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THE NEW AMERICAN COMMENTARY is for the minister or Bible student who wants to understand and expound the Scriptures. Notable features include:* commentary based on THE NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION;* the NIV text printed in the body of the commentary;* sound scholarly methodology that reflects capable research in the original languages;* interpretation that emphasizes the theological unity of each book and of Scripture as a whole;* readable and applicable exposition.
642 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1993
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
April 13, 2024
This volume (published in 1992) is part of the New American Commentary series on the Bible, under the imprint of Broadman Press, the publishing arm of the Southern Baptist Convention. Like the roughly contemporary New International Biblical Commentary from Hendrickson Publishers, it's based on the New International Version; both series are edited and written by evangelical scholars, and intended for laypersons interested in serious Bible study as well as for preachers and for teachers and students in academia. (Apparently unlike most of the volumes in both series, though, this one treats technical matters in the commentary itself, and uses some technical terms that not all lay readers will be familiar with.) Senior New Testament scholar Robert H. Stein, the author of this book and a number of others, was a major figure in his field (he's now retired); at the time this was written, he was a long-time professor at Bethel Seminary, but subsequently taught for many years at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky.
In this commentary, Stein's focus is on Luke's theological message. So he usually doesn't go into discussions of the historical authenticity of the events Luke records, or the pre-history of the Gospel traditions, though he sometimes touches on these subjects lightly. A short introduction covers such matters as authorship, date, audience, and especially Luke's purposes and themes; it also provides an outline of the third gospel, and a map of New Testament Palestine. The body of the commentary follows the outline, with a short introduction to each major division, the full NIV text of each individual unit, a discussion of its context, phrase-by-phrase comments, and a summary of that unit's message(s). Indexes of persons, Scripture references, and subjects are provided (though that last one is very sketchy, just about a page and a half). There is no bibliography, perhaps because Stein interacts more with the Lukan text itself than with secondary sources. (Some of the footnotes are references to the latter, but most refer to other Bible texts.)
For the most part, the exegesis here is inductive. Where the text itself admits of more than one interpretation, Stein generally lists all the possibilities, and gives contextual or grammatical reasons for his preference. To briefly summarize his treatment of some key passages, he does not see a direct allusion to the year of Jubilee in Luke 4:19; regards the Beatitudes in this gospel as blessings upon believers, not as a list of requirements for becoming a believer; and treats Luke 21:7-24 as referring to the fall of Jerusalem in 70 A.D., not to an eschatological tribulation. His treatment of the parable of the soils in Luke 8:4-15 offers a mediating position on the polarized "eternal security" vs. "conditional security" debate. Those who hold a "conditional immortality" position on individual eschatology will disagree with his view of the parable of Lazarus and the rich man; and his treatment of the parables in Luke 15 would have benefited from Kenneth E. Bailey's Finding the Lost: Cultural Keys to Luke 15 (1992), which was evidently published too close in time to this commentary to allow Stein to use it.
Read from cover to cover, the commentary seems repetitive in places; but the repetitions serve the needs of many commentary users, who only look up treatments of particular passages instead of reading the whole book. At 642 pages (625 of them in the actual text), this is a very substantial and solid commentary, careful, sober and responsible in its treatment of the text. I would have no hesitation in recommending it to any readers wanting to seriously study this particular gospel.
Note: A version of this review first appeared in the January 1995 issue of The Christian Librarian.
In this commentary, Stein's focus is on Luke's theological message. So he usually doesn't go into discussions of the historical authenticity of the events Luke records, or the pre-history of the Gospel traditions, though he sometimes touches on these subjects lightly. A short introduction covers such matters as authorship, date, audience, and especially Luke's purposes and themes; it also provides an outline of the third gospel, and a map of New Testament Palestine. The body of the commentary follows the outline, with a short introduction to each major division, the full NIV text of each individual unit, a discussion of its context, phrase-by-phrase comments, and a summary of that unit's message(s). Indexes of persons, Scripture references, and subjects are provided (though that last one is very sketchy, just about a page and a half). There is no bibliography, perhaps because Stein interacts more with the Lukan text itself than with secondary sources. (Some of the footnotes are references to the latter, but most refer to other Bible texts.)
