Old FF Bruce Commentary on Ephesians & Colossians?

My question is: How good is this old commentary on Ephesians & Colossians by FF Bruce? I know he's not the only author of it, but since it's on sale to celebrate his birthday, I was wondering if it was worth buying it.

DAL

PS. Yes, I know, it's F.F. Bruce, but since it's a little outdated I just wanted to see if someone had some sort of reviews for it.

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Timothy Brown

From D. A. Carson's N.T. Commentary Survey: E.K. Simpson (on Ephesians) "provides some helpful comments on individual words, but on the whole the work is an erudite disappointment. His vocabulary is impressive, but not much else." Bruce on Colossians is good, but other commentaries are certainly better.

Jack Caviness

Bruce wrote a newer version (1984) of this commentary which also included Philemon. He was the sole author of the revised work. Unfortunately, it does not appear to be available separately from the set.

Personally, believe the email is somewhat misleading as Bruce did not write the commentary on Colossians in the advertised set (I could be incorrect on this, but I do not think so).

Bruce Dunning

Personally, believe the email is somewhat misleading as Bruce did not write the commentary on Colossians in the advertised set (I could be incorrect on this, but I do not think so).

Actually according to the resource itself it says that F. F. Bruce did write this commentary on Colossians while E. K. Simpson wrote the commentary on Ephesians. In this series both books are combined into one book.

DAL

From D. A. Carson's N.T. Commentary Survey: E.K. Simpson (on Ephesians) "provides some helpful comments on individual words, but on the whole the work is an erudite disappointment. His vocabulary is impressive, but not much else." Bruce on Colossians is good, but other commentaries are certainly better.

Well, enough said then. I won't buy it, not that Carson is the final authority, but then again, there are plenty of up-to-date commentaries and that should be enough.

Thanks!

DAL

Jack Caviness

Personally, believe the email is somewhat misleading as Bruce did not write the commentary on Colossians in the advertised set (I could be incorrect on this, but I do not think so).

Actually according to the resource itself it says that F. F. Bruce did write this commentary on Colossians while E. K. Simpson wrote the commentary on Ephesians. In this series both books are combined into one book.

Thanks for the correction. Did not investigate thoroughly enough [:$]

Josh

From D. A. Carson's N.T. Commentary Survey: E.K. Simpson (on Ephesians) "provides some helpful comments on individual words, but on the whole the work is an erudite disappointment. His vocabulary is impressive, but not much else." Bruce on Colossians is good, but other commentaries are certainly better.

It's hard to trust D.A. Carson on some of his suggestions. While I don't have experience with this particular commentary, there are plenty of times where I have to wonder what he was thinking. For instance, Carson slams John MacArthur on his Matthew commentaries: "A hybrid difficult to classify—part commentary, part expository sermon—is the work of John MacArthur in 4 vols. These books are wordy and often betray too little time and care taken with the text, so that they cannot be read as reliable commentary; but the amount of information goes beyond that of most expositions. Doubtless they will well serve the well-read layperson and the poorly trained preacher." In fact, he doesn't say anything really positive about any of John's other commentaries either. But to say that MacArthur's work often betrays "too little time and care" with the text! What?!

As such, I always make sure to check other "commentary surveys" along with Carson's.

Evan Boardman

Carson slams John MacArthur on his Matthew commentaries

I have to agree. MacArthur is great for background information, and thats about all.[:(]

Mike Childs

From D. A. Carson's N.T. Commentary Survey: E.K. Simpson (on Ephesians) "provides some helpful comments on individual words, but on the whole the work is an erudite disappointment. His vocabulary is impressive, but not much else." Bruce on Colossians is good, but other commentaries are certainly better.

It's hard to trust D.A. Carson on some of his suggestions. While I don't have experience with this particular commentary, there are plenty of times where I have to wonder what he was thinking. For instance, Carson slams John MacArthur on his Matthew commentaries: "A hybrid difficult to classify—part commentary, part expository sermon—is the work of John MacArthur in 4 vols. These books are wordy and often betray too little time and care taken with the text, so that they cannot be read as reliable commentary; but the amount of information goes beyond that of most expositions. Doubtless they will well serve the well-read layperson and the poorly trained preacher." In fact, he doesn't say anything really positive about any of John's other commentaries either. But to say that MacArthur's work often betrays "too little time and care" with the text! What?!

As such, I always make sure to check other "commentary surveys" along with Carson's.

I think Carson's less than enthusiastic review of John MacArthur's Commentaries is largely just a result of the fact that MacArthur is an expository preacher, not a Biblical scholar. That is not a put down of MacArthur. And expository commentaries are very useful, but they are not critical scholarly works. I have a number of expository commentaries, including John MacArthur's, and James M. Boice's, and several by Martyn Lloyd-Jones. But the scholarship in them is in a sense "dumbed down" to a lay person's level. (That is not a put down of lay people, but they generally haven't had opportunity to study biblical language, etc.)

