Stephen Barkley
Understanding the entire Old Testament is a challenging task for students, made easier with DeRouchie’s What the Old Testament Authors Really Cared About. This glossy 500 page textbook walks students through every book in the Hebrew Bible, organized according to the order of the Tanakh: Torah, Prophets, then Writings.
The charts, images, and maps in this volume are outstanding. Difficult topics like the monarchies of the divided kingdom and the timeline of the prophets (former and latter) are made easier with clearly laid out diagrams.
One of the unique features of this work is their KINGDOM story acronym (58):
- Kickoff and Rebellion
- Instrument of Blessing
- Nation Redeemed and Commissioned
- Government in the Promised Land
- Dispersion and Return
- Overlap of the Ages
- Mission Accomplished
This rubric seeks to describe the entire biblical narrative, including the New Testament (points six and seven). Despite the acronym and corresponding icons, I found this to be forced, oversimplifying the nuance of scripture.
Other areas are shoehorned into artificial categories as well. For example, DeRouchie subsumes the Writings, that diverse collection that includes Job and Lamentations, under the title, “Old Covenant Enjoyed” (52). Enjoyed? Hardly.
The chapters of this volume are all written by conservative men, including some with connections to McArthur’s The Master’s College, so you can expect a very theologically conservative Reformed approach to the text. For me, this narrow approach grew wearisome.
I’ve chosen to replace this textbook with Hill and Walton’s A Survey of the Old Testament. The elevation of historical context, greater orientation toward the Jewish nature of the text, and broader perspective make it a more well rounded text.
DeRouchie, Jason S., ed. What the Old Testament Authors Really Cared About: A Survey of Jesus’ Bible. Kregel Academic, 2013.
