Comments on: Making Wise the Simple http://bluecord.org/biblioblog/2006/11/making-wise-the-simple/ A biblioblog Fri, 25 Jul 2008 05:05:06 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.5 By: Kevin A. Wilson http://bluecord.org/biblioblog/2006/11/making-wise-the-simple/#comment-2329 Kevin A. Wilson Tue, 28 Nov 2006 06:44:59 +0000 http://bluecord.org/biblioblog/2006/11/making-wise-the-simple/#comment-2329 Thanks for your comments, Chris. It is good to hear a review from someone who has actually used it in class. You touched on some of the points that I had noticed but didn't write up in the review, such as her treatment of slavery. Overall I think it is a good book, but I wouldn't recommend it as a stand-alone textbook for a class. Thanks for your comments, Chris. It is good to hear a review from someone who has actually used it in class. You touched on some of the points that I had noticed but didn’t write up in the review, such as her treatment of slavery. Overall I think it is a good book, but I wouldn’t recommend it as a stand-alone textbook for a class.

]]> By: Christopher Heard http://bluecord.org/biblioblog/2006/11/making-wise-the-simple/#comment-2324 Christopher Heard Mon, 27 Nov 2006 22:54:33 +0000 http://bluecord.org/biblioblog/2006/11/making-wise-the-simple/#comment-2324 I am just finishing up a semester of using <em>Making Wise the Simple</em> in a Pentateuch course for undergraduates and graduate students. I have mixed feelings about the book. I chose it as the main textbook in the course because Van Wijk-Bos tries to integrate both academic study of the Torah and theological reflection on the Torah, from a Christian point of view—exactly the sort of thing my students need. However, I now wish that Van Wijk-Bos had provided <em>more</em> of an overview, and had given more "airtime" to themes other than "preference for the poor." I'm not convinced that her treatments of other themes, and of problems like the fact that the Torah itself presupposes and even advocates slavery, are really quite adequate for what I want a textbook to do for a course. I would definitely rate it as "above average," but not as "excellent," for my purposes as in a university classroom. I guess my biggest complaint was that by the end of the book you suspect that Van Wijk-Bos can only sound one or two notes (this is not fair to the full range of her publishing, but represents the specific phenomenon of this book). Kevin has already pointed out a couple of problems with Van Wijk-Bos's translations, the biggest being that they are sometimes so unusually cadenced that they actually interfere with the point she is trying to make due to distraction. Also of interest is the way that Van Wijk-Bos identifies certain principles in the Torah as what she calls "outer markers," and then uses these "outer markers" to argue for moral/ethical stances precisely <em>opposite</em> of those actually taken in the Torah itself. My review would therefore have to be "mixed." Good points, weaker points. I am just finishing up a semester of using Making Wise the Simple in a Pentateuch course for undergraduates and graduate students. I have mixed feelings about the book. I chose it as the main textbook in the course because Van Wijk-Bos tries to integrate both academic study of the Torah and theological reflection on the Torah, from a Christian point of view—exactly the sort of thing my students need.

However, I now wish that Van Wijk-Bos had provided more of an overview, and had given more “airtime” to themes other than “preference for the poor.” I’m not convinced that her treatments of other themes, and of problems like the fact that the Torah itself presupposes and even advocates slavery, are really quite adequate for what I want a textbook to do for a course. I would definitely rate it as “above average,” but not as “excellent,” for my purposes as in a university classroom. I guess my biggest complaint was that by the end of the book you suspect that Van Wijk-Bos can only sound one or two notes (this is not fair to the full range of her publishing, but represents the specific phenomenon of this book).

Kevin has already pointed out a couple of problems with Van Wijk-Bos’s translations, the biggest being that they are sometimes so unusually cadenced that they actually interfere with the point she is trying to make due to distraction. Also of interest is the way that Van Wijk-Bos identifies certain principles in the Torah as what she calls “outer markers,” and then uses these “outer markers” to argue for moral/ethical stances precisely opposite of those actually taken in the Torah itself.

My review would therefore have to be “mixed.” Good points, weaker points.

]]> By: dave beldman http://bluecord.org/biblioblog/2006/11/making-wise-the-simple/#comment-2320 dave beldman Mon, 27 Nov 2006 19:06:13 +0000 http://bluecord.org/biblioblog/2006/11/making-wise-the-simple/#comment-2320 Thanks for the info on your book. As the project is due tomorrow I won’t have time to utilize it for this study but I am curious if you deal with the Torah Psalms? McCann and others argue that by introducing the Psalter with a Torah Psalm and by structuring it into five books the editor meant to convey something, namely the Psalter is also torah. Any thoughts from an OT scholar? Thanks for the info on your book. As the project is due tomorrow I won’t have time to utilize it for this study but I am curious if you deal with the Torah Psalms? McCann and others argue that by introducing the Psalter with a Torah Psalm and by structuring it into five books the editor meant to convey something, namely the Psalter is also torah.
Any thoughts from an OT scholar?

]]> By: dave beldman http://bluecord.org/biblioblog/2006/11/making-wise-the-simple/#comment-2314 dave beldman Mon, 27 Nov 2006 13:26:01 +0000 http://bluecord.org/biblioblog/2006/11/making-wise-the-simple/#comment-2314 Interesting. Her title must be an allusion to Ps. 19. I happen to be in the middle of working on a 5-6 week bible study booklet on the Torah Psalms for a class on preaching the Psalms. One of the assumptions of the study is that Torah is important for Christians, and that by shaping the Psalter as he/she did, the editor was making the point that the Psalter is to be understood as torah (i.e. instruction). I guess the most difficult thing is understanding how (or if) we ought to appropriate torah this side of the cross. Christ makes plain that he is not doing away with the law, probably no one would deny that we must still be instructed by God. But many Christians read Paul as saying that the law is no longer necessary and only leads to death. Anyway, thanks for the post. Interesting. Her title must be an allusion to Ps. 19.
I happen to be in the middle of working on a 5-6 week bible study booklet on the Torah Psalms for a class on preaching the Psalms. One of the assumptions of the study is that Torah is important for Christians, and that by shaping the Psalter as he/she did, the editor was making the point that the Psalter is to be understood as torah (i.e. instruction). I guess the most difficult thing is understanding how (or if) we ought to appropriate torah this side of the cross. Christ makes plain that he is not doing away with the law, probably no one would deny that we must still be instructed by God. But many Christians read Paul as saying that the law is no longer necessary and only leads to death.
Anyway, thanks for the post.

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