OLD TESTAMENT THEOLOGY: ITS HISTORY AND DEVELOPMENT, by John H. Hayes & Frederick Prussner. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 1984. Pp. 290. $29.95 (paper).

This is Prussner’s PhD dissertation edited and updated by John Hayes.  On pages 233-239 it gives another helpful intro into von Rad for those that are new to this Old Testament giant.

First, the key to understanding von Rad’s work is found in his choice of the subject matter.  According to him the OT theologian is mainly concerned with “Israel’s own explicit assertion about Yahweh.” [234]

Second, H&P outline six basic principles that underlie von Rad’s approach to the OT:

a.OT itself must set the agenda for writing a theology.

b.OT is primarily a book of history concerned with the divine acts in history.

c.Traditions about Israel’s sacred history were formulated as testimonies and credal confessions which were products of Israel’s thinking about itself.

d.OT does not contain a single, unified theology.

f.Linkage of promise and fulfillment is crucial to von Rad’s understanding of how older traditions functioned in the life of Israel.

g.Since the basic content of OT is the sacred story, “retelling remains the most legitamate form of theological discourse on the OT” [vol.1, 121]

Third, H&P level few criticisms against von Rad’s work that I could try to summarize under three main headings:

They point out inconsistencies in von Rad’s work.  These have to do with his inability to completely avoid systematic theological discussion which he criticizes Eichrodt for and his failure to really carry out the mode of “retelling”.  H&P site an example of von Rad’s position on Deuteronomy as a product of 7th century BC which goes against the ancients’ affirmation of its Mosaic origin.

Furthermore, von Rad is accused of Theological Romanticism by overemphasizing the significance of Israel’s historical traditions at the expense of the prophets’ personhood and individuality in thought and experience.

Finally, H&P chide von Rad for using the form of Heilgeschichte [salvation history] but without the insistence on factual historicity that usually accompanies it.

OLD TESTAMENT THEOLOGY, vols. 1 and 2, by Gerhard von Rad, with an introduction by Walter Brueggemann. Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2001. Pp. 502; 496. $29.95 each (paper).

Walter Brueggemann has furnished a good introductory article for those of us not familiar with von Rad’s work yet.

First, Brueggemann provides an insightful background to von Rad’s life that explains the roots of his project.  As a young pastor, von Rad was “formed and shaped by the force, vitality, and liveliness of the work of Barth” (xi).

Second, Brueggemann identifies three features of von Rad’s work that reflect Barth’s influence:

(1) the primal mode of theological statement is narrative. The Credal statements of Deuteronomy 6:20-24, 26:5-6, and Joshua 24:1-13 are at the heart of the Old Testament.

(2) this narrative is testimony, that is, “active, out-loud, public utterance whereby Israel makes its faith claim in an either/or mode of presentation that vigorously counters other religious claims” (xv)

(3) this testimony that is central to the Old Testament is a counter-truth against the claims of “Canaanite religion.” (xiii).

Third, Brueggemann’s main and by and large only criticism of von Rad reflects his own academic seinsitivity.  He decries the fact that von Rad “did not acknowledge the existence of vibrant contemporary Jewish faith communities” (xxvi).

Most of you know I took (and passed!!) my Ph.D. comps this past April and May (see HERE, HERE, HERE, and HERE).  One of the questions I prepared–and answered–dealt with the history of scholarship on the composition of the Pentateuch, focusing especially upon the last 30 years.  This is certainly a still quite unsettled issue within scholarship, and it is a fascinating topic as well.  The overall trajectory has seen a movement away from traditional source criticism towards more tradition-historical approaches or even those emphasizing literary unity.

In working on this topic I did a great deal of reading, obviously.  I then synthesized and organized the information into a cogent, articulated response in outline form.  That larger, original outline was then wittled further from 12 pages down to 5.

