Knowing Jesus Through the Old Testament: A Decision-Maker's Guide to Shaping Your Church

by Christopher J.H. Wright

Book Overview

We cannot know Jesus without knowing his story.Today the debate over who Jesus is rages on. Has the Bible bound Christians to a narrow and mistaken notion of Jesus? Should we listen to other gospels, other sayings of Jesus, that enlarge and correct a mistaken story? Is the real Jesus entangled in a web of the church's Scripture, awaiting liberation from our childhood faith so he might speak to our contemporary pluralistic world?To answer these questions...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0830816933
• ISBN13: 9780830816934
• Release Date: April 1995
• Publisher: IVP Academic
• Length: 267 Pages
• Weight: 0.76 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 5.5" x 8.1"

Customer Reviews

Excellent book

Wright's book connects Hebrew Bible passages to Jesus in a practical & readable way without resorting to cliches, proof-texting or stretching the original intent of the scriptures. There is lots of good material there for preachers in sermon prep as well as folks who want to be able to see, better, how Jesus related to & completed the scriptures familiar to the folks of his time.

The Old and New Testament is bound together through Jesus Christ

Dr. Wright has gleaned a large amount of material from the Gospel of Matthew. In fact, Wright has identified the first seventeen versus as the key to understanding the authentic Jesus Christ. Even though using the book of Matthew as the framework for the study of Jesus is not uncommon, Wright may have done so with a more thorough and interconnected analysis. It is remarkable that Wright presents as much theology and salvation-history as he does with a two hundred and fifty-two page book! Christopher J.H. Wright's, Knowing Jesus through the Old Testament is the vehicle that transports the reader to a deeper understanding of God's ultimate plan for the redemption of mankind. The final destination is the understanding that: 1. Without considering the Old Testament we cannot fully comprehend the historical Jesus. 2. The Promises of the Abrahamic and Davidic covenants are fulfilled with Jesus Christ. 3. Salvation-history is completed through Jesus. 4. The Old and New Testament is bound together through Jesus Christ. The author claims that if God's final work of redemption is accomplished through Jesus Christ's Crucifixion then the Gospel must include the exodus model of liberation, the sacrificial model for atonement, and the restoration model brought about because of God's grace. Christopher Wright notes that the New Testament does indeed include these elements. Throughout the book Wright does a competent job of unpacking each of these models, he explains how each model has implications that are related to the events presented in the New Testament which are associated with Jesus Christ. Wright points out how influential the Book of Leviticus was to Jesus. In many ways, the nineteenth chapter of Leviticus can be viewed as the ethical standard for the New Testament. An interesting theme that is brought out in this book is how Israel was chosen and ordained by God to be a missionary nation for all other nations of the world.God purposely placed Israel in the center of the Ancient Near East surrounded by multiple ancient Near Eastern world powers. By doing so, Israel was forced to depend on and trust the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob to survive. Israel's missionary purpose seems to be an area that is less well known to the "average" Christian. A book such as Wrights' has considerable utility in bringing a greater knowledge of Old Testament theology, and the interconnectedness that Jesus has with the salvation-history of Israel to the reader. Wright points out several lesser known facts about Jesus, for example, Wright addresses that Jesus had Gentile ancestors and explains why this is significant. Many Christians may not know this about Jesus' genealogy. After reading Knowing Jesus Through the Old Testament, the reader will not only gain an awareness of the salvation-history, which reaches fulfillment in the Crucifixion of Jesus, but also gain a deeper relationship with Jesus Christ. Christopher J.H.

Great grasp of Jesus back in the Old Testament

An intriguing passage in the New Testament (NT) states, "Beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, He interpreted for them the things concerning Himself in all the Scriptures." (Luke 24:27). Christopher Wright's book titled `Knowing Jesus Through the Old Testament' gives a reasonable answer to what Jesus may have told these disciples from Emmaus. Many NT Christians believe they can fully know Jesus without knowing the Old Testament (OT). On page two, Wright states "The Old Testament tells the story which Jesus completes." Even the NT needs to be read in light of the OT. Wright draws out the identity, mission and values of Jesus. Jesus completes the OT promises in surprising ways. Wright deals with the popular idea that Christians can know Jesus without knowing the OT. This book sheds light on how Jesus used and completed the OT message in relation to His identity, mission and values. The author fleshes out 5 comprehensive themes each close to 50 pages in length. The NT book of Matthew chapters one to four are the primary text Wright uses to expound his five main points. The reader will gain a clear understanding of Jesus' life mission and destiny as the book is read through. The comprehensive vision of God's redemptive plan and purpose is the main theme throughout the book. I highly recommend this book as a strong introduction to understanding Jesus in light of the OT. It goes well beyond the typical work that merely shows the OT types and how Christ was hidden all along waiting to be discovered in the OT. The hermeneutical principles used by the author focus on the biblical text in its original context and then the theological principles are extracted from the text. The author avoids a textual criticism approach. One will not see a discussion on looking for source material nor speculation on JEDP theory. He also goes beyond messianic proof texting and leaves out typology about the Temple and Tabernacle. The author's primary purpose in writing this text is for everyday Christians and he avoids an overly scholarly approach to the material. Wright's text serves as a contrast to R.T Frances' book on Jesus and the Old Testament which covers more criticism and has a lot of footnotes. Despite Wright's lack of explicit scholarly focus, the book still remains a scholarly and thought-provoking work. A strong explanation of typology is made in the chapter on Jesus' identity. A weakness of typology is when the reader of the OT fails to find much reality in the events and persons of the OT in themselves. This jump start to Christ away from the historical context is a Platonic view of the OT. The OT becomes a collection of shadows. Typology is defined by Wright as a way to understand Christ and events surrounding him in the NT by analogy and correspondence. Historic realities are seen as patterns or models. Typology should not be the sole way of understanding the OT. A weakness of the book is that it meanders an

