By Kelly Shellnut, Christianity Today.
Kenneth E. Bailey, the scholar who introduced evangelicals to Middle Eastern culture and history, died Monday at age 85.
Bailey gave Western readers “the eyes to see” the deeper significance of Jesus’ life and stories by placing them in the cultural context of the Middle East, publishing books like Jesus Through Middle Eastern Eyes and Paul Through Mediterranean Eyes, a 2012 CT Book Awards winner.
Bailey was the “premier cultural interpreter of the life of Jesus,” according to Wheaton College New Testament professor Gary Burge. Bailey’s insights stemmed from his own childhood in Egypt and a 40-year career studying and teaching in Egypt, Cyprus, Israel, and Lebanon.
“He told the parables of Jesus to peasants from Morocco to Pakistan, and their insight helped him (and so us) gain new understanding that would be available no other way,” wrote Andy Le Peau, his editor at InterVarsity Press. “Being fluent in many ancient languages also gave him a remarkable perspective on the New Testament that few others could match.”
Bailey directed the Institute for Middle Eastern New Testament Studies in Beirut and lectured on theology all around the world, from Oxford and Cambridge to Columbia, Princeton, and Fuller Seminary. He was a prolific author, writing more than 150 articles in Arabic and English, as well as books like The Cross and the Prodigal and The Good Shepherd.
“For all of my adult life, it has been my privilege to study the New Testament while living and teaching in the Middle East,” he wrote in a 1998 CT cover story, a cultural analysis of the prodigal son parable.
Bailey spent his later years in western Pennsylvania. Ordained in the Presbyterian Church (USA), he belonged to the Presbytery of Shenango and served as canon theologian for the Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh. He is survived by his wife, Ethel, a microbiologist who assisted Dr. Jonas Salk with his polio vaccine research, and their family.
Gifted Author, Lecturer and Scholar Kenneth E. Bailey Dies — InterVarsity Press
A Legacy of Illuminating Biblical Scholarship — InterVarsity Press
The Pursuing Father: What We Need to Know about this Often Misunderstood Middle Eastern Parable, by Kenneth Bailey.
Paul’s Theology of Sexual Practice: A Study of 1 Corinthians 6:9-20, by Kenneth Bailey.
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We were priveledged to have Dr.Bailey preach and teach at Palos Park Presbyterian Community Church. Your link to “Paul’s Theology of Sexual Practice,” is to Theology Matters. This issue also includes his enlightening study of “The Women Prophets of Corinth,” also from I Corinthians.
The Christianity Today article has an error, in that Dr. Bailey was the Canon Theologian of the ANGLICAN Diocese of Pittsburgh at the time of his passing, he was installed as the Episcopal Canon Theologian in 1997 and (I believe) moved to the Anglican Diocese when it split from the ECUSA.
Dr. Bailey opened my mind and heart. He made the peculiar, reasonable and the obscure, crystal clear. He opened mysteries and connected the dots from Old and New Testaments so that I could understand and experience the Word of God. All this during a 4 day seminar and with two books. I love him for generous wisdom and look forward to the Resurrection more because of him.
Very sad to see this scholar pass out of our midst. Dr. Bailey has shown how scholarship should treat the Bible. His teachings on the birth of Christ in Bethlehem, of the significance of the father’s actions toward his prodigal son, and on sexual practice are sound, insightful, and true. He will be much missed.