Given the perpetual importance of this topic and the question, I have decided to share here, in .pdf format, each of the two outlines.  Please note these files, as well as anything on this blog, falls under the jurisdiction of Creative Commons Copyright law and is not to be reproduced or distributed without author’s consent.  Full attribution must be made to me as well. 

I would also be curious of your thoughts on the files, and how you plan to–or do–use them.

Here are the two files:

Outline 1 – Longer

Outline 2 – Shorter

Here is a bibliography of those sources which are treated in the outlines:

Blenkinsopp, Joseph. The Pentateuch: An Introduction to the First Five Books of the Bible. Anchor Bible Reference    Library. New York: Doubleday, 1992. 

Blum, Erhard. Die Komposition der Vätergeschichte. WMANT 57. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukurchener Verlag, 1984. 

_________. Studien zur Komposition des Pentateuch. BZAW 189. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1990. 

Campbell, Anthony F. and Mark A. O’Brien. Sources of the Pentateuch: Texts, Introductions, Annotations. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1993.

 _________. Rethinking the Pentateuch: Prolegomena to the Theology of Ancient Israel. Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2005.

Carr, David M. Reading the Fractures of Genesis: Historical and Literary Approaches. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 1996.

 Clines, David J.A. The Theme of the Pentateuch. JSOTSupp 10. 2^nd ed. Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1997.

 Dozeman, Thomas B. and Konrad Schmid, eds. A Farewell to the Yahwist? The Composition of the Pentateuch in Recent European Interpretation. SBL Symposium Series 34. Atlanta: SBL, 2006.

Mann, Thomas W. The Book of the Torah: The Narrative Integrity of the Pentateuch. Atlanta: John Knox, 1988.

Noth, Martin. The Deuteronomistic History. Sheffield: University of Sheffield, 1981.

_________. A History of Pentateuchal Traditions. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, 1972.

Rendtorff, Rolf. The Problem of the Process of Transmission in the Pentateuch. JSOTSupp 89. Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1990.

 Van Seters, John. The Pentateuch: A Social-Science Commentary. Trajectories 1. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1999.

Von Rad, Gerhard. “The Form-Critical Problem of the Hexateuch.” Pages 1-78 in The Problem of the Hexateuch and Other Essays. London: SCM Press, 1966.

Wellhausen, Julius. Prolegomena to the History of Israel. New York: Meridian Books, 1957.

Whybray, Roger N. The Making of the Pentateuch: A Methodological Study JSOTSupp 53. Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1987.

(See my earlier post HERE on the topic of OT theology as [a]historical discipline).

As I am writing my dissertation on an Old Testament theology related topic, and as I prepare to do some TA work Bill Bellinger’s OT theology seminar this Fall, I find myself continually returning to a question on method.  The question, for me, is less what is/constitutes OT theology and more how is one to do/construct an OT theology.  One can learn very much, I feel, by attending to the history of research on the topic.  Reflecting on this question, I will here survey four responses briefly, those of Eichrodt, von Rad, Childs, and Brueggemann.

Walther Eichrodt, Theology of the Old Testament (2 vols.), 1930s
Eichrodt’s theology is systematic in its organization, grouped into three parts: God and world, God and man, God and people.  OT theology for him is an historical (though not chronological), and scientific (though not confessional) exercise.  He sees the task of OT theology as being “to construct a complete picture of the OT realm of belief” (I, 25).  Eichrodt does this by what he calls a “double aspect,” emphasizing 1) comparative material from ancient Near Eastern religions; 2) a forward looking trajectory to the NT and Jesus as fulfillment of OT precursors.  Eichrodt takes a cross-section approach, arguing one can ‘cut’ at any given point in Israel’s historical narrative and there discern the unifed structure of OT belief.  His approach is thus, in this way, synchronic, and it assumes a basic unified structure to OT thought over time.  The conceptual center Eichrodt identifies as the central organizing principle of the OT is the Mosaic covenant, the encounter between YHWH and Israel with formative implications.  Other covenants, such as the Abrahamic or Davidic, are merely later retrojections of this primal covenant concept. 

