2 Samuel and Colossians - Brazos Theological Commentary (Brazos Press)

The Brazos Theological Commentary series is an ongoing work by Catholics, Orthodox, and Protestants. The books are being published in no particular order, as far as I can see, and it also seems that they will only address the 66 books from the Protestant Bible and omit what some consider Apocrypha or Deuterocanonical, i.e., Tobit, Judith, etc. That fact is a bit disappointing, but with ecumenical commentaries, it's rare people buy the whole set, and instead pick and choose volumes from people of their faith background, i.e., Catholics will buy Catholic volumes. Today, I will be reviewing the latest two releases in this series 2 Samuel and Colossians.

Fr. Robert Barron, the author of the commentary on 2 Samuel, needs no introduction. He has reached celebrity status in more than the Catholic realm. Through the use of breathtaking videos and popular culture references, he has made the Catholic faith understandable, accessible, and approachable to Catholics and non-Catholics alike. One cannot ignore the fact that he is actually a brilliant theological mind, which he puts on display in this commentary of the often forgotten Old Testament book - 2 Samuel. Fr. Barron's commentary style is not verse-by-verse, where he analyzes every word for meaning. Instead, he focuses on five overall themes found in the book of 2 Samuel and how each chapter displays the particular theme. The themes are as follows:

1. David Comes to Power
2. Priest and King
3. David and Bathsheba
4. A Sword Will Never Leave Your Home
5. Toward the Temple

While reading this commentary, I was enlightened so much on what I had misread or just glossed over in my past reading of 2 Samuel. Fr. Barron does an excellent job of explaining terminology and phraseology that would have been used for the time, and in doing so, the passages actually started to make sense. He also does a nice job of explaining difficult to understand passages. For example, I always wondered why it was such a sin for David to take a census of the people. Fr. Barron explains that it is the act of a tyrannical king looking to reassure himself of his might and power. The most interesting chapter to me was Chapter 11 where David's story completely turned around with Bathsheba. In this chapter, he explains the sin of David and the shrewdness of Bathsheba. In this chapter, I learned that I had been completely blaming David for what happened and painting Bathsheba as innocent victim. This is not the case. The only victim in all of this was Uriah who was everything David should have been.

After reading through this commentary, I have a greater understanding of the book of 2 Samuel. It is not just some dry historical text, but a deep and beautifully written work that touches on the idea of priesthood; kingship; bad fathering and bad kingship; and the noncompetitive transcendence of God. Fr. Barron explains all of this and more in a manner that is appropriately profound yet easily understood. There are Catholic references in this volume as well as patristic references (like St. John Chrysostom), but it is not just a commentary for Catholics. I honestly wish he would have worked on both 1 Samuel and 2 Samuel in this series, but I guess I will have to buy 1 Samuel and see how the style and scholarship compares to this work. If you are looking for an excellent commentary on 2 Samuel, this one is 5 stars!

Colossians is one of St. Paul's shortest Epistles, and it was also written while he was in prison. The general consensus is that he was writing to correct errors found among the converts in the church of Colossae, such as false forms of worship, avoiding certain foods, and mortification of the flesh. Seitz, the commentator argues otherwise. When I received this commentary on Colossians, I was expecting a roughly 100 page book. The book was in fact 200+ pages, and it left me wondering, "How can you write that much on a four chapter book?" For starters, this is a verse-by-verse commentary, and anytime you analyze every verse in a Biblical book, you give yourself room for plenty of words. There are also many excursuses or narrative digressions sprinkled throughout the book. Seitz divides Colossians into the following sections:

1:1-2 Formal Introduction and Salutations
1:3-8 Paul and Associates Give Thanks
1:9-14 Our Prayers for You and Our Common Destiny in Christ
1:15-20 Hymn to Christ from His Scriptures
1:21-29 Christ's Reconciliation and Paul's Vocation
2:1-7 Striving Mightily for You
2:8-23 The So-Called Conflict at Collosae
3:1-17 Putting on the New Life in Christ
3:18-4:1 In Deed
4:2-18 Goodbye

There were two features of this commentary that I found interesting. The first is that Seitz read Colossians in the context of all of St. Paul's Epistles and the entire Canon of Scripture. The other part I found interesting was that Seitz ignored the Colossians heresy and focused instead on this being a shift from Paul the missionary apostle to Paul the letter-writing apostle. The former I greatly appreciated, and the latter I found disappointing. To completely ignore the heresy seems imprudent. This wasn't the best commentary I have read on Colossians, nor was it the best commentary in Brazos' series. If you are looking for a more traditional commentary, look elsewhere. If you are looking for a different perspective on this Biblical book to compare with other commentaries, pick it up. 3.5 stars.

