If you have been a regular, or even semi-regular, participant in what Personalist Manifesto(s) is up to, chances are you’ve heard the name Brian Brock mentioned by me and/or by people I’ve had conversations with.

Because Brian was my PhD supervisor—and an excellent one at that—he’s a big influence, just as he is for so many other people I know. As far as Brian’s influence on me goes, he walked with me while I went on the long journey of researching Jacques Ellul and Paul Virilio for my PhD thesis. Not only that, he was there to review—and endorse—that thesis when it became a monograph.

So, given Brian’s involvement—his ongoing supervision and support—he has spent a fair amount of time reading, writing, and talking about Ellul. And of course, he’s also spent a lot of time reading, writing, and talking about other texts and scholars too. In this conversation, we talk about Brian’s soon to be released book 'Joining Creation’s Praise: A Theological Ethic of Creatureliness.'

As you’ll discover, this book has been years in the making, and its publication represents a massive accomplished as it “follows the first few chapters of Genesis in order to discover the things that the sages of Israel took to be crucial for the ethical life of human beings among other creatures in God’s world.” Having also spent a fair amount of time doing such reflection on the first few chapters of Genesis, I think Ellul would be intrigued by this book if he were alive today. So it only makes sense that I would have Brian join me here for a conversation.

Bio

Brian Brock (PhD, King’s College, London) is chair of moral and practical theology at the University of Aberdeen in Aberdeen, Scotland. He has written scholarly works on the use of the Bible in Christian ethics, the ethics of technological development, and the theology of disability, including Singing the Ethos of God: On the Place of Christian Ethics in Scripture. He is managing editor of the Journal of Disability and Religion, founder and managing editor of the T&T Clark Enquiries in Theological Ethics, and president of the Society for the Study of Christian Ethics.

Links

University of Aberdeen Faculty Page: https://www.abdn.ac.uk/people/b.brock

Joining Creation’s Praise (authored book): https://bakeracademic.com/p/Joining-Creation-s-Praise-Brian-Brock/618589

Singing the Ethos of God: https://www.eerdmans.com/9780802803795/singing-the-ethos-of-god/

Wondrously Wounded: https://www.baylorpress.com/9781481310130/wondrously-wounded/