Problems with Eichrodt’s View
1) Too much unity.  Eichrodt does not take into account adequately the posibility of development over time (as does von Rad, below).  By assuming a continuity across the entire history of OT thought, there is no emphasis on the reshaping and reappropriation of, say, Exodus traditions that are now well known in scholarship.

2) Covenant as the center.  Related to #1 above, there is simply too much unity.  Eichrodt’s covenant is univocal.  What about the Abrahamic, Mosaic, Noachide covenants?  Is it adequate to call them retrojections?  This emphasis on unity has also been challenged by the advent of bi-polar OT theologies or even a great multiplicity of theologies, as Erhard Gerstenberger argues for in his Theologies of the Old Testament.

3) Supersessionism. Writing in Germany in the 1930s, such rhetoric may be understood.  But it is still inexcusable.  While his NT trajectory may be defensible based upon the simple fact this is an Old Testament theology (though I am still not so forgiving), his rhetoric is not.  Not only is his theology full of critiques and jabs at Judaism, which has developed into a degenerate faith, but he also goes so far as to call Judaism a “torso.”  I cannot accept this.

Gerhard von Rad, Old Testament Theology (2 vols.), 1950-60s
Von Rad rejects Eichrodt’s systematic way of doing OT theology because he believes the OT’s own way of doing theology is non-systematic.  He proposes a diachronic model, namely tradition history.  He argues that ancient Israel’s faith traditions developed and grew over time.  As a result, there is no unifying center to the OT; one can and should rather speak of theologies.  The task of the OT theologian is to identify and trace out the various traditions and their development.  Israel’s faith, then, is grounded in a theology of history with its starting point being YHWH’s action in history.  Toward this end, von Rad begins with what he calls the kleine Credo, tiny statements of faith that narrate the basic picture of OT salvation history.  The two kleine Credo he emphasizes are Deut 26:5-10. and Josh 24:2f.  These creedal statements narrate the same events: ancestral promise, exodus, land.  Sinai is absent in these creeds and thus has a separate development.  The importance of doing theology in this way for von Rad is that it honors the order of events as ancient Israel has set them out.  Reactualization (or, the making pertinent and continual reshaping and updating of a tradition in each successive generation) is seminal for von Rad.

Problems with von Rad
1) Too much diversity.

2) Heilsgeschichte seems to function as the implicit center for von Rad.

3) Is OT theology the same thing as history of traditions?

4) Wisdom literature does not fit nicely into his theology; it is not about salvation history.

5) The credo theory is little held to anymore today.  Rather than being small statements of faith out of which ancient Israel’s historical narratives grew and developed, they can just as well (and are likely better viewed as) later, distillations of an already expansive narrative.

Brevard Childs, Old Testament Theology in a Canonical Context, 1985.
Childs’ opening chapter on methodology is worth the price of this volume alone.  Literally.  In it, Childs notes several problems with prior attempts at OT theology: 1) is one’s task to write an OT theology, a history of Israelite religions, or both?; 2) an overemphasis on variety and growth has led to an inability to see any sort of coherence; 3) OT theology has failed to engage the question of how concrete communities of faith have heard and appropriated these texts; 4) the relation of OT theology to Judaism and the NT remains ill-defined.  As a result of these points, he says the field is at a stalemate.  As a way forward Childs advances the canonical approach, whose basis is the received traditions of Israel located in the Hebrew Bible, and not the (reconstructured) events or experiences lying behind the text.  Childs argues that canonization represents the final step in a process of hermeneutical activity that establishes the scope of what is and is not authoritative literature.  The final form of the text, for Childs, still preserves many elements of ancient Israel’s earlier theological thought and its development.  It is now given a new interpretive context, though, in its place in the canon.  Now, Childs is quite inconsistent across all his volumes over what constitutes canon (see Brueggemann on this).  Here, canon seems to mean an exercise in intertextuality (very Midrashic!) in which Scripture interprets Scripture.  Therefore, tradition-historical exercises like those of von Rad are absent and inconsequential for Childs; according to him, they are not only reconstructions but also lie outside the bounds of  Israel’s faith.

