A Boundless God
Publication Date: February 2020
The word rûaḥ (commonly translated as breath, wind, spirit, or Spirit) occurs in the Old Testament 378 times–more frequently than torah, shalom, or Sabbath. In this volume, Jack, whose previous books have received wide acclaim, cracks open the challenging and provocative world of the Spirit in the Old Testament, offering readers cogent yet comprehensive insights. Read more.
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7 Questions About the Holy Spirit
In this short, insightful e-book, Old Testament scholar Jack Levison fills in the gaps of our understanding on the meaning and message of the Holy Spirit. A book that springs out of decades of scholarship, yet brimming over with wisdom, humor, and joy that can only come from an author who has experienced his subject deeply, “7 Questions About the Holy Spirit” will both inform and inspire readers to a greater understanding, and experience, of the Holy Spirit in their own lives.
The Holy Spirit before Christianity
Publication Date: September 2019
With his latest book, The Holy Spirit before Christianity, John R. Levison again changes the face and foundation of Christian belief in the Holy Spirit. The categories Christians have used, the boundaries they have created, the proprietary claims they have made—all of these evaporate, now that Levison has looked afresh at Scripture. Read more.
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40 Days with the Holy Spirit
Publication Date: February 2015
40 Days with the Holy Spirit will inspire you to encounter God in fresh and surprising ways. You’ll develop stronger spiritual muscles as you breathe, read, reflect, and pray—all with an eye to cultivating a relationship with the least familiar member of the Trinity. The book is interactive, offering the opportunity to write and pray each day; intelligent, rooted in a rigorous study of scripture, from Genesis to Revelation; and inviting, with 40 insightful, well-planned 20-30 minute daily exercises; and prayerful, with 40 original prayers that capture each day’s insight into the deep, spiritual work of the Holy Spirit. Read more.
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Inspired: The Holy Spirit and the Mind of Faith
Publication Date: October 31, 2013
In this book Jack Levison speaks a fresh prophetic word to the church, championing a unique blend of serious Bible study and Christian spirituality. With rich insight, he shows Christians of any church or denomination how they can take the Spirit into the grit of everyday life. Levison argues for an indispensable synergy between spontaneity and study, ecstasy and restraint, inspiration and interpretation. Read more here.
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Fresh Air: The Holy Spirit for an Inspired Life
Publication Date: April 2012
The Holy Spirit staggers us with unexpectedness. The Holy Spirit is not just about speaking in tongues, spiritual gifts or “fruits”—but also about our deepest breath and our highest human aspirations. Popular teacher Jack Levison brings a scholar’s knowledge of this complicated biblical topic to a wide audience that crosses all denominational boundaries. His new book aims to do nothing less than clarify 2,000 years of confusion on the topic of who the Holy Spirit is, and why it matters. Provocative and life-changing, Fresh Air combines moving personal anecdotes, rich biblical studies, and practical strategies for experiencing the daily presence of the Holy Spirit. In brief chapters, the book finds the presence of the Holy Spirit where we least expect it—in human breathing, in social transformation, in community, in hostile situations, and in serious learning. Fresh Air will unsettle and invigorate readers poised for a fresh experience of an ancient, confusing topic.
For a discussion guide and reviews, click here (PDF).
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Filled with the Spirit
Publication Date: October 6, 2009
Containing meticulous, up-to-date scholarship yet written in a flowing, enjoyable style, this comprehensive book takes readers on a journey through a breathtaking array of literary texts, encompassing the literature of Israel, early Judaism, the Greco-Roman world, and the New Testament. John R. Levison’s skill with ancient texts — already demonstrated in his acclaimed The Spirit in First-Century Judaism — is here extended to a myriad of other expressions of the Spirit in antiquity.
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The Spirit in First-Century Judaism
Publication Date: September 1, 2002
The work mirrors the growing recognition that the role of the Spirit in Judaism and early Christianity warrants further scholarly inquiry and lays a cornerstone in the foundation of pneumatological studies by scouring the writings of Plato and Plutarch, Daniel and the Dead Sea Scrolls, as well as those of Philo of Alexandria and Flavius Josephus. The text contextualizes the material both historically and literally, taking seriously the influence of popular Greco-Roman thinking as well as Jewish exegetical traditions.
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Of Two Minds: Ecstasy and Inspired Interpretation in the New Testament World
(Dead Sea Scrolls & Christian Origins Library, Vol. 1)
Publication Date: June 1, 2000
How does the spirit work through prophets? Early Jewish writers were themselves of two minds on this question. Levison shows that not only are both of these concepts biblically based, they are but two expressions of a biblical concept of a spirit which is unbounded by nature or geography and which has no limits on the way it can work.
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Texts in Transition: The Greek Life of Adam and Eve (Dissertation)
Publication Date: January 2000
Return to Babel: Global Perspectives on the Bible
Publication Date: May 1, 1999
In Return to Babel, each of ten historically significant biblical texts is interpreted by three scholars: one Latin American, one African, and one Asian. Geographic locales range from a tiny village in the Philippines to the city of Nairobi, Kenya; from Gwangju, South Korea, with its one million inhabitants, to the frontier city of Wiwili in the northern mountains of Nicaragua. The result is a collection of essays that shed new light on familiar texts and make the reader aware of the ways in which culture can shape our understanding of Scripture.
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Josephus’ Contra Apionem: Studies in Its Character and Context With a Latin Concordance to the Portion Missing in Greek
Publication Date: June 1, 1996 | Series: Arbeiten Zur Geschichte Des Antiken Judentums Und Des Urchristentums, Bd. 34 (Book 34)
This volume offers a state-of-the-art collection of papers on one of the most significant works of Flavius Josephus, by many of the leading scholars in current Josephus research. The collection, which includes a concordance by H. Schreckenberg of the Latin section “Contra Apionem” 2.52-113, forms a standard, indispensable resource for the study of Josephus’ writings, of apologetic literature in general, and particularly for the study of “Contra Apionem,” one of the most significant apologetic treatises in Antiquity.
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Jesus in Global Contexts
Publication Date: October 1, 1992
Liberator, ancestor, cosmic Christ, and Black Messiah: these are just some of the ways that Jesus is viewed in the world. This rare book provides a global tour of the Christologies emerging in Latin America, Asia, and Africa, and those of North American feminist and African American theologies.
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Portraits of Adam in Early Judaism: From Sirach to Baruch (JSP Supplements)
Publication Date: December 1, 1988