While I reject the dispensational elements of John MacArthur's theology, I have great respect for his exposition of the Word. But I respect him for what he does, not for something he is not even trying to do. He is not trying to write a scholarly commentary. Carson is right: MacArthur's commentaries are "A hybrid difficult to classify—part commentary, part expository sermon—is the work of John MacArthur in 4 vols. They are pretty good for that purpose. They are not intended to be more.

Any expository commentary will betray "too little time and care" with the text. That is because they are largely sermons written from the theological perspective of the pastor. Nobody's sermon will give as much critical and scholarly time and care to text as a scholarly commentary should. MacArthur's commentaries present MacArthur's theology, as intended.

And, by the way, I do like MacArthur's New Testament Commentaries. I am glad I got them when they were available in Logos, and hope that they soon will be available again.

I also have great respect for Don Carson.

mab

One also needs to keep in mind that older commentaries aren't likely to impress someone who lives and works on the cutting edge of recent scholarship.

The reason for the older work is primarily now scholarly. If you were writing a commentary, you'd most certainly want to read and include references to this volume where appropriate.

Josh

Carson slams John MacArthur on his Matthew commentaries

I have to agree. MacArthur is great for background information, and thats about all.

Do you also agree that MacArthur's work "cannot be read as reliable commentary" and is best used by the "poorly trained preacher"? Give me a break! Carson went over board...

Unix

What does everyone think about Baker's New Testament Commentary (HK): Matthew by William Hendriksen, 1973? To answer that, go to: Logos box products reviewed ... also follow the links!

Carson slams John MacArthur on his Matthew commentaries:

How does E. K. Simpson compare to W. Hendriksen, 1968? Follow the above link to the other thread to answer!

There may be newer commentaries, but aren't they much more expensive? I'm thinking about using Hendriksen as a temporary sollution for Eph for years, and sometime in the future buy a recent (not yet published) commentary on Eph.:

Well, enough said then. I won't buy it, not that Carson is the final authority, but then again, there are plenty of up-to-date commentaries and that should be enough.:
From D. A. Carson's N.T. Commentary Survey: E.K. Simpson (on Ephesians) "provides some helpful comments on individual words, but on the whole the work is an erudite disappointment. His vocabulary is impressive, but not much else."

E. K. Simpson wrote the commentary on Ephesians. In this series both books are combined into one book.

NB.Mick

To geth somewhat back on the thread topic:

Bruce wrote a newer version (1984) of this commentary which also included Philemon.

Yes, and this one gets rather a lot of praise (many points at bestcommentaries.com etc), whereas the older one was in pre-internet times and thus not many reviews are to be found. But buying the current NIC series is out of the range for me now.

I think that former NIC volumes may still be very worthwile (seems they built the eminence of the series) and a commentary from 1957 may still shed a lot of light on scripture. From a scholar's perspective, one wouldn't use such a commentary as an only source (it will lack interaction with other current literature and developmenst such as NPP), however, it may still be a good commentary in its own right and in some areas have the place to discuss aspects that may be cut short due to 'more recent problems'.

Unix

I've decided almost a year ago that I don't want the NPP in any of the commentaries I buy! There must be something else?:

a commentary from 1957 may still shed a lot of light on scripture. From a scholar's perspective, one wouldn't use such a commentary as an only source (it will lack interaction with other current literature and developmenst such as NPP), however, it may still be a good commentary in its own right and in some areas have the place to discuss aspects that may be cut short due to 'more recent problems'.

I have a correction about the 1 Cor volume in Baker's New Testament Commentary (HK): it's not from 1953, it's from 1993! See also these posts/reviews for more about the volume: Re: How good is Kistemaker on 2 Cor 1-9 in Baker NT Commentary (1997)?
www.amazon.com/1-Corinthians-New-Testament-Commentary/product-reviews/0801052602/ref=cm_cr_dp_see_all_btm?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=1&sortBy=bySubmissionDateDescending
... don't make links to amazon clickable in order for people not to find books via google on amazon first!

See at the bottom of this post for more about the Mt -volume: Are commentaries from 1953-1988 that are traditional, bad? Exposition, devotional:

What does everyone think about Baker's New Testament Commentary (HK): Matthew by William Hendriksen, 1973? To answer that, go to: Logos box products reviewed ... also follow the links!

Bruce Dunning

Since we're talking about F. F. Bruce I thought I would share a quick story how a friend of mine was impacted by this man in a personal way. As a younger woman she remembered Bruce traveling across London to speak at her small church of only a dozen people. Even though he was such a learned man she was more impressed with his humility.

Jack Caviness

I've decided almost a year ago that I don't want the NPP in any of the commentaries I buy!

Not all commentaries that discuss NPP do so with favor. Cranfield, Moo, and several others clearly outline the shortcomings of this theory.