The Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture does what very few of today's students of the Bible could do for themselves. With the aid of computer technology, the vast array of writings from the church fathers—including much that is available only in the ancient languages—have been combed for their comment on Scripture. From these results, scholars with a deep knowledge of the fathers and a heart for the church have hand-selected material for each volume, shaping, annotating and introducing it to today's readers. Each portion of commentary has been chosen for its salient insight, its rhetorical power and its faithful representation of the consensual exegesis of the early church.
The Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture is an ecumenical project, promoting a vital link of communication between the varied Christian traditions of today and their common ancient ancestors in the faith. On this shared ground, we listen as leading pastoral theologians of seven centuries gather around the text of Scripture and offer their best theological, spiritual and pastoral insights.
Today the historical-critical method of interpretation has nearly exhausted its claim on the biblical text and on the church. In its wake there is a widespread yearning among Christian individuals and communities for the wholesome, the deep and the enduring. The Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture does not seek to replace those excellent commentaries that have been produced in the twentieth century. Rather, it supplements them, framing them with interpretive voices that have long sustained the church and only recently have fallen silent. It invites us to listen with appreciative ears and sympathetic minds as our ancient ancestors in the faith describe and interpret the scriptural vistas as they see them.
The Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture is a postcritical revival of the early commentary tradition known as the glossa ordinaria, a text artfully elaborated with ancient and authoritative reflections and insights. An uncommon companion for theological interpretation, spiritual reading, and wholesome teaching and preaching.
About the Isaiah 40-66 volume:
No book of the Old Testament is more frequently quoted in the New than Isaiah, and no portion of Isaiah is more frequently quoted in the New than the typologically fertile soil of Isaiah 40-66. Still, as interpreted by the fathers, Isaiah presents a message that is far more soteriological than christological, leading readers to a deeper understanding of God's judgment and salvation. Isaiah 40-66 provides us with the closest thing the Old Testament has to offer regarding a systematic theology.
The excerpts included in this volume offer us a rich array of differing styles, principles and theological emphases from Theodoret of Cyr to Eusebius and Procopius, to Cyril of Alexandria, Jerome and Augustine. Readers will be enriched by the wide-ranging selections, some of which are translated here into English for the first time.
