Professor Davidson was one of the greatest Old Testament scholars of our generation. His Hebrew Grammar is the best student's manual in the field. His commentaries on Job, Ezekiel, Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah in the Cambridge Bible are masterpieces of exposition. His articles in the Encyclopedia Britannica, in Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible, and in numerous theological and critical reviews are epoch-making contributions to the study of the Old Testament. From his classroom have gone out such famous scholars as Robertson Smith, George Adam Smith, Elmslie, Thomson, and Skinner. To his quiet influence is mainly due the general adoption by the Free Church of Scotland of modern critical views in regard to the Old Testament. It was with great satisfaction, therefore, that we learned a number of years ago that he had promised to write the volume on Old Testament theology in the International Theological Library. We have looked forward eagerly for the appearance of this book, and have anticipated that, when it appeared, it would be the greatest work on the subject in English, or perhaps in any language. When we heard of the author's death in I902, we were grieved to think that this longexpected volume would probably never be finished; but were presently comforted by the news that the manuscript had been left nearly complete and would soon be published under the able editorship of Principal Salmond. Dr. Salmond has at last completed his arduous labor of love in collecting and editing the notes left by his friend, and the result lies before us in this Theology of the Old Testament.' It is a book that one takes up with enthusiastic anticipation of pleasure and profit in reading it, but one lays it down with a keen feeling of disappointment. The material in it may all be Davidson's, but we miss the masterly power of co-ordination that is seen in his earlier writings. Apparently his notes were left in a scattered, fragmentary form, and the editor, who is not an Old Testament critic, was not able to fit them into a consistent

Theology of the Old Testament

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Theology of the Old Testament: testimony, dispute, advocacy

Decolonizing God: The Bible in the Tides of Empire

In the shopping centre : experiments at the limits of ethnography

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Earth and World(s): From Heidegger’s Fourfold to Contemporary Anthropology

Desert Dreamers is full of beautifully told tales of transnational identity negotiations, mainly focussed on Lajamanu—a Warlpiri community born out of forced migration in 1949 and located in the so...

Desert dreamers: with the Warlpiri people of Australia

This essay begins by contrasting the contributions of two leading atheists. Richard Dawkins dismisses the Bible as a disordered and chaotic anthology. Alain Badiou, in contrast, engages it (specifically the writings of Paul) as material that creatively maintains fidelity to revolutionary events. Badiou’s insight is taken here as a prompt to explore the diverse biblical witnesses to creation, which, as in the case of the resurrection, resists conceptual control. The Jewish and Christian traditions of creation theology can thereby offer an opportunity to explore, in the company of atheists, the ambiguities of the biblical canons and the capillaries of their socially formative effects.

Dawkins and Badiou: two atheist approaches to the Bible

This short reflection argues that, in the face of natural crises that occur in the world, responsible Christian speech requires a much fuller and more thickly textured understanding of creation tha...

Creation, God, and the coronavirus

According to P and H, Israelites can in some respects be seen as "sojourners" (גרים) not just in foreign lands but also in the land given to Abraham's seed. As one would expect, Israelites are also viewed as citizens in their own land, yet ironically this is affirmed in H passages such as Lev. 24:22 and Exod. 12:49 which call for equality between natives and immigrants. The paper suggests that P and H are engaged in a debate with the Deuteronomistic traditions about the significance of political sovereignty and citizenship. The priestly writers mimic imperial symbolism and imply that the "many nations" descended from Abraham (Gen. 17:4), and the "assembly of nations" descended from Jacob-Israel (Gen. 35:11), would embody an imperial rather than national sovereignty.

Permutations of Sovereignty in the Priestly Tradition

The essays collected in this volume embrace an impossibly large set of vital questions, and each essay presents very different arguments. This short reflection observes some of the intersections between the various contributions and reflects on questions of academic strategy.

Mark G. Brett

Papers

Desert dreamers: with the Warlpiri people of Australia

Dawkins and Badiou: two atheist approaches to the Bible

Creation, God, and the coronavirus

Permutations of Sovereignty in the Priestly Tradition

Response: Utopian Versus Prophetic Visions