For the most part, the exegesis here is inductive. Where the text itself admits of more than one interpretation, Stein generally lists all the possibilities, and gives contextual or grammatical reasons for his preference. To briefly summarize his treatment of some key passages, he does not see a direct allusion to the year of Jubilee in Luke 4:19; regards the Beatitudes in this gospel as blessings upon believers, not as a list of requirements for becoming a believer; and treats Luke 21:7-24 as referring to the fall of Jerusalem in 70 A.D., not to an eschatological tribulation. His treatment of the parable of the soils in Luke 8:4-15 offers a mediating position on the polarized "eternal security" vs. "conditional security" debate. Those who hold a "conditional immortality" position on individual eschatology will disagree with his view of the parable of Lazarus and the rich man; and his treatment of the parables in Luke 15 would have benefited from Kenneth E. Bailey's Finding the Lost: Cultural Keys to Luke 15 (1992), which was evidently published too close in time to this commentary to allow Stein to use it.
Read from cover to cover, the commentary seems repetitive in places; but the repetitions serve the needs of many commentary users, who only look up treatments of particular passages instead of reading the whole book. At 642 pages (625 of them in the actual text), this is a very substantial and solid commentary, careful, sober and responsible in its treatment of the text. I would have no hesitation in recommending it to any readers wanting to seriously study this particular gospel.
Note: A version of this review first appeared in the January 1995 issue of The Christian Librarian.
March 6, 2017
Robert Stein has written a quality volume for the New American Commentary series. I have long felt that the NAC series is a top choice for pastors in terms of content and price. Though the volumes are slightly shorter than some of the other exegetical commentary series, the help these volumes provide is still top-notch. This volume on Luke is one of the better volumes in the series.
The Introduction is succinct, power packed, and covers an amazing amount of information in its pages. In just a few pages he covers the authorship of Luke by examining internal evidence, church tradition, and the “we” sections and, to my mind, unanswerably proves that Luke was the author. He surveys well the various opinions on the date of Luke. He reminds us that Acts was never intended to be either Paul or Peter’s biography, but sought to tell the story of taking the gospel to the world. Though such things are highly suspect to me, he covers scholarly opinion on the sources of Luke. Though he finds outlines rather arbitrary, he provided a good one.
I fully agree with his conclusion that the purposes of Luke ought not be pigeonholed into a single purpose. He explains what he believes to be the four main purposes of Luke and provides a great deal of detail in explaining his case. I thought it was effective. His section on the theological emphases in Luke was also highly suggestive. By the time you get to the fine map that ends the Introduction, you may feel as I did that it was the kind of Introduction that really helps a pastor.
I found help in the many passages I reviewed in this volume. He was never trite, and he provides real assistance to one who preaches the Gospel of Luke. I highly recommend this volume to all my fellow pastors out there. You won’t be disappointed.
I received this book free from the publisher. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255.
The Introduction is succinct, power packed, and covers an amazing amount of information in its pages. In just a few pages he covers the authorship of Luke by examining internal evidence, church tradition, and the “we” sections and, to my mind, unanswerably proves that Luke was the author. He surveys well the various opinions on the date of Luke. He reminds us that Acts was never intended to be either Paul or Peter’s biography, but sought to tell the story of taking the gospel to the world. Though such things are highly suspect to me, he covers scholarly opinion on the sources of Luke. Though he finds outlines rather arbitrary, he provided a good one.
I fully agree with his conclusion that the purposes of Luke ought not be pigeonholed into a single purpose. He explains what he believes to be the four main purposes of Luke and provides a great deal of detail in explaining his case. I thought it was effective. His section on the theological emphases in Luke was also highly suggestive. By the time you get to the fine map that ends the Introduction, you may feel as I did that it was the kind of Introduction that really helps a pastor.
I found help in the many passages I reviewed in this volume. He was never trite, and he provides real assistance to one who preaches the Gospel of Luke. I highly recommend this volume to all my fellow pastors out there. You won’t be disappointed.
I received this book free from the publisher. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255.
December 28, 2014
Не лош, доста обемист коментар съдържащ някои интересни бележки. като цяло - нищо необикновено въпреки високата оценка дадена в www.bestcommentaries.com
January 7, 2020
Gotta be Honest. I actually didn't finish the book. But I read over 800 pages of this thing. So, I have decided to put it down and read something else for the time being.
July 5, 2024
Honestly, the least theologically dense and/or rich one we (Tommy and I read this together) have read in the series yet.
November 11, 2015
Not a bad commentary, but not a great one either. There's little depth or detail here. This might be a good option for a layperson teaching a Sunday school class or a Bible study, but not very useful for the preacher.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews