Genesis

Author Andrew E. Steinmann
Publisher IVP £19.99  2019
Format pbk
ISBN 9781789740905

Following the decision completely to revise the Tyndale Old Testament Commentaries, Steinmann, Distinguished Professor of Theology and Hebrew at Concordia University, Chicago, was invited to undertake the first volume in the new series. The general preface sets the tone by stating ‘The Old Testament is not simply another text from the ancient world …… but remains the word of God for us today.’ Steinmann notes that ‘conservative scholars who accept that Moses wrote the Pentateuch acknowledge that small changes were made to the text after his day’. He concedes that Moses might well have had access to oral traditions for his early material but remains unconvinced by the JEDP documentary hypothesis which he discusses in the introduction. The author gives the impression of being rather literalistic when addressing Genesis chapters 1 to 11, as in the sentence: ‘Eve understood this promise, as shown in her own words’. Seven pages of analysis list the contents of the 27 chapters of commentary which each follow the pattern of Context, Comment & Meaning; although the contexts are largely within the confines of the Genesis text with an occasional reference to other sources including archaeology. However there is the expectation that the reader has the Christian Standard Bible (Holman Publishers) to hand for the Comment sections. Hebrew words are transliterated when reference is made to alternative translations and Hebrew nuances. Thus, the overall tone is unashamedly conservative Christian in the Meaning sections, with phrases like ‘God states’, ‘God’s commitment’, ‘Joseph is Blessed by God in Egypt’. And, as the book culminates, we read ‘the last words of Jacob in the book of Genesis set the agenda for the rest of Scripture…and finally, the life, death and resurrection of …Jesus, the Messiah, the Christ’.
DAVID SELLICK