For a great general introduction to the differences between how Westerners and non-Westerners think, see:
Nisbett, Richard. The Geography of Thought: How Asians and Westerners Think Differently . . . and Why. New York: Free Press, 2003.
For more on the changing demographics of Christians worldwide and the implications of these changes for biblical interpretation, see:
Jenkins, Philip. The Next Christendom: The Coming of Global Christianity. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002.
———. The New Faces of Christianity: Believing the Bible in the Global South. New York: Oxford University Press, 2006.
Kenneth Bailey’s work in this area is excellent and quite readable. We highly recommend his books for exploring this topic. For an introduction to the ways being unaware of our cultural blind spots has affected the way Westerners conceive of church, see especially:
Bailey, Kenneth E. Jesus Through Middle Eastern Eyes. Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 2008.
Rah, Soong-Chan. The Next Evangelicalism: Freeing the Church from Western Cultural Captivity. Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 2009.
For an introduction to how non-Western Christians (and minority Western Christians) understand the task and challenges of theology (and how that affects biblical interpretation), see:
Felder, Cain Hope, ed. Stony the Road We Trod: African American Biblical Interpretation. Minneapolis: Fortress, 1991.
Fields, Bruce L. Introducing Black Theology: Three Crucial Questions for the Evangelical Church. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2001.
Greenman, Jeffrey P. and Gene L. Green, ed. Global Theology in Evangelical Perspective: Exploring the Contextual Nature of Theology and Mission. Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 2012.
Parratt, John, ed. An Introduction to Third World Theologies. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004.
The best general books on biblical values are:
Pilch, John J., and Bruce J. Malina, ed. Biblical Social Values and Their Meaning: A Handbook. Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson Publishers, 1993.
Rohrbaugh, Richard L., ed. The Social Sciences and New Testament Interpretation. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2003.
For more specific values, see:
Campbell, Ken M., ed. Marriage and Family in the Biblical World. Downers Grove, Ill.: IVP Academic, 2003.
Cohick, Lynn H. Women in the World of the Earliest Christians: Illuminating Ancient Ways of Life. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2009.
Ebeling, Jennie R. Women’s Lives in Biblical Times. New York: T & T Clark International, 2010.
Hanson, K. C., and Douglas E. Oakman. Palestine in the Time of Jesus: Social Structures and Social Conflicts. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1998.
Pohl, Christine D. Making Room: Recovering Hospitality as a Christian Tradition. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1999.
A great treatment of the biblical perspective on race and ethnicity is:
Hays, J. Daniel. From Every People and Nation: A Biblical Theology of Race. Downers Grove, Ill.: IVP Academic, 2003.
For specific discussions of race in the Bible, see:
Adamo, David T. Africa and Africans in the Old Testament. San Francisco: Christian Universities Press, 1998.
Bilde, Per. et al., ed. Ethnicity in Hellenistic Egypt. Aarhus, Denmark: Aarhus University, 1992.
Brenner, Athalya. Color Terms in the Old Testament, Journal for the Study of the Old Testament, Supplement Series 21. Sheffield: Sheffield, 1982.
Brett, Mark G. Ethnicity and the Bible. Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1996.
Copher, Charles B. “Three Thousand Years of Biblical Interpretation with Reference to Black Peoples.” In African American Religious Studies, edited by Gayraud Wilmore, 105-28. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 1989.
Hall, Jonathan M. Ethnic Identity in Greek Antiquity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997.
Snowden, Frank M. “Attitudes towards Blacks in the Greek and Roman World: Misinterpretations of the Evidence.” In Africa and Africans in Antiquity, edited by Edwin Yamauchi, 246-75. East Lansing: Michigan State University, 2001.
For discussions of race in Western Christianity, see:
Emerson, Michael O., and Christian Smith. Divided by Faith: Evangelical Religion and the Problem of Race in America. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000.
