July

Books

Schreiner, Thomas R. The King in His Beauty: A Biblical Theology of the Old and New Testaments. Grand Rapids: Baker, 2013.

In this biblical theology Thomas Schreiner studies the themes of the books of the Bible (Paul’s epistles are grouped together in a single section, as are some other smaller sections, like Luke-Acts). Schreiner either follows a thematic approach or a literary one in which he traces the main themes of successive sections. Overall, his comments are insightful and the book gives a good overview of Scripture’s main themes.

Bird, Kai. The Good Spy: The Life and Death of Robert Ames. New York: Crown, 2014.

Lewis, C.S. The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.

Articles

Witherington III, Ben. "Not So Idle Thoughts about Eidolothuton" Tyndale Bulletin 44.2 (1993) 237- 254.

Witherington argues that all the occurrences of εἰδωλόθυτος refer to food eaten in the temple precincts. It does not refer to meat offered to idols that is served outsides the temple precincts. The weakest point of Witherington’s argument is that the three items restricted in for Gentile Christians in Acts 15 don’t seem to have to do with what went on in the temple, as the must in Witherington’s argument. He admits in a footnote that strangling was not a common practice in Greek and Roman temples and chalks it up to James being a provincial Judean who didn’t really know much of what went on in Roman and Greek temples. I don’t find that line of reasoning persuasive (nor did Thiselton). (I do, however, think that Witherington is correct that Acts 15 is not about keeping a modicum of Jewish or Noachic food laws.) Garland objects to Witherington on the grounds that all the early Church Fathers also exclude eating from the marketplace meat specifically identified as idol-meat. He notes that if Witherington’s view is correct then all subsequent early interpreters of Paul misunderstood, which Garland finds unlikely.

Gerhard, Johann. On the Nature of Theology and on Scripture. Saint Louis: Concordia, 2009.

Gerhard is a Lutheran scholastic who followed Martin Luther and Martin Chemnitz as the great Lutheran scholar of the third generation of Lutheranism. Reading his On the Nature of Theology should dispel the notion that the Protestant scholastics were rationalists or without real piety. Gerhard rightly argues that theology is not derived from reason but that reason is a tool to be used in understanding Scripture. His treatment of Scripture is excellent. He has one of the most detailed discussions of why the Apocryphal books are not to be included in the canon that I’ve read. Indeed, I sometimes wonder if the Protestant scholastics have been maligned because their opponents would rather dismiss them than engage their careful, detailed arguments.

August

Books

Wright, Lawrence. The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11. New York: Knopf, 2006.

Eliot, George. The Mill on the Floss.

McKenzie, Robert Tracy. The First Thanksgiving: What the Real Story Tells Us About Loving God and Learning from History. InterVarsity, 2013.

The primary question that McKenzie is answering in this book is how Christians should practice the discipline of history. He uses the story of the first Thanksgiving as a case study. Readers will therefore learn a about the Reformation, Puritans, Separatists, their culture, and their beliefs. This is a valuable part of the book. But readers will get more. They will also learn how to appreciate Christian forbearers without turning them into idols. They will learn the benefit of challenging one’s modern ideas by exposure to historical ones. They will learn that historical honesty is more important that using history for political purposes: Christian or otherwise. Highly recommended.

Beeke, Joel. Developing Healthy Spiritual Growth: Knowledge, Practice and Experience. Grand Rapids: Evangelical Press, 2013.

This brief book of three sermons on Colossians 1:9-14 has been the most spiritually nourishing book that I have recently read. It led me to desire to know Christ more, to follow him better, and to grow in my experience of the Spirit’s sanctifying work.

Articles

Head, Peter. "Graham Stanton and the Four-Gospel Codex: Reconsidering the Manuscript Evidence," in Jesus, Matthew’s Gospel and Early Christianity.

Head argues that the manuscript evidence does not support Stanton’s argument that the acceptance of the four Gospels was linked with four-gospel codices.

Brack, Jonathan M. and Jared S. Oliphint. "Questioning the Progress in Progressive Covenantalism: A Review of Gentry and Wellum’s Kingdom through Covenant," Westminster Theological Journal 76 (2014): 189-217.

