Tag Archives: ethics

Portrait of a Disgruntled Prophet

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I have just submitted the completed manuscript of my book on the story of Samuel (the prophet) and Saul (Israel’s first king) to the publisher (Eerdmans). It covers 1 Samuel 1–15, with a coda on the anointing of David at the start of chapter 16 (which is Samuel’s last significant act).

The current title is Portrait of a Disgruntled Prophet: Samuel’s Resistance to God and the Undoing of Saul (at least, that’s my preferred title; publishers often suggest something different from what authors want).

When I signed the contract, my original title was Portrait of the Prophet as a Crotchety Old Man (a take-off on A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce). But as I’ve reflected on this, and tested that title with others, I’ve come to realize that it’s a bit off-putting. Almost everyone I spoke to preferred (and actually liked) the new title.

The Book Came from My Teaching

The book has a long history.

I started working on 1 and 2 Samuel soon after I began my full-time tenure-track faculty career. I initially taught graduate seminar courses on Samuel at Colgate Rochester Crozer Divinity School (1997–2001) and then advanced undergraduate seminars at Roberts Wesleyan University (2002–2011). These seminars were amazing learning experiences both for me and my students; my students were especially helpful in raising ethical questions about the characterization of God, Samuel, Saul, and David in the text.

In more recent years (since 2011) I taught a more focused exegesis course on 1 Samuel at Northeastern Seminary, where we were able to slow down even more to attend to the details of the text. I was thus able to further develop my understanding of Samuel’s role in the demise of Saul.

I wrote a couple of chapters on the Hannah story (1 Samuel 1–2) long ago (while I was teaching at Colgate Rochester); then I published some essays on 1 Samuel, which were expansions of paper presentations I gave at conferences. Some sections of these essays have found their way into the book.

A Long Time Coming

But I got more serious about the writing when I signed a contract with Eerdmans back in 2016. An Eerdmans acquisitions editor approached me at the 2015 Society of Biblical Literature annual meeting to ask if there was a book I would like to write for them. So I submitted the proposal and got the contract.

Initially, I thought (very optimistically) that I could finish the book in a few years (I suggested 2019). However, I had just signed a contract with Baker Academic (in 2015) to write the book that eventually became Abraham’s Silence (published in 2021). That, plus the busyness of teaching (and some health problems in 2023), significantly delayed the Samuel book.

When I retired from my faculty position at Northeastern Seminary in 2024, I really got down to writing. I completed the bulk of the book in the past two years.

Did I Write a Commentary?

I hadn’t planned on writing a commentary, but rather a thematic study of the Samuel-Saul struggle, which took the reader through the flow of the book. I guess I thought of it as a quasi-commentary.

They say that a good sculptor doesn’t impose his or her predetermined idea on the stone, but needs to follow the contours of the material as they work. That was my experience as I worked through 1 Samuel.

Once I got into the writing, I found many fascinating details of the text that cried out for interpretation, details that many commentaries jumped over or treated in a very cursory way. By following the text more carefully, I was able to deepen my initial intuitions about the power struggle between Samuel and Saul (and Samuel and God) in ways I had not anticipated.

The book ended up being longer than I had anticipated. My wrestling with the text of Samuel led me to double the length of what I had originally thought would be a short 60,000 word manuscript (though it’s still shorter than my book A New Heaven and a New Earth).

One of the last things I wrote before I submitted the manuscript to Eerdmans was a semi-humorous dialogue at the start of my Preface, which you can read here (let’s see if the publisher allows me to keep it).

That dialogue was inspired by the Prologue to Robert Farrar Capon, An Offering of Uncles: The Priesthood of Adam and the Shape of the World (New York: Sheed and Ward, 1967).

Table of Contents

The book has seventeen chapters, plus an Introduction (on my approach to interpreting 1 Samuel) and a Conclusion (on evaluating the character of Samuel). You can download the Table of Contents here.

