This collection of essays is drawn from a series of previous collections to which the author has contributed that were designed to honour senior scholars in the discipline of Old Testament study. Each of these essays reflects a distinct intention depending on the nature of the original collection in which they appeared and the scholar who was being honoured. Taken together, however, this collection amounts to an articulation of Brueggemann's distinctive approach to theological interpretation of the Old Testament. Already in his major volume on Old Testament theology, Brueggemann proposed a dynamism of tension, dispute, and contradiction as the text of ancient Israel sought to give voice to the mystery of God as a sustaining and disruptive agent in the life of the world. This collection reflects the author's growing clarity over a long period about the task of Old Testament theology. It further reflects on the nature of the biblical text and the way in which the God who inhabits the text runs beyond all of our att empts to define and explain.
Rather than dwelling on methodological issues, Brueggemann's essays take up the substantive questions that regularly occupied ancient text-makers.