The Honey of Souls is the first full-length study of the Explanation of the Psalms by Cassiodorus. While the Explanation became a seminal document for the monastic movement in the West and was eagerly read and widely quoted for centuries, it has languished in relative obscurity in the modern period. Derek Olsen explores Cassiodorus and his strategies for reading as a window into a spirituality of the psalms that defined early Western biblical interpretation.

The Peshitta is the Syriac translation of the Old Testament made on the basis of the Hebrew text during the second century CE. Much like the Greek translations of the Old Testament, this document is an important source for our knowledge of the text of the Old Testament. Its language is also of great interest to linguists. Moreover, as Bible of the Syriac Churches it is used in sermons, commentaries, poetry, prayers, and hymns. Many terms specific to the spirituality of the Syriac Churches have their origins in this ancient and reliable version of the Old Testament. The present edition, published by the Peshitta Institute in Leiden on behalf of the International Organization for the Study of the Old Testament, is the first scholarly one of this text. It presents the evidence of all known ancient manuscripts and gives full introductions to the individual books. This volume contains Proverbs, Wisdom of Solomon, Ecclesiastes, and Song of Songs.

A collection of essays, lectures and printed materials that address the issue of the proper use of the Old Testament in the church.

A distinctively theological take on the book of Micah Readers of the book of Micah learn a great deal about God: he is a mighty God who controls the nations, yet he is also concerned with everyday matters like equity, poverty, and care for widows and orphans. In presenting this transcendent-yet-immanent God, Micah's message revolves around themes of justice, judgment, and salvation that continue to carry great significance today. In this theological commentary on the book of Micah, Stephen Dempster places the text in conversation with the larger story of Scripture. After discussing questions of structure and authorship in his introduction, Dempster systematically works through the text, drawing links to the broader biblical story throughout. In the second part of his commentary Dempster offers theological discussion that further explicates the most significant themes in Micah and their applicability to today's Christians.

This study centers on the question: how do particular readers read a biblical passage? What factors govern each reading? DeLapp here attempts to set up a test case for observing how both socio-historical and textual factors play a part in how a person reads a biblical text. Using a reception-historical methodology, he surveys five Reformed authors and their readings of the David and Saul story (primarily 1 Sam 24 and 26). From this survey two interrelated phenomena emerge. First, all the authors find in David an ideal model for civic praxis-a "Davidic social imaginary" (Charles Taylor). Second, despite this primary agreement, the authors display two different reading trajectories when discussing David's relationship with Saul. Some read the story as showing a persecuted exile, who refuses to offer active resistance against a tyrannical monarch. Others read the story as exemplifying active defensive resistance against a tyrant. To account for this convergence and divergence in the readings, DeLapp argues for a two-fold conclusion. The authors are influenced both by their socio-historical contexts and by the shape of the biblical text itself. Given a Deuteronomic frame conducive to the social imaginary, the paradigmatic narratives of 1 Sam 24 and 26 offer a narrative gap never resolved. The story never makes explicit to the reader what David is doing in the wilderness in relation to King Saul. As a result, the authors fill in the "gap" in ways that accord with their own socio-historical experiences.

In Justifying Christian Aramaism Eveline van Staalduine-Sulman explores how Christian scholars of the sixteenth and early seventeenth century justify their study of the Targums, the Jewish Aramaic translations of the Hebrew Bible. She focuses on the four polyglot Bibles - Complutum, Antwerp, Paris, and London -, and describes these books in the scholarly world of those days. It appears that quite a few scholars, Roman-Catholic, protestant, and Anglican, edited Targumic books and translated these into Latin. The book reveals a stimulating and conflicting period of the Targum reception history and is therefore relevant for Targum scholars and historians interested in the history of Judaism, Church history, the history of the book, and the history of Jewish-Christian relationships.

In this engaging book, Graeme Goldsworthy reflects with clarity and practical insight on reading and using the Old Testament. By showing us how Jesus is central to the Old Testament's message, he encourages us to reinstate it as essential and transformative to our lives, churches and mission in today's world. The author asks important questions: Where is Jesus in the whole biblical storyline? How does the kingdom of God relate to him? In what way is he central to the divine revelation? This is a must-read for those who wish to transform their biblical understanding.

In Re-Imagining Abraham: A Re-Assessment of the Influence of Deuteronomism in Genesis Megan Warner revisits the tradition that Genesis was edited by editors sympathetic to the theology of the Deuteronomist. On the basis of close, contextual readings of the four passages most commonly attributed to (semi-)Deuteronomistic hands, Warner argues that editorial use of Deuteronomistic language and themes points not to a sympathy with Deuteronomistic theology but rather to a sustained project to review and even subvert that theology. Warner's 're-imagining' of Abraham demonstrates how Israel's forebear was 're-imagined' in the post-exilic context for the purpose of offering the returning exiles a way forward at a time when all the old certainties, and even continued relationship with Yahweh, seemed lost.

Over the course of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, as more and more vernacular commentaries on the Decalogue were produced throughout Europe, the moral system of the Ten Commandments gradually became more prominent. The Ten Commandments proved to be a topic from which numerous proponents of pastoral and lay catechesis drew inspiration. God's commands were discussed and illustrated in sermons and confessor's manuals, and they spawned new theological and pastoral treatises both Catholic and Reformed. But the Decalogue also served several authors, including Dante, Petrarch, and Christine de Pizan. Unlike the Seven Deadly Sins, the Ten Commandments supported a more positive image of mankind, one that embraced the human potential for introspection and the conscious choice to follow God's Law.

