What a fascinating little book! Originally published in 1977, The Bible Makes Sense is a primer for interpreting the Bible that takes the hermeneutical task seriously. In the first chapter, Brueggemann surveys a number of approaches to Biblical interpretation, asking the reader to think through their presuppositions and embrace a sacred text that “does not accommodate our conventional language, images, or presuppositions” (11).

Brueggemann invites readers to understand scripture as literature, in all its narrative glory. This method eschews the demythologization of modernism and allows the Bible to speak. This way of reading reminds me of what T. F. Torrance would call a scientific reading of the text—allowing the text to set the categories and the agenda.

It is not helpful to try to impose on the literature an order that reflects modern scientific understandings. As much as we are able, we can try to read the Bible like insiders and let the material itself determine the order for us. (23)

This insistence on reading the Bible as an insider highlights the wordplay in the title. On the surface, it’s intended to reassure new readers that the Bible really does cohere. In another sense, Brueggemann intends to say that the Bible creates meaning. It makes sense.

The Bible Makes Sense is still worth reading today, especially for philosophically astute readers interested in exploring the grandest narrative of all.

Brueggemann, Walter. The Bible Makes Sense. Revised ed. Westminster John Knox Press, 2001.