Modern
readers of the Bible often find the Old Testament difficult and even
disturbing. What are we to do with obscure prophecies of long expired
nations? Why should we read and study ancient laws that even the New
Testament says are eclipsed by Christ? How can we reconcile Jesus’
Sermon on the Mount with the Old Testament’s graphic narratives of sex
and violence? What does the Old Testament offer that is not surpassed
and even made irrelevant by the New Testament?
John
Walton has spent a career engaging deeply with the Old Testament’s text
and ancient context. He has studied, taught, and written about the
issues. His signature approach can be introduced in one sentence: The
Old Testament was written for us but not to us. We must not conform it
to our own understanding. We will fully grasp the Old Testament and its
theology only when we are immersed in the ancient cultural current of
Israel within its broader cultural river of the ancient Near East.
In Old Testament Theology for Christians,
John Walton invites us to leave our modern—and even inherited
Christian—preconceptions at the threshold as we enter the world of the
Old Testament. He challenges us to see it anew—as if for the first
time—as guests in a strange and fascinating foreign land. Then we will
rediscover its testimony to God’s great enterprise.
In
this capstone to a career of studying and teaching the Old Testament,
Walton unfolds a grand panorama of Yahweh and the gods, of cosmos and
humanity, of covenant and kingdom, of temple and torah, of sin and evil,
and of salvation and afterlife. Viewed within its ancient Near Eastern
cognitive environment, the text takes unexpected turns and blossoms into
fresh and challenging insights. No matter how you are accustomed to
viewing the first testament of the Bible, Old Testament Theology for Christians will challenge and sharpen your perceptions.