Brack and Oliphint critique Gentry and Wellum’s Kingdom through Covenant on three grounds. First they challenge their exegetical methodology, next they challenge their understanding of covenant theology, third they challenge their understanding of the New Covenant. I find Brack and Oliphant’s critique on the first two points valid and helpful. I think they go astray on the third point.

The methodological critique focuses on the use of ANE background material. I believe that Brack and Oliphint are correct to welcome insights from ANE background while at the same time insisting that material external to Scripture not be allowed to supersede Scripture itself―including Scripture’s own canonical interpretation of Scripture. In addition to displacing Scripture itself, Brack and Oliphint note two additional problems with privileging background material in one’s hermeneutical method. First, it may neglect to note how Scripture transcends cultures. Second, it fails to acknowledge that the original audience often did not understand Scripture. "Conjecture on what would have been adequately understood by Scripture’s original audience is a poor test for what qualifies as biblical exegesis" (195).

In the article’s second section Brack and Oliphint critique Gentry’s treatment of the covenant’s and Covenant Theology. They note that their treatment of covenant theology relies on the writings of Michael Horton and Doug Wilson while neglecting the diversity that really existed among the key covenant theologians. Differences over whether the Mosaic Covenant is part of the covenant of grace or covenant of works or whether the covenant of grace is the new covenant or encompasses all (or most) of the covenants. I think this is a valid criticism. Ironically the treatment of Dispensationalism is much better (this aspect of Kingdom through Covenant is not dealt with by Brack and Oliphant). All too often Covenant Theologians treat Scofield as representing all of Dispensationalism, with perhaps a nod to later developments. To their credit Wellum and Gentry avoid caricature and represent Dispensationalism in all its variety.

Ironically, in the third section Brack and Oliphint are the ones who forget the diversity of Covenant Theology and are the ones who impose an external paradigm on Scripture rather than giving the text priority. In this section they object to Wellum and Gentry’s argument that, unlike the OT covenants, the members of the new covenant are not a mixture of believers and unbelievers. They also downplay the progress from the OT to the new covenant indicated by the newness of the indwelling Spirit for new covenant believers. On this count I find the Exegetical arguments favoring Wellum and Gentry’s position to be stronger. Brack and Oliphint, on the other hand, made primarily theological arguments that depended on their paedobaptist version of covenant theology. They read statements about the necessity of the Spirit indwelling made in the New Testament back into the Old Testament. And though they in another context noted works like Pascal Denault’s, which answered their theological objections, they failed to acknowledge that the objections they raised do have answers that Baptist theologians have provided. This part of the paper was disappointing. Because it raised old arguments without engaging response to those arguments, it failed to advance the discussion.

From my theological perspective, I think the real value of this review is its discussion of ANE material in one’s hermeneutics. The errors the critique seem to be spreading at present, and I believe their critique on this point to be spot on.

Edwards, Jonathan. "The Mind." In Scientific and Philosophical Writings. Edited by Wallace E. Anderson. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1980. [Also read much of the editor’s introduction]

Edwards’s idealism is far from convincing, but the editor’s introduction helpfully explains the materialist challenge to Christianity that Edwards was seeking to counter. Some of the most interesting aspects of the essay to my mind was the discussions of aesthetics. Edwards ties aesthetics to proportion. Thing with proportion are beautiful. This means there can be things that are ugly when viewed narrowly, but which are beautiful when seen in a larger context in which proportion becomes evident. Ethically this explains how something sinful can appear beautiful when viewed narrowly. But when viewed from the broadest perspective, it would not be so.

Michael J. McClymond and Gerald R. McDermott. "God as Trinity." "The End of God in Creation." "Providence and History." The Theology of Jonathan Edwards. New York: Oxford University Press, 2012.

I find Edwards’s account of the Trinity overly speculative and unhelpful. His view on the end of God in creation I find superlatively biblical and essential reading for all literate Christians. Edwards’s history of redemption I find to be a mixed bag. I really like what he is attempting, but I don’t always find his typology convincing. McClymond and McDermott provide very helpful summaries of all three of these topics.

