Andy Naselli on his new concise commentary on 1 Corinthians

In general, I’m not a fan of layman commentaries. I grew up with J Vernon McGee’s Thru the Bible commentaries. After reading them, I thought I had a good grasp of Scripture. I didn’t realize how deficient I was in my understanding of the Bible even after studying “Thru the Bible.”

On the other hand, I would recommend someone in my congregation use Tyndale New Testament Commentaries, The Expositor’s Bible Commentary, Tom Constable’s Expository Notes on the Bible, or the Bible Knowledge Commentary. Matthew Henry and Albert Barnes are okay, but they wouldn’t be my first choice. They just happen to be free and easily available online.

We have some tattered copies of TNTC at church. They’re about as technical as I’d feel comfortable giving church members. I like Moody’s Everyman commentaries. Those are all old, though. I haven’t check out the *** For You series, which is supposed to be substantive but for “normal” people. McGee is always good. Wiersbe is my go-to recommendation for normal people. Henry’s language can be too old. I like Barnes more than Henry. NOTE: Henry didn’t write anything in his commentary post-Acts. It was completed by multiple authors from his notes, after his death.

Well, Tyler, I think you are perhaps selling average church people too short. While I know there are some technical details that don’t have much edifying value, if any, I think the average church person is far more capable of grasping advanced concepts than you think. One of the duties of the pastor, I think, is to learn how to put advanced concepts into terms that 1) are understandable and 2) are interesting.

Fresh out of seminary, I had people who were patient with my enthusiasm for the obscure, but over time I think I’ve learned something about communicating that builds up our people. And I’ve taught them about chiasms - one, as a device for understanding some OT passages, especially certain poetical sections, but two, as a check on the enthusiasm of commenataries. Many commentaries see chiasms where none exist. Anyway, it is a legitimate device that the Hebrews sometimes used in order to emphasize points in a certain way. Understanding that emphasis gets at the real meaning of the passage, and from there to the present application.

What I don’t like about some commentaries is their ability to demonstrate that they know what every other commentator in history has said, but rarely coming to any kind of Scripturally reasoned conclusion themselves. (Douglas Moo, I’m looking at you! And others…) Another thing I don’t like about evangelical commentaries in particular is their constant concessions to liberalism in one way or another. For example, in Schreiner’s Romans commentary, he has a footnote questioning the Davidic authorship of Psalm 51. That annoys me no end.

When the Lord enables us to gain advanced degrees, it is for the good of the people to whom we minister. We don’t just get all that education for our own egos, do we?

You wrote:

When the Lord enables us to gain advanced degrees, it is for the good of the people to whom we minister. We don’t just get all that education for our own egos, do we?

I agree. That’s why I wonder if I’m putting the cookies on a shelf too low. Perhaps I’ve swung the opposite way; from being too obscure to being too simple? We have a bi-monthly theology class where we delve into deep things. We spent two sessions on Christology. We spent four sessions on the Trinity. We’re on the Holy Spirit, now. Next week, we’ll discuss the Spirit’s role in salvation and I’ll present a Reformed view (regeneration is before faith). So, I do go deep. I just grow exasperated at details that people don’t need, sometimes. I grow impatient when people focus on minutiae and miss the bigger point. Silva and Phil 4:10-23 is just the most recent example.

What I don’t like about some commentaries is their ability to demonstrate that they know what every other commentator in history has said, but rarely coming to any kind of Scripturally reasoned conclusion themselves. (Douglas Moo, I’m looking at you! And others…)

Yes and yes!

[Don Johnson]

While I know there are some technical details that don’t have much edifying value, if any, I think the average church person is far more capable of grasping advanced concepts than you think. One of the duties of the pastor, I think, is to learn how to put advanced concepts into terms that 1) are understandable and 2) are interesting.

Amen and Amen. As an educated layperson (and there are many such people today), I don’t need to hear every single one of the theological nuances of a passage or minute details of Greek/Hebrew grammar that are mostly interesting in seminary. On the other side, if the preacher wants to base some of what he is preaching on such technical information, but tries to gloss over some necessary details “for simplicity’s sake,” and then jump to a conclusion based on what has not been explained, my nonsense-detector goes off pretty strongly at that point. Rightly or wrongly (since the conclusion might be correct) I tend to discount such conclusions, as well as any applications that come out of them.

Not too many men would actually say out loud “just trust me, that’s what the passage means,” but if a speaker neglects the necessary logical steps to the conclusion in the name of “making it simple for the listener,” that’s exactly what he is saying.

[dcbii] Not too many men would actually say out loud “just trust me, that’s what the passage means,” but if a speaker neglects the necessary logical steps to the conclusion in the name of “making it simple for the listener,” that’s exactly what he is saying.

Not to go off on a tangent, but if a pastor hasn’t studied the original languages, he does have to take a “just trust me, that’s what the passage means” approach when he reads through the commentaries (especially the older ones). He doesn’t have the tools to discern whether the linguistic or grammatical “golden nuggets” found by the author are only fool’s gold.

