by John Dekker
Biblical Theology: A Canonical, Thematic, and Ethical Approach by Andreas J. Köstenberger and Gregory Goswell. Crossway, 2023
At over a thousand pages, this is a weighty tome, but it is not quite as long as it looks – the bibliography alone takes up 125 pages. Although it is very impressive, I was disappointed that James B. Jordan was not included, since his insights into the connections between different parts of the Bible are so helpful.
Biblical Theology is a reference book covering every book in the Bible, but it can also be read devotionally, as I did – in fact, it took me nine months to read. As C. S. Lewis says in his wonderful introduction to Athanasius’ On The Incarnation, doctrinal books are often “more helpful in devotion than the devotional books”.
This work goes through every book of the Bible, elaborating on the themes of each book. What is more unusual is that it also explains how each book fits into the rest of the Bible (which often includes how it is used by later books or how it uses earlier books) and the ethics of each book. For example, Judges includes a discussion on the themes of leadership and the unity of Israel (p. 168); the ethics section covers the way the leaders degenerate throughout the book (culminating in Samson breaking all the components of his Nazirite vow); while the canonical section looks at how on the one hand the book picks up the “all Israel” theme of Deuteronomy and on the other hand looks forward to the prophetic hope of the ultimate reunion of north and south (Ezekiel 37), picked up by Jesus’ comments about “other sheep” that must be regathered (John 10:16).
Most distinctive, however, is the emphasis Köstenberger and Goswell give to paratext – everything in our Bibles that is added to the text, such the ordering of biblical books and the book titles. Some readers may not be aware of the variety of book orderings in the New Testament and Köstenberger and Goswell devote a chapter to it, drawing on Goswell’s recent Text and Paratext: Book Order, Title, and Division as Keys to Biblical Interpretation (Lexham Academic, 2022). Both the Codex Vaticanus and the Codex Alexandrinus, for example, put the general epistles (James – Jude) before the Pauline epistles (p. 355).
The conclusion to this book is 76 pages and could almost be a booklet by itself. Köstenberger and Goswell go through dozens of themes in Scripture. They argue that we need to give up trying to make a single theme (such as covenant) do too much work (p. 761). It appears that if they had to pick one pre-eminent theme, it would be love – Köstenberger and Goswell argue that the heart of the entire biblical story is “God’s love for the world, and his desire that those who are his reciprocate his love” (p. 705). I was also intrigued that they included “remembrance” as a biblical theme (p. 724).
Köstenberger and Goswell try to keep their coverage of each biblical book well balanced, but they cannot help emphasize those things in which they are particularly interested. I thought the book was somewhat weak on eschatology: there was no discussion about theories of the Rapture in 1 Thessalonians, or about how to interpret the Book of Revelation. Perhaps this is downplayed because of difference of opinion between the authors. In any case, I would have liked to have seen greater attention given to the way in which the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD casts its shadow over the New Testament.
Although not every reader will read this book right through, it is indispensable as a reference book in that it covers ground – particularly with regards to canon, ethics, and paratext – that are not in any other one-volume work on the whole Bible.
John Dekker obtained his PhD from Christ College, Sydney, under Greg Goswell’s supervision. He is currently pastoring a church in Oregon.