{"id":4090,"date":"2023-05-01T10:15:08","date_gmt":"2023-05-01T09:15:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thomascreedy.co.uk\/?p=4090"},"modified":"2023-06-16T10:37:17","modified_gmt":"2023-06-16T09:37:17","slug":"book-review-1-chronicles-wbc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thomascreedy.co.uk\/book-review-1-chronicles-wbc\/","title":{"rendered":"Book Review: 1 Chronicles (WBC)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Reviewing commentaries is a tricky business \u2013 particularly for me as a generalist, and an in-publisher editor of commentaries! I tend to offer my review based on the format and content of the volume, and it\u2019s utility or otherwise to preachers and pastors. Occasionally I\u2019ll digress into particularly theological or stylistic quirks.<\/em><\/p>\n

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1 Chronicles is not necessarily a book that is regularly preached, dived into devotionally, or particularly popular. It is not a book I’ve heard described as a favourite by anyone, but it is part of the Bible, God’s authoritiative word, and so it is useful, instructive, and has much to teach us. I found Roddy Braun’s 1987 entry in the Word Biblical Commentary to be a helpful, and surprisingly readable guide in my devotional study of the book. The WBC is somewhat notorious for having a slightly clunky, over-realised and flow-lacking format – even by commentary standards they feel like books that are explicitly\u00a0not<\/strong> designed to be read cover to cover. Normally, this is an irritation, and why my small collection of WBC volumes tends to be used for reference rather than reading! However, due to the text of 1 Chronicles being a blend of genres (genealogies, narrative, psalm, to name just three), this format actually helps to illuminate and open up the text of the book. In this, I think it is fair to say that the author’s aims are met:<\/p>\n

“it is my hope that, if no new ground is broken here, at least a beginning, or a further step, may be taken in understanding Chronicles sympathetically and on its own terms, and a greater appreciation gained of the theological viewpoint of the writer and of the thoroughness, determination, and skill with which he pursued that point<\/em>” (p. ix)<\/p>\n

After around 30 pages of introduction the commentary proper gets going, with a particularly helpful observation on the 9 possible purposes of Old Testament genealogies (p. 3). The commentary proper is workmanlike and readable – in between the unfortunately placed bibliiographic sections – with Braun managing to do both the technical work, and provide useful summaries of sections:<\/p>\n