"This book is not only absorbingly readable but important. For its themes engage effectively with main dilemmas not only of formal theology but of current piety and witness."
– Amos N. Wilder, Andover Newton Quarterly
"This book is immensely valuable for its persuasive illustrations of the parabolic and metaphoric imagination. McFague attends both to the interpretive and the evaluative levels of hermeneutics. Her readings of specific parables, poems, stories, and autobiographies are insightful and relevant to her thesis that what religious language 'says' is 'conceptually imperceivable and inexpressible.'"
– Mary Gerhart, Journal of the American Academy of Religion
"It is at the very least a fine guide to one important direction that theological hermeneutics might take, and more than that, it testifies confidently to the presence of still unplumbed resources of the biblical word and its secular counterpart that are there for the imagination's appropriation."
– Robert Detweiler, Religious Studies Review
"Everyone interested in theology will be stimulated by Sallie McFague's mediating theological position and the form of thinking and discourse she espouses. Those interested in the intercourse between theology and literature will be stimulated by the way she links the two and the perceptive way she handles her literary examples. Biblical scholars will undoubtedly note her primacy of the parables as the central corpus of the biblical records. Preachers of the church will be strengthened by the concern McFague has for the Christian community and the importance of the word through the words of the preachers. With this variety of concerns, Speaking in Parables will have a deservedly wide reading and, perhaps even more important, wide discussion."
– Ronald E. Sleeth, Perkins School of Theology Journal
Sallie McFaguewas the Carpenter Professor of Theology at VanderbiltDivinity School, where she taught for thirty years. She is now Distinguished Theologian in Residence at the Vancouver School of Theology in Vancouver, British Columbia. Among her many influential works, all from Fortress Press, are:
Life Abundant: Rethinking Theology and Economy for a Planet in Peril (2000)
Super, Natural Christians: How We Should Love Nature (1997)
The Body of God: An Ecological Theology (1993)
Models of God: Theology for an Ecological, Nuclear Age (1987), which received the American Academy of Religion's Award for Excellence
Metaphorical Theology: Models of God in Religious Language (1982)
"Sallie McFague is a prominent figure among the growing number of theologians who have been attempting to rethink the Christian understanding of God's and humanity's place in the physical world."
-Chronicle of Higher Education
"The power of McFague's work is in its ability to speak to the American Protestant mainstream, challenging Christians with models of God that reflect both ecological sensitivity and concern for justice."
-Sharon Welch, Harvard Divinity School