These books were provided to me for free by Brazos Press in exchange for an honest review. If you found these reviews helpful, please click here and/or here and hit Yes!

Luke - Brazos Theological Commentary (Brazos Press)

When it comes to picking which commentaries you follow along with when reading your Bible, you can never be too careful. I have a couple of multi-volume Bible commentaries that I trust:

• Scepter Publishers has the Navarre Bible.
• Ancient Faith Publishing has completed their Orthodox Bible Study Companion Series, but that only covers the New Testament.
• Ignatius Press has had the New Testament completed for some time, and is working their way through the Old Testament slowly but surely.
• Baker Academic has the Catholic Commentary on Sacred Scripture, which is exciting but still not through the New Testament.

Even with these four, I am always on the lookout for more commentaries. Recently I have been introduced to Brazos Theological Commentary. Unlike the commentaries above, Brazos commentaries are not written strictly by Catholics or strictly by Orthodox or strictly by Protestants. I'm not sure how I feel about this, but I am willing to give the series a shot on a book-by-book basis. Today, I will be reviewing their commentary on Luke.

The Brazos commentary on Luke by David Lyle Jeffrey is one of the more recent volumes in this series, but the first one I have had the chance to study and read. I must admit that I have never heard of Dr. Jeffrey, and it was the endorsements of Scott Hahn and Matthew Levering that sold me on this being a worthwhile volume in a series, with which I am unfamiliar. It turns out that Dr. Jeffrey "is known as a medievalist and as a scholar of biblical tradition in Western Literature and art." He is also a professor or literature and humanities at Baylor. This shows in the way he approaches his commentary on Luke.

The first thing I noticed about this commentary is the format. Almost every commentary I own, has the Scriptural text at the top of the page or in a block quote before the commentary. This one does not, so you will need a Bible to reference specific passages when studying with this book.. Dr. Jeffrey opts for three versions of the Bible - King James (KJV), New King James (NKJV), and Revised Standard (RSV). I'm not a fan of the first two, but that's a personal preference. The second thing I noticed was that unlike other commentaries, this isn't a verse-by-verse commentary. I have mixed feelings on this. On the one hand, I'm used to the verse-by-verse format. On the other hand, sometimes you can get lost in the minutia of interpreting each word or each verse that you miss the forest for the trees.

It's hard to fully analyze and review a commentary, so instead of attempting this monumental task, I am just going to talk about one passage in Luke that I always enjoy reading and how Dr. Jeffrey discusses. When it comes to the scene of Gabriel appearing to Zacharias, Dr. Jeffrey points out that Gabriel's name means, "power of God" or "emissary of God." He also points out that he only is mentioned four times in the Bible, but each time it contains a messianic message. He also references places Gabriel appears outside of Scripture like 1st and 2nd Enoch and the Qumran scrolls. He then goes on to compare and contrast Zacharias' doubt with Abraham's doubt and how Abraham was humble and doubting, but Zacharias was more brazen and bold in his unbelief. Dr. Jeffrey calls on many sources in this one passage of Luke, such as St. John Chrysostom and Venerable Bede. He also dissects the language and shows how beautiful in symbolism and wordplay the original Greek is. This plethora of opinions (including Aquinas, Calvin, etc.) and examination of language pervades the entire book and adds a richness to it that other commentaries on Luke do not have.

Despite the unique approach (not form-critical, nor philological, nor verse-by-verse), this was still a solid commentary on the Gospel of Luke. It is clear from reading this commentary that Dr. Jeffrey cares very deeply about this book of the Bible and the message within it. For those unfamiliar with Luke, that message is found in Luke 1:1-2 - "to set forth in order a declaration of those things which are most surely believed among us, even as they delivered them unto us." I cannot say that this will be the primary commentary I reference when reading Luke, it has earned a place on my bookshelf with other commentaries I reference. And I will definitely reference this again and again, especially when the Church's calendar rolls back around to reading primarily from Luke. I look forward to investigating other volumes in this series as well to see if they are just as good or better.

This book was provided to me for free by Brazos Press in exchange for an honest review. If you found this review helpful, please click here and hit Yes!