The Triune Story: Collected Essays on Scripture

by Robert W. Jenson, Brad East (Editor), Bruce D Marshall (Foreword)

At the time of his death in the autumn of 2017, Robert W. Jenson was arguably America's foremost theologian. Over the course of a career spanning more than five decades, much of Jenson's thought was dedicated to the theological description of how Scripture should be read-what has come to be called theological interpretation. In this rapidly expanding field of scholarship, Jenson has had an inordinate impact.

Despite its importance, study of Jenson's theology of scriptural interpretation has lagged, due in large part to the longevity of his career and volume of his output. In this book, all of Jenson's writings on Scripture and its interpretation have been collected for the first time. Here readers will be able to see the evolution of Jenson's thought on this topic, as well as the scope and intensity of his late-period engagement with it. Where other twentieth-century thinkers rely on non-theological, secular methods of scriptural investigation, Jenson is willing to let go of "respectability" for the sake of a truly Christian theological interpretation. The result is a genuinely free, intellectually invigorating exercise in reading and theory from one of the greatest theologians in the last century.

376 pages, Hardcover

Published July 17, 2019

About the author

Robert W. Jenson was a student of Barth's theology for many years, and his doctoral dissertation at the University of Heidelberg earned Barth’s approval as an interpretation of his writings. A native of Wisconsin, Dr. Jenson attended Luther College in Iowa and Luther Theological Seminary in Saint Paul, Minnesota, before studying at Heidelberg where he was awarded his Doctor of Theology, summa cum laude. After doing graduate work at the University of Basel he returned to the United States. He taught theology for many years at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg and St. Olaf College. Dr. Jenson also served as Senior Scholar for Research at the Center of Theological Inquiry, Princeton, NJ. He died in 2017.

Reviews

[Christopher Gow · Rating 5 out of 5]

I don't think I've ever read anything like this:
Imagine if you really believed that God interacts with humans in the world--That God chooses to live His own life as character in history--that He really spoke and speaks through prophets--that the Inspiration of scripture was a triune project. How would it change the way you think about/read scripture?

Jenson absolutely incredible -- His thinking opened new possibilities for how to think about God and Scripture and The Church and I am certain that his work will forever shape my thinking.

He is somehow imaginative, nuanced, hard-hitting, and faithful all at the same time.

That said, this is not an easy read - it took me a longer to read this than all the LOTR books, it feels waay longer than 350 pages. Because it is a collection of essays, he repeats his ideas a fair amount and some of the essays even address very similar topics. So, I probably will never read it all the way through again, but I will definitely refer to it as a resource.

THAT said, I highly recommend Jenson's work: though I haven't read enough of it to know which is the best introduction. More to come.

[Cameron Combs · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the very best books I’ve read in some time. I want to read Scripture like him when I grow up.