Happy publication week to Ancient Christians: An Introduction for Latter-day Saints, edited by Jason R. Combs, Mark D. Ellison, Cathrine Gines Taylor, and Kristian S. Heal. This book, among other exciting new publications, is included in Jonathan Stapley’s 2022 Christmas Book Guide for By Common Consent.

Michel Austin at By Common Consent wrote an excellent review of Ancient Christians. Follow the link for the full review, but I’ll include his closing remarks here:

“The print version of Ancient Christians is lavishly illustrated and beautifully designed, and it weighs in at a hefty 561 pages. But whatever you do, don’t skip over the contributor’s biographies (532-537), because it is here that we learn something important. These people are good. The authors are all actual experts in the field who really (really, really) know what they are talking about. They hold advanced degrees from some of the most prestigious universities in the world, and they regularly publish the results of their research to other experts in the field.

And this, ultimately, is among the volume’s greatest strengths. The authors are Latter-day Saints writing to other Latter-day Saints. But they know stuff that most of us don’t know. This is important as we study the New Testament in 2023 because—let’s just be honest here—as much as we insist that we are really Christians when somebody suggests we are not, most of us know very little about the first 1800 years of the Christian tradition. This is a real problem. Ancient Christians: An Introduction for Latter-day Saints is at least the start of a real solution.”