Genesis 18 (all verses below are from the NLT) tells the interesting story of three mysterious visitors who visit Abraham at the Oak of Mamre:

One day Abraham was sitting at the entrance to his tent during the hottest part of the day. He looked up and noticed three men standing nearby. When he saw them, he ran to meet them and welcomed them, bowing low to the ground.

“My lord,” he said, “if it pleases you, stop here for a while. Rest in the shade of this tree while water is brought to wash your feet. And since you’ve honored your servant with this visit, let me prepare some food to refresh you before you continue on your journey.” “All right,” they said. “Do as you have said.”

Then a few verses later (13), in the story, the reader learns unexpectedly that one of the three visitors is God when reading “Then the LORD said to Abraham.” The all-caps designation stands in place of the divine name for God, (‏יהוה / Yahweh), leaving no doubt to the reader that one of the strangers is God, the same God who will appear to Moses in Exodus 3.

Ever since the early Christians began to work out the relationship of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit in what would come to be known as the Trinity, many Christian writers, teachers, and preachers over the last two millennia have looked at Genesis 18 and have suggested that the three individuals who visited Abraham and his family at the Oaks of Mamre were, in fact, the three persons of the Trinity in physical manifestations. This is what is known in theological terms as a theophany, a physical manifestation of God for the purpose of relating to human beings.

The problem is that the Genesis text never specifically states the identity of the two other than beyond the one of them already identified as Yahweh. While some would like to equate Yahweh with God the Father exclusively, traditional Christian doctrine doesn’t make this claim either. In fact, from a Christian perspective, Yahweh is not limited to one person of the Trinity. See for example John 8:58, where Jesus essentially tells the Jewish leaders that they are in the presence of the same “person” who appeared to Moses at the burning bush in Exodus 3, but that doesn’t imply that the Father and Holy Spirit weren’t there, too.

The passage with Abraham in Genesis 18 is subtle. When encountering it for the first time, the reader/hearer may not expect initially that God is one of the visitors, although it is foreshadowed at the beginning of v. 1. Whether the other men who were present with Abraham were theophanies of the other persons of the Trinity or whether they were angels or even someone else, we simply don’t know because we weren’t privy to the entire conversation. And that’s the way the Bible generally works--less is more, if you will.

But not so with William P. Young’s book The Shack. In Young’s book, the main protagonist, Mackenzie Philips gets to sit around the dinner table eating greens and other good food, while picking the brain(s) of God, represented in three physical entities: Papa (Father God), represented by a large African American woman; Jesus (the Son of God), depicted as a Middle Eastern, bearded carpenter; and Sarayu (The Holy Spirit) who is a kind of wispy Asian woman. Mack is there in the Shack on the invitation of Papa because he’s never gotten over the death of his daughter at the hands of a serial killer years earlier. Because of this, not only does he blame himself, he also blames God.

That’s a very brief synopsis of the book, and my hunch is--since I’m so late to the game with this review--that most readers of This Lamp know all this anyway. I’m writing this review because I’ve received questions and emails since last Fall asking what I think of The Shack. By simply being able to point people to this page, I won’t have to repeat myself so much.

Kathy and I listened to the unabridged audio version of The Shack in December while we were traveling to Louisiana and back for Christmas. I don’t own a physical copy of the book, so I won’t be able to quote it verbatim, but it doesn’t really matter. I can still offer my general impression and point readers to other sources.

You need to know, up front, that I don’t think very highly of The Shack on multiple levels. I am certain that some of you will think I’m just being theologically picky, that I’ve let formal study of the Bible make me into some kind of doctrinal do gooder who can’t allow my imagination to see God in creative ways. If you think that, you simply don’t know me well. But don’t just ask me about this book, ask my wife Kathy. She may be less charitable than me.

But let me start by being charitable. Let me start by saying that William P. Young seems to be a really great fellow. At the end of our audio version of The Shack we were able to listen to an extended interview with Young. His motives seem to be nothing more than sincere. At the very least, he is certainly the benefactor of fortunate circumstances with the sale of The Shack into the millions of copies at this point, and no doubt many of the publishers who turned him down greatly regret doing so.

Furthermore, I don’t think that Young was attempting to be unbiblical, let alone introduce heresy into his novel. Nevertheless, he did.

So much has been written about the doctrinal error in The Shack, I started not to even comment on it. One can easily run a Google search for “The Shack” and “heresy” and find a multitude of pages, so I doubt I could top what has already been done. However, let me reproduce here three of Norman Geisler’s fourteen errors in The Shack. Geisler may not win an award for best webpage layout, but he offers a strong theological critique for Young’s work.

Problem Four: An Unbiblical View of the Nature and Triunity of God
In addition to an errant view of Scripture, The Shack has an unorthodox view of the Trinity. God appears as three separate persons (in three separate bodies) which seems to support Tritheism in spite of the fact that the author denies Tritheism (“We are not three gods” ) and Modalism (“We are not talking about One God with three attitudes”—p. 100). Nonetheless, Young departs from the essential nature of God for a social relationship among the members of the Trinity. He wrongly stresses the plurality of God as three separate persons: God the Father appears as an “African American woman” (80); Jesus appears as a Middle Eastern worker (82). The Holy Spirit is represented as “a small, distinctively Asian woman” (82). And according to Young, the unity of God is not in one essence (nature), as the orthodox view holds. Rather, it is a social union of three separate persons. Besides the false teaching that God the Father and the Holy Spirit have physical bodies (since “God is spirit”—Jn. 4:24), the members of the Trinity are not separate persons (as The Shack portrays them); they are only distinct persons in one divine nature. Just as a triangle has three distinct corners, yet is one triangle. It is not three separate corners (for then it would not be a triangle if the corners were separated from it), Even so, God is one in essence but has three distinct (but inseparable) Persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Problem Five: An Unbiblical View of Punishing Sin
Another claim is that God does not need to punish sin. He states, “At that, Papa stopped her preparations and turned toward Mack. He could see a deep sadness in her eyes. ‘I am not who you think I am, Mackenzie. I don’t need to punish people for sin. Sin is its own punishment, devouring you from the inside. It is not my purpose to punish it; it’s my joy to cure it’” (119). As welcoming as this message may be, it at best reveals a dangerously imbalanced understanding of God. For in addition to being loving and kind, God is also holy and just. Indeed, because He is just He must punish sin. The Bible explicitly says that” the soul that sins shall die” (Eze. 18:2). “I am holy, says the Lord” (Lev. 11:44). He is so holy that Habakkuk says of God, “You…are of purer eyes than to see evil and cannot look at wrong…” (Hab. 1:13). Romans 6:23 declares: “The wages of sin is death….” And Paul added, “‘Vengeance is mine, I will repay’ says the Lord” (Rom. 12:19).
In short, The Shack presents lop-sided view of God as love but not justice. This view of a God who will not punish sin undermines the central message of Christianity—that Christ died for our sins (1 Cor. 15:1f.) and rose from the dead. Indeed, some emergent Church leaders have given a more frontal and near blasphemous attack on the sacrificial atonement of Christ, calling it a “form of cosmic child abuse—a vengeful father, punishing his son for offences he has not even committed” (Steve Chalke, The Lost Message of Jesus, 184). Such is the end of the logic that denies an awesomely holy God who cannot tolerate sin was satisfied (propitiated) on behalf of our sin (1 Jn. 2:1). For Christ paid the penalty for us, “being made sin for us that we might be made the righteousness of God through him” (2 Cor. 5:21), “suffering the just for the unjust that He might bring us to God” (1 Pet. 3:18).

Problem Six: A False View of the Incarnation
Another area of concern is a false view of the person and work of Christ. The book states, “When we three spoke ourself into human existence as the Son of God, we became fully human. We also chose to embrace all the limitations that this entailed. Even though we have always been present in this universe, we now became flesh and blood” (98). However, this is a serious misunderstanding of the Incarnation of Christ. The whole Trinity was not incarnated. Only the Son was (Jn. 1:14), and in His case deity did not become humanity but the Second Person of the Godhead assumed a human nature in addition to His divine nature. Neither the Father nor Holy Spirit (who are pure spirit--John 4:24) became human, only the Son did.

Look, I admit that understanding the nature of God--understanding the Trinity--is not the easiest of subjects. But it amazes me to hear from so many Christians “After reading The Shack, I think I finally understand the Trinity!” Well, no you don’t. You’ve merely become familiar with Young’s distortion of it. Again, I don’t think Young set out to distort a doctrine like that of the Trinity. I just don’t think he was able to write this kind of story without introducing error. And there’s lots of places I could go on about other weird representations of God (like Papa [the God the Father character] showing off his wounds, a textbook example of the heresy of patripassionism, which Geisler also notes), but where does one really stop? For those who want to read further on these kinds of issues--and really you should--there are links at the bottom of this post.

