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The Book of Exodus: A Critical, Theological Commentary

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Childs honestly admits that "the purpose of this book is unabashedly theological". As is expected from this author, his aim "is to seek to interpret the book of Exodus as canonical scripture within the theological discipline of the Christian church" (which means, of course, his version of theology). This may disconcert those who do not agree with his precise shade of liberal evangelism, especially in the sections headed "New Testament Context". However, once this hurdle is overcome, this book is packed with useful information. There are few if any thorough textual and philological studies of Exodus, and the notes here are probably the best available on these topics. The sections headed "Literary and Traditio-Historical Analysis" discuss (among other things) the Documentary Hypothesis, but Childs is not overly concerned with this aspect since he is more interested in the canonical form of Exodus. The most valuable parts are the "Old Testament Context", which discuss the meaning of the text and its relationship to the rest of the Old Testament. These sections, plus the extensive textual and philological notes, constitute an excellent commentary on Exodus and fully justify buying this book. The other parts can easily be ignored if you disagree with them.

Childs was the first scholar to attempt to blend the historical-critical approach with attention to the final form of the text. He pays as much attention to the pre-literary theories of the text as well as taking seriously the final form of the text in order to engage the text and its most likely "original" meaning as well as what it means for us today. I also appreciated the fact that he included a section of how the Christian community has throughout the centuries commented on certain texts as well as the usage of certain passages in the New Testament. I found it very helpful and it guides you to further study the sections that we might need to study more extensively. Childs is the first one who attempts to merge serious scholarship along with the Bible's intended purpose within the believing community.

I should say from the start that this is a very good commentary that most readers will find very helpful. It does suffer from the general lack of focus in Childs's canonical method. Because his method includes a review of the history of interpretation of each passage, a canonical commentary on Exodus necessarily includes a discussion of source-criticism, which dominated Exodus scholarship for a century. But this is exactly the kind of atomizing approach which Childs has repudiated. This commentary proves, however, that a critical approach to the book of Exodus simply cannot ignore the features of the text which motivated the source-critics in the first place. A thorough history of interpretation does serve to raise most of the central interpretive issues in each text. Childs is a gifted exegete, however, and even with a fuzzy method the results of his reading of Exodus are impressive. Furthermore, he does place the expected emphasis on theological implications. There is a shortage of critical commentaries on Exodus. Until Propp finishes his second volume, Childs's is probably the second best complete commentary after Durham's.

I purchased this work looking for a preaching aid to help me preach through Exodus. This one left me looking for others. The strength of this work lies in its textual criticism and ancient text use. The weakness of this volume was in helping to pull the major themes from the text and to help build the bridge to today. I had a wonderful time preaching through Exodus, but I found a little volume in the Tyndale OT series by R. Alan Cole to be more helpful than this one. If you are a preacher, keep looking.

I was just looking for a commentary to help me glean a little more meaning out of Exodus. This book seemed to have positive reviews so I picked it up. Unless you are a hard core intellectual Bible scholar (which I am not), I'll admit that getting through this book was a bit like running a marathon. There is no doubt that Brevard Childs was a gifted Bible scholar and intellectual. However, I wasn't looking to dissect every chapter into its theoretical sources and contemplate what the redactor (a word I had to look up) was trying to do when they combined various themes and story lines... Apparently, that is what is meant by "Literary and Traditio-Historical Analysis".
I just wanted to understand God and his plan for Israel a bit better with additional context that can come from a good commentary. I wanted to understand some of the nuances as Moses led Israel out of Egypt. I wanted to be spiritually uplifted which I have found in other commentaries. I am sure that this book is appropriate for someone who is interested in this type of literary analysis of the Bible. However, if you are a "common Christian" looking for depth in meaning of the Exodus rather than analysis, I would steer you elsewhere.
With that said, there were plenty of interesting passages, perspectives, and issues I've never even thought about in terms of how the Bible was put together. But, I'm not sure I got the value of reading through almost 700 pages of this book.