{"id":1030,"date":"2010-04-09T23:15:16","date_gmt":"2010-04-10T04:15:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/toddbolen.com\/2010\/04\/09\/my-first-commentary\/"},"modified":"2010-04-09T23:15:16","modified_gmt":"2010-04-10T04:15:16","slug":"my-first-commentary","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/toddbolen.com\/blog\/2010\/04\/09\/my-first-commentary\/","title":{"rendered":"My First Commentary"},"content":{"rendered":"

Thanks for taking my poll<\/a> on what biblical commentary I might write.  I don’t get a lot of interaction on this blog, so it’s nice to get a little from time to time.  By its very nature, the poll obviously wasn’t so serious.  It was more of a gauge on your perception of my future, based on very limited knowledge.  I don’t have an announcement to make, but in appreciation for your response, I ‘ll say a few words.<\/p>\n

I think the right answer to the question, “will I ever write a commentary,” is “never, ever.”  I don’t feel that’s my calling, and I’m not being trained for that now.  Commentaries are (usually) written by specialists, and my training is making me a non-specialist.  That has certain values (of course!), but commentary writing isn’t one of them.  I might be of better use in reading over someone else’s draft and giving them feedback (on the assumption that I may see parts of the big picture that the specialist missed).<\/p>\n

I personally didn’t vote for “never, ever.”  (Yes, I voted on my own poll!)  I chose Isaiah.  I shouldn’t have chosen Isaiah, and it’s highly unlikely I ‘ll ever attempt anything on Isaiah because the book is far too big for me.  I don’t mean long, I mean big.  It is phenomenal.  Complex.  Rich.  Sheer genius.  It’s a mountain too tall, an ocean too wide, a chasm too deep.  But the reason I voted for Isaiah is because as far as I know, there is not a commentary on Isaiah written by a dispensationalist.  (And by that awful word, I mean simply this: one who believes the prophecies will be fulfilled in the same way that the writer thought they would be fulfilled.)<\/p>\n

If you chose Samuel, I’d say you have the best chance of being right (next to the “never, ever” people).  Samuel is less difficult for me.  And I’ve had spent much more time in it.  And someone might dare ask me for such (but never on Isaiah or Job).<\/p>\n

I’m surprised that no one (to date) chose Matthew.  I love that book.  It’s my favorite gospel right now.  That may be related to the fact that Matthew and I agree on who our favorite prophet is.<\/p>\n

Exodus is fantastic.  I look forward to teaching through that book one day.  <\/p>\n

The least likely answer is “Job.”  I’ve spent all week in Job and I can’t understand the English, let alone the Hebrew.  It’s tough stuff.  Before this week, I would never have envisioned teaching through that book.  But I hope I can one day.  (And yes, I’ve said that about every book I’ve studied so far this year.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Thanks for taking my poll on what biblical commentary I might write.  I don’t get a lot of interaction on this blog, so it’s nice to get a little from time to time.  By its very nature, the poll obviously wasn’t so serious.  It was more of a gauge on your perception of my future,\u2026 Read More »<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1030","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-books"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/toddbolen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1030","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/toddbolen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/toddbolen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/toddbolen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/toddbolen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1030"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/toddbolen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1030\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/toddbolen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1030"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/toddbolen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1030"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/toddbolen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1030"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}