Warfield, Benjamin B. "John’s First Word." In Benjamin B. Warfield: Selected Shorter Writings. Edited by John E. Meter. Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R, 1970. pp. 148-50.

Warfield’s main point is that Jesus is the One who reveals the Father’s glory. That is why he is pictured as the Word and the light, the One tabernacling among God’s people and exegeting the Father.

Books

Lucas, Sean Michael. Robert Lewis Dabney: A Southern Presbyterian Life. P&R, 2005.

This is a superbly written but sad biography. Dabney is a tragic figure. He had a first-rate intellect that rightly saw dangers in modernism and critiqued them cogently. He defended orthodox theology. But he was deeply racist, defending slavery as biblical and opposing the ordination of black men after the war. Indeed, he opposed anything that would uplift black people. Lucas presents Dabney’s views fairly while also providing a biblical critique. The concluding chapter reflects on Dabney’s contribution both positive and negative. He notes the influence of Dabney’s racial views in past years on Lucas’s own denomination, the PCA, and his alma mater, Bob Jones University. He also includes a helpful comparison and contrast between Dabney and Abraham Kuyper. He notes that while both held problematic racial views, both defended Christianity from modernism, and both offered a public theology, Kuyper has received greater appreciation than Dabney. While noting ways in which Kuyper’s theology is a richer resource than Dabney’s (the antithesis, common grace, sphere sovereignty), Lucas still holds that Dabney has much to teach us. In the end, Lucas seems to prefer Dabney’s spirituality of the church position to Kuyper’s (which he thinks in danger of falling into theonomy). Indeed, the final critique of Dabney was his failure in that he created a public theology more Southern than Christian.

Foner, Eric. Reconstruction: America’s Unfinished Revolution, 1863-1877. Peter Smith, 2001.

Johnston, Philip and Peter Walker, The Land of Promise: Biblical, Theological, and Contemporary Perspectives. Downers Grove: InterVarsity, 2000.

This book has two great failings. First, many of the essays begin with the concern that the modern state of Israel treats the Palestinians unjustly and that a theology of the land must be found to undermine Israel’s claim to the land. Second, many of the essays evince little sympathy for opposing viewpoints and thus deal with caricatures or weak representatives of these viewpoints. For instance, the chapter "Dispensational Approaches to the Land," is not written by a dispensationalist. Instead the author begins with such representative dispensationalists as Jerry Falwell, Jim Bakker, Paul Crouch, Pat Robertson, and Jimmy Swaggart and ends by connecting dispensationalism to the Crusades and Manicheanism. The substance of the chapter is given to John Nelson Darby, C. I. Scofield, Hal Lindsey, and The International Christian Embassy, Jerusalem. Blaising and Bock are dispatched with a sentence, and other recent dispensationalist scholars don’t even merit a mention. Another author suggests dispensationalists adopt a literal interpretation of land prophecies because they don’t understand figures of speech or metaphors; because they are committed to "empirical positivism"; because they have adopted an American Dream utopianism; or because they are inerrantists. The authors rightly reject the idea that the modern state of Israel has a biblical mandate to reconquer the promised land. But they seem to conflate this error with any claims that Israel will receive the promised land in the future. What is more, the chapter presenting a Jewish Christian perspective on the land clearly denies that disobedient Israel can claim the land promises while also affirming the future fulfillment of the land promises for Israel. Unfortunately the other contributors fail to interact with this chapter, preferring easier targets instead. In addition, while several authors bring up injustices perpetuated by Israel against Palestinians, only one mentions the fact that Jews "are the target of special enmity." A book written by those sympathetic to those of other viewpoints would have stressed both the need of Israel to act justly toward Palestinians and of Palestinians to act justly toward Jews.

Though many of the chapters are written by conservatives, some fall short in their bibliology. One author speaks of "the failure of prophecy" when the utopia that the prophet predicted upon the return of the people failed to come to pass. He rejects moving the fulfillment into the "unpredictable and indefinite future." Instead he proposes reading prophecies as ancient hyperbole that must be radically re-read in light of Christ.