Keener, Craig S., and Glenn Usry. Defending Black Faith: Answers to Tough Questions about African-American Christianity. Downers Grove, Ill.: IVP Academic, 1997.
McNeil, Brenda Salter, and Rick Richardson. The Heart of Racial Justice: How Soul Change Leads to Social Change. Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 2004.
Okholm, Dennis L., ed. The Gospel in Black and White: Theological Resources for Racial Reconciliation. Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 1997.
Pearse, Meic. Why the Rest Hates the West: Understanding the Roots of Global Rage. Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 2004.
Perkins, Spencer, and Chris Rice. More than Equals: Racial Healing for the Sake of the Gospel. Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 2000.
Although the following is a rather technical read, McGilchrist has a great chapter on the nature of language in the Western mind:
McGilchrist, Iain. The Master and His Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 2010.
Some readers may find discussions of the biblical languages helpful, such as:
Moule, C. F. D. An Idiom Book of New Testament Greek. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1968.
We consider fiction to be a great way to gain an understanding of the mindset of collectivist cultures. Here are a few that have been enlightening for us:
Achebe, Chinua. Things Fall Apart. New York: Anchor, 1959.
Endo, Shusaku. The Samurai. Translated by Van C. Gessel. New York: New Directions Books, 1982.
This book illustrates the challenge of maintaining a collectivist religious worldview in individualist America:
Potok, Chaim. The Chosen. New York: Ballantine Books, 1996. First published 1967.
There are also helpful treatments of the differences between individualist and collectivist cultures in books on crosscultural communication, such as:
Elmer, Duane. Cross-Cultural Connections: Stepping Out and Fitting In Around the World. Downers Grove, Ill.: IVP Academic, 2002.
As for study Bibles, we recommend the following:
NIV Study Bible. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2002.
ESV Study Bible. Wheaton, Ill.: Crossway Bibles, 2008.
For general introductions to the topic of honor and shame and how it affects biblical interpretation, see:
deSilva, David A. Honor, Patronage, Kinship & Purity: Unlocking New Testament Culture. Downers Grove, Ill.: IVP Academic, 2000.
Neyrey, Jerome H. Honor and Shame in the Gospel of Matthew. Louisville, Ky.: Westminster John Knox Press, 1998.
For a brief introduction to the way our Western assumptions about the power of internal conscience affects how we read the Bible, see:
Stendahl, Krister. “The Apostle Paul and the Introspective Conscience of the West,” Harvard Theological Review 56 (1963): 199-215.
Because it is a novel, the following has limited value for explaining a Western view of time. But Vonnegut capitalizes on Western assumptions about the relationship between time (and especially chronology) and meaning:
Vonnegut, Kurt. Slaughterhouse-Five, or The Children’s Crusade: A Duty-Dance with Death. New York: Dell Publishing, 1991. First published 1966.
A brief attempt to explain an Eastern understanding of time, from an Indian point of view, can be found at:
Nakamura, Hajime. “The Notion of Time in India.” Accessed February 18, 2012, www.drury.edu/ ess/ Culture/ indian.htm.
For a technical survey, see:
Aveni, Anthony F. Empires of Time: Calendars, Clocks, and Cultures. New York: Tauris Parke, 2000.
For a technical discussion to assist American attorneys working with the Japanese, see:
Minami, Ken R. “Japanese Thought and Western Law: A Tangential View of Japanese Bengoshi and the Japanese American Attorney,” Loyola of Los Angeles International and Comparative Law Review 301 (1986); http://digitalcommons .lmu.edu/ ilr/ vol8/ iss2/ 4.
For discussions of patronage, see the books by deSilva and Rohrbaugh listed above.
Wright, N. T. After You Believe: Why Christian Character Matters. New York: HarperCollins, 2010.
For a general introduction to the process of interpretation that takes seriously the differences between meaning and application, see:
Duvall, J. Scott, and J. Daniel Hays. Grasping God’s Word: A Hands-On Approach to Reading, Interpreting, and Applying the Bible. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2001.