Book Review
The Cambridge Companion to the Bible, 2nd edition
Chilton, Bruce (ed.), Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008. Pp. 724 + x.
ISBN 9780521691406 US$34.99 (paperback) ISBN 9780521869973 US$100.00 (hardback)
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This is the second edition of a comprehensive reference work first published in 1997. It consists of three main areas which relate to the world of the Old Testament, 2nd temple Judaism and the New Testament era with the growth of the church.
An informative introductory essay by Howard Clark Kee sets the historical and geographical setting of the Biblical concept of God´s people. The first section, The World of the Hebrew Bible, written by Eric M Meyers and John Rogerson, covers historical and literary aspects of most books within the Hebrew Bible. The Hebrew Bible is the Old Testament text usually used in Protestant churches rather than that used in the Catholic Churches which includes deuterocanonical writings found in the Greek Old Testament.
The second section, Jewish Responses to Greek and Roman Cultures, 322BCE-200CE, written by Anthony J. Saldarini with Amy-Jill Levine, demonstrates conflict and collusion between Jews and Hellenism and then the Jewish response to the Roman Empire. This part deals with dates, people and places from the destruction of the temple to the bar Kochba revolt. It also covers the accompanying writings in the deuterocanonical literature , NT pseudopigraphia and rabbinic literature. Many students and pastors will find this section the most useful as it clearly presents complex issues which will help them to understand the background of the New Testament scriptures.
The third section, The Formation of Christian Communities (Howard Clark Kee) describes the development of early Christianity from Jesus to Paul and then the growth of the early church until near the end of the 2nd century.
With the publication being a revised edition over 10 years after the first edition there has been the opportunity to notably improve the text. There are now about 250 boxed summaries with concise information providing background material to understand the main articles. Sometimes these are small articles in their own right, for instance , “The Sources of the Pentateuch and Biblical History”, “The Roman Expansion to the Eastern Mediterranean” and “Luke-Acts and the Challenge of Prophecy at the End of the First Century CE”.
The bibliographical information is presented in the form of an essay discussing publications and writers. This gives readers a better appreciation of the literature available rather than simply a bibliographical list. Also the inclusion of 20 maps and about 110 photographs (mainly from bibleplaces.com) throughout the text provide additional information to clarify the articles.
It is disappointing that a literary approach to the Bible, in the form of narrative and rhetorical criticism is not included. Authors do however apply source and redaction criticism of the test, for example by using the Pentateucal documentary hypothesis. Such an approach will not be viewed too favourably by scholars who are not convinced by the usefulness of such critical models. Also inevitably when a publication is shared by various authors there can be an slight overlapping of material, e.g. boxed items on Alexandria appear twice, p.13 cf. p.340..
This publication is in an area where there are many competing texts with several Bible dictionaries and many introductions to the Biblical text currently available. Many of the best know rival publications have now been in print for some time, for instance the last edition of the New Bible Dictionary is dated 1996.
In summary the following features may be noted:
Positive features:
- Good historical background coverage to the Bible.
- Biblical and extra biblical texts are well presented.
- Improvement to the text with summaries y images.
- Bibliographic material is recent, extensive and presented in an informative way.
Negative features:
- Little on the literary approach to the Bible.
- Sometimes there is an overlapping of material in different sections.
- Use of debatable source and redaction critical approaches.
This book is a great asset for seminary students and pastors as it is a new, substantial, authoritative and clearly written explanation of the world of the Bible.
David E. C. Ford, Profesor de Nuevo Testamento, Fundación Universitaria Seminario Bíblico de Colombia, Medellín, Colombia