Rodney K. Duke, “Recent Research in Chronicles,” Currents in Biblical Research 8 (2009): 10–50.
From the abstract:
“This article surveys trends in Chronicles scholarship from 1994 to 2007. Most of the trends established by 1993 have continued with more depth and focus, although with a few challenges. These trends include: refining the distinctions between Chronicles and Ezra-Nehemia as coming from separate authors/editors; recognizing the integral role of the genealogies; and examining the literary artistry of the Chronicler. Newer trends include: pursuing the interplay between orality, on the one hand, and textuality and literacy, on the other; and bringing insights from an increasing sociological understanding of the Persian and Hellenistic periods in general. Recent years have also seen a wealth of new commentaries” (p. 10).
Duke, building on the earlier work of Kleinig, “Recent Research in Chronicles,” Currents in Research: Biblical Studies 2 (1994): 43–76, notes three trends which “have continued in the following years with increasing focus and breadth” (p. 41).
1. A shift from historical to literary analysis.
2. A shift from diachronic source and redactional analyses to more synchronic, canonical analyses.
3. A newly forming trend to move from thematic analyses to theological synthesis (pp. 68–69).
“As a result, numerous articles and monographs have been produced and major commentary series have been adding to, or even replacing, volumes on Chronicles. The significant newer tendencies have been to date Chronicles later, even down to Hellenistic times, and to try to place Chronicles better into its sociological and literary context as scholars gain a fuller understanding of the Persian and Hellenistic periods. Chronicles indeed has come into its own as a biblical book worthy of study” (p. 41).
Nancy L. deClaissé-Walford asks and then answers: "How, then, do we understand the Song of Songs in its canonical text"?
"As a simple erotic love song built on the model of other erotic love songs from the ancient Near East? A love song that celebrates the sexual love of one human for another? YES.
"As an allegory for the love of God for humanity? As the love of God for Israel? Asthe love of Jesus for the Church? YES.
"As a glimpse of Eden redeemed? A place where the created good is celebrated? YES, by all means, YES."
Nancy L. deClaissé-Walford, “An Introduction to the Song of Songs,” Review and Expositor 105 (2008): 399–400.
"At the end of the day, it is not helpful to arrange New Testament proof texts into preexistent systematic theology categories and then construct a Testament theology or ethics or analyze New Testament theology or ethics on that basis. This puts the ‘dog’ back in dogma, and that dog won’t hunt if we are talking about being fair to the focus and thrusts of the New Testament itself, which are christocentric and christological to the core.”
Ben Witherington III, The Indelible Image: The Theological and Ethical Thought World of the New Testament, Volume One: The Individual Witnesses (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2009), 54,
"We're always being measured: God is measuring us, and people are measuring us. When it comes to measuring Christian service and servants, other people can make mistakes, and we can make mistakes. Most Christian workers are prone to think either more highly of themselves than they should (Rom 12:3) or less highly. If we think too highly of outselves, we'll get proud and start pushing our way into what we think is a more important place. If we think less highly, we'll get discouraged and want to quit. Both attitudes are wrong."
Warren W. Wiersbe, On Being a Servant of God (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1993), 59.
In the process of researching a topic I came upon this bit from Nils Dahl. I think that I understand the first reason, but I am not sure that I understand the second reason (I only see two reasons although the word “several” normally applies to more than two). Thoughts anyone?
“The New Testament writers pay remarkably little attention to the problem of theodicy or to other problems inherent in any theology that asserts that God is simultaneously omnipotent, just, and loving. There are several reasons for this: The general concept of God is more or less taken for granted; the writers do not deal with dogmatic theory but address some vital issue, if they do not present their ‘theology’ in narrative form; they expect that God will in the near future publicly vindicate both himself and his faithful servants. Yet the more profound reason why New Testament authors do not seem concerned about problems and inconsistencies in their ‘doctrine of God’ may be that all general and traditional attributes of God are predicated of ‘the Father of Jesus Christ,’ that is, the Son of Man, who was abandoned and subjected to violence, injustice, and hatred–and who is one with his Father.”
Nils A. Dahl, “The Neglected Factor of New Testament Theology,” in Jesus the Christ: The Historical Origins of Christological Doctrine, ed. Donald H. Juel (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1991), 160-1.
Eugene Merrill writes the following in his article “Old Testament Archaeology: Its Promises and Pitfalls,” Journal of Dispensational Theology (August 2009): 19.