Regarding specific exegetical proposals, Williamson had somewhat helpful essay on the universalization of the land promise to encompass the whole earth. While I agree this is a feature of the Bible’s teaching, I thought Williamson stretched exegetically to find it in the Abrahamic Covenant itself. I also fail to see why universalizing the land promise, extending it to other nations, strips Israel of the promise. Do all get the promise except Israel? Walker also put forward some interesting proposals. He began his essays on the land in the New Testament promisingly by affirming that the New Testament authors did view the land as an important concept despite the paucity of direct references to the land. However, he concludes that Hebrews 3-4 when combined with Hebrews 11 reveals that the land promise is to be fulfilled by heaven. He thinks that as the author of Hebrews indicates the temple was a shadow, so the land was a shadow. It is worth pointing out, however, that the author of Hebrews does not call the land a shadow, as he does with the temple. Further, the city that Abraham looks forward to is the New Jerusalem that comes down out of heaven to the new earth. The heavenly country is the renewed earth, and our eternal rest takes place on literal land. Similarly more persuasive readings exist for each of Walker’s key texts.

Books that deal with the theological theme of land are relatively rare. It is therefore a disappointment that this volume did not even deal at an acceptably scholarly level with opposing viewpoints.

Leder, Arie C. Waiting for the Land: The Story Line of the Pentateuch. P&R, 2010.

The subtitle of this book describes its primary function: it maps out the story-line of the Pentateuch. Leder takes seriously the five book division of the Pentateuch rather than trying to construct an outline that breaks up the Pentateuchal material differently. He holds the Pentateuch follows an ABCB’A’ pattern. Leviticus is the center, framed by Exodus and Numbers. Genesis and Deuteronomy frame the whole and provide the beginning and the conclusion of the narrative. The central narrative problem of the Pentateuch, according to Leder, is exile from the presence of God. The holiness material in Leviticus is central because it is essential to overcoming this narrative problem.

The heart of this book are the five chapters that examine the five books of the Pentateuch. For each of these Leder provides a summary of the book, identifies the "central narrative interest," identifies the narrative problem of the book, outlines key points of the plot, and traces the structure of the book.

The title of the book identifies a minor theme that runs throughout. Each of the five central chapters ends with a section on waiting for the land. The final chapter of the book also takes up this theme. Leder’s basic contention is that the Pentateuch closes with Israel outside the land to show the relative unimportance of the land in comparison to God’s presence. Exile from Eden is not resolved by the land promise but by the presence of God among his people. I remain unconvinced by this thesis, especially as it leads Leder to take the wilderness wanderings and Babylonian exile as normative for the church. The conquest of Canaan and dwelling in the land are discussed in somewhat negative terms. This approach would seem to make normative the judgments of Israel rather than the promises. Yet if the tabernacle, the dwelling place of God, is a microcosm that also reflects Eden, then the theme of God’s presence should not be separated from the land promise. God intends to dwell with his people in his land (cf. Exodus 33)—which in the end will encompass all the earth. This is not to discount some agreement with Leder: there is some parallel between Israel outside the land but enjoying God’s presence in the tabernacle and the church, which is the temple of God’s Spirit, awaiting the renewed earth.

Overall, the book is accessibly written. Though it contains what I view as some missteps, and though he could have dug deeper at several points, the book also contains good insights into the themes and structure of the Pentateuch.

De Angeli, Marguerite. The Door in the Wall. Laurel Leaf, 1949.

Cook, David. Understanding Jihad. Berkley: University of California Press, 2005.

Cook helps his readers do exactly what his title says. He carefully works his way through the sources about Jihad from Mohammad until the present day. He finds the evidence that jihad meant an internal struggle rather than military conflict historically wanting. He is sympathetic with Muslims who make these claims in the hope of reforming Islam, but he finds these claims historically inaccurate. Cook also finds fault with those who believe that since Islam historically spread by the sword that modern day Islamic terrorists stand within the mainstream of Islamic jihad. The use of martyrdom or suicide bombers and the targeting of non-military targets are two significant departures from the jihad tradition. The careful discussion of primary sources and the distinctions of varying views of jihad make this perhaps the best book on the subject.

