5 Steps to Understanding Any Biblical Text: The Interpretive Journey from “Grasping God’s Word”
How can we know what the Bible means?
This extract from Grasping God’s Word may serve as a quick guide to “the interpretive journey.” This is a journey we must take — across the barriers of time, culture, language, and other differences — if we are to rightly understand the Bible. Read on as authors J. Scott Duvall and J. Daniel Hays sketch the interpretive journey before us.
For a limited time, Grasping God’s Word is 33% off at Logos Bible Software when you use source code GRASPING. Act fast because the deal ends on June 17, 2015.
Many of us want to be able to dig deeper into [God’s] Word. We want to see more and to understand more of the biblical text. We also want to know that we understand…
The Rise and Demise of the Deuteronomistic History — An Excerpt from Trent Butler’s “Joshua” Commentary (WBC)
Since Trent Butler published the first edition of his newly revised Joshua commentary (Word Biblical Commentary series), he says many more questions have been raised than answered in subsequent research and publications.
One thing has been clear from the start, however: “The language of Deuteronomy reappears at many points within the book.” (90) He says such language not only gives the book of Joshua its basic form, but also its meaning.
This reality is important for not only understanding the origins and composition of Joshua, but the first several books of the Hebrew Scriptures, as well. Such knowledge also helps exegetes grasp the major theological perspective of the book and how it ties to those preceding and following it.
Enjoy this generous excerpt below, where Butler…
Trent Butler Shares 6 Theological Themes of the Book of Joshua
Ed Noort has said of the book of Joshua, “By the theological evaluation of the Old Testament, [it] most often ends up in the position of the villain or scoundrel.”
Yet in his newly revised and updated commentary on the book, Trent Butler maintains Joshua “occupies a key position in the Hebrew Bible.” (157) Not only does the book mark the historical transition from Moses to Joshua, “thematically, the book brings the transition from the experience of covenant curse to the experience of covenant obedience and renewal.” (157)
Butler summarizes these themes and the components of its Deuteronomistic theology in this way:
“a conquered land, which could be lost; a model for leadership, which was never again followed; a law given to Israel as covenant, but repeatedly disobeyed; and a God of the universe,…
New Releases Today — 2 Corinthians; Theology of James, Peter, & Jude; and Gospel-Centered Counseling
This fall sees the release of several informative, engaging, challenging titles that will enhance and equip your teaching and ministry.
Four of those titles release today. Here’s a quick overview:
1) 2 CORINTHIANS (WORD BIBLICAL COMMENTARY)
We are pleased to announce the 1986 commentary of veteran scholar Ralph P. Martin on 2 Corinthians in the venerated Word Biblical Commentary series has been thoroughly updated. New sections include Collection, Rhetoric, Composition, and Social Setting. As before, Martin covers such topics as the Spirit, the Opponents, Paul’s Theology, and the Resurrection in this epistle. He gives penetrating insight into the particular problems of Christianity as expressed in the hedonistic, cosmopolitan setting of Corinth, showing how Paul attempts to clearly distinguish the gospel from Hellenistic Judaism and Hellenistic Jewish Christian ideology. What was at stake at Corinth, says Dr. Martin, was “nothing less than the essence of…