The latest issue of the Journal of Markets & Morality (13.2) is now available online to subscribers. This issue features a fine set of articles from Manfred Spieker, Gregorio Guitián, Joseph Burke, and Jim Skillen. It also has the usual range of book reviews, so ably overseen by the journal’s book review editor Kevin Schmiesing.
This issue also has two special features. The first is a controversy between Jonathan Malesic, assistant professor of theology at King’s College in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, and the author of Secret Faith in the Public Square: An Argument for the Concealment of Christian Identity (Brazos Press, 2009), and Hunter Baker, associate dean of arts and sciences at Union University in Jackson, Tennessee, and the author of The End of Secularism (Crossway, 2009). In a lively and wide-ranging discussion, Malesic and Baker debate the question, “Is Some Form of Secularism the Best Foundation for Christian Engagement in Public Life?”
The other special feature in this issue is our second occasional installment of the Status Quaestionis. Conceived as a complement to our Scholia, which are original translations of early modern texts and treatises on ethics, economics, and theology, the Status Quaestionis features are intended to help us grasp in a more thorough and comprehensive way the state of the scholarly landscape with regard to the modern intersection between religion and economics. This Status Quaestionis is an original translation of a piece by the Dutch theologian Herman Bavinck (1854-1921), “General Biblical Principles and the Relevance of Concrete Mosaic Law for the Social Question Today.” This piece was written by Bavinck for the First Social Congress in Amsterdam in 1891. This congress is famous for its opening address, given by the Dutch neo-Calvinist theologian and statesman, Abraham Kuyper (available in translation as The Problem of Poverty). John Bolt, professor of at Calvin Theological Seminary and editor of the four volume English edition of Herman Bavinck’s Reformed Dogmatics (Baker Academic, 2003–2008), provides an extensive and insightful introduction to Bavinck’s essay and the broader context of European Christian social thought in the latter half of the nineteenth century.
This issue of the journal also marks the end of the tenure of the journal’s founding executive editor Stephen Grabill, who now is director of programs at the Acton Institute and editor emeritus of the journal. Here is an excerpt from my editorial (PDF):
Dr. Stephen Grabill’s time as editor of the Journal of Markets & Morality has been characterized by close editorial care and precision, a commitment to responsible scholarly expression, and innovation in terms of content and delivery. At the close of his time as executive editor, Dr. Stephen Grabill is most deserving of the “well done” said to a “good and faithful servant” of freedom and virtue (Matt. 25:31).
Dr. Grabill’s farewell editorial is also available and worth reading as a retrospective on the journal’s first thirteen years of publication (PDF).
Given the journal’s ongoing policy of distinguishing between current issues (the two latest issues) and archived issues (which are freely available), this means that issue 12.2 is now fully and freely available to the public.
For access to the two current issues, including the newly-released 13.2, I encourage you to consider subscribing as an individual as well as recommend that your institution subscribe to the Journal of Markets & Morality.