Preface

Introduction: A Proposal for Reading Samuel

Part 1: Overture to Conflict: A Preview of Things to Come (1 Samuel 1–3)

  1. Hannah’s Resolve and the Birth of Samuel: A New Era in Israel’s History
  2. Hannah’s Vow and Victory Song: A Challenge to Israel’s Leaders
  3. From Promised Priest to Newly-Minted Prophet: Clues to God’s Role in the Story

Part 2: Interlude before Conflict: The Ark Narrative as Preemptive Warning (1 Samuel 4–6)

  1. “Why Has YHWH Defeated Us Today before the Philistines?”: The Ark in Israel’s Theology
  2. The Ark of the Covenant Is “Taken”: Philistine and Israelite Responses to the Ark
  3. “Who Can Stand before YHWH, This Holy God?”: The Return the Ark

Part 3: The Conflict Begins: Samuel Asserts His Priorities (1 Samuel 7–11)

  1. Samuel on the Cusp: The Prophet’s Finest Hour
  2. The People Request a King: A Rift Begins to Open between Samuel and God
  3. Saul Loses His Way and Finds Samuel: Prelude to Kingship
  4. The Secret Anointing: Saul is (Almost) King
  5. Saul is Publicly Acclaimed King—at Mizpah and Gilgal

Part 4: The Conflict Intensifies: Samuel Clashes with Saul (1 Samuel 12–14)

  1. Samuel’s “Farewell Speech”: The Sin of Monarchy
  2. The Beginning of Saul’s Undoing: Whose/Which Command Did He Disobey?
  3. The Fallout for Jonathan: Saul’s Oath as Overreaction

Part 5: The Climax of the Conflict: Samuel and God Part Ways (1 Samuel 15–16)

  1. Failure and Rejection at Gilgal: Saul’s Confrontation with Samuel
  2. The Question of God’s “Repentance”: Samuel’s Disagreement with YHWH
  3. Prophet on a Short Leash: Irony in Samuel’s Anointing of David

Conclusion: How Should We Judge Samuel?

Stay Tuned

I plan to post updates on the publication of the book, including various tidbits of interesting things I learned or noticed about the story as I worked on the writing. This will include things like:

Why does God shift from his promise to provide a new priest (1 Samuel 2:35) to provide a prophet instead (1 Samuel 3:19)?

Why is the title for the Ark in 1 Samuel 4:4 (“the Ark of the Covenant of YHWH of Hosts […] the Cherubim”) missing a Hebrew preposition where you would expect one (so translators have to insert what they think is appropriate)?

Why does Samuel consistently disobey God’s instructions after the people ask for a king in 1 Samuel 8?

Where is the first place in the narrative when Samuel actually obeys an instruction or command from God?

What is going on with the seemingly garbled chronological note about Saul’s reign in 1 Samuel 13:1?

How should we understand Samuel’s contradictory instructions to the newly anointed King Saul in 1 Samuel 10:7–8 (especially given the multitude of interpretations proposed)?

What sin was Saul actually condemned for in 1 Samuel 13:13–14?

And lots more to come . . .

How My Rewrite of The Transforming Vision Will Vary from the Original

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I am currently doing a total rewrite of the book on a Christian worldview that Brian Walsh and I coauthored, called The Transforming Vision: Shaping a Christian World View (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1984).

Original book cover
New book cover

The book has found a wide audience in both English and other languages (especially Korean, where it has just about outsold the English original). To date, it has been translated and published in Korean (1987), French (1988), Indonesian (2001), Spanish (2003), and Portuguese (2010); with new Korean (2013), French (2016), and Indonesian (2013, 2019) editions.

Over the years, many people who were using the book in teaching asked us for a second or revised edition, where we would update aspects of our analysis. Although the publisher did give the book a new cover, we were each too busy working on other projects to devote the time needed to a second edition.

Worldview Book and Worldview Courses

Brian and I wrote The Transforming Vision based on non-credit courses we were teaching through IVCF campus ministries at a number of Canadian universities. For a few years after the book was published, I continued teaching non-credit courses on a Christian worldview at universities in the USA and Canada as I moved around for graduate studies and university chaplaincy.

Since I began doctoral studies in 1990, and especially since I started a faculty position in the mid-nineties, I have been offering the course for credit to undergraduates and to graduate/ seminary students, while also giving papers and publishing as a biblical scholar—especially in the area of Old Testament.

Changes to the Course (and the Book)

The course has gradually changed over the years, in accordance with my expertise and context. The new version of the book will follow the content (and outline) of the course as I have been teaching it most recently (it’s a solo rewrite, since Brian hasn’t been teaching a comparable course).

