Revised, updated, and enlarged, this edition of a standard survey clearly sets forth and analyzes the major trends in contemporary Old Testament scholarship, concluding with seven basic proposals for doing Old Testament theology. In this revision Hasel has incorporated significant scholarship since 1982; his bibliography of Old Testament theology, with nearly 950 entries, is the most comprehensive published to date.

Revised and Expanded Fourth Edition. An excellent survey of a majority of the players and their arguments throughout what Hasel calls the “Golden Age” of OT Theology, primarily 1930-1980, while also tracing these lines of thought all the way back to their beginnings in the modern era. You really get a sense, as you work through this book, how scholars were all trying to answer many of the same questions and how many of their answers remained the same no matter what particulars and insights they provided. So it will not be long before you also find yourself entering the various tug-of-wars between issues like the purpose and place of history and faith in the discipline of Old Testament theology. If discussing the thoughts and perspectives of such a huge mass of scholars during this Golden Age within no more than 200 pages were not, itself, a marvelous and enlightening feat, the bibliography alone for this period and subject-matter may very well be the most thorough of any other in print. The footnotes themselves are magnificently comprehensive. The book's overwhelming interest in German scholarship has the advantage of sharing with us the author's own familiarity with German scholars and their work, which we might not otherwise receive, as well as his own English translations, directly from sources being discussed, to bring those scholars' thoughts and arguments to life.

This is, however, no survey of the drastically different present of OT Theology. As exhaustive as the book may seem, and as willing as it may appear to deal with the different perspectives that have come along, this is really an exploration of a previous age. Hasel has only begun to appreciate some of the newer (from his time frame) literary methods like New Criticism and Structuralism, which were among the first great cracks in the structure of the past age before it collapsed. Hasel's thoughts and arguments are situated firmly within and defined by that past age. In a very real sense, therefore, this book is behind the times and out of date. As an example, we see that Hasel is still mired by the Romanticism and Positivism of that Golden Age when he believes we may indeed come to a theology “without in the least distorting the text” because we “avoid a superimposition of external points of view or presuppositions” (p. 114) by doing OT Theology “without in the least distorting the original historical witness” (p. 207).

The book is further faulted by Hasel's own narrow perspective, which is, unfortunately, part and parcel of that Golden Age, and which also directly contradicts his own Positivistic claims and assumptions (also part and parcel of that age). Though the analysis gives an illusion of inclusiveness, Hasel's view of Old Testament theology is strictly conservative, Christian, and Protestant (perhaps even Neo-Orthodox). And thus what we end up with is a book and an OT Theology that is really only for conservative, Protestant Christians.

As examples, we may note that even though Hasel admits that systematic theology is reductionistic and not a part of biblical theology, he still believes it is necessary and complimentary (p.195-196) although no reason is given why this should be so. And though Hasel believes we can have a presupposition-less theology, he nevertheless says that OT Theology requires the presupposition of various Christian doctrines like a belief in the Christian canon of scripture and its inspiration (“The presentation of the individual theologies of the OT books, or blocks or writings, will preferably not follow the sequence of the Hebrew canon or the Septuagint” - p. 113, “It is founded exclusively on materials taken from the OT. The OT comes to him through the Christian church as part of the inspired Scriptures” - p. 201, “One can indeed speak of such a unity in which ultimately the divergent theological utterances and testimonies are intrinsically related to each other from the theological viewpoint on the basis of a presupposition that derives from the inspiration and canonicity of the OT as Scripture” - p. 206). Unfortunately, this only leaves us with the same problems we were left with when the Golden Age gave us the same answer: if OT theology is only properly done by those of faith to serve their faith on the basis of their faith, why couldn't any other religion or faith say the exact same thing about their perspective and what is it that makes Christian faith “normative” other than its own claim to do so? This perspective in the Golden Age was unable to provide us with any reasonable answer to those questions and Hasel is similarly unable to do so. And although a hundred and more years may have passed since biblical theology was widely considered the handmaiden of faith instead of the other way round, this is still its goal according to Hasel (“the historical-theological interpretation is to be at the service of faith” - p.201). It becomes evident that OT Theology is, for Hasel, only a Christian discipline when he begins speaking of and towards the “Christian theologian” (see, for instance, p. 114 and 172) instead of the mere “Biblical theologian” who could be from any background or religious persuasion.

The greatest contribution Hasel makes in this book is by arguing that OT Theology should not be an either/or, but a both/and enterprise. Instead of limiting it to the historical or to the theological, it should be both: a “historical-theological” discipline. ( )