“Archaeology in the abstract is neither friend nor foe of the Bible and the Christian faith. It is a silent witness to the past that has no independent authority and that cannot interpret itself. Therefore, it is useful only as it becomes a tool in the hands and minds of human interpreters. How it is used depends, of course, on the disposition of the user. Those who wish to bring it to the service of the written Word of God can find it to be an invaluable aid in understanding, defending, and proclaiming that Word. On the other hand, those who bring the Word to the service of archaeology will use and abuse the Word as they see fit to make it conform to the ‘assured results’ of modern criticism and infidelity.”
"From the very first paragraph of the letter of James it becomes apparent how very wrong it is to suggest that this homily is simply an ethical miscellany. It would be better to call it ‘theological ethics,’ as it is grounded in a certain view of God and divine activity, as the opening paragraph makes apparent. God is the one who sends wisdom, gives every good gift, including perseverance, and is the model of rectitude—not a shadow of a doubt or of any behavior that could be called questionable. It becomes clear from the outset that by and large James is serving up not commonsense wisdom but rather revelatory wisdom, wisdom that comes by revelation and presupposes a particular view of God and the divine activity that enables human beings to be their best selves."
Rod Decker has posted links to David Turner's paper "Matthew Among the Dispensationalists: A Progressive Dispensational Perspective on the Kingdom of God" and Mark Bailey's response"A Response to David Turner's 'Matthew Among the Dispensationalists." Both papers are scheduled to be delivered at this years national Evangelical Theological Society meeting. You can access the papers here.
Ben Witherington III has just published the first of two volumes on New Testament theology and ethics (which he sees as inseparably intertwined). The first volume, and the volume under review here, is analysis of the individual New Testament witnesses (i.e. Jesus and the NT authors). The second volume will apparently be a synthesis or a presentation of the collective witness of the New Testament. In a very real sense both volumes are or will be a culmination of sorts of Dr. Witherington’s prodigious literary output, including published commentaries on every book of the New Testament (p. 13). Witherington argues that a new comprehensive work on New Testament theology and ethics is needed for three reasons (p. 15). (1) The relationship between theology and ethics has not often been treated adequately. (2) Some key terms in the NT are both ethical and theological (e.g., love). (3) One unfortunate side effect of the Reformation was the subordination of ethics to theology. Whether one agrees with these three reasons are not, I suspect that these volumes will provide academic food for New Testament students to sample for years to come.
In general, The Indelible Image, is what one comes to expect from a book authored by Witherington. The book is academic and yet accessible; informative and yet interesting. Matter-of-fact assertions are juxtaposed with rhetorically effective and culturally current turns of phrases. As one might expect, there are echoes of Witherington’s earlier literary work (e.g. The Christology of Jesus, Paul’s Narrative Thought World, etc.). Furthermore, as I noted in a previous post (see here) I especially appreciated the equal time given to other, less well-known, voices in the New Testament (e.g., the General Epistles). Each chapter is concluded with a helpful “Short List” bibliography for those who need/want help for further study. The subject, name, and Scripture indexes in the back of the book appear to be thorough and complete. By the way, the reader may want to begin by reading the “Rewind” section (pp. 813-18) at the end of the book. This section deftly summarizes what the author has sought to argue in the volume as a whole and may help to provide helpful orientation for the reader.
Here is the table of contents for the book: Foreword The Overture: The Grand story in Miniature Prologue: Blueprints and Bylaws 1 Jesus: The Alpha and Omega of New Testament Thought 2 Paul the Paradigm Setter 3 The Kinsmen and Their Redeemer; Peter and His Principles 4 The Anonymous Famous Preacher 5 Beloved Theology and Ethics 6 One-Eyed Gospels 7 The End of All Things and the Beginning of the Canon
Concerning Paul's citation of Scripture in his epistles, Francis Watson in "Scripture in Pauline Theology: How Far Down Does it Go?" Journal of Theological Interpretation 2 (2008): 181-92, writes:
"Scholars who have reflected on these issues may be divided into two classes: there are maximalists, and there are minimalists. Maximalists think that scripture is profoundly important to Paul, minimalists think that it matters to him only superficially Maximalists tend to argue that Paul's texts are full of scriptural allusions, even where explicit citations are lacking. They believe that a citation of an individual text is intended to evoke the entire scriptural context from which it was taken. Minimalists believe that Paul is usually unconcerned about the contexts of the texts he cites. They argue that he often cites texts because he is forced to do so by opponents, not because he really wants to" (p. 182).
In the article Watson critiques the Minimalist position and argues for a version of the Maximalist position.
