Journal: Journal of Ministry and Theology
Volume: JMAT 24:1 (Spring 2020)
Article: Book Reviews
Author: Anonymous

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Book Reviews

Old Testament Ethics: A Guided Tour. By John Goldingay. Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2019. 278 pp. $28.00.

Some of the finest books written by biblical scholars on ethics have been thematic in approach. The themes are often those of interest and concern to contemporary readers. In his book Old Testament Ethics: A Guided Tour, John Goldingay has broken the mold in several surprising ways. Among them are his choice of topics, the brevity of the chapters, his translations and brief summaries of biblical texts, his presentation of the significance of the texts to the original audience, his insightful comments on cultures and characters, his thought-provoking questions at the end of each chapter, and his personable interaction with the contemporary reader. After each translation of a longer passage, Goldingay takes a paragraph to refer back to the quoted text, explaining simply what the teaching of the passage is and identifying each verse within parentheses.

The genesis of the book helps to explain the uniqueness and popular approach of Goldingay’s Ethics. After he finished his multi-volume short commentary series on the Old Testament, The Old Testament for Everyone, he was encouraged to write a few books on topics derived from the Old Testament. This book is one of those companion volumes. His translations throughout Old Testament Ethics are from drafts of another of his books, The First Testament: A New Translation. Along with suggestions for further readings for those who think his presentation is either too conservative or too liberal, Goldingay suggests that readers who want more of ethics from the angle of the book read volume 3 of his Old Testament Theology: Israel’s Life.

The author introduces the book with a brief summary of the questions he is convinced ethics asks (what sort of people we are; how we think; what sort of thing we do; and what sort of thing we don’t do), and of the angles from which he explains the views of those questions in the Old Testament. The book is divided into five major subject areas, each area consisting of a different theme or choice of source material for ethical consideration: Qualities; Aspects of life; Relationships; [selected biblical] Texts; and People [selected biblical characters]. The book includes a

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conclusion in which the author makes a plea for Christian believers to go back to the Old Testament to see how it confronts us to teach, rebuke, correct and train today. There is also a Subject List and Scripture Index.

Goldingay does not leave out an examination of the “tricky issues.” For example, in a postscript he gives a brief respons...