The Daily Hatch

_____________

NEW AMERICAN COMMENTARY (GENESIS 1-11) by Kenneth A. Mathews. Nashville, TN: Broadman and Holman Publishers, 1996. 528 pages, index. Hardcover; $34.99.

Mathews is professor of Old Testament at Beeson Divinity School, Samford University. He is an acknowledged expert in the Dead Sea scrolls, text criticism, biblical Hebrew, and the literary study of the Old Testament, having written or edited books and articles in these areas.

His commentary on Genesis 1-11 thoroughly covers foundational doctrines. The freewill of man (pp. 211-12), the explanation of evil (pp. 226-31), and the divine model for marriage (pp. 222-25) are all dealt with in detail. Moreover, Mathews puts special emphasis on explaining what it means to be made in the image of God (pp. 164-75). Later he concludes that Ahuman life must be treated with special caution because it is of singular value as life created in the image of God (p. 402).

Mathews convincingly argues that the biblical flood was worldwide according to the Bible (pp. 365, 380) and that it was not based on other ancient pagan flood myths (pp. 86-100). He explains that these epics differed from the biblical flood story (pp. 339-40) and that the biblical flood story has no chronological inconsistencies (pp. 377, 385, 492).

The issues of creationism and naturalism are covered (pp. 101-7). Mathews points out that Aphilosophical naturalism denies the existence of God, while methodological naturalism, though not explicitly rejecting deity, excludes God in developing a theory of the universal process (p. 102). He shows that creationists have their different views too, but the disagreement is Anot about who? but about how? and how long? and when? (pp. 106-7). Mathews cites the works of J. P. Moreland, Phillip Johnson, K. P. Wise, Henry Morris, John Whitcomb, Hugh Ross, H. J. Van Till, Bernard Ramm, W. L. Bradley, and C. B. Thaxton.

Mathews spends a good deal of time discussing the documentary hypothesis and the historical-critical approach that many modern scholars use when examining the pentateuchal witness (pp. 63-85, 353-56, 377, 435-36). Mathews disagrees with the critical approach, and he gives some evidence that seems to nullify the liberal view that the Pentateuch was written during the first millennium B.C. The literary evidence indicates a much earlier date of authorship. Mathews observes:

Several lines of internal evidence, while unable to prove traditional Mosaic authorship, indicate the concurrence of a second millennium date, such as the antiquity of Deuteronomy’s literary structure having similarity to international treaty formulas of the Late Bronze Age (p. 79).

Mathews is not alone in this view. He cites the works of other scholars such as M. G. Kline, P. C. Craigie, E. Merrill, P. J. Wiseman, D. J. Wiseman, G. C. Aalders, G. Archer, R. K. Harrison, K. A. Kitchen, O. T. Allis, E. J. Young, I. Abrahams, M. H. Segal, and B. Jacob (p. 79). Furthermore, Mathews notes:

The names of the coalition of kings in Genesis 14 and the political circumstances accord well with what we know of this early period. The author was an eyewitness of the events in Exodus Deuteronomy and was well acquainted with Egyptian language and geography. Egyptian loanwords from the second millennium are found in Hebrew (p. 79).

Obviously Mathews has extensive knowledge of ancient Near Eastern languages, literature, and culture. The New American Commentary series is one of the finest on the market today, and Mathews continues the scholarly tradition with his work on the first eleven chapters of Genesis. I highly recommend it to the readers of PSCF.

Reviewed by Everette Hatcher III, P.O. Box 23416, Little Rock, AR 72221.

Related posts:

_________