Gouge, William. Building a Godly Home. Volume 2. Reformation Heritage, 2013.

Volume one of this edited and slightly modernized version of William Gouge’s Domestical Duties is an excellent exposition of Ephesians 5:22-6:9. This volume provides practical application of the husband and wife’s mutual duties to each other, the wife’s duties toward her husband, and a husband’s duties toward his wife. According to the editors this book was the most influential Puritan book on marriage and family. It is easy to see why. It is full of careful, biblical guidance. Hermeneutically, Gouge is sometimes over-reliant on biblical examples that should not be taken as normative. Overall, however, his counsel is biblically grounded.

As expected, Gouge presents the biblical teaching of a husband’s leadership in the home and the wife’s submission to her husband. Gouge also sees the wife as holding an exalted position in the home, and his counsel repeatedly calls on the husband to lovingly treat her in way that honors her station. Egalitarian caricatures of what life in a biblically ordered home fall flat here as would any attempts to misuse the biblical teaching about the husband’s authority in order to demean the wife.

The overall effect of this volume is to challenge husbands and wives in their daily life to reflect Christ and the church. Gouge writes in a way that is direct and challenging while also being inspiring. These volumes by Gouge may still be the best books on marriage and the family on the market. They certainly are worthy of being as widely read today as they were in Puritan times.

Hill, Charles E. Regnum Caelorum: Regnum Caelorum: Patterns of Millennial Thought in Early Christianity, 2nd ed. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2001.

Though the earliest writers who touch on the issue of the Millennium hold a millennial view, both Justin and Irenaeus affirm that some of orthodox Christians also held to an amillennial view. Hill proposes that we can identify who these people were by trying to identify wider systems of eschatology that extend beyond the millennial issue alone. Hill argues that those who affirmed a millennium also held that the redeemed existed in a subterranean intermediate state awaiting the resurrection of the body. On the other hand Christian writers who oppose millennialism all held that the soul ascends to God’s presence in heaven in the intermediate state. Hill grants that it is theoretically possible that a person held to a heavenly intermediate state and a millennium, but he argues in response that there is no evidence that such a position existed.

Based on the link between a heavenly millennial state and amillennialism, Hill concludes that Clement of Rome, Ignatius, Polycarp, Athenagrous, Meilto of Sardis, and others held to the amillennial position. The most significant name on that list is Polycarp. Polycarp is the link between the apostle John and Irenaeus—between the apostle whose writing contains the key New Testament millennial text and the chief early defender of the millennial position.

If Polycarp held to an amillennial position, how did his student, Irenaeus, come to hold a millennial position? Hill argues that Irenaeus changed to the millennialist position in the course of writing Against Heresies in order to strengthen his position against Gnosticism. Gnostics would be content with a spiritual existence in the presence of God but a subterranean intermediate state defers that until after the bodily resurrection and a Millennial reign of Christ affirms the goodness of the material creation.

If Hill is correct, then Irenaeus inherited an amillennial position from Polycarp that he later abandoned. Since Polycarp was a disciple of the apostle John, this would strengthen claims that John was not a millennialist. Indeed, Hill argues that since John (and the rest of the New Testament) teach a heavenly intermediate state at odds with the millennial position’s subterranean intermediate state, the New Testament is amillenial.

