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The New Interpreter's Bible Commentary - 12 Volume Set #7
New Interpreter's Bible: Introduction to Apocalyptic Literature, Daniel, the Twelve Prophets
Introduction to Apocalyptic Literature; Daniel; THE Twelve Prophets. New Interpreter's(r) Bible offers critically sound biblical interpretations for the 1990s and beyond. Guided by scholars, pastors, and laity representing diverse traditions, academic experience, and involvement in the Church, this entirely new collection of writings is specifically prepared to meet the needs of preachers, teachers, and all students of the Bible. Easy-to-use Format: * Full texts and critical notes: NIV and NRSV * A detailed, critical Commentary providing an exegetical "close-reading" of the biblical text * Reflections that present a detailed exposition of issues raised in the discussion and dealt with in the Commentary Key Features: * The entire Bible (including the Apocrypha Deuterocanonical books) in twelve volumes * Introductions to each book that cover essential historical, sociocultural, literary, and theological issues * An ecumenical roster of contributors * Comprehensive, concise articles * Numerous visual aids (illustrations, maps, charts, timelines) enhance use. Download The NIB Vol. 7 Errata Sheet
- GenresReferenceOld Testament
887 pages, Hardcover
First published November 1, 1996
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August 17, 2025
My impetus for reading this volume was because I recently read a commentary by Sam Frost on Daniel, and I was hoping this commentary would present a fresh perspective. According to the back cover, the NIB is "an invaluable tool for everyone who studies, preaches, and teaches Scripture—including Bible scholars, pastors, Sunday school and Bible school teachers, and interested laypeople." My late father-in -law, Bill Bales, was a deacon in the Episcopal church, and he purchased these volumes, I suppose, to help him prepare sermons. I'm also guessing he found that he wasn’t using them very much, because he passed them on to my brother-in-law, Rusty Bales. I guess Rusty also didn’t find much use for them, because they ended up being passed on to me.
For years I used them only occasionally, looking up a verse here and there to read the attached commentary. Honestly, I almost never found anything worth mentioning or writing into my notes. They were of more value when I did a paper on Gomer (from Hosea) for a class on women in the Hebrew Bible.
I don’t think these books were intended to be read through like a regular book. Like a lot of commentaries, they are most useful as reference books. Pastors may find the reflections at the end of most sections useful for preparing sermons. Some of these reflections touch on contemporary issues. For example, some of these reflections touch on contemporary issues, such as the ones on Hosea that touched on spousal abuse and sexual abuse in the church. Eileen Schuller, O.S.U.'s reflection on Malachi 3.13-4.3 was notable for discussing the use of that passage in the lectionaries. This is the sort of thing that could be useful sermon material.
These commentaries helpfully provide Bible passages in two parallel translations (NIV and NRSV for canonical books, NAB and NRSV for the Apocrypha). My habit has been to read from the NRSV as it provides a more literal translation and is free of the conservative bias evident in some translations, but I found to my surprise in reading these commentaries that I found the NRSV to be more difficult to understand than the NIV. This, I think, is because the NIV strives for more readable prose than the more literal NRSV. So, for example, whereas in Amos 4.6 the NRSV chooses the more literal "cleanness of teeth" (an obscure reference for modern readers), the NIV chooses the clearer "empty stomachs."
These articles generally stayed away from controversies, which was a shame for me (I'm all about stirring the pot). I think the main idea is to provide resources for pastors who are also likely to avoid controversies, at least theological controversies. My impression is that the commentators tended not to be conservative. Many of them made reference to redaction criticism, generally anathema to conservative scholars or at least viewed with distrust. When I looked up Theodore Hiebert, author of the article on Habakkuk and professor at McCormick Theological Seminary, I found that "McCormick Theological Seminary is generally considered a progressive or liberal seminary within the Presbyterian Church (USA)." Hiebert claimed that Habakkuk 2.4 was quoted by Paul without reference to the larger context which would be a startling claim for a conservative to make.
An example of the tendency of these articles to avoid controversies was the opening article on the book of Daniel by Daniel Smith-Christopher, where he makes allusion to the disagreement between conservatives and liberal scholars over the dating of Daniel, but never discusses it or comes down on one side or the other. Other scholars in this volume imply a later dating for Daniel without coming out and saying it. Hiebert, cited above, puts Habakkuk's prediction of Babylon's future action against Judah at 605-604 BC, which of course conflicts with the book of Daniel's claim that Nebuchadnezzar had already taken action against Jerusalem in 605. Ben C. Ollenberger, in his s article on Zechariah, states that Daniel was written after Zechariah, which could have been written no earlier than 520 BC.
My interest in the minor prophets is uneven, but some books stood out for me. Some years ago on a forum about biblical Greek, someone suggested that if one wanted to introduce themselves to the Greek of the Septuagint, a good way to start was to translate the short narrative books of Ruth and Jonah. So of the minor prophets I am most familiar with Jonah because I have translated it from the Greek. I felt Phyllis Trible's article on Jonah was one of the best in the collection and I may check out some of the books referred to in her short bibliography. Every article has a short bibliography at the end of the introductory part of the article; very helpful for those for whom the included commentary is just not enough.