Psalms 120-134, possibly the most exquisite single group of psalms, are described as 'Songs of Ascents'. They recall the journeys of pilgrims from all over the land 'up' to Jerusalem to keep the feasts of the Lord. And as the people walked, they sang. God's people today may not make quite such a journey but, as Alec Motyer contests, in living the Christian life we have all embarked on a pilgrimage of the heart. The life of faith is to be lived on the move, through varying terrains but with a single destination - as we walk with eyes fixed on Jesus. A devotional read to hearten both weary and sure-footed travellers.

During the second invasion of Jerusalem(597 B.C.), Nebuchadnezzar deported an even larger group of Judah's upper and middle class citizens to Babylon, and among this group was a young twenty-six year old priest in training named, Ezekiel. This group of Jewish captives was placed in the region of Tel Aviv, along a wide canal that links two branches of the Euphrates known as the Kebar River. There, they were treated more as colonists than slaves and enjoyed many privileges. It was there on the banks of the Kebar River, that, in 593 B.C., a now thirty old Ezekiel received his calling from GOD (Ezekiel 1 & 2). Thirty years old is the minimum age that priests are actually allowed to begin serving in the temple (Numbers 4:1-3). And so, as the LORD would have it, it was from that place, that Ezekiel first served the LORD by delivering his first prophetic message to his fellow captives in Babylon.

David's Successors: Kingship in the Old Testament argues for a new reading of kingship in the Old Testament. Rather than presenting the kings as monsters-with the occasional angelic ruler-this study seeks a more nuanced version of kingship. This book considers the original concept and context of kingship before concentrating on five kings in particular: Jeroboam, Ahab, Hezekiah, Manasseh, and Josiah. Much contemporary scholarship is concerned with the reconceptualization and recontextualization of kingship that hearkens from a negative perspective on kingship, but this book will fully consider the positive and original vision of kingship. This book is ultimately rooted in a hopeful and joyful view of humanity as found in the Psalms, Sirach, and the Chronicles.

In this unique volume, father-and-son team Walter and John Brueggemann take a close look at our fractured American society and suggest ways for improvement. Using six themes identified by some scholars as the moral foundations of societycare, fairness, liberty, loyalty, authority, and sanctitythey examine the unsustainable patterns of our contemporary society and reveal how those patterns played out in the ancient world of the Old Testament. Brueggemann and Brueggemann demonstrate how comparing the current state of these moral foundations with what God wanted them to be can help us better respond to the challenges of today. They assert that achieving any significant change will require the work of all of us and will be grounded in a vision of neighborliness. Rebuilding the Foundations will inspire readers to reorient toward a better way of living, both for themselves and for all living things.

The Judean monarch Hezekiah remains one of the most significant figures in biblical studies. For all of his greatness, however, there is little about him that may be stated with certainty. This study provides a detailed reexamination of this enterprising ruler. It commences with data outside the biblical text from Assyrian records and ancient Near Eastern archaeology which may be brought to bear in reconstructing the historical Hezekiah, and subsequently proceeds to augment this picture based on his portrayal in the books of Kings, First Isaiah, and Chronicles. Its focus is on those issues that either remain contentious in biblical scholarship, or else have been resolved into a general consensus that needs to be called into question.

Winner of the 2015 Choice Outstanding Academic Title Award Winner of the Frank Moore Cross Award for Best Book in Biblical Studies from ASOR Winner of the Biblical Archaeology Society 2017 Publication Award for Best Book Relating to the Hebrew Bible Eugene Ulrich presents in The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Developmental Composition of the Bible the comprehensive and synthesized picture he has gained as editor of many biblical scrolls. His earlier volume, The Biblical Qumran Scrolls, presented the evidence - the transcriptions and textual variants of all the biblical scrolls - and this volume explores the implications and significance of that evidence. The Bible has not changed, but modern knowledge of it certainly has changed. The ancient Scrolls have opened a window and shed light on a period in the history of the text's formation that had languished in darkness for two thousand years. They offer a parade of surprises that greatly enhance knowledge of how the scriptural texts developed through history.

In "Walking In the Dark" Daniel Fuller guides us step by step while he examines and expounds the text and the message of the biblical book of Job. As Professor of Hermeneutics at Fuller Seminary, Dr. Fuller wrestled with this text for many years in the context of teaching future pastors and theologians how to understand the original author's intended meaning. Today's serious students of Scripture can now benefit from his work as they engage with his methods and with the meaning he exposes as he unfolds the language and layers of this classic story. "Walking In the Dark" helps readers, appreciate the scope of God's righteousness, realize the complexity of God's providence, and acknowledge the limits of human wisdom. Don't miss this opportunity to shed some light on why God sometimes consigns us to suffer without explanation.

Take an in-depth look at over twenty fierce, faithful, and strong women featured in the Old Testament with Preaching the Women of the Old Testament. Inside this unique resource author Lynn Japinga interprets the stories of various biblical women, including Eve, Rebekah, Dinah, Tamar, Miriam, Deborah, Jael, Abigail, Bathsheba, and Vashti. Along with providing an interpretation, Japinga demonstrates how the character's story has been read in Christian tradition and offers sermon ideas that connect contemporary issues to each story. This book is ideal for pastors who want to know more about the many women of the Old Testament and learn how to better incorporate them into their sermons.

The Book of Job presents the story of the sufferings of a man of God at the hands of the devil. God allowed it! In fact, God put Job forth to the devil as a wonderful servant of God! The Book of Job teaches how God operates in this world. As a servant of God, Job thought he knew God...but not nearly as well as he thought he did. The book contrasts the knowledge of the world, represented in the words of Job's three friends, to Job's confusion concerning the ways of God, to the truth of God explained by the Lord! Hopefully, by studying the details of Job's experiences, each of us will learn to turn our attention and trust to God - without the need to personally endure affliction and suffering like Job!