1-Handbook on the Historical Books:
Joshua, Judges, Ruth, Samuel, Kings, Chronicles, Ezra-Nehemiah, Esther
Victor P. Hamilton
Product Details Hardcover: 557 pages ; Dimensions (in inches): 1.42 x 9.26 x 6.42
Publisher: Baker Academic; (August 1, 2001)
ISBN: 0801022576
From the Back Cover
"Issues of 'history' swirl notoriously all around Old Testament studies, highly subjective judgments made in the sober name of critical objectivity. In the midst of the acrimonious swirl, Hamilton cautiously, carefully, and judiciously works his way through the so-called history books of the Old Testament. Hamilton knows all about current scholarly issues, but is more interested in the text itself, the way it works, and the way the past is rendered imaginatively. As a consequence, students will find here a clear guide in considering the detail and claim of the text itself, at least for now not needing to engage the scholarly debates that focus outside the text and outside its claims." -Walter Brueggemann, Columbia Theological Seminary
"This highly readable handbook combines clear exposition with an informed synthesis of scholarship-truly the work of a master teacher! Hamilton presents narrative summaries of the historical books that seamlessly integrate historical, compositional, and literary analysis. Students at all levels will find it to be an excellent guide to the biblical text and to the issues that lie at the heart of scholarly discussion." -L. Daniel Hawk, Ashland Theological Seminary
"The many who have appreciated Victor Hamilton's Handbook on the Pentateuch will be glad to learn that he has turned his attention to the historical books of the Hebrew Bible. Like his previous volume, Handbook on the Historical Books manages to steer between the oversimplified approaches found in many evangelical texts and the complex and speculative theories found in many critical studies of Hebrew historiography. The book gives proper attention to interpretive and critical issues, but this does not obfuscate Hamilton's thorough exposition of the ideology, theology, and content of these ancient Israelite histories. Like Handbook on the Pentateuch, this volume is destined to become a standard evangelical introductory text." -Kent Sparks, Eastern College
About the Author
Victor P. Hamilton (Ph.D.,Brandeis University) is professor of Bible and Theology at Asbury College where he has taught for thirty years. His works include Genesis (2 volumes, NICOT) and Handbook on the Pentateuch.
Book Description
From the tumbling walls ofJericho to a Jewish girl who became the queen of Persia, the historical books of the Bible are intriguing and unquestionably fascinating. In this companion volume to his Handbook on the Pentateuch, veteran Old Testament professor Victor Hamilton demonstrates the significance of the messages contained in these biblical books.
To do so, Hamilton carefully examines content, structure, and theology using rhetorical criticism, inductive Bible study techniques, published scholarship, archaeological data, word studies, and text-critical evidence. Hamilton details the events and implications of each book chapter by chapter, providing useful commentary on overarching themes and the connections and parallels between Old Testament texts. Using theological and literary analysis, this comprehensive introduction examines historical issues, attempting to uncover and discover their thrust and theological messages. For those who wish to do additional research, each chapter is appended with a bibliography of recent, relevant scholarship.
Undergraduate students of advanced biblical studies will find this volume enlightening and helpful as they forge their way through the historical books, and pastors will find useful insight for their encounter with and exposition of this portion of Scripture.
2-The Mammoth Book of Eyewitness Britain:
Eyewitness Accounts of Great Historical Moments from 55 B.C. to A.D. 2000
Jon E. LewisBook Description
Beginning with the Roman invasion of Britain in 55 B.C., as seen through the eyes of Julius Caesar, and ending at the dawn of the third millennium, this new Mammoth volume heightens major events in three thousand years of British history with the immediacy of vivid firsthand accounts that have been culled from memoirs, diaries, letters, and newspaper reports of people who were there. So it is that William of Poitiers recounts the Battle of Hastings, where in 1066 King Harold got it in the eye, while Edward Grim recalls the murder of the Archbishop of Canterbury Thomas a Becket. So, too, Samuel Pepys describes the Great Fire of London; Friedrich Engels the slums ofManchester; Charlotte Bronte the Great Exhibition of 1851; Virginia Woolf the Blitz; and Edmund Hillary the conquest of Everest. This collection of eyewitness accounts not only chronicles such critical historical moments as the defeat of the Spanish Armada, the execution of Charles I,Wellington's triumph at Waterloo, and the resignation of Margaret Thatcher. It also provides vignettes of British social life like cockfighting in Tudor inns and a Victorian Sunday in the country as well as cultural milestones like the first concert of the Sex Pistols. From the discovery ofVirginia to the invasion of the Beatles, from the execution of Mary Queen of Scots to the tragic death of Princess Diana, here is brutal, dynamic, glorious, decadent, insular, powerful, splendid Britannia through the ages.