Some changes have to do with Scripture, while others are aspects of what you might call contextualization, changes that reflect the cultural (and academic) contexts I have been living and teaching in.

An Expanded Exposition of the Biblical Story

First, I’ve expanded (and deepened) my understanding of biblical theology over the years, so the book will reflect that. Instead of three chapters on Scripture (in The Transforming Vision), I have eight chapters tracing the biblical story from creation to eschaton (the biblical worldview as a coherent story wasn’t explicitly addressed in the original book). Each chapter will be a theological dive into a biblical text (or set of texts) that advances the story (creation, imago Dei, fall, Israel, monarchy, prophets, Jesus, eschaton). I will draw out practical implications for Christian living from each of these “soundings” into Scripture.

An Analysis of “Postmodern” Tribalism

The second change is in my analysis of the history of western culture. I still find it helpful to begin with the otherworldly dualism that impacted the church (from the early middle ages onward) and trace the rise of the modern impulse to autonomy and conquest (over the last five hundred years). But my analysis of the crisis of modernity now includes our current “postmodern” tribalism—how modernity has devolved into the toxic “post-truth” culture we now experience.

The Contested Meaning of the “Christian/Biblical Worldview”

A third change is that I won’t start the book with much analysis of the nature of worldviews (which is how The Transforming Vision began). The new book will focus more on showing than telling. However, I plan to include an Appendix or Afterword on the problematic nature of worldview discourse among Christians. I’ll explain why I am reclaiming the terms “Christian worldview” and “biblical worldview” from those who use these terms to designate a pre-packaged absolutist system of so-called “truth,” which is often nothing more than an oppressive framework for control. In contrast, I think these terms are helpful markers for the Bible’s liberating vision, disclosed especially through its overarching narrative of God’s desire for creational flourishing and shalom.

Living between the Times

Also, I won’t have a section on the implications of Christian faith for academic disciplines. That section of The Transforming Vision came from the campus ministry context the course was developed in; that’s not been my present context. Instead, I’ll close with two chapters on “living between the times,” one addressing a Christian approach to suffering (drawing on the lament psalms) and one on the biblical pattern of discipleship (from the Gospels and Pauline epistles).

Dancing in the Dragon’s Jaws

My plan is for a fourteen-chapter book (plus Appendix/ Afterword), tentatively titled Dancing in the Dragon’s Jaws: The Bible’s Liberating Worldview. Those who know the music of Bruce Cockburn will recognize Dancing in the Dragon’s Jaws as the title of one of his albums; it is also a line in a song on the album, describing Jesus’s victory over evil: “just beyond the range of normal sight / this glittering joker was dancing in the dragon’s Jaws.”

The title is meant to capture the sense of freedom and joy that being grounded in Scripture can bring, while realistically acknowledging that our joy comes in the face of personal brokenness and systemic evil, both of which are ultimately overcome only by God’s saving action in Christ.

I decided to keep the term Worldview in the subtitle, as a gesture towards reclaiming that term as valuable and helpful; indeed, I believe that the Bible discloses a Liberating Worldview!

The word Liberating is also a nod to my book on humanity as the image of God, called The Liberating Image: The Imago Dei in Genesis 1 (Grand Rapids: Brazos, 2005). The human calling to image God is a key component in my exposition of the unfolding biblical story.

An Accessible Read

I plan to keep the reading level of the new book close to that of The Transforming Vision, so it is accessible to early undergraduates and Christian lay people (The Transforming Vision was even used in Christian high schools in Canada and the US).

If you have used The Transforming Vision in teaching or if the book has been important to you personally, please contact me. I am looking for a few key people to read portions of the draft of the new book and give me helpful feedback.

Three Recent Theses Completed at Northeastern Seminary

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Three Master’s theses that I supervised were recently completed, two last year and one this summer. They are all substantial pieces of theological research, with clear implications for the life of the church.

