Book Reviews -- By: Anonymous

Journal: Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society
Volume: JETS 39:4 (Dec 1996)
Article: Book Reviews
Author: Anonymous


Book Reviews

Biblical Theology of the Old and New Testaments: Theological Reflection on the Christian Bible. By Brevard S. Childs. Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress, 1993, 768 pp., $40.00.

This work constitutes not only the magnum opus of Brevard Childs, esteemed Professor of Old Testament and Sterling Professor of Divinity at Yale University, but also the capstone to years of wrestling and refinement regarding the method, nature and content of Biblical theology. Childs has long been an advocate of the “canonical” approach to the Scriptures—that is, that in affirming two testaments (parts) of one Bible he is affirming not only a hermeneutical activity but that the reception of the multileveled compositions/traditions (books) of Scripture within a faith community is the reception of a norm whose authority and meaning lies in the literature itself as a whole—of course in relation to God, its object, to which it “bears witness.” By such an approach, Childs is endeavoring to lead modern Biblical studies into a new and more fruitful way of reflection on the contextual elements of Scripture in relation to and within the whole (canon), thus renewing Biblical theology as a discipline. He also intends to build more effective avenues of relation to the systematic/dogmatic theological disciplines, with which he is clearly much concerned—especially within the Reformed lineage from Calvin to Barth. Like Calvin and Barth, Childs sees in theological reflection on the “witness of scripture” a further tool in illuminating Scripture.

While this volume is “officially” structured in seven interrelated parts, the book actually unfolds in four parts, each part critical in either method or content to what follows. The first two major sections, “Prolegomena” and “A Search for a New Approach,” together form the “why?” of Childs’ canonical approach to Biblical theology. He overviews Biblical theology since Gabler, along with appreciative analyses of earlier Christian approaches since Irenaeus. This sets the stage for Childs’ canonical approach to the two parts of Christian Scripture as “witness” to the subject matter (i.e. God). Here the surprising but interesting influence of Barth is evident in his approach. “The Discrete Witness of the OT,” the second section of this tome, takes the argument sequentially (diachronically) through the prominent “traditions” (e.g. creation, patriarchal, Mosaic, monarchial, prophetic, apocalyptic, etc.) to uncover in each the critical “consensus” on development and shapings that occurred within and between them, while uncovering through these layers (understood as they now stand in their canonical context) the “trajectories” that are critical to the larger Biblical-theological enterprise. Likewise, in “The Discrete Wi...

You must have a subscription and be logged in to read the entire article.
Click here to subscribe
visitor : : uid: ()