On a completely different level, The Shack doesn’t work for me simply because overall, it’s not good literature. Let me qualify that statement. I’ll admit up front that everything leading up to Mack’s entering the shack where his dialogue with God begins kept my keen attention. It was a tragic story about the loss of his daughter and his estrangement from God, and one that I was really interested in. And I would also point to Mack’s vision (or whatever you want to call it) in which he was reconciled to his earthly father--powerful stuff.

Unfortunately, it’s the most significant part of the book--his encounter and dialogue with the persons of the Godhead--which not only are full of bad theology, but really are the weakest narrative parts of the whole story. The dialogue is overblown, repetitive, and pretentious. If you want good theological dialogue, I recommend Peter Kreeft (see here
and here). But if it’s true that George Lucas is incapable of writing realistic romantic dialogue, the same can be said for William P. Young when it comes to religious dialogue.

Besides that, there is too much content in the story that’s just plain weird or cheesy. The ongoing joke about Mack’s potential flatulence causing Papa (God the Father, as you’ll remember) to refuse him any more greens at dinner was more weird than humorous to both Kathy and me. Papa laughing at Jesus and calling him “Butterfingers” when he let slip a casserole dish, letting it come crashing to the floor seemed not only odd, but also introduced another doctrinal error. Essentially Young has Jesus err, something the Bible says he was incapable of doing. Would this also mean that Jesus occasionally smashed his thumb during carpentry work in Nazareth? Such a thought or question might not even matter to most reading this, but the implications start to get unsettling.

I had to grimace and shake my head when Mack opened his nightstand drawer in his bedroom at the shack and found a Gideon’s Bible. Ha ha ha. To me, that’s the kind of “gimmick” that distracts more than adds to the story. Further, when Jesus and Mack needed to walk to the other side of the lake, I knew it was coming before Young said it--sure enough, they would walk across the water! What else would you do if you were with Jesus? It’s these kind of gee whiz moments that I felt were bordering on immature and simply not needed in the story.

And should I even go into how Mack’s conversations with Papa in the kitchen while she was cooking was a blatant rip-off of Neo in The Matrix conversing with the Oracle in her kitchen while she made cookies? Should I question how Mack’s character, who was supposedly seminary trained, could ask the most inane questions of God, that any student who went to an institution worth its salt, or for that matter, any laymen who’d spent any decent amount of time with the Bible should know?

What boggles my mind is that a number of well-respected individuals do consider The Shack to be good literature. One endorsement comes from Eugene Peterson, an individual I admire very much and happen to be reading currently. Of The Shack, Peterson says this:

When the imagination of a writer and the passion of a theologian cross-fertilize the result is a novel on the order of The Shack. This book has the potential to do for our generation what John Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress did for his. It's that good!

The Shack equated to Pilgrim’s Progress? Really? Seriously? I read that and it makes me wonder if Peterson actually read the book. I don’t mean that as an insult against him. Regularly, well known individuals are approached by publishers, given a synopsis of a book, and then an already written endorsement for the individual to sign. Most of the endorsements you see on the back covers of books are handled this way. Endorsements should be evaluated with more than a grain of salt.

Yet, I could see why someone like Peterson would appreciate the concept of The Shack simply because of the way he sees the communal nature of the Trinity. In Christ Plays in Ten Thousand Places, Peterson writes,

Trinity understands God as three-personed: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, God in community, each “person” in active communion with others. We are given an understanding of God that is most emphatically personal and interpersonal. God is nothing if not personal. If God is revealed as personal, the only way that God can be known is in personal response. We need to know this. It is the easiest thing in the world to use words as a kind of abstract truth or principle, to deal with the gospel as information. Trinity prevents us from doing this.

The premise of The Shack promises what Peterson describes above; unfortunately it does not satisfyingly deliver. And that’s the key question--does The Shack really satisfy? Ask yourself that if you really liked the book. Strip away the way the persons of the Godhead were presented in very likable portrayals. Strip away the meal time conversations, the walking on water across the lake, and ask yourself if you really know God better.

Here’s the problem: ultimately we are not given real answers by God in The Shack. Rather we are given answers as best as William P. Young understands God and can speak for God. See, in any work of fiction, the writer is ultimately God. The writer sets the events in an absolute predetermined way, and all characters--even God himself as a character--will speak and behave only in how the true god of the story (the writer) thinks they should. I’m not trying to be harsh here, but I’m trying to remind readers of this very important fact: The Shack does not contain a message from God; it contains a message about God from the writer--a writer whom to my knowledge hasn’t received any more revelation from the real God than you or me. This writer did the best job he knew how, but ultimately, he doesn’t really give us anything new and certainly nothing revelatory about God and our relationship to him.

And frankly, it saddens me that so many have so uncritically embraced the book. You don’t have to be a theologian to see problems in The Shack. Kathy does not consider herself a theologian at all, but as we were listening to the audio version, she offered a blow by blow commentary of its weaknesses as we listened. The book right now has almost 3000 reviews on Amazon.com. One reviewer, who said he liked the book, but gave it only three out of five stars noted that he was very concerned by the “book being embraced with nothing but naive, uncritical, and untempered enthusiasm.” This concerns me as well.

My friend Todd Benkert has written about the popularity of The Shack, trying to figure out why it’s been so very popular for a self-published book. In his blog post, “One More Post about The Shack with ‘Something Else’ to Consider,” Todd offers this theory:

The Shack offers people what the church, by and large, does not--hope for and acceptance of messed up people.

Mack is a messed up person. He has real hurts. He has experienced real pain. He does not act and think the way a Christian ought to act and think. In fact, he questions and even blames God for what has happened to him. People relate to Mack. They relate to the pain and hurt and struggle and questions Mack has. And they find from Papa, Jesus, and Sarayu the kind of understanding and acceptance that is, for whatever reason, missing in the church.

Todd may very well be on to something. My concern is that while the Church does indeed need to get its act together in regard to people who are hurting, The Shack is not really a solution. It’s a band aid for a much more serious kind of wound. Think about this really-- if you knew someone who had lost a child through murder or some other tragic means, would you really consider giving The Shack to a hurting person to read? I cannot fathom that idea.

And I know that many people who’ve appreciated The Shack feel as if they can relate to God better after reading the book. But if someone wants to know what God is like, rather than handing them a copy of The Shack, (and pardon me if this sounds unnecessarily church) I’d give them a copy of the New Testament. In the Gospels, we learn how God “became human and made his home among us.” In doing so, not only did he provide a way for us to be reconciled to him, he also “put on a face” in the person of Jesus. You want to know what God is like? Read the Gospels. Do you want to know specifically what the Father and Son are like and how they interrelate? Engage in a good study of Jesus’ parables. If you’re curious to know how to relate to the Holy Spirit, read the Book of Acts. God has revealed himself already through his Son and through his written Word. If you still cannot relate, it may be your translation of the Bible. Be sure you are reading something translated in the last decade or so in normal, contemporary English.

I have no trouble recommending the New Testament as a way of relating to God. That’s one of its major functions. But sadly, I cannot recommend The Shack under any circumstances or in any contexts.


For Further Reading:

• “The Shack: Helpful or Heretical? A Critical Review by Norman Geisler and Bill Roach”
    Geisler and Roach outline 14 primary theological blunders made in The Shack. Some of these are more significant than others, but they still make a compelling case.

• “A Look at The Shack” (The Albert Mohler Radio Program)
    You can download this MP3 file and listen to it on your iPod or iPhone while driving to work.

Lest anyone accuse me of not giving equal time, here are two reviews a little more positive worth considering:

• “Reading in Good Faith” by Derek Keefe
    Acknowledging there are problems in the book, Derek Keefe finds some value in The Shack that the church can benefit from.

• “The Shack by King David” by Gordon MacDonald
    MacDonald wonders if anyone took offense when David portrayed God as a smelly, dirty shepherd in Psalm 23.

Four years ago, Zondervan published the first edition of A Reader's Greek New Testament. A second edition is set to be released sometime in November.


SOME BACKGROUND: THE FIRST EDITION

I've always found A Reader's Greek New Testament (RGNT from this point forward) to be an extremely practical resource. The RGNT addresses the issue that while there are over 5,000 distinct words in the Greek NT, the reality is that many of this words only occur a few times or even in single occurances. While it's an admirable goal for a student of Greek to memorize every word, it's not a reality for most. Most introductory grammars, in fact, only cover a little over 300 words, but these words occur so frequently that they account for roughly 80 of the entire New Testament. But that remaining 20% is still enough from keeping the average person who has a familiarity with Greek from sitting down and reading the New Testament in its original language as easily as one might read an English translation. In fact, in my experience and observation, I've known personally of only about two or three people who can really read the Greek NT without stumbling. Oh, sure, the dirty little secret is that any of us can read a passage just fine when we've taken the time to work through it ahead of time. But as soon as someone asks us a question about a different passage--one that we haven't prepared beforehand, we stumble and stammer as we try to read it in a quick and efficient manner.