An article that deserves special mention is the one on Zephaniah by Robert A. Bennett. Bennet is member of the Church Black Caucus and has served as a professor of the Old Testament at Episcopal Divinity School, Harvard Divinity School, Princeton Theological Seminary and several others. He has the interesting theory that Zephaniah was biracial based on the fact that his father's name was Cushi, which elsewhere in the Bible refers to the upper Nile region. So to emphasize Zephaniah's suggested ancestry, Bennett typically refers to Zephaniah as Zephaniah ben Cushi. Now this is a nice thought, but it is totally unsupported by any other evidence, and is simply too speculative for me to give it any serious consideration.
I don’t mind having read this volume, but I’m not in its principal audience and I’m unlikely to read another volume straight through like this any time soon. The reflections were for the most part obviously aimed at those who believe that the Bible is the Word of God, which is not me. Occasionally these reflections were refreshingly honest, such as in pointing out the outright cases of ethnocentrism and misogyny in these works (Ollenberger calls Zechariah 5.5-11 outright misogynistic). Still, I’m very happy to have these volumes in my library and will continue to use them for occasionally looking up a verse or chapter. Recently I read the commentary on Tobit and learned some interesting stuff.
For years I used them only occasionally, looking up a verse here and there to read the attached commentary. Honestly, I almost never found anything worth mentioning or writing into my notes. They were of more value when I did a paper on Gomer (from Hosea) for a class on women in the Hebrew Bible.
I don’t think these books were intended to be read through like a regular book. Like a lot of commentaries, they are most useful as reference books. Pastors may find the reflections at the end of most sections useful for preparing sermons. Some of these reflections touch on contemporary issues. For example, some of these reflections touch on contemporary issues, such as the ones on Hosea that touched on spousal abuse and sexual abuse in the church. Eileen Schuller, O.S.U.'s reflection on Malachi 3.13-4.3 was notable for discussing the use of that passage in the lectionaries. This is the sort of thing that could be useful sermon material.
These commentaries helpfully provide Bible passages in two parallel translations (NIV and NRSV for canonical books, NAB and NRSV for the Apocrypha). My habit has been to read from the NRSV as it provides a more literal translation and is free of the conservative bias evident in some translations, but I found to my surprise in reading these commentaries that I found the NRSV to be more difficult to understand than the NIV. This, I think, is because the NIV strives for more readable prose than the more literal NRSV. So, for example, whereas in Amos 4.6 the NRSV chooses the more literal "cleanness of teeth" (an obscure reference for modern readers), the NIV chooses the clearer "empty stomachs."
These articles generally stayed away from controversies, which was a shame for me (I'm all about stirring the pot). I think the main idea is to provide resources for pastors who are also likely to avoid controversies, at least theological controversies. My impression is that the commentators tended not to be conservative. Many of them made reference to redaction criticism, generally anathema to conservative scholars or at least viewed with distrust. When I looked up Theodore Hiebert, author of the article on Habakkuk and professor at McCormick Theological Seminary, I found that "McCormick Theological Seminary is generally considered a progressive or liberal seminary within the Presbyterian Church (USA)." Hiebert claimed that Habakkuk 2.4 was quoted by Paul without reference to the larger context which would be a startling claim for a conservative to make.
An example of the tendency of these articles to avoid controversies was the opening article on the book of Daniel by Daniel Smith-Christopher, where he makes allusion to the disagreement between conservatives and liberal scholars over the dating of Daniel, but never discusses it or comes down on one side or the other. Other scholars in this volume imply a later dating for Daniel without coming out and saying it. Hiebert, cited above, puts Habakkuk's prediction of Babylon's future action against Judah at 605-604 BC, which of course conflicts with the book of Daniel's claim that Nebuchadnezzar had already taken action against Jerusalem in 605. Ben C. Ollenberger, in his s article on Zechariah, states that Daniel was written after Zechariah, which could have been written no earlier than 520 BC.
My interest in the minor prophets is uneven, but some books stood out for me. Some years ago on a forum about biblical Greek, someone suggested that if one wanted to introduce themselves to the Greek of the Septuagint, a good way to start was to translate the short narrative books of Ruth and Jonah. So of the minor prophets I am most familiar with Jonah because I have translated it from the Greek. I felt Phyllis Trible's article on Jonah was one of the best in the collection and I may check out some of the books referred to in her short bibliography. Every article has a short bibliography at the end of the introductory part of the article; very helpful for those for whom the included commentary is just not enough.
An article that deserves special mention is the one on Zephaniah by Robert A. Bennett. Bennet is member of the Church Black Caucus and has served as a professor of the Old Testament at Episcopal Divinity School, Harvard Divinity School, Princeton Theological Seminary and several others. He has the interesting theory that Zephaniah was biracial based on the fact that his father's name was Cushi, which elsewhere in the Bible refers to the upper Nile region. So to emphasize Zephaniah's suggested ancestry, Bennett typically refers to Zephaniah as Zephaniah ben Cushi. Now this is a nice thought, but it is totally unsupported by any other evidence, and is simply too speculative for me to give it any serious consideration.
I don’t mind having read this volume, but I’m not in its principal audience and I’m unlikely to read another volume straight through like this any time soon. The reflections were for the most part obviously aimed at those who believe that the Bible is the Word of God, which is not me. Occasionally these reflections were refreshingly honest, such as in pointing out the outright cases of ethnocentrism and misogyny in these works (Ollenberger calls Zechariah 5.5-11 outright misogynistic). Still, I’m very happy to have these volumes in my library and will continue to use them for occasionally looking up a verse or chapter. Recently I read the commentary on Tobit and learned some interesting stuff.
Displaying 1 of 1 review