Problems with Childs
1) Which/whose canon?  There is no single canon for Christianity; the canon varies by faith community.  How is one to adjudicate what canonical shape of the text is or is not authoritative?

2) What is meant by canon?  Childs is inconsistent across his works on what he means by canon.  In Introduction to the OT as Scripture, it means the literary shape of the book.  In OT Theology in a Canonical Context, it means an intertextual exercise.  In his earlier Exodus commentary in the OTL series, it is an exercise in reception history. 

Walter Brueggemann, Theology of the Old Testament: Testimony, Dispute, Advocacy. 1997.
Brueggemann is writing after what Leo Perdue has called The Collapse of History (noting the move away from history for a variety of reasons in OT theology/study in general).  Brueggemann’s Theology is itself postmodern, perhaps the first truly postmodern OT theology we have.  Methodologically, Brueggemann’s work may be described as a “theology of metaphor” or a “theology of rhetoric” in that he intentionally brackets out discussions of history and focuses upon what the text says and how the text says it.  Towards this end, he employs the image of a courtroom to talk about the witness of the OT, focusing upon Israel’s solicited testimony, counter testimony, unsolicited testimony, and lastly, embodied testimony.  Given this methodological stance, Brueggemann is very happy–indeed, interested and purposeful in–maintaining the tensions of the text.  He notes, in good postmodern fashion, the plurality of interpretive strategies and possibilities that pervade OT study.  At bottom, though, Brueggemann seems very much to be a covenant theologian and reads the text through this lens.

Problems with Brueggemann
1) Is OT theology entirely ahistorical?  Can it be?

2) Does the image of a courtroom cause an unintended problem by fostering, unintentionally, a sense of ‘legalism’ in the OT?

3) Does a truly postmodern OT theology lead, again, to too much diversity?

Reflection
I take a little from everyone.  Each has difficulties, which I note, but also areas that are to be commended.  Here is what I glean:

From Eichrodt . . . . an appreciation of the covenantal concept as central from the OT and Israel’s faith.

From von Rad . . . . an agreement with his focus on reactualization and development of the traditions, as well as emphasizing that one must honor them in the order preserved by ancient Israel.

From Childs . . . . the realization that the final form of the text is the beginning place (the raw material, perhaps) for OT theology, and that the final form preserves therein earlier stages of Israel’s faith development.

From Brueggemann . . . . an appreciation for the emphasis on rhetoric as a place of focus (contra Childs’ wholly intertextual approach in the volume discussed above) and not seeking an easy smoothing out of the tensions in the text but rather allowing them–even those concerning God’s character–to stand and have meaning.

What are your thoughts on Eichrodt?  Von Rad?  Childs?  Brueggemann?  What do you take from each?  And, most importantly, how do you (or, how should we) do OT theology?

In re-reading through Walter Brueggemann’s magisterial Theology of the Old Testament: Testimony, Dispute, Advocacy, I must admit I am quite taken still by his theology of rhetoric.  Brueggemann writes:

I shall insist, as consistently as I can, tha the God of Old Testament theology as such lives in, with, and under the rhetorical enterprise of this text, and nowhere else and in no other way.  This rhetorical enterprise operates with ontological assumptions, but these assumptions are open to dispute and revision in the ongoing rhetorical enterprise of Israel.” (66)

For Brueggemann, and for myself, the locus of ancient Israel’s theological reflection and meaning lies solely in the text, more particularly, how the text narrates what it does about God.  What is said is far more important for Brueggemann than attempting to reconstruct either what happened or how the text came to be.  On the so-called historical task of OT theology, Brueggemann says:

“Note well that in focusing ons peech, we tend to bracket out all querstions of historicity.  We are not asking: ‘what happened?’ but ‘What is said?’ To inquire into the historicity of the text is a legitimate enterprise, but it does not, I suggest, belong to the work of Old Testament theology.  In like manner, we bracket out all questions of ontology, which ask about the ‘really real.’ It may well be, in the end, that there is no historicity to Israel’s faith claim, but that is not a position taken here.  And it may well be that there is no ‘being’ behind Israel’s faith assertion, but that is not a claim made here.  We have, however, few tools for recovering ‘what happened’ and even fewer for recovering ‘what is,’ and therefore those issues must be held in abeyance, pending the credibility and persuasiveness of Israel’s testimony, on which everything depends” (118).

What do you make of Brueggemann’s insistence on rhetoric as the means of approaching Old Testament theology?  What of his ahistorical approach?  As you may suspect, I am quite on board.  But for a variety of reasons.

The task of OT theology has long been seen as an historical one.  Eichrodt’s seminal two volume theology stressed a “double aspect”: 1) investigate and analyze a given text agains the backdrop of ancient Near Eastern religion; 2) trace out how this text has been fulfilled in Jesus and the NT [a terribly reductionist and triumphalist reading the way Eichrodt presents it].  Similarly, von Rad’s two volumes–from which I still learn very much–see OT theology through the lens of tradition history.  For von Rad, the task of the OT theologian is to trace the development of these traditions, thus emphasizing the diversity of the task.  Erhard Gerstenberger’s more recent Theologies of the Old Testament seems to carry this strand forward, arguing (correctly) that there are multiple theologies in the OT (although he and I would disagree on what these multiple theologies are).  Gerstenberger, though, is also purely historical, discussing the theology of various institutions within ancient Israel.  And there are countless others who have seen the task of OT theology as an utterly historical one.  In fact, reading some of these early OT theologies is quite similar to reading early introductions on the OT for me.  Both were largely doing excavative work and writing history, with theology peppered in.

More recently (1985 to be exact, some 12 years prior to Brueggemann’s volume), Brevard Childs sought a paradigm shift.  In his Old Testament Theology in a Canonical Context, he argues (correctly) that OT theology has long been too taken with matters of history.  One must ask precisely what the task itself is, writes Childs.  Is the task to do OT theology, a history of traditions/religion, or some mutation of both?

I don’t believe OT theology should be utterly ahistorical.  But I also don’t think Brueggemann is wholly ahistorical (as Norman Gottwald points out in his essay in God in the Fray: A Tribute to Walter Brueggemann, of which see my review HERE).  But Brueggemann is not historical in the way Eichrodt or von Rad were historical.  Brueggemann is concerned with what ancient Israel says, regardless of any concerns for the authenticity of the utterance or its development into that utterance.  I remain quite agnostic about the historical critical method of reading.  And thus, I think Brueggemann’s discussion outlined above presents a refreshing way forward for how one does OT theology.  One is not writing a history.  One is writing a theology, from ancient Israel’s perspective, about her views on God.  That, I would argue, is the task of OT theology.  It is literally a “word about God.”  And only as such can it be called OT theology proper.

And you?  What do you think of Brueggemann’s method?  How do you see the task of OT theology?

Von Rad (Theology, II, 388ff.) has mounted the case that originally the Mosaic law was understood as Yahweh’s saving action. The law was not seen as a threat to Israel’s existence, but was understood as an act of divine grace, in the New Testament terminology, as gospel. It was the prophets, rather, who first pronounced Israel’s relationship to Yahweh as having been altered through their message of judgment. Obedience to the law became a measure to test Israel before the divine will, and Israel was condemned as fundamentally in disobedience. As a result, only a radically new saving event, different in kind from the past tradition, could redeem Israel from its punishment.
The most incisive exegetical and theological response to von Rad’s interpretation has come from Zimmerli (Law and the Prophets). Initially he finds it odd that von Rad has turned Moses in to ‘gospel’ and the prophets into ‘law’. Further he argues that the Mosaic law was dialectically structured from the start. On the one hand, it contained a promise to life to Israel, a saving act of divine grace. On the other hand, Israel always understood that there was a reverse side to the covenant (Deut. 27.1ff.). Disobedience called forth certain divine judgment before which the people of God had no privileged status. Zimmerli then makes the convincing case that the prophets understood their vocation as calling forth the divine judgment which was implied from the law from the beginning as an inevitable response to disobedience.
- Brevard S. Childs, Biblical Theology of the Old and New Testaments (Minneapolis, MN: First Fortress Press, 1992), 175.  

In From Genesis to Chronicles Gerhard von Rad writes:

“Righteouseness” (sedaqah) in the Old Testament sense is not the height of virtue…it is a notion concerned with relationship, and the man who meets the demands of a communal relationship is a “righteous” man. This communal relationship may be a civil and social one, but more often in the Old Testament refers to that relationship with Israel, which Yahweh has enshrined in his covenant. When Yahweh is said to be “righteous,” it means that he is faithful to this covenant relationship that he has condescended to establish. Israel is “righteous” in so far as the nation assents to this covenant relationship, and submits to its cultic and legal ordinances.

…ist irgendwie nicht das, was ich vorher dachte. Sondern:

Volker Leppin: Martin Luther

Eine neuere Luther-Biographie, endlich mal fertig gelesen, nachdem im Wintersemester ein Seminar zum Großen Katechismus ansteht. Leppin ist insgesamt sehr um einen nüchternen Ton bemüht, der Luther nicht als Denkmal, sondern als leidenschaftlichen, widerständigen, spätmittelalterlichen Theologen darstellen will. Das gelingt hier und da auch ganz gut – gegen Ende (und das heißt: ab 1525) ist es wohl ein wenig dick aufgetragen, wenn beinahe einmal pro Seite auf den sinkenden Stern Luthers verwiesen wird. Jedenfalls: Einen guten biographischen Überblick bringt es. Als Ergänzung will ich mir dann mal Obermans Luther-Buch reinziehen – schon jemand gelesen?

Gerhard von Rad: Theologie des Alten Testaments, Bd. 1

Ein Klassiker – bis heute die deutschsprachige alttestamentliche Theologie des 20. Jh. Mit seinem Ansatz, der die Theologie Israels “nacherzählend” statt “dogmatisch-systematisch” darstellt, hat von Rad die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft revolutioniert – vor allem weil er die Disziplin mit einem im großen Entwurf von der reinen Religionswissenschaft zur Theologie zurückgerufen hat. Manche sagen, von Rad schreibt wie Thomas Mann – da ist was dran, wie ich finde. Manche seiner Thesen (1962!) sind natürlich nicht mehr aktuell. Aber insgesamt ist es ein faszinierendes Buch und macht es selbst mir, als relativem AT-Muffel, Freude in das Thema einzusteigen.

P.S.: Würde ja auch sehr gerne mal wieder nen guten aktuellen Roman lesen – habe nur gerade keinen auf dem Schirm. Kann jemand was empfehlen?

From Genesis to Chronicles: Explorations in Old Testament Theology by Gerhard Von Rad is a must own book.

Review from JBL is found here.

I am a big fan of James Crenshaw.  I have collected several of his books and have many of his articles (either bound or in a pdf format).  His writings have helped me to better understand the Wisdom Literature of the 1^st Testament, while helping me clarify some of my own thoughts. (on a side note: I plan on reviewing two of his books in the near future.)

Apparently Crenshaw has jettisoned a couple hundred books from his library and sold them to Dove Booksellers (who then is selling them to people like me).  So I purchased four volumes that were previously gracing the shelves of this prolific scholar.