The RGNT is noted for including lexical forms for all words of the Greek New Testament that occur 30 times or less. If this sounds like a crutch, think again. The reader still has to know his or her Greek grammar fairly well to use this resource. In fact, I tend to carry the first edition of the RGNT with me to church on Sundays. If I need to look up something quickly, and come across a word that's not part of my working vocabulary, I can look at the footnote at the bottom of the page. It's not realistic for me to carry a lexicon with me to church, and I usually don't have my MacBook so that I can access such tools in Accordance. Perhaps one day, I'll make time to memorize all 5000+ words in the Greek NT, but for right now it's not a practical goal and the RGNT is an ideal solution.

The other distinct feature of the RGNT first edition has to do with its textual basis. Most might assume that this is simply an edition of the current UBS/NA eclectic Greek text with a special apparatus. Not so. The Greek text in this edition is actually one that has been retrofitted, so to speak, to match the text that underpins the New International Version. The reality is that every translation committee makes decisions that sometimes causes them to choose a different textual route than the majority opinion of the UBS/NA committees. The RGNT first edition has about 200 instances, all noted in the footnotes, where its text differs from the standard text.


IMPROVEMENTS/CHANGES IN THE SECOND EDITION

New Greek font. I don't know if the font itself is actually a different font, but the main difference from the first edition is that the text in the second edition is not in italics. And I say, "Thank goodness!" My major complaint about the first edition of the RGNT is the italicized text that is extremely difficult to read. I have no idea why some publishers of Greek texts like to do this. The UBS 4th edition Greek NT uses a horribly thin italicized text also making it difficult to read. Thankfully, Zondervan changed this policy in the RGNT 2nd edition.

However, the font itself does look slightly smaller than the original edition. I've made a comparison in the graphic below that displays the first page of Matthew's Gospel on the left in the first edition and with the second edition on the right (note that the image below is not actual size).


The observant reader may notice that there's slightly more text (most of Matt 1:12) on the second edition page. Therefore, the font is either tighter or smaller. Zondervan offers a PDF sample of the RGNT2 featuring the first five pages of Matthew. The second edition ends with Matt 3:17 while the equivalent page in the fist edition ends with 3:15. Two verses--is that a big deal? Probably not, but there is definitely an attempt to use fewer pages. Why? Because while there are more features in the RGNT2, but there are actually fewer pages than the first edition. Therefore, an attempt was made to conserve space. And while I wish Zondervan had not chosen to use a tighter/smaller font, I will say that regardless, the new text is much easier to read than the italicized text of the first edition.

But that brings us to another issue, and frequent readers of This Lamp will have to pardon a familiar complaint that I've discussed many times before. This New Testament, (presumably) like its predecessor is a thinline. How do I know this? Well, in spite of the fact that complete measurements have not been released, we do know a few things. I'm guessing the dimensions are a bit wider because the outer margin on each page is wider (see more below). We also know that although there is about a twenty page difference in the two editions, the weight is comparable (1.065 lbs. for the first edition vs. 1 lb. for the second edition). Thickness measurements for the second edition have not been released, but the first edition is 7/10 of an inch thick. Since the two editions weigh virtually the same, I can only assume that the second edition will be just as thin.

So what's wrong with a thinline Bible? Lots of things. First, thinner paper is used that causes bleedthrough of text from underlying pages. If you look at the scan on the right from the RGNT first edition, which I have enlarged for the point I am making, you can easily see text from the other side of the page. But if you look carefully, you will note that it's not just the text from the back of the page; you can also make out text from the next page. And I'll tell you the truth--the bleedthrough is much worse to the eye than what is picked up by my scanner. Fortunately most of the time our eyes can adjust to bleedthrough after a while, and we simply filter it out. Regardless, it can also be an unnecessary distraction. Second, thinline Bible tend to use fonts that allow for more text on the page in addition to using a smaller point size in general. Many thinline Bibles end up looking very crowded in their layouts, and all of this creates a page that is harder to read. Third, the pages of thinline Bibles are often simply not good surfaces for making personal notes, and certainly not for highlighting as such personal additions will bleed through to the next page.

Personally, I hope that one day, publishers will get over their infatuation with thin Bibles and realize that the target market for a resource like this does not mind having a book that is somewhere between one inch and one and a half inches in thickness. I'm sorry, but cramming 576 pages into 7/10 of an inch is ridiculous.

A wider margin? Now let me make a careful distinction here. The second edition of the RGNT is not a wide margin Bible. However, if the PDFs are representative of the final product, the margin of the second edition is significantly wider than that of the first edition. When looking at the PDFs, I immediately noticed the change in the text's outer margin. Turning on the rulers in Adobe Acrobat, as shown in the image on the left, quickly demonstrated that the margin is slightly greater than 3/4 of an inch, an improvement over the 1/2 margins of the first edition.

Again, this is an area where I with publishers would realize that those who buy products such as the RGNT appreciate not just thicker paper, but also wide margins for making notes, Regardless, whereas, the first edition's anemic margins were useless for any annotations, the new wider margins begin to approach a minimum width for note-taking,

Mlnl-Lexlcon. For those occasions when the reader forgels one of those words that occur more than 30 times, a new mini-lexicon has been added, presumably in the back of the RGNT.

Maps. Four new color maps have been added to the second edition of the RGNT. Already UBS/NA Greek New Testaments tend to have basic contextual maps inside the front and back covers. With the addition of these maps to the RGNT, this resource begins to take the feel of a standard reference tool and even a one-stop instrument for public use.

And the rest. Like the first edition, the new RGNT comes in an Italian Duo-Tone binding, I've stated before that I like this material just as much as actual leather. Assuming that these covers are going to hold up over decades-long use, I find them to be a very adequate substitute for real leather, especially if this keeps the price down. Perhaps Zondervan could put a disclaimer on the copyright page: "No cows were harmed in the publishing of this New Testament."

And of of course, the RGNT second edition will continue to offer lexical forms of words that occur less than 30 times in the Greek NT as well as noting where the text diverges from the UBS/NA texts. I'm pleased that they continue to keep these notes on the same page as the NT text, in footnote fashion, rather than by some other means.

I'll have more to say about the RGNT2 after I get my hands on one in November, Butfrom what l can already determine, it is already looking to be a great improvement over what was already a very practical and useful resource.

Tags: Greek NT, TNIV, NIV, Zondervan

I've mentioned a number of times that I have a particular homemade method of making annotations in my Bible. Over the last couple of years, this has become one of the most requested posts I've been asked to write. I remember one particular commenter stating that he had been looking for a really good academic method for a very long time. Well, my fear is that the final product may disappoint. There's nothing profound here and certainly nothing specifically academic in nature. My "system" (if you want to call it that) is simply something that has worked for me both in my own study and in my teaching.

I actually developed it while I was in college, and although I've tweaked it along the way here and there, it's not overly changed from the way it was years ago. I have to admit that the actual structure is based on the colors available in a pack of Stabilo Boss Dry Highlighters. The pack came in five colors. I never figured out what to do with the orange, so I used it elsewhere. However, here is how I arranged my categories:

YELLOW = General and miscellaneous notes that do not fall into other categories.
RED = Dates, chronology, date of composition
GREEN = symbolism, metaphor, literary features
BLUE = Messianic, Christological

With each of the dry highlighters, I use a corresponding pen for my annotations with the exception of the first category for which I use a black pen. In other words, I highlight in yellow, but the corresponding note is in black, unlike the other colors for which I have matching highlighter and pens.

The main Bible I take notes in is a NASB wide-margin single column reference Bible from Foundation Publications. I would be willing to use a more contemporary version such as the TNIV or NLT, but no adequate wide margin Bible is available in these translations. I make these annotations whenever I study a passage (using commentaries and other reference works) for personal edification or teaching others. I make different kinds of notes in a Greek NT, usually grammatical issues relating to the Greek text or a gloss of a rarely used word that is not in my memorized vocabulary.

