The personal libraries of most academics include a shelf stocked with handy reference books. Such books are useful for a quick fact check or a brief overview of a topic that has faded from memory over time. The editors of this book hope that this new volume will be granted coveted space on these reference shelves. This history is, however, not a typical reference book. On the one hand, the editors see it as possibly replacing ‘the old Patrologies, now thirty to forty years old, though without adopting the same style or pretending to offer comprehensive bibliographies’ (p. xii). For those of us who still keep our copies of Quasten ready at hand, this is an especially welcome goal. On the other hand, the editors have not tried to create another encyclopedia or dictionary: ‘instead of brief introductory articles in alphabetical order by an enormous variety of scholars, an attempt is made to provide a coherent focus, and to concentrate on the literature, its interpretation and significance, and its context, historical, social, philosophical.’ (p. xii)

In order to follow through on this dual ambition of introducing the literature of early Christianity and providing a context in which to think about it, the editors have divided the work into three main parts. Part One deals with the time from the composition of the New Testament through Irenaeus. Part Two takes up the literature of the third century. Part Three discusses the rise of Christian culture from Diocletian to Cyril. Each of these three main parts contains two subsections called ‘Literary Guide’ and ‘Context and Interpretation.’

The literary guide lends the ‘patrology-like’ feature to the work. Here a variety of authors present in a straightforward way the names of key writers and their works. The old standbys of Greek and Latin patristics are all treated, and fans of Syriac literature will be pleased to find significant attention given to the authors of this region. For some of the lesser-known authors however, scholars are advised not to retire their copies of Quasten. There is, for example, no serious discussion of the likes of, say, Nilus of Ancyra. This is not really a criticism of the work–the editors themselves point out that they did not intend this kind of depth and detail – but it does have an impact on how the volume will be used. The ‘literary guides’ are complemented, at the end of the book, with a series of bibliographies that focus both on studies of the period and on scholarship about particular ancient authors. The bibliographies also suggest the best available critical editions for any given work. However, in contrast to Quasten, the bibliographies list English translations only if they are not a part of one of the main translations series (listed on p. 497). Readers looking for a handy reference to available English translations will be disappointed. Nevertheless, this section of the book is very useful as an overview of the literature itself.

The sections dealing with ‘Context and Interpretation’ are more difficult to discuss. More than being informational ‘literary guides’, the essays in this section are necessarily more interpretive. Generally, the editors and contributors try to present what we might call ‘the academic consensus’ surrounding particular issues. Lewis Ayres's contribution in Part Three is an example of this effort. Ayres does a masterful job, not only describing the issues of the fourth- and fifth-century doctrinal controversies, but also explaining how the scholarly discussion has evolved over time. Readers needing an update on the development of doctrine will understand why, for example, contemporary scholarship hesitates to use the phrase ‘Arian Controversy’ to describe the doctrinal realities of the fourth century. Similarly, Frances Young's several contributions help readers understand the significant progress that has been made in understanding the role that biblical interpretation played in the development of early Christian theology.

Balance is a difficult thing to achieve, however, and some of the essays seem either to err on the side caution or to claim as consensus ideas that are still disputed. As an example of the former, Richard Norris's discussion of the Jewish Christian relations in the second century flawlessly presents the classic view, but could have benefited from some consideration of the significant new directions that scholarship in this area is following. On the other end of the spectrum, Karen Jo Torjensen's interesting discussion of the social and historical setting of the third century seems to veer somewhat beyond the consensus when she declares, with very little qualification, that Christian women were ‘ordained priests’. These examples do not so much reflect flaws in the work as they expose the complexity of creating such an ambitious volume. Specialists from every discipline will likely find their own axes to grind with respect to any given topic. One may also be tempted to regret that the volume does not go beyond the fifth century. Such an editorial decision eliminates the treatment of important authors and theological developments that are arguably central to ancient Christianity. Nevertheless, one cannot do everything, and the comprehensive treatment of even a few subsequent centuries would require another volume.

The editors may have underestimated the readability of this book when they note ‘this is meant to be a reference work, not necessarily a book to be read consecutively from cover to cover’ (p. xiii) It is certainly true that each individual contribution stands on its own. However, in preparation for this review, at least one reader read it from cover to cover and found it both interesting and stimulating. Doubtless, this readability stems from the editors’ selection of contributors. In addition to those authors already mentioned, readers will find chapters by John Behr, Sebastian Brock, Ronald Heine, John David Dawson, Oliver Nicholson, Andrew Louth, David Hunter, Mark Vessey, Henry Chadwick, Susan Ashbrook Harvey and R. A. Markus. The Cambridge History of Early Christian Literature is a first-rate work of scholarship. It will be a welcome addition to those handy reference shelves and may well bump some works that are already there to a lower place.