This valuable resource introduces readers to the Old Testament books of wisdom and poetry--Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and Song of Songs--and helps them better understand each book's overall flow. Estes summarizes some of each book's key issues, offers an exposition of the book that interacts with major commentaries and recent studies, and concludes with an extensive bibliography. Now in paperback.

'For the LORD gives wisdom...he stores up sound wisdom for the upright... The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom' (Proverbs 2:6, 7; 9:10). The Old Testament books of Proverbs, Job and Ecclesiastes are often referred to as the wisdom books of the Bible. The theme of wisdom, however, is not limited to these books: it actually pervades much of the Bible. Dan Estes explores wisdom in key passages in Scripture. In Part 1, he investigates the concept of wisdom in the book of Proverbs: what wisdom is and how it calls out to humans to follow its path. In Part 2, he considers how wisdom is presented in various contexts in the Old Testament, in passages from the law (Deuteronomy 30), history (1 Kings 3-4), prophecy (Jeremiah 8-9) and Psalm 112. Part 3 focuses on Proverbs to learn how wisdom affects our conduct in our work, our speech, our decisions and our righteous living. There is complexity in the biblical message of wisdom. Part 4 shows how the prominent theme of retribution in Proverbs is balanced and qualified in the books of Job and Ecclesiastes. In Part 5, Estes examines the culmination of wisdom in the New Testament, as we see that Jesus is the master teacher of wisdom and the source of all wisdom, and that we are challenged to live by God's wisdom rather than falling into folly. Throughout the Bible, we are constantly challenged to learn God's wisdom, to live God's wisdom, and to love God's wisdom.

Even a cursory reading of the book of Proverbs reveals that it is dominated by the subject of education, or personal formation. The voice of the teacher addressing his pupils resounds from its pages. A wide array of topics is presented, and frequent exhortations challenge the learner to hear and heed the teacher's instruction. This material, however, comes for the most part without recognizable order or sequence. Much of Proverbs consists of apparently random collections of maxims. As readers, we see many individual pieces, but the puzzle as a whole remains unclear. In this New Studies in Biblical Theology volume, Daniel J. Estes synthesizes the teachings of the first nine chapters of Proverbs into a systematic statement of the theory of education and personal formation that lies behind the text. Working from the Hebrew text and building upon an extensive analysis of exegetical works, Estes organizes his study of Proverbs 1-9 into seven categories typical of pedagogical discussion: worldview, values for education, goals for education, curriculum for education, the process of instruction, the role of the teacher and the role of the learner. His work agrees with but also transcends the original purpose of the text by revealing the foundational theory of intellectual and moral formation embedded in this important section of Scripure. It also has valuable things to say about constructing a bibilically informed philosophy of education today. Addressing key issues in biblical theology, the works comprising New Studies in Biblical Theology are creative attempts to help Christians better understand their Bibles. The NSBT series is edited by D. A. Carson, aiming to simultaneously instruct and to edify, to interact with current scholarship and to point the way ahead.