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Mr. Patrick Miller states that Mr. (Rev. Dr. Prof.) Bruggeman is “pre-eminently an Old Testament theologian” who believed that “the Old Testament was a theological document in every sense of the word.” He was able to work between the academic and popular contexts with facility. His work always proceeded from the text. He was influenced by Brevard Childs, that is, the canonical Scriptures had an authority and claim on the lives of those who confessed them.” That sounds a tad bit circular and tautological.
Mr. Brueggeman claims that the “organization of Old Testament theology is quite open and unresolved” (1) now that Misters Eichrodt and Gerhard Von Rad have “now been found wanting.” What does that mean? What happened to all the Germanic assurances of finality?
Mr. Brueggeman postulates a bi-polarity (his words) to the text as outlined by other expositors:
• Westermann’s blessing and deliverance
• Terrian’s aesthetic and ethics
• Hanson’s cosmic and teleological
• Sander’s constructive and critical
• Albertz’s Grosskult and Kleinkult
• Tracy’s manifestation and proclamation
This is it? 20th century expositors? Where's the history of exegesis here? We'll postpone criticisms more largely for the present.
Mr. Brueggeman adopts a middler’s or perhaps an assimilative, syncretistic position between Brevard Childs and Norman Gottwald:
• Childs accepts the Old Testament as canon and canon beyond critical dissection and historical development. The canon is the baseline for narrative theology. That is, the canon above the fray [italics in original]. We get the sense that Mr. Childs simply tired of all the Documentarianisms of J-this-E-that-P-over-there-D-h
• Gottwald views the text as the result of “literary legitimation of a social context.” That is, the canon is the result of the fray [italics in original].
Mr. Brueggeman outlines/asserts some aspects of common theology (his words, "common theology"):
• The Sinaitic covenant was a “tight system of sanctions,” “punishments and rewards,” “blessings and curses” and the authorization of “legal policy”
• The same obtains for the “Deuteronomist theology.” The Chronicler adopts the same perspective: the royal history has the “perspective of Torah obedience and disobedience.” We would add, where are the Edenic, Noahic, Abrahamic and David promises, but we digress?
• According to Mr. Brueggemann, the Prophets adopt the same view of Mosaic severities and order. He claims that the “Prophets are not moral teachers or reformers” (13). No promises? Not moral teachers? Some of the weightiest promises of hope, deliverance, justification and conquest are in the Prophets and receive their fulfillment in David's true and final Son. Let's hope this volume "picks up the step" here. We are not happy thus far.
• According to Mr. Brueggeman, the Wisdom documents reveal the same. Order, coherence, and inflexibility of law provide no exemptions for the wealthy, powerful or the clever. There is no way to circumvent law.
We are not OT scholars, but this has something amiss, but we'll see.
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