"The fact that Israel remains a given for the NT is very striking, not least in view of the fact that by the end of the first century embryonic Christianity must already have been predominantly Gentile in composition. But fundamental it was. Jesus' message can be summed up in terms of a hope for the restoration of Israel. The first believers were all Jews, and the great majority of the NT writings were composed by Jews. The Paul of Acts sums up his mission by reference to ‘the hope of Israel’ (Acts 28:20), just as the Paul of Romans affirms the irrevocability of God’s calling of Israel and purpose for Israel (Rom 1 1:25–32). The chief term for Christian congregations, ‘church’ (ekklēsia), has been taken over from the LXX's translation of the qahal YHWH or the qahal lsrael (qahal = ‘assembly, congregation’).The assumption of the opening verses of James and 1 Peter is that the letters were addressed to (the twelve tribes[!] of) the Diaspora. And the seer of Revelation envisages salvation as embracing 144,000, 12,000 from each of the twelve tribes of Israel (Rev 74–8)."
James D. G. Dunn, New Testament Theology: An Introduction, Library of Biblical Theology, ed. James D. G. Dunn (Nashville: Abingdon, 2009), 97–8.
I had two discussions recently that involved the past, present, and future relationship of Israel and the Church. While the following is not exhaustive some might find the following summary of a recent article helpful.
Michael Vlach's recent article entitled “Various Forms of Replacement Theology,” The Master’s Seminary Journal 20 (2009): 57–69, defines and delineates various forms of suppersessionism (“fulfillment theology” and “replacement theology”). “Supersessionism . . . in the context of Israel and the church, is the view that the New Testament church is the new and/or true Israel that has forever superseded the nation Israel as the people of God. The result is that the church has become the sole inheritor of God's covenant blessings originally promised to national Israel in the OT. This rules out a future restoration of the nation Israel with a unique identity, role, and purpose that is distinct in any way from the Christian church” (p. 60). Vlach (following R. K. Soulen and others) goes on to identify three variant forms of supersessionism.
1. “Punitive/Retributive Supersessionism” (pp. 60–1) = A doctrinal/theological that holds that God is punishing Israel by displacing her as the people of God for her rejection of Christ. Adherents include Origen and Luther.
2. “Economic Supersessionism” (pp. 61–3) = A doctrinal/theological approach that holds that God’s plan for Israel’s role as the people of God expired with the coming of Christ when Israel was replaced by the church. Adherents include Barth, N. T. Wright.
3. “Structural Supersessionism” (pp. 63–5) = A hermeneutical approach which holds that much of the Old Testament is largely irrelevant in the formulation of Christian conviction about God’s work as consummator and redeemer. No Adherents are identified clearly in the article.
Vlach further suggests that, “Two terms are important for understanding what some supersessionists believe about Israel. These terms are salvation and restoration. In short, some supersessionists believe there will be a future salvation of Israel, but this salvation does not mean a restoration of Israel” (p. 65). Furthermore, “there are two major variations on the future of Israel among supersessionism. ‘Strong’ supersessionism asserts that Israel will not experience salvation as a nation. Moderate supersessionism, though, holds that the nation Israel will experience a salvation. Thus, the major distinguishing factor among supersessionists is whether they believe in a future salvation of Israel or not. ‘Strong’ supersessionists say ‘No’ to a future salvation of Israel. Moderate supersessionists say "Yes" to a future salvation of Israel” (pp. 65–6).
Michael Patton has an interesting post in which he identifies and delineates four types of theologians. They are:
1. Theological Maximalist – Most every doctrine is essential. 2. Theological Minimalist – Most every doctrine is non-essential. 3. Theological Centrist – Let’s meet in the middle. 4. Theological Centralist – Let’s unite around the central issues of the faith and give liberty in other areas.
Ben Witherington III has posted a paper he delivered on November 4, 2009 at Huntington University entitled "E Pluribus Unum: The One and theMany in Luke-Acts" on his blog here.
Thanks to Jesse Hillman at Zondervan for the free review copy.
The following review relates specifically to volume five, but I trust that the comments will have general relevance to all the volumes. Volume five covers the Minor Prophets, Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and Song of Songs. I won’t list all the authors here, but a complete list of contributors can be seen here.
In general, I can happily add my hearty affirmation to the growing and glowing recommendations of the Zondervan Illustrated Bible Background Commentary(ZIBBCOT). The book is well-designed and attractively produced. The quality and quantity of content of individual chapters vary somewhat as one might expect from the utilization of different authors. But having said that, every chapter in the volume that I reviewed proved to be both insightful and helpful. The boxed topical discussions such as Sovereign Lord” on page 67 generally provide solid discussions of the main issues at hand. Furthermore, the selection and quality of the pictures were as a whole outstanding. There is a nice margin provided on the open side of the page for readers who like to make notations in their books.