level headed reading: Jesus in his own context

in order to properly understand the Jesus of the new testament, instead of making a Jesus of our own liking, it is necessary to understand Jesus as he himself indicated. Jesus himself, according to the new testament, made constant reference and allusion to the hebrew scriptures, ( old testament ), as he sought to explain himself, his actions, his teachings and his significance. Understanding the old testament is therefore of paramount importance for understanding what Jesus was and is about. This means far more than knowing some of the messianic proof texts or knowing about Noahs ark or the temple and sacrificial system of the ancient hebrews. Understanding the old testament involves knowing the overall aim and purpose of it, and how it all is held together by connected themes that form a unified whole. Christopher Wright's book, Knowing Jesus Through the Old Testament, is an absolute Godsend towards getting the drift of the old testament and how it carries forward to the Jesus of the new testament. This book is a little bit technical at times, it is not a devotional work, but reading this book will educate a person to accurately understand what the old testament is about and how it flows into the person of Jesus, thereby expositing the true meaning and intent of Jesus according to the background that Jesus himself referred to. Thanks Chris Wright for this fabulous book. Also, for serious bible study of the best sort, see his excellent magnum opus, The Mission Of God. It is truly outstanding!! For some other great little books on Jesus that are sane and sober, see: Jesus and His World by Peter Walker, The Original Jesus by N.T. Wright, and for a bit of a larger work see Jesus and The Gospels by Craig Blomberg.

looking over Jesus' shoulder as he reads his Jewish Bible

When scholars write popular books, it is sometimes evident that they are speaking a strange tongue. Chris Wright's semi-popular biblical theology does not suffer this deficiency. Wright wears his scholarship lightly and writes with a good preacher's respect for his audience's intelligence and lack of awareness of the issues that detain and entertain the specialist. The result is a solid and enriching example of a mature hermeneutic that takes the Old Testament seriously in its own right, and then seeks in it a witness to Jesus. The organization of the book's five chapters underscores the book's unwavering focus on both the Old Testament and on Jesus. Wright names them, respectively, 'Jesus and the Old Testament Story', 'Jesus and the Old Testament Promise', 'Jesus and his Old Testament Identity', 'Jesus and his Old Testament Mission', 'Jesus and his Old Testament Values'. The result is a confessionally Christian biblical-theological treatment of the texts that avoids and occasionally critiques the hermeneutical blunders that bedevil much Christian proclamation of Old Testament texts. In his first chapter ('... Story', pp. 1-54), Wright presents a fairly conventional survey of Old Testament history and literature. I use the term with no pejorative meaning, for Wright is convinced the average Christian knows little of this material, and so his task is essentially remedial. Indeed, his method has biblical precedent, for example in Peter's speech in Acts chapter seven. The author takes his cues from the manner in which the gospels frame their protagonist in terms of his relationship to a heritage that we know principally from the pages of the Old Testament. It is evident from the outset that Wright will read Jesus with rather than against the grain of the Old Testament and the Judaism of his own day, an argument that will be developed in the book's final chapter. Wright gives due attention to the 'inter-testamental literature' and, to this reader's satisfaction, attempts a brief rehabilitation of the Pharisees, a matter that requires attention in the light of his chosen readership of 'typical Christian carol-singers'. Wright is eager to establish that the Old Testament sets the basic definitions of terms like 'redemption', 'salvation', and the like that will be bandied about in the New in the expectation that readers will know to what they refer. He is particularly attentive to the character of the Old Testament as 'story', a tale that will not be fully told by the time the first testament comes to its end, and so points forward to God's subsequent redemptive activity in Jesus himself. Indeed, 'the Messiah was Israel', an affirmation that for Wright seems to hint more at the continuity between the two literary sections of the biblical story than at the discontinuity that is evidenced by them. The relationship of story to promise is critical for a work of this kind, not least because a popular view of the Old Testament as a context-les

I now know jesus christ through the Old Testament

This book has given me a new insight on the generas of the Old Testament. I would recoment this book to all old testament readers as a guid for not only the old testament but for life. Wright's writing style is like music to my soul if anyone knows how I could get in touch with him please let me know. I warn you though if you read this book you will fall madly in love with Wright. I feel like I know more than Jesus, I know Wright. I feel privialged to be the first to review this book I give my professional recomendation to read this book. I love you always and forever Wright. I think I must go and read his book again. Sincerely,Dr. Shaddy