Hill is an erudite scholar who is familiar with the patristic writings. In closely examining the passages that Hill claimed evidenced changes in Irenaeus’s theology, I found convincing the claim that he shifted from a heavenly to a subterranean intermediate state. However, I found unconvincing the claim that he shifted from an amillennial to a millennial position. The texts that Hill appealed to as being amillennial were not clearly such. In addition Irenaeus explicitly claims having received his millennial interpretations from the elders, which would likely have included Polycarp. Further, a key point in Irenaeus’s theology is that what is received from the elders is the authoritative interpretation of Scripture. It is unlikely that he would have changed positions on an interpretation he attributes to the elders. The upshot of accepting HIll’s argument that Irenaeus changed positions on the intermediate state but rejecting his argument that Irenaeus changed millennial positions is that evidence does therefore exist for millennialists who also held to a heavenly intermediate state (the early Irenaues being a prime example). Hill’s claim that belief in a heavenly intermediate state is evidence of amillennialism therefore does not hold. Indeed, if one shifts from a focus on the intermediate state to eternal state, it becomes clear that the patristic amillennialists held to a spiritual eternal state while, according to amillennialists such as Turretin, Bavinck, Hoekema, Horton, and Venema, the NT teaches an earthly eternal state.

Lewis, C.S. The Magician’s Nephew.

Articles

Carson, D. A. "Sin’s Contemporary Significance." In Fallen: A Theology of Sin. Edited by Christopher W. Morgan and Robert A. Peterson. Crossway, 2013.

This is Carson at his best: exegetically careful, theologically insightful, and devotionally stirring.

Arnold, Matthew. "Dover Beach," "The Buried Life," Empedocles on Etna."

Books

Tolkien, Christopher. History of Middle-Earth II’>The History of Middle-earth II. HarperCollins, 2002.

Traces in great detail the manuscript development of the Lord of the Rings.

Verbeek, Theo. Descartes and the Dutch: Early Reactions to Cartesian Philosophy, 1637-1650′>Descartes and the Dutch. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1992.

This book documents the conflict between Descartes, his followers, and the Reformed Orthodox. The Orthodox had several concerns with Descartes.

First, they thought that his methodological skepticism was sinful: to doubt the existence of God is a breach of the first commandment. It is not a way to knowledge. Though Descartes did argue for the existence of God, the Orthodox found his arguments weak. They believed the net result of starting with methodological doubt and following with weak arguments for the existence of God would be an increase in atheism.

Second, they held that reason was an instrument of knowledge that should always be subject to Scripture. They rejected the concept that reason is an "independent source of knowledge." They were concerned that if reason was raised as an authority above Scripture that doctrines such as the Trinity, incarnation, original sin, and eternal punishment might be rejection as contrary to reason. The Orthodox were also concerned by Descartes dismissal of the human senses as reliable. They believed that since the senses were given by God they were, in general, reliable. Voetius indicated that, "People who reject the senses are like the philosopher who, for the sake of wisdom, put out his own eyes in order to meditate at his ease" (56).

Third, the Orthodox were concerned that Descartes approach was too speculative. Descartes argued that even God must be caused, if only by himself, since all beings must have a cause. The Orthodox held that speculations about the being of God are dangerous; they believed they could say from Scripture that God is not caused by anything else. Beyond this they did not wish to go.

Fourth, the Reformed Orthodox were also concerned that Descartes placed human free will over the sovereignty of God.

Wright, N. T. The Case for the Psalms: Why They Are Essential’>The Case for the Psalms: Why They are Essential. HarperOne, 2013.

For anyone interested in an introduction to the Psalms, Gordon Wenham’s, The Psalter Reclaimed would be a much better resource than Wright’s Case for the Psalms. Though not without occasional insight, I did not find time, space, and matter to be the most compelling or insightful way to unpack the themes of the Psalter.

Articles

Calvin, John. Institutes of the Christian Religion’>Institutes of the Christian Religion’>Institutes of the Christian Religion. Edited by John T. McNeil. Translated by Ford Lewis Battles. Philadelphia: Westminster, 1960. [2.9-14]

Chapters 9-11 deal with continuity and discontinuities between the Old and New Testaments. Calvin is right to see both present, but he is wrong to see the continuity as one covenant of grace under different administrations. I think he is further wrong to locate part of the discontinuity in making the OT about physical promises and the NT about spiritual fulfillments.

Chapters 12-14 deal with the humanity of Christ. Calvin does an excellent job of demonstrating why Christ must be man. He answers the objections of heretics to the humanity of Christ, and he lays out the orthodox position