeating the tired liberal cliche about not legislating morality (or something like that). Further, Hays adopts a nasty, mean-spirited tone in his refutation of pro-life Scriptural exegesis. Hays may well be correct, but there is no reason for his arrogant personal attacks on people with different views. Hays seems to have a strong dislike of pro-lifers in general, which I believe warps his discussion of abortion. I am also disappointed by his limp conclusion to the issue of homosexuality. After marshalling considerable evidence that the New Testament does not approve of homosexuality, Hays refuses to draw the necessary conclusions regarding church discipline. Just like with abortion, on the issue of sexuality, Hays adopts the shopworn liberal approach of saying "I don't approve of this, but I won't impose my views on others." Of course, this again begs the question as to why it is OK to legislate morality in some ethical areas but not in others. In short, this book deserves a "4" or "5" for its Biblical studies, but a "1" or "2" for its contemporary application.
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