Here are some random examples of the kind of annotations I've got marked in my NASB wide-margin Bible:

GENERAL AND MISCELLANEOUS NOTES

• In Gen 45:4, I have the word alive highlighted in yellow. In the margin I have the words "meaning 'enjoying health and well-being.'" I have no idea where I got this information--probably from a commentary. I will list a source for extended notes, but not short comments like these.
• Sometimes I merely write annotations without highlighting anything specific. For instance, In the top margin above 2 Sam 13, I have "reminder" bullets: • Absalom and Tamar were David's children by Maacah, daughter of the king of Gesure; and • Amnon Was David's son by Ahinoam, the Jezruelitess.
• At Neh 4:3, I have highlighted in yellow the words "break their stone wall down." In the margin are the words, "Actually archaeological discoveries have revealed Nehemiah's wall to be four feet thick--NAC." In this case, I did note the source: the New American Commentary. I could have just as easily noted the author instead of the series, but more than likely, the series would make a more familiar reference in this case.
• At Neh 3:13, Zanoah is highlighted in yellow with the accompanying note, "13 mi. sw of Jerusalem."
• Sometimes the notes will reflect alternate translations. In Neh 5:7, I highlighted the words "I consulted with myself" and in the margin have the note "lit. 'my heart took counsel upon me.'"
• Certain books like Job are heavily annotated. In this case, I was doing personal study through Job at one point, and then I've taught the book a few times.
• In many places throughout the Bible, I'll highlight a word in yellow, and in the margin or very close to it, write the actual underlying original language word.

DATES AND CHRONOLOGICAL ISSUES

• In Jer 1:2, I highlighted in red the phrase, "the thirteenth year of his reign." The corresponding note (written in red ink) says 627 BC.
• I highlighted in red the Hebrew month "Nisan" with the corresponding note "spans March-April; 1st month of the Persian year." Similarly at Neh 9:1, I highlighted the phrase "the twenty-fourth day of this month" with the annotation "Oct 30, 445 BC."
• I have a note in red at Acts 6 that these events occur five years after Pentecost.
• At the beginning of books, I often try to list suggested dates of composition. For instance in Matthew, I have a number of suggestions including on the more conservative side: "60's <70" from Carson, Moo, & Morris' NT Intro and "After 70" from Kümmel's more progressive NT Intro. Because these types of annotations come at the beginning of the book, I sometimes write other introductory notes in red as well such as suggested authors, but I don't do this consistently, it seems.
• I occasionally use red for brief outlines and structural notes.

SYMBOLISM/METAPHOR/LITERARY

• I highlighted "with fasting, in sackcloth and with dirt upon them" in green and my corresponding note written in green says "mourning and humility." This kind of note seems unnecessary after a while. I simply "know" that kind of information. Do I really need to make a note of it? And yet, I tend to add that kind of notation anyway for teaching purposes as it reminds me to mention it in an instructural setting.
• In Job 1:2 I have highlighted "Seven sons and three daughters" with the annotation "The symbolism of the numbers imply that Job had an ideal family." This kind of note gets a lot of play in a book like Revelation, where I have quite a bit of green.
• In Psalm 74:19, turtledove is highlighted with the simple annotation "Israel."
• A passage like Eccl 12:3-6 is loaded with symbols. "watchmen of the house" = arms, "mighty men" = legs, "grinding ones" = teeth, etc. I have all of these highlighted in green with accompanying annotations written in green.
• I use green for the many euphemisms in a book like Song of Solomon.

MESSIANIC/CHRISTOLOGICAL

• This turns out to be my least used color, perhaps because it could be overdone, especially in the gospels and become meaningless. Often annotations that could receive blue treatment simply get highlighted in yellow.
• Since the NASB wide margin that I use has a cross reference system, I often will highlight in blue the cross references between the testaments referred to in messianic prophecies. Surprisingly, often I find that the references aren't included both ways and I will have to write one of them in using a blue pen.
• In Rev 5:5, I have Lion highlighted in blue with an annotation written in blue that says "conquering warrior messiah." Then in v. 6, I have the accompanying Lamb highlighted in blue with the note "sacrificial death; links the Messiah to the passover lamb." I also have a note written in blue with v. 6, but not directly related to anything specifically highlighted, that says "Here John joins the OT Davidic Messiah and the Suffering Servant of Isaiah (Isa 52-53)." I really should have listed my source for that because I doubt it was my own original conclusion. It may have come from John Newport's book, The Lion and the Lamb.

Obviously, there are thousands of other examples, but the above are a sampling which I believe gives the flavor for what I am doing.

The actual Stabilo Boss Dry Highlighters are no longer made, but are still available on eBay. I have stocked up on enough to last for a very long time. The dry highlighters I usually see in stores these days are the Staedtler dry highlighters. To me these are a perfectly suitable replacement, except for the yellow pencil which makes me continue to seek out the older highlighters.

For years, I used ballpoint pens for my corresponding notes, with green ballpoints always the most difficult to come by. Noticing that some of my oldest notes were starting to bleed through, and I began to look for something else. A number of readers for this blog suggested the Pigma Micron pens. These are what I use exclusively in my Bibles now, and having experimented with different nib sizes, settled on a 01 point for writing in my Bibles. I like these pens so much, I use the larger nibs for grading papers and writing in my Moleskine journal.

I also discovered that Pigma Micron has a brown pen. I like the color brown for a pen, having used brown ink the last couple of years in the Mont Blanc I carry with me everyday. I incorporated brown into my Bible notetaking recently (the first new color added since the originals) by using it as the color for notable quotations that I sometimes find room for in the top or bottom margins of the page.

When I was teaching out of the NASB in which I take notes, I could truly say this was my primary Bible. At one time, I was studying with this Bible, teaching from it, and occasionally preaching from it. I really feel there's great value in using the same Bible for both preparation and delivery. Because I have chosen to teach from a more contemporary version, I have to leave my NASB at home and rely on typed notes and any annotations I may have had room to write in the limited space of the Bible I've been using. Of course, I always taught from pages of notes as well anyway, but in conjunction with the annotations in my Bible. Obviously, not everything could fit into a Bible's margins. But not having the same Bible for both phases definitely has its drawbacks.

And every Sunday morning as I pack up my bag of books to take to church, I am often tempted to chuck the contemporary versions and go back to my trusty NASB instead. Again, I've been willing for two years to make a complete jump to newer translations. The publishers just don't seem to want to comply.

Tags: Wide-Margin, Bible study

Below is a guest review from This Lamp reader and occasional contributor, Larry.

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Writings of St. Paul, 2nd ed., Edited by Wayne Meeks and John Fitzgerald, (Norton 2007) (Amazon price $14.50).

[Note: because of the recent appearance of this work, I’ve decided to change my order of presentation of academic study Bible reviews. Previous reviews discussed the (Oxford) Jewish Study Bible and the New Oxford Annotated Study Bible, 3rd Augmented Edition. See my introductory remarks in my first review.]

There are many ways to read the Bible. One way is to attempt to understand the “original authorial intent” of the Bible – often called a historical-critical reading. A related, but distinct way is to attempt to chart the way that various readers have understood the Bible. Both of these methods have value, but in the complex portions of Scripture, we may never have a clear consensus of the meaning of Scripture, so the most we can hope for is to understand how different groups have read it. The Writings of St. Paul (2nd edition) (WSP) is an excellent introduction to reading the writings of Paul through the eyes of groups varying from his contemporaries to our contemporaries.

The Pauline Epistles form a genre unto themselves – aside from Jesus (who is the subject of the Christian Scriptures but not the direct author or any book in it), Paul is the leading character in the Greek writings of the Bible. Seven letters are clearly written by him, another six letters are attributed to him, there is an extensive New Testament apocryphal literature attributed to Paul, and a good portion of Acts is devoted to him. Paul may the single greatest contributor to Christian theology and the meaning of his works form the most virulent disputes in Christendom. The secondary literature on Paul – even in English – is so extensive that no single person can hope to read it all. But understanding the different ways in which Paul is interpreted is important, not only for the Christian faithful, but for anyone who wishes to understand this religious genius of Western culture.

Paul is difficult to read – his reasoning often appears inconsistent and his writing was to specific audiences who were familiar with Second Temple period Judaism or contemporary Hellenistic culture – under Roman political rule. Since most of us are not fluent in cultural references from this period, it is easy to misunderstand Paul.

Norton publishes a series of relatively inexpensive paperbacks featuring annotated texts and assorted essays with critical readings, called the Norton Critical Editions series. These are the “Criterion Editions” of the literary world – stuffed with notes and extra material. The selection of titles does not attempt to be a comprehensive survey of literature, but rather includes a variety of texts that are of interest in the undergraduate classroom. (Among the texts of interest to those in religious studies are St. Thomas Aquinas on Politics and Ethics, Newman’s Apologia Pro Vita Sua, The Epic of Giglamesh, and Dante’s Inferno.)

The Writings of St. Paul, 2nd edition (WSP) is a revision of a 1972 classic by Wayne Meeks (which is still available from Amazon). This second edition is co-edited by Wayne Meeks (emeritus at Yale, former President of the SBL) and John Fitzgerald (University of Miami). The new edition is much larger than the older – it contains xxxv+710 pages (as opposed to xvii+454 pages in the older edition) and each page has more information – because it uses larger paper and a smaller font, each of the new pages is equal to about one and a half pages in the older edition. The second page is printed on thinner paper (which is perfectly suitable for taking notes – remember this is intended as a textbook), so this new edition is actually thinner than the old edition, and the new edition also has larger margins (a half-inch top and inside margins, three-quarters-inch bottom and outside margins).

