Hopeful Imagination

This book seeks to do two interpretative tasks at the same time. First, it attempts to do biblixcal theology, to discern and articulate the main theological claims of a body of textual material, to listen to the text and to speak echoses of it. Second, it seels to make a hermeneutical move to our theological situation by drawing a 'dynamic equivalent' between Israel's exilic situation and our own. Biblical theology that hs any vitality is always done in this way. The body of textual material in question is the tradition of Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Deutero-Isaiah, embodying some of the boldest and most eloquent theological probing in the Old Testament. We are invited to join an exploration of the themes of relinquishment and receiving as expeienced in 587 BCE in terms of the ending of an old, familiar order and the irruption of a new one and to experience the powerful analogies drawn for our own generation.