Guest Reviewer: Rev. Cameron West One of the most beautiful films I’ve seen is Xavier Beauvois’ Des hommes at des dieux (2010) about the nine Trappist monks of Tibhirine kidnapped by Islamic fundamentalists and martyred in 1996. The final testimony of Dom Chrisitan de Chergé finishes with these words addressed to his murderer: “May we meet again as happy thieves in paradise, if it please God, the father of us both.” De Chergé had become convinced of the primary claim... Read more

The first batch of Evangelical Exegetical Commentaries are set to come out soon with Logos. Among the first volumes to come out is William Varner’s commentary on James. I’m no Jacobean expert, but Varner has produced a fine commentary, with a very readable introduction and sober comments throughout. He seems very much on board with Hengel and Bauckham in attributing a significant role to James in the early church. Each section has an introduction, outline, original text, textual notes, ESV... Read more

I’m working on Gospels and tackling the genre question in more recent days. Here is my interim definition (with obvious HT to Talbert, Burridge, and Aune): The Gospels are the textual imprint of the oral phenomena of Christian preaching and teaching about Jesus. Viewed this way, the Gospels are Christian documents related to the needs of Christians in corporate reading, worship, apologetics, and proclamation. So in that sense they are a unique genre with no precise literary counter-parts. However, their... Read more

Funny episode in teaching today. More anon. I remember years ago reading David Rhoads’ Mark as Story and absolutely devouring it, and then getting into Robert Tannehill’s The Narrative Unity of Luke-Acts, and enjoying that one too. The brilliance of the narrative approach is that it treats the Gospels as a unified and coherent story, rather than an onion of sources to be peeled away, and supposed inconsistencies to be used as premises for compilation theories. What is more, story creates meaning... Read more

Over at Jesus Creed, Scot McKnight briefly discusses Douglas Campbell’s essay in The Apostle Paul: Four Views. Doug’s position was the hardest to classify since he is very eclectic in his theological pedigree. The most obvious description would be “apocalyptic” or “Barthian,” but those designations are not only broad in what they mean, but would be lost on most lay-people. What is more, “Torrancian” and “Irenaean” would be even vaguer. So, in the end, we called Campbell’s position “Post-NPP.” Read more

Dr. Peter Singer the animal rights activist and infanticide advocate, was on TV again last night (Q&A), once more heralding the virtues and values of “selected infanticide.” He believes in killing babies with disabilities. There is a great response to Singer by a woman with a disability, Stella Young, over at the ABC website Ramp Up. Wonderful stuff. Do read it. She concludes: For me, Singer’s views about the hypothetical are not hypothetical at all. While he may see value... Read more

Two fine friends of mine, Michael Pahl and Sean Adams, have teamed up to organize a great collection of essays on Luke-Acts in a new volume called Issues in Luke-Acts: Selected Essays. Blurb: This volume provides an introduction and engagement with the major critical issues in the study of Luke-Acts. As the study of Acts has become, once again, one of the major areas of focus within New Testament scholarship, this collection of essays presents an orientation to the major issues of... Read more

My JSPL co-editor, Nijay Gupta, reviews The Apostle Paul: Four Views, noting the perceived strengths and weaknesses of the volume. Nijay has a colorful turn of phrase, naturally I like this statement by him:  Strengths – this is a fun book. I practically read the whole book in one sitting because, thanks to the type of series, the reader gets excited about digging into both main chapters and responses. Mike Bird does a fantastic job taking stock, when the dust has settled, of who... Read more

Jordan Cooper, a Ph.D student at London School of Theology and minister in the AALC, who blogs at Just and Sinner, has written a Lutheran Response to Justification: Five Views. Interesting piece, worth having a glance at. He concludes: The differences between Luther’s approach to justification and these five views have been made apparent. The Lutheran Reformation affirms the imputation of Christ’s alien righteousness contra Bird, Dunn, and Rafferty. The Lutheran confessions also  accept a legal view of justification as is... Read more

Last year was a quiet year on the publishing front, but this year I’ve had a flurry of books come out. Some of which were five years in the making, others that were put together in a few short months. So this (American) summer has seen the following books arrive:   The Apostle Paul: Four Views. This is a sassy book because it has an excellent cohort of Pauline scholars showing how they understand various elements of Paul’s thought. It’s... Read more