The philosophy behind this work is to present the broadest possible set of views. Thus we hear from Paul’s opponents (e.g., the Jewish Christians often criticized by Paul, the Pagans) and those with radically different views of Paul (e.g., the Jews, the Gnostics). Thus this book has full representation of the opinions of heretics – and even for the faithful, this is useful; since it allows us to understand the nature of some of the disputes over Paul, both classical and modern.

The switch to the TNIV
The biggest surprise in this new edition is the textual basis – the first edition used the 1946 RSV translation (note that the first edition predated the appearance of the NIV and NRSV, although it postdated the appearance of the NEB and the NASB.) In the first edition, the editor writes (p. xi)

"The text is from the Revised Standard Version. It was chosen from the several excellent contemporary English versions now available because its relatively conservative mode of translation enables the reader to recognize certain distinctive features of Paul’s style."

The second edition uses the TNIV instead, a surprising choice since the TNIV is most closely associated with Evangelical circles. The editors write (p. xi)

“The text of the Pauline letters is from Today’s New International Version (TNIV). It was chosen from the several excellent modern versions now available ecause its relatively conservative mode of translation enables the reader to recognize certain distinctive features of Paul’s style, while still taking account of current discussions in biblical scholarship and aiming for both inclusiveness and accuracy in the representation of gender.”

Clearly issues of gender played a large role in the editors’ decision to use the TNIV. This inclusive approach forms a core desideratum of the authors, who are at pains to point out (p. 589) “whereas the first edition had no excerpts from female scholars, the second edition features contributions by seven women.” The second edition also features many more contributions by Jewish scholars and contemporary Roman Catholic scholars.

Overall, the TNIV works better than I expected as a textual basis. The Epistles are difficult reading, and the TNIV certainly reads more smoothly than the RSV and NRSV. Furthermore, Paul requires careful attention, but his writing is rarely characterized as elegant. Paul writes in a rough, sometimes crude, Koine style, and thus is robust enough to retain its character in a translation that sometimes uses paraphrase (in contrast to more formal passages in Scripture, such as the Psalms.)

The editors do not always agree with the text of the TNIV. In some cases, they use their footnotes to assert an alternative translation. (For example, they prefer the RSV’s rendering of Romans 9:5. This verse can be punctuated in several ways; the TNIV, RSV, and NRSV all punctuate this verse differently although each translation gives the other two alternatives in footnotes.)

One might wonder why the editors did not choose the NRSV. Although there is no explicit explanation, hints are given that the editors are often critical of the NRSV’s rendering. For example, the NRSV renders Acts 22:3 as

I am a Jew, born in Tarsus in Cicilia, but brought up in this city [Jerusalem] at the feet of Gamaliel, educated strictly according to our ancestral law.

while the NIV has

I am a Jew, born in Tarsus of Cilicia, but brought up in this city. Under Gamaliel I was thoroughly trained in the law of our fathers.

The implications here are quite different – the NRSV seems to suggest that Paul only was “brought up” in Jerusalem when he entered Gamaliel’s yeshiva, while the NIV implies a much closer connection with the center of mainstream Jewish thought. The editors discuss the pros and cons of either translation, slightly favoring the NIV’s rendition (which remains largely similar in the TNIV.) (Interestingly, neither the NRSV nor the TNIV include a textual note discussing the alternative reading.) The editors include a variety of apocryphal legends, including one from Paul’s Jewish-Christian critics (paraphrased by Epiphanius, Bishop of Salmis,) that Paul was a convert who was spurned in marriage and thus became radically anti-Jewish – although the editors unambiguously reject this legend asserting that Paul was a “a Hebrew [born] of Hebrews.”

For me, an interesting effect of this edition was that more academic “framing” of the TNIV caused me to see the TNIV in a more neutral light. With more academic footnotes (that in some cases make textual emendations to the TNIV’s translation) the TNIV seemed less like a doctrinaire Evangelical translation and more like a neutral translation. Of course, this is a double-edged sword, and those who want a strictly Evangelical presentation of Paul may not care for the WSP. But for those who wish to understand in a more academic framework the ways in which Paul has been read – both by supporters and by critics –this more neutral framing is essential.

Parts 1&2: Paul’s Letters and Pauline School Letters
The work begins with an introduction that surveys sources and Paul’s biography, and then follows with Part 1, Paul’s letters sorted by likely date of composition: 1 Thessalonians, Galatians, 1 & 2 Corinthians, Romans, Philippians, and Philemon. These works are accompanied by lengthy introductions and generous annotations that often discuss Hellenistic or Jewish references or matters of language style. However, given the unusual ordering of the books and formatting that makes chapter and verse symbols similar, it can be hard to quickly look up a specific passage. Then follows Part 2, six letters traditionally attributed to Paul, with introductions explaining why Pauline authorship is controversial, again organized in terms of date of likely composition: 2 Thessalonians, Colossians, Ephesians, 1&2 Timothy, and Titus.

Part 3 Pseudo-Pauline Works
These pseudepigrapha are identified as clear forgeries. The Correspondence of Paul and the Corinthians appears in the Acts of Paul and is an “orthodox forgery” to combat heresy. The Laodicean Epistle is a cento of Pauline epigrams primarily drawn from Philippians. The Correspondence of Paul and Seneca builds on the similarity between to two great classical figures and lead to Jerome’s inclusion of “our Seneca” in his On Illustrious Men. (Seneca chides Paul for his rhetorical style, while Paul exhorts Seneca to be a “herald of Jesus Christ” to the imperial household.) Two apocalypses follow, based on the famous passage 2 Corinthians 1-4 when Paul ascends to the third heaven. The Apocalypse of Paul (excerpted) is, according to Syriac legend, the written record of this revelation (this was one of the inspirations for Dante’s Inferno.) The Gnostic Apocalypse of Paul is a Nag Hammadi codex which recounts Paul’s travels to the fourth through tenth century. Note that the Prayer of the Apostle Paul from the Nag Hammadi library is not included (since it is not attributed to Paul but a petition that invokes him as an authority.)

Part 4 Views of Paul in the Ancient Church
This section begins with excerpts from the sections of Acts dealing with Paul (in the TNIV translation) and analyses of the Lukan account by Irenaeus (2nd century Bishop of Lyons) and by separate pair of differing scholars: Daniel Schwartz (Hebrew University) and Jacob Jervell (University of Oslo). The analysis of Acts concludes with a very interesting (and engagingly written) discussion of the Bar Jesus episode (Acts 13) by Susan Garrett (Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary).

Next the text presents apocryphal accounts: Jerome’s discussion of Paul, Tertullian’s claim that Jacob foresaw Paul’s life, an account of the risen Christ predicting Paul from the apocryphal Epistle of the Apostles, a physical description of Paul from the apocryphal Acts of Paul and Thecla, a description from Clement of Alexandra which interprets Phil. 4:3 as a reference to Paul’s spouse and gives an account of it, a description of Paul’s daily schedule from Ambrosiaster, a story of the of baptized lion (I remember hearing this as a child) from the apocryphal Acts of Paul, another extract of Clement of Alexandria where he quotes an apocryphal account of Paul consulting pagan oracles, a lengthy extract of a panegyric from Chrysostom on Paul as the Paragon of Virtue, and an extract from the apocryphal Acts of Peter of Paul’s missionary journey to Spain.

Apocryphal accounts of a martyr’s death for Paul appear from an extract of Clement of Rome’s work in the Apostolic Fathers and from the apocryphal Acts of Paul.

Jewish-Christian opponents to Paul are represented in extracts of paraphrases of their comments from Abrosiaster and Epiphanius. Direct attacks appear from a long extract from the Preachings of Peter [depicting Paul as the “messenger of Satan”] and the pseudo-Clementine Recognitions of Clementine. J. Louis Martyn (Union Theological Seminary) analyzes Paul’s Galatian opponent, Martin Hengel (Tubingen) analyzes the Lettter of James as an anti-Pauline polemic, and David Flusser (Hebrew University) discussing Jewish-Christianity enmity in the Didache.

Pagan opponents to Paul are represented by extracts from Emperor Julian’s Against the Galileans, and an anonymous Hellene’s attack on Paul quoted by Macarius Magnes in Monogenes. But then follows a fascinating discussion of how the Gnostic Valentinus and his school interpreted Paul favorably – with an extract of Theodotus arguing that Paul was the Gnostic Paraclete, an extract from Elaine Pagel’s (Princeton University) Gnostic Paul, and a discussion from Irenaeus.

Marcion’s dualistic interpretation of Paul is represented by extracts from Irenaeus’s Treatise of Irenaeus of Lugdunum against the Heresies and Tertullian’s Against Marcion, followed by Marcion’s epigrammatic Antitheses as reconstructed by Adolf von Harnack and von Harnack’s analysis itself.

