Defending the Faith’s fifteen essays explore how John Jewel, sixteenth-century Bishop of Salisbury (1560–1571), helped create “the new Church of England on every level, from the theological and political to the practical and pastoral” (2). The volume examines Jewel's historical significance to the Church of England's ecclesiology, including how Jewel's famous sermon, The Apology of the Church of England (1562), affected the Church of England. Parts of the collection also consider Jewel's work through material culture and gender studies. An ongoing theme of textual interaction and discursive exchange undergirds most of the volume.

The volume is divided into two parts. Part 1 situates Jewel within his cultural moment, discussing how “Jewel's work, reputation, and legacy” participated within “a crucial psychological moment at the start of Elisabeth's reign” (5). The second part examines “Jewel's theological achievement through an evaluation of his intellectual legacy” (11).

Ian Atherton's “An Apology of the Church of England's Cathedrals” and Alice Ferron's “Silence Is a Fine Jewel for a Woman” are important standout essays. Atherton investigates how English cathedrals survived the Protestant Reformation, concluding that their “kinship to the [English] universities” kept them from ruin (113). Ferron investigates the “unauthorized” (75) publication of Anne Cooke Bacon's translation of The Apology.

While the volume itself is light on textual exegesis, the reader is left with a sense that Jewel's writing had a profound conceptual impact on the greater religious community, and the volume successfully opens the door for further contribution.