Reading the Old Testament: An Introductory Textbook
Reading the Old Testament: An Introductory Textbook
Project Summary
This book is a new edition of a well-known introduction to the Old Testament, written by Larry Boadt and later revised and updated by my teachers, Richard Clifford and Dan Harrington. Paulist Press has asked me to write a new Reading the Old Testament from scratch, and I'm enjoying the opportunity to write this new introductory textbook.
Audience
Undergraduate and graduate students who are reading the Old Testament for the first time. The book presupposes no prior knowledge, so I hope it will also be read by popular audiences.
Why conduct this research?
Having recently completed a research book, I was interested to write something in a more popular key, so the timing of this opportunity with Paulist Press was perfect. Like many professors who teach an introductory course in the Old Testament, I have had a hard time finding a textbook that works well with the course as I teach it. So I thought I would write one myself, and I hope others will find it a helpful guide through the Old Testament.
This book avoids two things that annoy me in most introductions to the Old Testament: too much background and too much plot summary of the text. As the title Reading the Old Testament indicates, my book is meant to be a companion for actually reading the Old Testament. Books with too much background or summary often become substitutes for reading the biblical text itself. The goal of Reading the Old Testament is to draw readers more deeply into an encounter with the literary and theological artistry of the Old Testament.