A Dictionary of Early Christian Beliefs is of immense value to the student of the history of Christianity and what early Christians believed. Debates continue today about what these early Christians believed. No doubt scholarship has progressed in this field, for which I am thankful. Yet, people always look for the “classics” to possess on one’s bookshelf. For example, Karl Barth’s Dogmatics is a classic in Protestantism. Or for our Catholic friends, volumes of Aquinas’s Summa. For a more conservative, Calvinistic Reformed position, Charles Hodge’s Systematic Theology or Herman Bavinck’s Reformed Dogmatics top the field. In the study of early Christianity and what they believed, there are few volumes I would recommend, but this is one of them.

First, I recommend this volume for its thoroughness. The breadth and depth of topics covered is immense. This is fantastic for a time period we do not know much (or enough!)…