The following are the books that I purchased:

Genesis: A Commentary (Old Testament Library) by Gerhard Von Rad. Westminster John Knox Press (1973), Edition: Revised, Hardcover, 440 pages (contains Crenshaw’s signature, which is cool because he would have used this volume when he wrote his two different biographies on von Rad.)

Character in crisis : a fresh approach to the Wisdom literature of the Old Testament by William P. Brown. Grand Rapids, Mich. : W.B. Eerdmans Pub. Co., c1996. (Bill Brown wrote a nice little message on the front cover thanking Crenshaw for his advice and time.  This book is both referenced in his Introduction to Old Testament Wisdom Literature, and his book on Ancient Israel’s Education.)

Roots of Wisdom: The Oldest Proverbs of Israel and Other Peoples by Claus Westermann. Westminster John Knox Press (1994), Paperback, 188 pages

Proverbs and Northwest Semitic Philology by S.J. Mitchell Dahood. Roma: Pontificum Institutum Biblicum.

While I know that I most likely will not get to read all of these before my semester begins, I am excited to add them to my to be read list.

Also, I would highly recommend ordering through Dove Booksellers.  The order was processed quickly and the books were in impeccable shape as they have reported.

Googlebooks allows you to preview some of the work by Gerhard von Rad.

Genesis
Deuteronomy: A Commentary
Old Testament Theology (Vol 1)
Old Testament Theology (Vol 2)

My copy of von Rad’s Old Testament Theology arrived today! And soon I shall have my copy of Herschel’s The Prophets! Then I shall think maybe I have gone to heaven! Here is a quote from the pen of von Rad.

To have to abandon an historical presentation of Israel’s credal statements has the advantage that we are able to let the material stand in those contexts in the saving history in which it was arranged by Israel. And in this way there comes more clearly into our field of vision that part of Israel’s theological activity which is probably one of is most important and interesting one’s, namely those ever new attempts to make the divine acts of salvation relevant for every new age and day-this ever new reaching out to and avowel of God acts which in the made the old credal statements grow into such enormous masses of traditions. A theology which attempts to grasp the content of the Old Testament under the heading of various doctrines (the doctrine of God, the doctrine of man, etc.) cannot do justice to these credal statements which are completely tied up with history, or to this grounding of Israel’s faith upon a few divine acts of salvation and the effort to gain an ever new understanding of them.

It’s still on sale at Christianbook dot com. Really, think about getting it!

Von Rad’s venerable and seminal treatment of the topic, now made available in an inexpensive reprint, is considerably enhanced for modern readers by B.C. Ollenburger’s introductory essay, ‘Gerhard von Rad’s Theory of Holy War.’ This version of what has become a classic point of departure for studies of warfare and the Divine Warrior figure in the Old Testament’ is further complemented by J.E. Sanderson’s ‘War, Peace, and Justice in the Hebrew Bible: A Representative Bibliography.’ Approaching the topic with an ethical concern that is not given broad expression in Von Rad’s monograph, Sanderson appends her annotated bibliography ‘as a contribution to the advancement of peace’ from the pen of ’someone with a lifelong fascination for the Bible as well as a commitment to peacemaking.’

Thus framed, this new publication of von Rad’s Holy War in English displays both the virtue and the vulnerability that characterise a theory that ’seemingly accounts for everything’, as Ollenburger assesses. His introductory essay places von Rad in the historical context of the discussion about war in the Old Testament, something von Rad’s sparsely footnoted monograph itself did not take pains to achieve.

The substance of von Rad’s argument requires no comment. From the vantage point of Old Testament studies at the present juncture, von Rad’s description of how an ancient idea and practice was appropriated and reappropriated within circles whose ideological habits were markedly distinct from those of its origin, is undertaken with sometimes breathtaking confidence. His characteristic attention to the institutions in which this occurred undergirds a reconstruction of the history of Holy War that has demanded an accounting from all subsequent writers on the topic. This fine new presentation, marred only by recurrent errors in Hebrew quotation, returns an old standard to easy accessibility.