That Zondervan has provided a nice resource for biblical studies seems obvious. The question remains though, what is the best way to use this resource? My answer is that would best serve as an intermediate introduction to background issues related to the books of the Old Testament. Four observations can be made on this point. First, I would suggest that it is intermediate in the sense that beginning readers might be a bit overwhelmed by the sheer volume of material. Also some of the commentary is probably a bit beyond the neophyte student. Second, this volume raises the whole issue of how background material ought to be utilized (note: this is a question of how rather than if). For example, how does one avoid the problem of parallelomania associated with written texts noted nearly fifty years ago by Sandmel. This issue is covered to some degree in Walton’s introductory essay. But some users of ZIBBCOT will either not read the introductory essay or forget/ignore the ten “principles” on p. xii. Third, it is important to remember that ZIBBCOT is introductory in the sense that the texts and artifacts in the book are often and necessarily presented without the larger context. This means that responsible students will need to refer to more comprehensive resources to look at these texts/artifacts in context before drawing too many conclusions. Texts for example will need to be read in their larger contexts in volumes such as Hallo and Younger’s The Context of Scripture. Fourth, ZIBBCOT is introductory in the sense that while it presents commentary on the biblical text, the commentary is selective, and in this sense, inadequate. One will either need to turn to ZIBBCOT after doing the exegetical work and interacting with exegetical commentaries or begin with ZIBBCOT and then do one’s exegesis and interaction with more detailed exegetical commentaries.
Although my view of this work is overwhelmingly positive there are a few minor criticisms. First, I wonder about the propriety of some of the images. For example, in the chapter on Habakkuk, the first image is from an Assyrian relief. This could be potentially confusing since the foreign threat in Habakkuk is Babylonian rather than Assyrian. It is possible that the image was chosen because it pictures ramparts and ramparts are mentioned in Habakkuk 2:1. But even if this is the reason for the inclusion, no link is made in the description itself. This problem could be easily alleviated by the inclusion of a simple text reference such as (see Hab 2:1). Second, there are times when it seems that appropriate images are left out. For example, it seems strange that an image of the Cyrus Cylinder is not utilized once in the chapters devoted to the Post-Exilic Prophets. Third, some interpreters will be troubled by certain assumptions that are made without qualification and presentation of other views. For example, the assumed identification of Daniel/Dane’l in Ezekiel 14:14, 20 as a mythical Ugaritic character rather than the prophet Daniel in the Book of Daniel seems to merit at least some qualification. While this Ugaritic identification is not uncommon, it is not a settled matter either, especially among some Evangelical interpreters (see for example Daniel Block’s discussion in his Ezekiel commentary (NICOT). Wouldn’t at least a footnote be merited in cases like this? Fourth, while I appreciate the picture index, its utilization of categories (e.g., “amulets”) might be helpful in some ways, but unhelpful in others since the reader will need to know what category that the image that they are looking for falls under. Perhaps a supplementary general alphabetical index would help to make the volume more user-friendly. A Scripture index would also be helpful and should be considered mandatory for modern reference works such as this one. Finally, and this is a matter of personal preference, I would have preferred footnotes rather than endnotes. But these criticisms are minor and should not detract significantly from the overall value of the work as a whole.
Michael Halcomb has done it again! He has now created and made available a document on how to create a statement of teaching philosophy. Check it out here. While there, check out Michael's other helpful resources.
Michael Bird highlights the following three recent treatments related to the theology of the Catholic (or General) Epistles (James, 1-2 Peter, 1-3 John, Jude).
Peter H. Davids, “The Catholic Epistles as Canonical Janus: A New Testament glimpse into Old and New Testament Canon Formation,” Bulletin of Biblical Research 19 (2009): 403-16.
David R. Nienhuis, Not by Paul Alone: The Formation of the Catholic Epistles and the Christian Canon (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2007).
Karl-Wilhelm Niebuhr and Robert W. Wall, eds., Catholic Epistles and Apostolic Tradition (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2009).
C. Michael Patton has a good list of "Eight Ways to Lose Your Influence in Theology." The The eight points are worth making, list but I would add two observations. First, these eight "ways" relate to argumentation in general, and not just theological argumentation in particular. Second, I am not sure that committing these errors leads to a loss of theological influence. sadly, it seems that many of the better known voices in biblical/theological studies do these types of things rather frequently. In any case, Michael's eight "ways" are as follows.
1. Be Imbalanced 2. Overstate your case 3. Misrepresent your opponents 4. Obscure the options 5. Get defensive 6. Lack of grace 7. Be perpetually non-committal 8. Define yourself by what you are against