There then follows a discussion of Paul’s celibacy and asceticism with extracts from the apocryphal Acts of Paul and Thecla and a detailed technical analysis by Dennis MacDonald (Claremont Graduate University) of the Pastoral Epistles with a discussion of the role of women and asceticism.

There is a brief extract from the apocryphal Acts of Phileas in which Phileas’s execution is described and in which he defends Paul.

We then have extracts from the Orthodox fathers interpreting Paul from Origen, Irenaeus, Victorinus, Theodore of Mopsuestia, Theodoret of Cyrus, and Ambosiaster. Bernadette Brooten (Brandeis) analyzes the Patristic interpretations of Romans 1:26.

Part 4 concludes with an extract from David Rensberger’s Yale Ph.D. dissertation analyzing the use of Paul’s letters in Second Century Christianity.

Part 5: Law versus Grace and the Problem of Ethics
The role of grace versus law is explored in extracts by Origen, Abrosiaster, Pelagius, Augustine, Theodoret of Cyrus, Martin Luther (from his lectures on Galatians), and Karl Barth (from his own summary of his book Christ and Adam). While the outlines of this debate is likely to be familiar to most readers of Rick’s blog, it is still a pleasure to read the careful exegesis directly from the “horses’ mouths” of these profound interpreters.

Part 6: “The Second Founder of Christianity”
This section revolves around the 19th century German debate on Paul. The question was: did Paul cause Greek philosophical theology to replace that of Jesus? The original provocateur was F. C. Baur – the founder of the Tubingen school – and an extract from his Church History of the First Three Centuries is given. Baur argued that Paul had changed Jesus’s message from a Jewish one to a Greek one. Nietzsche, in an extracts from his Dawn of the Day and from his Antichrist, argues to the contrary Paul was a Judaizer – locking the universal message of Jesus into the straightjacket of “rabbinic” myth. George Bernard Shaw, in an extract from his Preface on the Prospects of Christianity (from his Androcles and the Lion) argues similarly, only with humor and without the dark metaphysics and racial trappings of anti-Paulism. Adolf von Harnack, in an extract from What is Christianity? partly agrees Baur that Paul removed the Jewish “husk” from Jesus’s message, but presents the transition as direct and linear rather than dialectical. Wilhelm Heitmuller in an extract (translated) from Zum Problem Paulus und Jesus argues convincingly that the Hellinization of Christianity had already taken place before Paul and that Paul was converted to a Hellenistic form of Christianity (with sacraments, cultus, and atonement doctrine). This work was quite influential, and particularly influenced Rudolf Bultmann.

Part 7: Pauline Christianity and Judaism
Paul’s writings established a tension between Christianity and Judaism that was perhaps only dissolved in light of a full understanding of the horrors of the Holocaust. These four articles by Jewish scholars present a range of responses to Paul, in works by David Daube (UC Berkeley), Burton Visotzky (Jewish Theological Seminary), Daniel Boyarin (UC Berkeley), Alan Segal (Columbia), and Paula Fredriksen (Boston University). I found these essays very interesting – they explore the Jewish foundations of Pauline’s writing; especially interesting to me was Segal contrast of Paul’s mysticism with Jewish mysticism of the period. Segal argues convincingly for him as a type of Jewish mystic.

Part 8: Reading Romans
It is not hard to see why the Letters to the Romans is influential – it is the closest in form to a theological treatise. This part considers two passage from Romans, one passage being 7:1-25 where the pain of self-contradiction and the human plight form an essential part of the road to conversion. The second passage is Romans 13:1-7 which has influenced Christian forms of government.

A school of thought popularized by E. P. Sanders, James Dunn, and N. T. Wright called “the new perspective on Paul” has attracted wide attention in the Evangelical community as a contrast to Calvinistic thought; the theory proposes that when Paul speaks of justification he is not criticizing Judaism’s legalism as much as arguing for the status of gentiles in the Church. While this line of thinking has certainly penetrated public consciousness, I am not fully convinced that it is a first-line issue for New Testament scholars. (My own opinion is that the advocates of the “new perspective” are rather sloppy in their handling of rabbinic sources and don’t have a clear understanding of Second Temple Judaism.) First, it seems to me that many of the ideas underlying the “new perspective” were already present in criticism; I question the novelty of their work.

Sanders, Dunn, and Wright are not present in this anthology; books by Sanders and Dunn are listed in the bibliography (Wright does not even merit mention in any of the essays.) But to some degree, ideas from the “new perspective” are present in this part and in the next part. (For someone interested in a detailed anthology of views on Romans, including the “new perspective,” I can recommend another anthology, The Romans Debate Revised Edition edited by Karl Donfried.)

The section dealing with Romans 7 has extracts from Theodoret of Cyrus, Krister Stendahl (Bishop of Stockholm and Harvard), Paul Meyer (Princeton), and Stanley Stower (Brown). The section dealing with Romans 13 has extracts from Origen, Schelkle (Tubingen), Wilfrid Parsons (Georgetown and Catholic University), Martin Luther; Jonathan Mayhe,; and Ernst Kasemann (who was arrested by Gestapo – and then held by the Soviet troops, later of Tubingen).

Part 9: Sampler of Modern Approaches to Paul and His Letters
This section is among the most interesting, giving a wide sample of highly diverse modern approaches to Paul, including a discussion by Rudolf Bultmann of his mythologizing and demythologizing theories (extracted from Kerygma and Myth); Nils Dahl contrasting Paul’s treatment of Jesus with the story of the Akedah, the binding of Isaac; Gerd Theissen’s (Heidelberg) The Strong and the Weak in Corinth, a pioneering sociological analysis; two feminist pieces: an extract from Elisabeth Fiorenza’s (Harvard) classic In Memory of Her and an extract from Jouette Bassler’s (SMU) The Widow’s Tale; a trio of articles continuing the mythologizing approach from Bultmann by Abraham Malherbe (Yale), Hans-Josef Klauck (Chicago), and Margaret Mitchell (Chicago), the archaeological approach of Peter Lampe (Heidelberg); and an essay by Dale Martin (Yale) arguing that Paul rejected marriage as the appropriate context for the expression of sexual desire – that in contrast Paul’s real goal was the extirpation of desire. The book concludes with a shortened version of Wayne Meeks’s The Christian Proteus.

Missing from the second edition
The contents of the first and second editions are available online, so one can quickly see which essays are new and which are old. It is worth noting that the besides the TNIV translation, most of the apocryphal works are taken from J. K. Elliott’s new (1993) translation The Apocryphal New Testament.

A number of works that appeared in the first edition are omitted in the second, these include pieces Karl Barth, Leo Baeck, Martin Buber, Adolf Deissmann, Soren Kierkegaard, Hans Schoeps, Albert Schweitzer, Hans von Sorden, Philipp Vielhauer, and Maurice Wiles. While it is understandable that some essays had to be removed to make room for new material, it is less forgivable that there are still references to the pieces in the first edition in the introductory section essays – much like an amputee feeling phantom pain from his missing limb.

Conclusions
Despite these minor quibbles, this work still remains an excellent academic introduction to Paul and the way various groups have read Paul. It surprised me with its choice of the TNIV as a textual base, but it implicitly suggests that the simpler renderings of the TNIV are more appropriate for the college classroom. The book is hardly a comprehensive survey (such a survey is probably impossible within the confines of a single volume) but it has the merit of allowing students to directly read extracts from classic works (rather than a pre-digested summary of them in a typical textbook presentation) and of showing how diverse reaction has been to Paul. There is enough in this book to anger any reader passionate about religion – regardless of her beliefs – but for the reader interested in the history of our understanding of Paul, the work is compelling – a page turner.

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Feel free to react to Larry's review and interact with him in the comments section for this post.

Tags: TNIV, Pauline studies

This summer I will teach "Philosophy and Christian Thought" for the third time at the Louisville branch of IWU. Although philosophy has not been a primary focus of mine, I've always believed that it has rounded out my educational pursuits, and I've enjoyed teaching this class on the last two occasions. Last week, I received in the mail the new 5th edition of the textbook used in the class: Norman Melchert's The Great Conversation: A Historical Introduction to Philosophy (Oxford University Press, ISBN 0195306821).

[Aside: You know it must be a great thing to write a standard textbook since one can release a new edition every few years and circumvent all the sales from the campus used book stores ]

From the OUP Description:

Now in its fifth edition, this historically organized introductory text treats philosophy as a dramatic and continuous story--a conversation about humankind's deepest and most persistent concerns. Tracing the exchange of ideas between history's key philosophers, The Great Conversation: A Historical Introduction to Philosophy , Fifth Edition, demonstrates that while constructing an argument or making a claim, one philosopher almost always has others in mind. The book addresses the fundamental questions of human life: Who are we? What can we know? How should we live? and What sort of reality do we inhabit?

