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Who wrote the Bible? How is it used, and what are the different translations like? These questions are among the first asked by anyone interested in studying the Bible, but the answers are often contained in a multitude of books, many of which are often more academic than what most people need. There is a market, then, for a single volume which covers a multitude of topics - and this fits the bill.


Summary

Title: The Oxford Illustrated History of the Bible
Author: edited by John Rogerson
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 1591020107

Pro:
?  Explains history behind the creation of the Bible
?  Explains history of the translation into English
?  Explains how the Bible has been used in various ways.

Con:
?  Section of modern interpretations too limited

Description:
?  History and interpretation of the Bible
?  Addresses how the Bible is studied and used
?  Explains some modern forms of interpreting the Bible, like Liberation Theology

 

Book Review

As with the Bible itself, The Oxford Illustrated History of the Bible is also a library of "books," featuring articles of different lengths on a wide variety of issues relating to the history of the Bible. Some are better than others, but the whole is something well worth considering to add to your own library. There are four sections: (1) The Historical Background of the Making of the Bible; (2) Text and Translation of the Making of the Bible; (3) The Study and Use of the Bible; and (4) Contemporary Interpretation.

The first two sections are just what you would expect in a book like this, with discussions about when and where the various books of the Bible first appeared, the development of Biblical scholarship and research, and more. The second section would have been more interesting if they had included a chapter discussing translation problems and issues with languages other than English; however, the audience for the book itself is English, so that omission is reasonably understandable.

The third section is very interesting, providing a look at some topics which are common, like the use of the Bible in the early church, but also some which are not usually addressed in books like this, such as the use of the Bible in literature. One disappointment, however, was the article "The Bible in the Eastern Churches" - I really didn't get much insight out of it and am otherwise disappointed that there wasn't more dealing with non-Western Christian traditions.

Aside from a perspective which is mostly Western, the perspective is also mostly Christian, even though the Bible contains more Jewish than Christian texts. There is nothing about how the Bible is received in Muslim traditions, although there are two excellent articles about how the Bible is received in Judaism, a topic often ignored.

The final section was simultaneously engrossing and frustrating: engrossing, because it tackled a difficult topic which most readers will be unfamiliar with, but frustrating because so much more could have been done. The theme of the final section is how people today approach biblical interpretation from a variety of perspectives - feminism, marxism, deconstruction, post-modernism, structuralism, etc. Although people today may have heard these terms, most don't know how they approach biblical studies or what contributions they have made.

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