I have been asked about Bible commentaries. . . .

A number of my friends have responded to the challenge of reading the bible in one calendar year - THE 66/365 CHALLENGE - and they are finding loads of questions about the bible - which is just great and the questions have led a number of them to ask about commentaries.

Commentaries help us to understand the context the bible is written in, the language the bible is written in and possible understandings which have been drawn over the centuries.

At college a set of diligent tutors set out to help us with guidance about the 'depth' and 'academic rigour' of many of the available commentaries.

On the following pages we have laid out - with great gratitude to my tutors - two approaches to the comentaries

1. A list of the books of the bible with, where possible, 3 suggestions - categorised as "Heavyweight" "Medium" & "shorter". - ABRIDGED

2. a list of the books of the bible with a comprehensive assessment of the approach taken by different commentators - FULL OT

Each list also has a header describing the suggested commentaries - sadly the list is more comprehensive in the Old Testament, although perhaps this is the harder section of scripture for us to gain perspective of the language and historical context.

ABRIDGED

FULL OT

Example of "Heavyweight" commentary entries for Gensis 6:1-4