Preface

Summary

Writing a biblical commentary is a precarious enterprise. If the commentary one writes is technical and scholarly (“critical” in the parlance of scholarship), it will most certainly be judged too advanced for a general readership, in addition to the close scrutiny one expects from scholars and serious students of the Bible. If, on the other hand, the commentary is written for pastors or students, it will certainly seem inadequate to scholars because it cannot address all the issues, even all the important issues. Moreover, writing a relatively small commentary on a monumental classic such as Genesis is all the more challenging. The history of interpretation of the book of Genesis is an academic discipline in its own right. The amount of secondary literature on the book is unprecedented. I have been reminded at every step that a commentary of this size simply cannot comment on everything I would have liked, and the more advanced reader will want to keep close to hand the more advanced commentaries (especially Westermann).

My appreciation goes out to Ben Witherington, who conceived this series and serves as its General Editor. I owe much to Andy Beck of Cambridge University Press, for reasons too numerous to list here. Brent A. Strawn, who served as a “hired hand” to edit an early draft of the manuscript, was insightful, as usual.