  • Living Sacramentally: The Problem of Being and Doing with Special Reference to Thomas Aquinas (Margaret Giordano)
  • The New Creation Fugue: The Interweaving of Individual, Community, and Cosmos in Paul’s Theology of New Creation (Calvin Smith)
  • Two Pauline Ways to Describe the Ethics of the Resurrection Life (Matthew Davis)

Although my area of expertise is Old Testament, none of these theses were in that area. Meg Giordano’s thesis was in philosophy, while Calvin Smith’s and Matt Davis’s were in New Testament. So for the Giordano thesis I had to draw on my own M.A. in philosophy (my thesis addressed God language in Thomas Aquinas and Paul Tillich), and for the Smith and Davis theses, I could draw on my research for my recent book on eschatology, A New Heaven and a New Earth.

Meg Giordano’s thesis addresses the contemporary problem, particularly evident in Protestant churches in the evangelical tradition, of downplaying “works” (actions, good deeds) by emphasizing “faith” (this is often tied to the claim that “being” is more important than “doing”). Not only is this is a totally bogus distinction (we can’t simply “be” without “doing” anything; and faith without works is dead [James 2:14-26]), but she shows that the writings of Thomas Aquinas are helpful for exploring how action may be thought of as the core of being. Although there are tensions in Aquinas’s formulation (which Giordano explores), Aquinas drew on Aristotle, whose primary category of being was “energeia” or activity, a signal improvement over Plato’s more passive concept of Being (many Christian theologians have been more influenced by Plato).

Through this study, Giordanto aims to “reclaim the value of action in the life of the individual and in the relationships of community,” in such a manner that our action can be thought of as sacramental—living so that our ordinary lives “can be centers that activate in others grace, peace, and even connectedness to the presence of Christ, and to lay down our lives to ensure that they be so.”

Despite its clear philosophical character, this thesis resonated with me as a biblical scholar, since it is clear from both the Old and New Testaments that the goal of salvation is sanctification or transformation, which is manifested in a concrete life of discipleship and obedience to God.

Calvin Smith’s thesis addresses the interpretive question—which continues to surface in New Testament scholarship—of whether Paul’s references to “new creation” (Galatians 6:15; 2 Corinthians 5:17) speak primarily to the transformation of the individual or the community (the way the debate is often set up) or even to the entire cosmos (which is the primary reference of “new creation” in Second Temple Judaism).

His profound argument is that there is an interweaving of all three in Paul’s writings, and it is impossible to understand any of these emphases without the others.

As Smith aptly puts it: “There are two basic relationships to attend to: new creatures [individuals] making up the new community; and the new community as the signpost for the new cosmos. Altogether it is a cumulative relationship with the new community as the central link.” Smith likens the interweaving of these three motifs to a musical fugue. He writes: “This thesis is, in a way, an attempt to learn this fugue by separating the three parts and practicing each part before putting them all back together.”

Matt Davis’s thesis addresses the typical disjunction, both in contemporary theology and in the life of the church, between eschatology and ethics, with a focus on the resurrection. To overcome this disjunction, Davis focuses on two Pauline ways of speaking of resurrection life, signaled by Paul’s two-fold use of investiture language.

The first use of the investiture metaphor is Paul’s language of the resurrection as putting on a new body, in 1 Corinthians 15 and in 2 Corinthians 4–5, while the second is the more explicitly ethical language of putting on the new humanity, along with its practices, found in Ephesians 4 and Colossians 3. As Davis explains: “The eschatological foundation in 1 Cor 15 and 2 Cor 4–5 sets up Eph 4 and Col 3 as texts of profound ethical practices to follow. Paul stressed the community life and tied it to the transformation because of the Christ event.”

Davis wants to follow up by applying his research to the local church. He explains: “My plan is to create a church discipleship program from this labor of love, something that will help the church to practically and actively live out the resurrection life in the world.”

What They Are Doing Now

Meg Giordano has been adjunct professor of philosophy at Le Moyne College, Syracuse, NY for the past year; she has just begun a PhD in philosophy at the Institute for Christian Studies, Toronto.

Calvin Smith has been a pastor at Valley Chapel Free Methodist Church. Perry, NY for the past two years; he is currently exploring doctoral programs in New Testament and theology.

Matt Davis has been working in the Golisano Library at Roberts Wesleyan College for the last number of years, while also serving as adjunct professor in the religion department of the College. He has just begun a PhD in ministry studies at McMaster Divinity College, Hamilton, ON.

I’ve written before about Northeastern Seminary, where I teach, and what a special place I have found it to be.