J. G. McConville

The distinguished InterVarsity staff purport to portray a "broad picture of contemporary scholarship on the Prophets" without trying to resolve contentious issues. The project is joined by scholars from all points on the spectrum. While including Jewish scholarship, they select the "Christian Old Testament", including the reception history of book of Daniel as one of the four "major prophetic books", and the Book of the Twelve. Changes in the parameters of reference work from just decades previously are also reflected. The contributors of the articles express the joy and diversity coming to the fore in this fresh and moving field of interpretation. The work is informed by the most recent archeological discoveries -- including Qumran, Mishnah, and pseudepigrapha. Appropriate cross-referencing is provided, along with detailed Subject and Scripture Indices.… (more)

An exploration of the condition and nature of humanity as established in the Old Testament.

The author bookends the work with Psalm 8:4 and its implications: what is man that God is mindful of him? He begins with the beginning and what it might mean that man is made in God's image, especially in terms of becoming "like God" by eating of the fruit and the subsequent banishment from the Garden. He then does well to speak of people as situated in a given environment and context; he attempts to make sense of people in a political sense of the Old Testament; the importance of work and creating; he concludes with the nature of humanity in the Psalms with all its messy reality and difficulties.

A profitable meditation on the state of humanity in the Old Testament.

**- galley received as part of early review program… (more)

Let me illustrate how highly I regard this book: if you walked into my office and said, "So, I need to understand the book of Jeremiah," I'd just hand you this book. Well,actually...no. I'd write the name of this book on a Post-It and hand the note to you 'cause this book is NEVER leaving my office.

McConville has a very particular agenda: to debunk the myths that 1) Jeremiah is simply a "Deuteronomistic" work (over against Robert Carroll and Winfried Thiel) and 2) it has no overarching organization or theological point (over against William McKane). However, McConville doesn't spend his time poking holes in their arguments; rather, he spends his time building a reading of entire book of Jeremiah sensitive to the book's unique accent and argument.

Masterful, masterful work.… (more)