Rhetoric and Ethic: The Politics of Biblical Studies

A discussion of ethics as language and language as power should be a component of any introductory course on ethics as well as a substantive part of any discussion of contemporary ethics. "Rhetoric and Ethic" makes a significant contribution to that discussion, particularly the emerging field of constructivist ethics. While it may prove too difficult for the undergraduate reader, instructors of theology and ethics at all levels should be thoroughly familiar with its claims and able to incoprporate them into class discussions.This book is a challenge to the still largely unquestioned assumption that biblical ethics can only be understood as a form of moral realism or ontological ethics. It also challenges current trends in social ethics that assume that justice means only one thing with obvious demands. Values are not universally understood to mean the same thing or require the same things of us. "Rhetoric and Ethic" gives theologians and others interested in formulating shared commitments without the trap of assumed universality an invaluable tool.