The fifth edition retains the distinctive feature of previous editions: author Norman Melchert provides a generous selection of excerpts from major philosophical works and makes them more easily understandable to students with his lucid and engaging explanations. Ranging from the Pre-Socratics to Derrida and Quine, the selections are organized historically and include four complete works: Plato's Euthyphro, Apology, and Crito, and Descartes' Meditations on First Philosophy. The author's commentary offers a rich intellectual and cultural context for the philosophical ideas conveyed in the excerpts. Extensive cross-referencing shows students how philosophers respond appreciatively or critically to the thoughts of other philosophers. The text is enhanced by two types of exercises--"Basic Questions" and "For Further Thought"--and more than sixty illustrations.

What's new to the 5th edition?

• A new chapter (25) on Simone de Beauvoir and her contributions to philosophy
• New material on Buddhist, Muslim, and Jewish thinkers, including profiles of the Buddha, Avicenna (Ibn Sina), Averroës (Ibn Rushd), and Maimonides (Moses ben Maimon)
• A new profile of Jean-Jacques Rousseau
• Improved translations of several of Plato's works, including Protagoras, Gorgias, Phaedo, Symposium, Meno, and the Republic
• Review questions that are now dispersed throughout the chapters (instead of at chapter ends) to follow relevant passages and facilitate classroom discussion
• Thirteen new images, including seven explanatory cartoons that help students understand key concepts
• A revised Instructor's Manual and Test Bank containing essential points, teaching suggestions, and multiple-choice, short-answer, and essay exam questions

I really like Melchert's book not just for the content he covers, but also for his writing style. He is an engaging writer whose dry and subtle humor moves the reader along through the text. He uses "conversation" as a metaphor not only for the philosophers who build upon each other's thought but also for the learning experience that he wants to have with his readers. The questions aren't merely objective in nature, but many require synthesis and creative thinking on the part of the student. That's why one of the new features of the 5th edition is a great idea--that of moving the discussion questions to the text of each chapter interspersed throughout rather than merely placing them at the end.

I also appreciate Melchert's respectful treatment of religious subjects. His chapter on Christianity and the meaning of Jesus is quite good, although short. He also gives serious treatment to other Christian thinkers such as Augustine, Aquinas, the Reformers and more in the context of the times in which they lived.

Finally, I've found value in this book that it is not only an introduction to philosophy but serves as a philosophy reader as well. Melchert includes extremely generous excerpts (sometimes numerous excerpts) from philosophers including some complete works as referred to in the OUP description above.

Although written for college level philosophy intro classes, I've recommended this book to others as well who are interested in dipping their toes in philosophy and want something more than Philosophy for Dummies. The book's a bit pricey new, so if you're interested, watch the used market closely. If you want a 5th edition, make sure that is what you are getting before you place your order with 3rd party sellers. Speaking of which, I wonder what I can get for my 4th edition now that it's out of date?

Tags: philosophy, melchert

Speaking of plagiarism (see last post), I was at Kathy's elementary library yesterday helping her with some computer issues when she showed me a children's book about plagiarism. It's call When Marion Copied: Learning about Plagiarism by Brook Berg. The story revolves around some animal children who learn the lessons of plagiarism (it's cheating AND a crime!). Two different kinds of plagiarism are discussed in the book. One of the children borrows half of a poem from an old book of poetry, and provides the second half herself, but presents the whole poem as her own. After she wins a contest and then gets caught, the other kids are quick to judge her. However, some of the other kids soon discover that they are just as guilty of plagiarism because they have copied information from the Internet into their reports on the American Revolution. In fact, three different reports all have the same information, but only one student offers a citation.

With younger students, plagiarism often occurs out of ignorance. How many of us turned in reports copied out of the World Book Encyclopedia word for word when we were younger simply because no one told us that doing such was wrong? And I admit right here that the first term paper I ever turned in was plagiarized; but at the time (9th grade), I had no idea that what I was doing was wrong. I came into my school mid-year and one of my courses was at an advanced level that required a term paper for higher credit. The other students had written their papers at the beginning of the year with complete instructions on how to do so. When I asked my teacher how to write a term paper, she said that basically I had to use a minimum of six other sources in my paper. So I simply divided the minimum page requirement for the paper into six parts, wrote down information from each book in my notebook, and then had my mother type it up for me (she was a much faster typist at the time). I even listed the six sources on a bibliography page in the back of the book, and did not realize until two years later when we wrote term papers in my junior year English class that what I had done as a freshman was wrong.

I found it interesting in Berg's book that the source of plagiarism for her fictional characters was not the encyclopedia as it was in my day, but the internet. This certainly brings this issue up to date because the main source today for plagiarized texts among students of any age is the internet. When Marion Copied is aimed at elementary age children, but it's almost just as tempting to read it in a college classroom as well.

This is a book you certainly should pick up for your children if they are in elementary grades, and you might even want to consider donating a copy to their classroom or school's library as well.

Tags: plagiarism

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Chillingly accurate?

HT: Paul Roberts

If by some miraculous reason Lewis were still alive today, he'd have been 108.

When I was in college I made it my goal to read everything C. S. Lewis had ever written. I never actually finished that goal, but I read a whole lot of Lewis, especially in those days. In fact, I read so much Lewis in my college days, and his thoughts were so intermingled with mine, that I started getting marked off on my term papers for using British spellings instead of American ones (colour vs. color, honour vs. honor etc.). Yes, I confess that I used a typewriter in college for the first three years for all my writing; I didn't start using a computer until my final year.

I have a great little daily devotional drawn from Lewis' writings entitled The Business of Heaven. The title comes from a statement that Lewis once made, "Joy is the serious business of heaven."

Today's entry comes from one of his best known works, Mere Christianity and is worth repeating here.

I think all Christians would agree with me if I said that though Christianity seems at first to be all about morality, all about duties and rules and guilt and virtue, yet it leads you on, out of all that, into something beyond. One has a glimpse of a country where they do not where they do not talk of those things, except as a joke. Everyone there is filled full with what we should call goodness as a mirror is filled with light. But they do not call it goodness. They do not call it anything. They are not thinking of it. They are too busy looking at the source from which it comes. But this is near the stage where the road passes over the rim of our world. No one's eyes can see very far beyond that: lots of people's eyes can see further than mine.

Tags: C. S. Lewis

Passing by Matt Perry's blog, I was reminded that 43 years ago today (November 22, 1963) C. S. Lewis, John Kennedy, and Aldous Huxley died (and you thought that thing about deaths coming in threes was a myth!).

A few years back, Peter Kreeft wrote a very charming book in the form of a Socratic dialogue about the conversation Lewis, Kennedy and Huxley had on "the other side" while waiting for their fate. The book appropriately enough is entitled Between Heaven and Hell. Here's how it begins.

Kennedy: Where the hell are we?

Lewis: You must be a Catholic!

Kennedy: You could tell by the accent, eh?

Lewis: Yes. I say--aren't you President Kennedy? How did you get here--wherever here is?

Kennedy: Ex-President, I think: I seem to have been assassinated. Who are you? And--to return to my first question--where the hell are we?

Lewis: I'm C. S. Lewis. I just died too, and I'm pretty sure you're wrong about the location. This place just feels too good to be hell. On the other hand, I didn't see any God, did you?

Kennedy: No.

Lewis: Then it can't be heaven either. I wonder whether we're stuck in limbo.

Kennedy: Ugh! Do you really think so?

Lewis: Actually, I think it is more likely that it's purgatory, especially if we end up getting out of it and into heaven. I did a bit of speculating about such places as a writer, especially in The Great Divorce. I don't suppose you've read it. No...well...But surely you should be familiar with such concepts if you were a Roman Catholic.

Kennedy: Well...I was more of a modern Catholic; I never bothered about transcendental mysteries or mythology. I was too busy trying to take care of the world I lived in for escapist thinking. "One world at a time" as Thoreau put it.

Lewis: You can see now that you were wrong, can't you?

Kennedy: What do you mean?

Lewis: Why, first that it isn't mythology. It's real. Wherever we are, here we are, large as life. And second, that the rule isn't "one world at a time." Here we are in another world talking about our past life on earth. That's two worlds at a time by my count. And while we were on earth, we could think about this world too; that's also two worlds at a time, isn't it? Finally, it's not escapism. In fact, not to have prepared for this journey while we were living on earth would have been escapism. Don't you agree?

Kennedy: Hmm...I suppose you're right. But look! Someone is coming. Can you make out who it is?

Lewis: Why, it's Huxley! Aldous Huxley. Aldous, welcome. How did you get here?

