Through Middle Eastern Eyes

"""Missions and missionaries have often been regarded as one-way conduits of the West and Western culture to the Middle East. Kenneth Bailey was a unique kind of missionary who also reversed this movement. Immersing himself for forty years in the main centers of Near Eastern culture--Egypt, Lebanon, and Palestine--he brought the Middle East to the West by re-reading the New Testament through Mediterranean eyes. Michael Parker's book is a worthy scholarly tribute to Kenneth Bailey's life and achievement."" --George Sabra, president and professor of systematic theology, Near East School of Theology ""Drawing extensively upon primary sources, Michael Parker has crafted a lucid and engaging biography of the late Kenneth Bailey. Of chief importance, he describes how Bailey's decades of living in the Middle East, serving as a missionary who made a concerted effort to understand traditional village culture, led him to penetrating insights into the New Testament. Parker is to be commended for a fine piece of work."" --Michael T. Shelley, director emeritus, A Center of Christian-Muslim Engagement for Peace and Justice, Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago ""This is the remarkable story of a life we can only imagine. Michael Parker's expert telling of Bailey's life is enthralling and pulls us back to another era of courageous scholar-missionaries that today are few. Bailey was a missionary to the Arab world, but more, he was a missionary to the West, helping us see our Scriptures through the eyes of a world that originally produced them."" --Gary Burge, professor emeritus of New Testament, Wheaton College"