Customer Reviews

New Testament Theology: Many Witnesses, One Gospel

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With the massive amount of religious books being published these days, it would be helpful to know, as a minister, what to buy and what not to buy. This book is a definite buy! It has proven to be helpful to me in my preaching, teaching, and research as I have served as a minister in a local Protestant congregation. I.H. Marshall is one of the best biblical scholars of our time and this is perhaps his magnum opus.

Basically he goes through each section of each document of the New Testament relating to his readers the theological themes found therein. Thus, when preaching or teaching a passage, all you would have to do is open this book up to the appropriate page and get some helpful insights (after you have done the hard work of mulling over the text yourself of course!).

In case you are concerned about the investment, understand two things. Since the author is I.H. Marshall, this book is 1) Evangelical and 2) thoroughly researched.

This is no willy-nilly, off-the-cuff work; it is is a great book and a must have for those who minister in the church!

I. Howard Marshall is one of the most distinguished evangelical New Testament scholars of the past twenty-five years. And the adjective "evangelical" is not necessary to make that statement true: he stands tall in any scholarly company. His work has been devoted to the documents of the New Testament, from Luke-Acts to the Pastoral Epistles, with many important works of biblical theology as well. This work, New Testament Theology, is clearly the fruit of his long career.

First, a word about general format. Marshall begins with an introduction about the nature of New Testament theology. He then proceeds systematically through the documents of the New Testament, with periodic breaks for synthesis and comparison. He sums up the theology of the Synoptics and Acts, for example, before proceeding to Paul, and after discussing the Pauline corpus document by document, he synthesizes Paul's letters and then proceeds to carefully compare the theology of Paul's letters to the theology of the synoptics and Acts, and so on throughout the collections of literature that make up the New Testament. In each book, Marshall begins with some introductory comments about the book, it's setting, authorship, etc. He then tells the "theological story" of the book by moving chunk by chunk through each book, dealing with the major teaching units and their content. After moving through the book this way, he synthesizes the theology by approaching the book's content in a more theologically organized way, looking at things like "God the Father" or "Spiritual Gifts" or the like. This allows the book's theology to speak to itself, but also helps the book's theology to speak toward the categories of systematics and helps piece together an author's theological perspective.

I have really enjoyed reading this book, and though I haven't yet read it cover to cover, everything I've read has been well informed and uniformly excellent. I have also really enjoyed his synthesis and comparison articles, such as the article dealing with the synoptics and acts in relation to Paul, which help to explore some of the really important and pressing issues that are often so formative to a New Testament theology. I also really enjoyed his article on the theology of the Pauline letters. His synthesis was concise and clear, bringing out important themes. He is certainly conversant in the latest developments in Pauline studies, but defends a very balanced approach. He also deals delicately but effectively with the "authorship" questions by synthesizing Paul's earlier theology of the undisputed letters and then discussing the data from the disputed (and almost uniformly considered to be later if genuine) epistles in relation to this basic formulation. This allows the later letters to modify and support the undisputed letters without making authorship a stumbling block to the whole enterprise.

In short, this is a great book that I highly recommend. Marshall's writing is clear and learned, and this book has proven to be both good reading and an essential reference work.

I. Howard Marshall is the Honorary Research Professor of New Testament at the University of Aberdeen. His other publications include commentaries on Acts (TNTC), 1 Peter (IVPNTC), John (NICNT), and Luke (NIGTC).

The number and quality of the New Testament theologies in print at present require any new volume to not only be excellent but also set itself off from the others. Some of the best current NTTs include Dunn, Schreiner (abridgment), Thielman and the classics Ladd and Guthrie. If there is anyone who can add a worthwhile contribution to this list it would be Marshall.

Marshal writes with a canonical approach, treating each of NT documents individually. The book is sectioned into corpora: "Jesus, the Synoptic Gospels and Acts", "The Pauline Letters", "The Johannine Literature", and "Hebrews, James, 1-2 Peter and Jude". In addition there is an "Introduction" where Marshall argues for his methodology and approach, where he especially refutes Raisanen. Here he states that this volume is an attempt "to explore the New Testament writers developing understanding of God and the world". Finally there is a "Conclusion" discussing the unity and diversity in the NT.

The chapters start with short introduction to the book, a discussion through the content of the book, a discussion of the theological themes in the book and quite a good bibliography. The strongest chapters are those in the Gospels and the Pastorals, which is to be expected from Marshall. Like many in recent years, Marshall states in the introduction that he sees the main theme of the New Testament is the inclusion of the Church in God's mission through Jesus. He then makes comments throughout the text of each chapter of how the document provided a contribution to this theme. While this is a worthwhile pursuit, it seems that sometimes Marshall forces some of his connections here.

The greatest strength of this volume, besides the wealth of Marshall's NT knowledge from a lifetime of study and devotion to the New Testament, is his continual interaction with many specialized and recently released works where he sees great promise or agreement. It is clear that Marshall is involved and up to date on nearly all the major issues in New Testament theology. The writing quality, depth of information and theological analysis makes Marshall's New Testament Theology, in my opinion, the best canonical approach volume of NTT. Paired with Ladd for some more synthesis, you would have the best textbook set for a New Testament theology course.

This is one of the finest treatments on New Testament Theology. It finds a nice balance between the themes of the individual authors/books and the overriding themes of The Author and His Themes. It ranks as one of the premier books along side Thomas Schreiner's NT Theology: Magnifying God in Christ. I recommend reading both books as the address the topic from two different ways of understanding and organizing the thoughts/themes that run throughout the New Testament.

This is our text book, I found it very well written and easy to read.

i think this book should be called a book on themes instead of theology. Marshall spends majority of his time on the thematic aspect of the New Testament and the words used by him are engrossed in his own theology of Arminianism. However, they are very insightful and he clearly illustrates the themes in such a way that helps you remember the books more easy

Marshall is a well recognized scholar. His Theology will be something I turn to again and again. In a world with so many divergent views, it is nice to find someone who writes and thinks so close to the way I do.

TNIV? What were you thinking choosing the most unacademic translation available for an academic publication? It is a shame b/c it limits the reading audience for this publication and reflects poorly on the author.