Huxley: Same way you did, I'm sure. I just died. Oh. I say! Kennedy and Lewis! What good company to die in--or live in, whatever you're doing. Where is this place anyway?

Kennedy: That's what we're trying to figure out. Lewis thinks it may be some sort of limbo or purgatory. I'm just hoping it's not hell.

Huxley: Well, you're both wrong. It's heaven. It must be heaven.

Kennedy: Why?

Huxley: Oh this is going to be fun! Lewis you've lost none of your cantankerous penchant for Socratic questioning, have you? I remember you made Oxford a regular hornets' nest when you debated back on earth, and now you've shipped your hornets to heaven. This is a nice challenge.

Lewis: Then reply to it. If everywhere is heaven, then either hell does not exist, or hell is a part of heaven. Which way will you have it Aldous?

Kennedy: Wait, please! Before you two take off, could you please give me some assurances about this sort of debate? I was a debater too, but we politicians confined ourselves to the concrete and the tangible. I'm not all that convinced that you can do anything more than talk through your hat about things you've never seen.

Lewis: So you want an assurance that there is some method of really finding the truth about things we can't see.

Kennedy: Yes. Before you take off, be sure you have a plane that can fly, and can get back to earth and land. Lewis, you said you wrote a book about heaven and hell. How the hell--how in heaven's name--how on earth--do you know anything about heaven and hell? Have you ever been there?

Lewis: Yes, indeed. I've been in and out of the back doors many times.

Huxley: You see, Mr. President...

Kennedy: Please call me Jack.

Lewis: That will be rather confusing. My friends call me Jack.

And so it goes for another hundred or so pages. Kreeft's Between Heaven and Hell is a delightful read, but carries many serious themes about the Christian faith as well.

Peter Kreeft. Between Heaven & Hell: A Dialogue Somewhere Beyond Death with John F. Kennedy, C. S. Lewis & Aldous Huxley. Downers Grove, Illinois: InterVarsity Press, 1982.

Tags: C. S. Lewis

I just received my newest issue of Philosophia Christi (vol. 8, no. 1) in the mail today. I haven't had a chance to jump in yet, but the exchange between Alvin Plantinga and Timothy and Lydia McGrew looks especially interesting.

Here are the contents:

ARTICLES:
"Historical Arguments and Dwindling Probabilities: A Response to Timothy McGrew" -- Alvin Plantinga

"On the Historical Argument: A Rejoinder to Plantinga" -- Timothy McGrew and Lydia McGrew

"The Counterattack of the Resurrection Skeptics" -- Stephen T. Davis

"Epistemic Relativism and the Possibility of Religious Epistemology" -- Timothy Mosteller

"Cartesian Anxiety, Perspectivalism, and Truth: A Response to J. P. Moreland" -- Myron B. Penner

PHILOSOPHICAL NOTES:
"Trinity Monotheism Once More: A Response to Daniel Howard-Snyder" -- William Lane Craig

"Natural Uniformity and Historiography" -- John Beaudoin

"What Is Naturalism?" -- Philip E. Devine

"Does Plantinga Have His Own Defeater?" -- Bruce R. Reichenbach and Adam W. Nugent

"Omniscience As a Dispositional State" -- Andrew Cullison

"Ducking Friendly Fire: Davison on the Grounding Objection" -- William Lane Craig

BOOK REVIEWS:
Christopher Peacocke, The Realm of Reason -- Reviewed by Joshua C. Thurow

David Cheetham, John Hick: A Critical Introduction and Reflection -- Reviewed by Paul Rhodes Eddy

David Bassinger, Religious Diversity: A Philosophical Assessment -- Reviewed by Paul Rhodes Eddy

Michael Martin and Ricki Nonnier, eds., The Impossibility of God -- Reviewed by Charles Taliaferro

Erik J. Wielenberg, Value and Virtue in a Godless Universe -- Reviewed by Michael W. Austin

John E. Hare, God's Call: Moral Realism, God's Commands, and Human Anatomy -- Reviewed by David A. Horner

Harry Frankfurt, The Reasons of Love -- Reviewed by John Milliken

Mikael Stenmark, How to Relate Science and Religion: A Multidimensional Model -- Reviewed by James C. McGlothlin

Mary Midgley, Science and Poetry -- Reviewed by Christopher Blakey

Jorge J. E. Gracia and Timothy B. Noone, eds., A Companion to Philosophy in the Middle Ages -- Reviewed by Christina Van Dyke

Tags: philosophy

Lifeway Christian Resources, the publishing arm of the Southern Baptist Convention, produces a wonderful quarterly magazine with articles on archaeology and historical backgrounds designed to supplement a Sunday School teacher's preparation. Every issue of Biblical Illustrator has around 20 or so articles tied to subjects in the Bible study curriculum in addition to at least one general article and one book review. The articles are intelligent without being too technical for the average teacher. And although they are not necessarily written with the student in mind, the magazine would be appropriate for the person in your Sunday School class who has a strong interest in history. The articles are usually written by experts in the field and are illustrated with pictures of archaeological finds, pictures from biblically-related sites, and ancient artwork

In the title I call Biblical Illustrator a hidden gem because I don't know how many Baptist Sunday School teachers are familiar with it. In fact, I think I'm the only person at my church who uses it. In the church I grew up in, Biblical Illustrator was standard fare among our teachers, but I haven't seen it used as widely in the churches of which I've been a part since coming to Kentucky.

Below is a listing of the contents from the current Fall issue of Biblical Illustrator. One thing you'll notice is that a number of different portions of the Bible are covered. Lifeway produces a variety of curriculums, and Biblical Illustrator provides background articles for three of them. If you've visited this blog in the last week or so, you'll know that the class I teach just started a study on the book of Hebrews. You'll note below that there are quite a few articles to aid my preparation, but I certainly don't mind having the other articles as well. I usually find myself reading the whole issue in addition to the articles from back issues available on the optional CDROM that I'll describe further down below.

Article Title	Author	Related Text
Daily Life in Biblical Times by Oded Borowski	McLemore, James D.	Book Review
The Veil	Bergen, Martha S.	Hebrews 6; 9-10
From Slaves to Soldiers	Harris, John L.	Joshua
What's for Supper? The First-Century Diet	Gritz, Sharon	Hebrews 5:11-6:12
"Better" in Hebrews	Booth, Steve	Hebrews
First-Century Gymnasiums and Exercise	Simmons, Billy E.	Timothy 4:6-16
Agricultural Metaphors in the New Testament	McCoy, Glenn	Hebrews 5:11-6:12
Why Are 1 and 2 Timothy So Different?	Weathers, Robert A.	1 and 2 Timothy
Who Were the "Officers"?	Jenkins, David L.	Joshua 1:1-15; 24:1-31
The Aim and Message of Hebrews	Smith, Argile A.	Hebrews
The Jordan River	Register, Dean	Hebrews 5:11-6:12
Life for the Babylonian Exiles	Hall, Kevin	Isaiah 40-55
Moses in the Book of Hebrews	Jackson, Paul N.	Hebrews
Genealogies, Myths, and Old Wives' Tales	Chambers, Andy	1 Timothy 1; 4; 2 Timothy 4
Seated at the Right Hand	Stewart, Don H.	Hebrews 8:1-9:28
Ai	Caldwell, Daniel P.	Joshua 7:1-25
In the Days of Ahaz	Newell, James	Isaiah 7:1-9:7
Seizing Property	Young, R. Garland	Hebrews 10:19-39
Ephesus Through Timothy's Eyes	Gregg, D. Larry, Sr.	1 and 2 Timothy
Ancient Weights and Anchors	Roark, C. Mack	Hebrews 6:13-7:28; 12:1-29
ArtiFACTS: Biblical Archaeology: Why Does It Really Matter Anyway?	Drinkard, Joel F., Jr.	General Article

But wait...there's even more. Not too long ago, someone at Lifeway had the great idea to make each issue available on CDROM. Now, if you get Biblical Illustrator Plus, you not only get every article in the print magazine in PDF form but also between sixty and seventy articles from back issues! Each time I get a new copy of Biblical Illustrator Plus, it's like a mini-Christmas for me. Although the CDROM comes with an interface that will run on either a Macintosh or Windows system, that's generally not the way I use it. I move all the articles to my hard drive sorted into folders named after books of the Bible. In merely a year's time, that gives me access to hundreds of articles that I can use not only in Sunday School but other teaching venues as well.

If you teach Sunday School in a Baptist church, this is a must-have resource. However, even if you aren't Baptist, you might find great value in Biblical Illustrator. Subscriptions per year cost $20.55 for the print copy and $34.55 for the CDROM. If you teach in your church, you may be able to ask your minister of education to order this resource for you.

For further information:
• Biblical Illustrator (Print)
• Biblical Illustrator Plus (CDROM)
• Complete Article Index (1974-2006)

Tags: Biblical Illustrator

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