Back to your point, Dave, when I preach a passage that involves a significant linguistic or grammatical point, I just say something like, “Based on the grammar Paul uses here …” I don’t quote Greek or Hebrew words, I don’t refer to verbal tense / aspect, and I don’t get into grammatical details (e.g. “this is a participle of means” or “this is an objective genitive.”). I’ve only had a couple of people question me afterwards about the specific grammatical point, and I do get into more detail with those individuals.

Even if the pastor goes through step by step into the grammatical forms and such, one needs to have trust at some level, no? That said, I do always appreciate it when a pastor in effect says “don’t trust me, here’s how you check my logic out, the word is X and the grammatical form/ending is Y, and you can get started with Biblehub and then go to B-D-B and your Hebrew grammar….”

Still some room for debate—language is always somewhat an approximation—but it would do wonderful things for a congregation’s exegetical skills.

One other thing regarding commentaries; they often do seem to be a “crutch” for those who choose not to even try to approach things like the original languages, as well as bridging the gaps between exegesis to Biblical and systematic theologies. Not that every pastor (or layman) can be expert in this, but those who give it a “college try” will at least start to see when the wool is being pulled over their eyes.

[T Howard]

Back to your point, Dave, when I preach a passage that involves a significant linguistic or grammatical point, I just say something like, “Based on the grammar Paul uses here …” I don’t quote Greek or Hebrew words, I don’t refer to verbal tense / aspect, and I don’t get into grammatical details (e.g. “this is a participle of means” or “this is an objective genitive.”). I’ve only had a couple of people question me afterwards about the specific grammatical point, and I do get into more detail with those individuals.

My pastor rarely goes into detail like you quote above like “participle of means” or “objective genitive.” He will mention the Greek or Hebrew word if it’s useful, and sometimes he even talks about why the tense is important to the point being made. And, like you, he’s willing to discuss more afterwards.

I get what you are saying about the cake vs. the ingredients, but what type of point is being made makes a difference. If it’s to convince me about something like the timing of the rapture, or whether there are two 2nd comings, etc. it’s quite different from something that affects how I live the Christian life. When “the cake” means a conclusion that is intended to get me to change my mind on something I’m doing, or to make a specific biblical application that I need or am expected to follow, I want to know how to arrive at that conclusion. I accept that the Bible (i.e. God) can tell me what to do without explanation. I don’t accept that from any man (there are no apostles around today) or an interpretation that isn’t intuitively obvious or clear from reading the text and doing some thinking (i.e. Luther’s “plain reason”). In other cases I want to see why my lack of understanding of the thinking or environment in biblical days or my lack of understanding the text due to translation of what the original text is trying to say, etc. is influencing my wrong understanding of what the Bible is saying.

I realize that a pastor has to know more than he preaches, and I realize that he has to know his audience and what they can reasonably be expected to understand. Still, if a preacher dumbs it down too much, anyone who sees he has made some logical leaps will be tempted to discount what was just said, at least if they are at all thinking. I’m not saying it is easy to do, and I know it goes into just why there shouldn’t be “many masters,” as the text must be handled well, and it’s a skill that most of us don’t possess.

I agree with a lot of what is being said here. As a new believer, I thought good preaching included a lot of “The Greek word here means”. Now I know enough Greek (very little) to know that is almost never helpful to the average believer. I much prefer pastors that give the argument of the passage but don’t feel the need to explain the predicate nominative.

[josh p]

I much prefer pastors that give the argument of the passage but don’t feel the need to explain the predicate nominative.

I don’t disagree with this. I may have been unclear above, but if the text and argument are clear without the Greek, then that’s great. No Hebrew or Greek necessary. However, if the argument depends on understanding, at least to some extent, the original language, it shouldn’t be glossed over, even if it requires a little explanation for us laymen.

I should have been more clear. I wasn’t responding to you as much as just expressing something bought a on the issue. I agree that there are many places where a pastor must make an interpretive stance and that he needs to support his position.

I have no problem with expositional commentaries that go into the “preposition of mean” or the genitive type, etc. What I don’t like, and I think this is what Tyler meant, is commentaries that are long on obscure thoughts, possibilites, answering 19th century commentaries, etc. and never express the main idea of the passage.

I find help in a variety of commentaries, as long as they are committed to the inerrancy of Scripture. I need technical and academic commentaries to gain an accurate understanding of the text. I gain help from devotional commentaries to think through possible applications. Depending upon the length of the text, I may consult ten or twelve commentaries. Longer passages limit me to perhaps five or six. I study commentaries on Monday through Wednesday and spend the rest of the week working on structure and applications. I need and value good commentaries, but do not follow them slavishly. They plant seeds of thought which then germinate in my own mind.

My impression when it comes to study of the original languages is that there are two stages in the course of study where it’s very useful: 1) to know how to use the various Biblical study tools and not get lost, and 2) after a massive amount of study and/or a particular brilliance or giftedness with languages.
If you’ve accomplished 1, I suspect there’s not much practical benefit in pursuing more, unless you’re ready to try for 2 — or just enjoy the work.

Too many people with some years of study under their belts get up and simply reveal they don’t have a deep understanding of how languages actually work.

I’m definitely in category one. I am reviewing Mounce right now and will proceed to Wallace or something comparable afterwards. I am not at all gifted in languages. Paradigms are hard!