Yeah. Wow.

The bible has a single narrative, lots is lost when we teach or preach the bible outside of that narrative. This book is a brilliant sketch of how the sweep of the OT develops the solution to man's seperation from God- a Davidic King through God's temple to the ends of the earth.

Dempster brilliantly demonstrates the unity of the Tanakh through common themes such as genealogy and geography. Also, the amount of times he comes up with new ways to say those two terms while employing alliteration is honestly impressive. This book is a beautiful reminder to believers of the Triune God’s great unity, especially as it is expressed in the Tanakh. 10/10 would recommend.

This book feels like sitting down with a really smart person and they just tell you the story of the Old Testament. Dempster’s work is accessible and helpful as he highlights the comprehensive themes and connections throughout the biblical narrative. He clearly shows how the Tanak is one unified book and that God’s purposes have never wavered in restoring humanity back to His good design. This book is very helpful for developing a wide-angle framework for the whole biblical narrative by better understanding the unified message of the OT upon which the NT builds and continues.

Excellent!

A wonderfully helpful biblical theology of the whole Old Testament. Dempster interprets the Hebrew Scriptures as a unified Text, not atomistically, seeing the whole of the narrative as communicating far more than its individual parts can. It is a “canonical” approach, without the problems of Brevard Childs’ method. I will certainly return to this book whenever studying anything in the OT.

Amazing!

SO good. Dempster walks through the entire Hebrew Bible, developing the internal themes that Scripture itself develops and connects, emphasizing the ideas of dominion (essentially land) and dynasty (seed or descendants). He connects inter-textual themes so well and lets them happen naturally, never forced. The section on the Pentateuch is especially good. The chapter on Genesis alone is worth the price of the book. Fantastic stuff.

Good biblical theology of human kingship (only Old Testament) : first before the fall all human were kings because of being created in God's image, then after the fall the pious and right kingship was lost, then God promised a king who would bring humanity back to Eden by crushing the serpent's head, then God enters in his procedure of fullfilment of this promise : it would be a davidic king who will extend God's kingdom throughout all the earth.

The book follows the original and jewish canonical order (Law, Prophets and Writings). It integrates all books of the OT (explains their place in the canon and their goal, their raison d'être) in this main theme "the restauration of God's kingdom through the kingship of the royal seed promised.

Only a view of Adam's state as probation is lacking, Dempster doesn't seem to side with Vos, Beale and Kline view of humanity's being able to reach a consummate state after having complete their mission (cultural mandate), even if the fall didn't happen.

Biblical Theology is essential to studying the Bible. With Biblical Theology, Christ is clear on every page of Scripture. Once instructed as to how to read the Bible, it becomes a place for understanding God and His gospel. Not knowing how to read the Bible can be the reason for not enjoying it, or getting much out of it. The Bible fits together as One Book written by One Author using multiple stories to explain the Story of Jesus.

What a cracking book!

Stephen Dempster’s purpose is to show the way that the Hebrew Bible (Genesis-Chronicles) fits together as one developing story, and the result is a carefully-crafted demonstration of how the Old Testament holds together under the themes of dominion (geography) and dynasty (genealogy). Although some ideas were considered too briefly to be convincing, I was frequently struck by connections between passages throughout the OT canon that were simultaneously persuasive and profound. He combines some excellent, more-detailed exegesis (e.g. of Psalm 89, or Lamentations 3) with a bird’s eye view of vast swathes of Scripture, and I left feeling edified and eager to read more of these too-unfamiliar books.

If I were to criticise the book at all, my two reservations would be its focus on ‘purpose’ over ‘character’, and it’s shallow read of some books. In both cases, the criticisms are only slight. Regarding its focus, it would be an overstatement to say the book was anthropocentric; God is inevitably the hero and accomplisher of all that is going on, His purposes are the focus of the whole book. But it leant slightly more towards "what He is doing for/with us" than "what that reveals about Him" - the focus more on the plans than the Planner. Regarding its shallowness, there were books that Dempster treated more fleetingly than others - “the Twelve” (minor prophets), and wisdom literature were only briefly discussed. Of course, that's necessary when you've got a page-limit - and the book could easily have become 10 times as long; indeed, Dempster made good choices in dwelling longer on the Pentateuch, and the major prophets. But it also meant that I left unconvinced over his conclusions for a few books - especially where they are books I know well.

Any yet, in spite of any criticism, I was overwhelmed by how useful the book is - both as a point of reference when I return to any of these Old Testament treasures - and as a presentation of God’s amazing purpose through history. A book like God's Big Picture by Vaughan Roberts would be a better introduction to the single overarching story of the Bible; but for those seeking something more stretching, I know of nothing that reaches as high as this.

This was such a helpful read! It has a very specific and compelling thesis stating that the Hebrew order of the OT books were written to highlight the two themes of land and nation (dominion and dynasty). This is a well written, detailed topical glance at the Hebrew OT (Tanakh).

What a great book! I've never seen so many connections and seeing the Big Story in such connected detail!

As one wades through the Old Testament, its disparate nature becomes quickly evident, consisting of 39 books by different authors written over a period of 1,000 years and composed of a variety of genres. For many Biblical scholars this raises the question of the Bible’s unity: can these books be said to be unified, and if so, by what?
It is Stephen G. Dempster’s contention that the unity of the OT is evident in the narrative it unfolds: using the analogy of Mount Rushmore, he relates the OT’s “patchwork” to the narrow focus of an observer who only sees the individual juts and crags that make up the rock face but relates its unity to the wide focus that takes in the whole scene and sees the art as it was intended to be seen (30). This is Dempster’s thesis, that viewing the OT through a “wide-angle lens” reveals a purposeful pattern, a coherent narrative: Dempster presents a literary reading of the OT as a continuous narrative, a primary history presenting the story of Israel from Genesis to the uncertain resolution of 2 Chronicles, with poetic commentary interpolated in the middle (Jeremiah-Esther) (39, 49-50). The plot unifying this narrative is the realization of God’s kingdom, centred on the themes of dominion (or geography) and dynasty (or genealogy) through the Davidic house (which combines both dominion and dynasty in one), moved forward by the ups and downs of Israel’s relationship with God (49, 62). Dempster proceeds by unpacking this twin theme of dominion and dynasty throughout the Biblical canon (according to the order of the Talmudic Baba Bathra), concluding with a brief reflection on the relationship of the OT to the NT.
Dempster’s work demonstrates great familiarity with the OT and the relevant literature and an excellent mixture of scholarly erudition with faithful Christian commitment. A student of the OT cannot but benefit from the fresh perspective Dempster provides. The perennial debate in OT biblical theology is whether a single theme does justice to all the biblical data; though Dempster may not convince the reader that dominion and dynasty together are the central theme of the OT narrative, he surely succeeds in demonstrating the importance of these concepts to the biblical material.
However, in the opinion of this reviewer, Dempster’s attempt to read the whole Bible literarily fails to consider what the OT is and the contribution its nature and structure make to the question of the OT’s unity. By seeking the unity of the OT in a narrative plot unpacking the themes of dominion and dynasty, Dempster forces the OT into a procrustean bed, failing to adequately reckon with the unity given by its structure. That is, by adopting his bipartite narrative-commentary schema, Dempster ignores the significant external and internal evidence that the OT has a tripartite structure and gives undue priority to the narrative sections of the OT, resulting in several significant oversights. I argue this point extensively in a book review posted on my website.