Review: Ancient Near Eastern Themes in Biblical Theology

Jeffrey Jay Niehaus. Ancient Near Eastern Themes in Biblical Theology.  Grand Rapids: Kregel Publications, March 13, 2008. 208 pp.

5 out of 5

Purchase: Amazon

Have you ever wonder how the Ancient Near East contribute towards our understanding of the Bible?  There’s of course books out there that have used Ancient Near East primary sources to question the veracity of the Bible and biblical doctrines so I understand when Christians are cautious with books on this topic.  This book not only still hold a high view of the Bible but I think this book makes a unique contribution in bringing the fruit of Ancient Near East research and unified it as one coherent Biblical theology rather than various assorted unrelated fact.  This book impressed me beyond my expectation and I’m glad a fellow blogger and friend Mandy Sweigart recommended me to read this!

After the preface the book consists of seven chapters and a conclusion.  Chapter one dealt with the foundational issue of how the Ancient Near East extra-biblical literature relate to the Bible.  I enjoyed the author’ survey of historical approaches to this question and he surveys two approaches to comparative method in biblical studies before arguing for his view that these parallels with Ancient Near East and the Bible is God’s common grace to give conceptual framework to understand God’s Truth.  What I appreciate is the author didn’t just take it for granted of “trusting the experts” in this area but in this first chapter he also refute those who have wrongly interpreted Ancient Near East data and its relations to the Word of God.  Chapter two onwards then explore various motifs found in Ancient Near Eastern sources that contribute to our understanding of the Bible’s use of these motifs.  These include the Royal Shepherd motif discussed in chapter two, then in chapter three it covers “Covenant and Conquest.” Chapter four is on “City, Temple, Image” and the following chapter continue looking at the City and Temple motif but now specifically with the theme of Divine abandonment and restoration.  Chapter six is on the Covenantal Household’s destruction and salvation and the final chapter is on the restoration of all things.
I learned a lot from this book.  For instance I always wondered what were Egyptians’ understanding of Pharaoh and their gods and whether or not the Egyptians thought of their king as Divine.  The book answers that with their complex theology and also developments.  I also appreciate the many parallels and contrasts between Ancient Near East motif and Biblical motif.  For example the Assyrians saw that it was important for their kings to be great hunters as we gleam from their surviving records.  David as King can be seen as paralleling that.  Later in the New Testament we do see Satan being described in 1 Peter 5:8 as a roaring lion but Jesus crushes Satan as the Hunter-Shepherd King!  There’s instances reading this book made me pay closer attention to the Old Testament itself such as the author’s discussion about 2 Kings 17:24-28 where the Assyrian king after capturing Israel’s territory nevertheless sent a Jewish priest back to Samaria so the Assyrians residing there will live properly and disrespect Yahweh.  The fact that the narrative describe this with no hesitation on the part of the king shows an understanding that a nation’s deity operates in the locale; of course there is only one God in Biblical Theology but here it does show God is not to be trifled with.  The discussion of divine abandonment is also important here to understand God’s discipline of Israel and Judah for their idolatry.  There’s so much more knowledge one gain from this book that it is worth purchasing.  In fact even after finishing this I am keeping in mind of this as a reference for future Bible studies and sermons in which I can bring out some of the arguments and citation of primary sources that enrich one’s understanding of a biblical motif.  So not only was I excited to read this book, and excited during my reading but I’m still excited after I read this book to use as resource!

I admit I have not heard of the author previously before and I did notice his PhD is from Harvard and he’s manage to be the best of both worlds in which he is scholarly informative and biblical.  The amount of primary sources he cited and quoted is incredible for a book that is 208 pages: I counted 498 footnotes!  What’s even more incredible is his citation comes from Egyptian, Sumerian, Assyrian and Babylonian primary sources (and also the occasional important secondary scholarly sources) which involves knowing different languages over a wide span of time but familiarity of what these literature is talking about.  Incredible.  And yet he wrote this in a way that’s accessible for the general Christian reader.  One get a deeper appreciation of not only the Bible but God’s accommodation for our understanding of the Word of God.  Even if you don’t plan to read this book yourself I do think this book makes a great gift idea for Pastors, Sunday school teachers, Bible study leaders, seminarians, etc.  I suppose the best compliment I can give to this book is that I do want to read other works by this author in the future.

NOTE: This book was provided to me free by Kregel Publications without any obligation for a positive review. All opinions offered above are mine unless otherwise stated or implied.

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