'Let us die that we may live': Greek homilies on Christian Martyrs from Asia Minor, Palestine and Syria c.350-c.450 AD author: Pauline Allen rating: asin: 0415240425 binding: Paperback list price: $39.95 USD amazon price: $39.95 USD

This book represents a collaborative effort of early Church scholars, primarily from Australia and Europe, in translating homilies, exhortations, and other early Christian writings on martyrs. Consequently, the work is highly significant to all modern Christians, because martyrdom and the praise and emulation of those martyrs and confessors who suffered for the faith greatly influenced churches throughout the world. In Egypt, for example, martyrs and confessors staunchly defended the faith against Roman, Persian, and Islamic persecutors. Elsewhere, the Church used the stories of the martyrs to strengthen believers and their faith in the face of even the most difficult obstacles. The homilies on the Forty Martyrs of Sebaste by Saint Basil the Great and Saint Gregory of Nyssa reflect this quite well.

I do find one fault with the book, however. In its introduction, the authors treat these accounts from a uniquely sociological perspective, viz., without any reference to faith. For scholars, these accounts may simply be a new form of literary genre that was created in response to a sociological disturbance among early Christians; for others, these accounts may be "crisis literature" created in response to a governmental threat. And yet, for many, these accounts reflect the stories of saints in whom we see Christ and models of strong faith and Christian living. I personally fall into the last category and would have therefore enjoyed an introduction that did not diminish my view of these lives of the martyrs.

Nonetheless, the authors did an excellent job with this book, even if they wrote from a purely academic perspective.