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Archive for the ‘Eerdmans’ Category


Ethnicity and Inclusion

In Eerdmans, ethnicity, history of interpretation, inclusion, Jonathan Rowlands, NT reception history, Reception history on December 5, 2022 at 3:00 pm
Book cover

2022.12.11 | David G. Horrell. Ethnicity and Inclusion: Religion, Race, and Whiteness in Constructions of Jewish and Christian Identities. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2020. 

Review by Jonathan Rowlands, St. Mellitus College

In Ethnicity and Inclusion, Horrell examines the ways in which the contested categories of ethnicity, race, and religion coalesce in and arise from conceptions of the relationship between Judaism and early Christianity. Seeking to focus “on the log in my own eye rather than the specks in others’ eyes” (pp. 2–3), Horrell brings these issues into conversation with the implicit whiteness (another contested term) of contemporary biblical scholarship. In so doing, he not only upturns claims about Judaism and early Christianity, but also offers sobering critique of NT studies itself. Horrell articulates the need to re-examine conceptions of race, ethnicity, religion, and identity in antiquity, as well as the ways in which these categories are apprehended in contemporary scholarship. 

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Reading with the Grain of Scripture

In Eerdmans, Gospels, Intertextuality, Nathan Charles Ridlehoover, Paul, Richard HAYS, Scripture, theological Interpretation of Scripture on February 19, 2021 at 3:00 pm

2021.2.6 | Richard B. Hays. Reading with the Grain of Scripture. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2020. ISBN: 978-0-8028-7845-8.

Review by Charles Nathan Ridlehoover, Columbia Biblical Seminary.

Students and scholars of the New Testament hardly need an introduction to Richard Hays. Hays has written ground-breaking scholarship on the letters of Paul and New Testament ethics, and his latest full-length study examines intertextual echoes in the Gospels and their Christological significance (Echoes of Scripture in the Gospels). Just before his retirement in 2018, Hays assumed the mantle of dean of Duke Divinity School while maintaining his role as the George Washington Ivey Professor Emeritus of New Testament.

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Christobiography

In Craig S. KEENER, Eerdmans, Gospels, Historical Jesus, Narratology, Nathan Charles Ridlehoover on October 18, 2019 at 4:00 pm

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2019.10.13 | Craig S. Keener. Christobiography: Memory, History, and the Reliability of the Gospels. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2019. ISBN 978-0-8028-7675-1.

Review by Charles Nathan Ridlehoover, Columbia International Seminary.

Scholars in the New Testament guild need no introduction to the work of Craig Keener. Keener has been one of the modern masters of long-form scholarship in the field of biblical studies. Following on the heels of his work on Acts and miracles, Keener returns to the question of the Gospels’ reliability and historical Jesus. The following volume is Keener’s efforts to situate the Gospels more precisely in the ranging spectrum of Greco-Roman biographies. Keener does not view his research as another volume in historical Jesus studies, but rather, a contribution to the epistemology of historical Jesus research. Read the rest of this entry »


Jesus the Eternal Son

In Christology, Eerdmans, Gospels, Michael F. BIRD, Michael Kok, New Testament, review, Synoptic Gospels on November 3, 2017 at 4:00 pm

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2017.11.22 | Michael F. Bird, Jesus the Eternal Son: Answering Adoptionist Christologies. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2017. ISBN: 978-0-8028-7506-8

Reviewed by Michael Kok, The King’s University in Alberta, Canada.

The Christian doctrine of the hypostatic union aimed to articulate how Jesus’s human and divine natures were united in one person. Over-emphasizing Jesus’s humanity at the expense of his divinity, or vice versa, was ruled out of bounds. One of the christological conceptions that was censured for falling short of the orthodox consensus on the incarnation has been labelled by modern scholars as “adoptionism,” which Michael F. Bird defines as “reducing Jesus to a human figure who had acquired divine status by merit” (7).

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Job 1-21: Interpretation & Commentary

In Book of Job, C. L. SEOW, Eerdmans, HB/OT, JiSeong Kwon on May 4, 2014 at 2:09 pm

9780802848956

2014.5.10 | C. L. Seow. Job 1-21: Interpretation & Commentary. Illuminations Series. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2013. 999 pages. ISBN:  9780802848956. Hardcover.

Review by JiSeong Kwon, Durham University

Many thanks to Eerdmans for providing a review copy.

The work by C. L. Seow is among the most thoughtful and insightful commentaries on the book of Job. Seow divides this commentary into two parts: ‘Introduction’—whose subsections include ‘Texts and Versions’, ‘Language’, ‘Integrity’, ‘Provenance’, ‘Setting’, ‘Genre(s)’, ‘Structure’, ‘Artistry’, ‘Theology’, and ‘History of Consequences’—and ‘Commentary’—whose subsections include ‘Interpretation’ (with ‘History of Consequences’), ‘Retrospect’, and ‘Commentary’ (textual notes). Each section deals with important issues in the book of Job with thoroughness and scholarly depth. Especially noteworthy are Seow’s discussions of literary technique in the book of Job and the book’s history of interpretation.

The virtue of Seow’s commentary is that he attempts to compensate for the weak points of previous commentators. For instance, the literary genre of Job as a whole is a longstanding matter of debate. Read the rest of this entry »


John Barclay, “Paul and the Gift”

In Durham, Eerdmans, Galatians, John BARCLAY, Justin A. Mihoc, Paul, Romans on November 11, 2011 at 12:49 am

This is a report on a book preview by Prof John Barclay, Professor of New Testament Studies at Durham University, at the New Testament Research Seminar, Department of Theology and Religion, Durham University, 07th of November 2011.

The list of forthcoming papers in the NT Research Seminars at Durham University can be found here.

At the last assembly of the weekly New Testament research seminar, a new type of presentation was inaugurated. Prof Francis Watson, this session’s chair, introduced the format of book previews, a new and different one from the seminars we were used to so far. In these new sessions, the chair will get involved much more as a moderator, in a questions and answers format. For the first half of the session, the moderator will ask a set of questions which will enable the author and respondent to draw the general structure and themes of his book. In the second half, the open discussion, to which all participants are invited, would complete the already composed picture and further focus on the participants’ interests in the previously presented book.

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