In the nearly 2 decades since, Strawn has written on a wide array of biblical and theological topics, has gained tenure and earned full professorship at Candler School of Theology at Emory University, and is a frequent guest on CNN as an expert on religious topics.
As a professor (associate level) of Old Testament, myself, I was eager to read Strawn's latest book, The Old Testament is Dying: A Diagnosis and Recommended Treatment. Using the analogy of language adaptation and language death, Strawn demonstrates that the Old Testament is in danger of becoming a dead language. In fact, earlier this week, Christianity Today published a story that seemingly confirms Strawn's thesis: even Christian theologians vastly ignore the content of the Old Testament!
Strawn tackles the topic in three parts. Borrowing from his patient healthcare analogy, Part One is composed of the battery of tests run on the patient called the Old Testament. These tests include inclusion of the OT in sermons, hymns, and the Revised Common Lectionary. According to Strawn, the results have come back positive, meaning the patient appears to be terminally ill. In Part Two, Dr. Strawn confirms the lab results with the patient's symptoms, manifest most prominently in New Atheism, Neo-Marcionism, and what he calls "Happyiologists" (purveyors of the prosperity gospel). In Part Three, the good doctor offers a course of treatment that, if properly administered, could save the dying patient. In short, although the OT is in critical condition, the patient can make a full recovery.
No doubt, The Old Testament is Dying will (or, should) receive plenty of publicity, so I won't attempt to offer a full, detailed review here. Instead, let me briefly say why it's well worth your time.
First, Strawn lays out a clear-cut case for loss of the OT language in (particularly) Western Christianity. His analogy with pidgin languages and creoles is impressively effective at driving this point home. Too often people think they speak OT, but they only know some vocabulary, but not its syntax; or their vocabulary and syntax is syncretized with the vocabulary and syntax of another religious language. For the OT to remain a living and distinct language, it needs to retain its syntax and most of its vocabulary.
Second, living languages are not stagnant languages. They adapt to new environs and adopt loan-words from contact langauges. English from the 16th century is not the same as English from the 21st century, but they are both English. By demonstrating through multiple examples how the OT was appropriated variously in different circumstances in later biblical texts, Strawn demonstrates that the language of the OT is a living, malleable language, but it is still OT language.
Finally, Strawn's treatments in Part Two ("Signs of Morbidity") are worth the price of the book alone. Here he deals with three of the most important theological issues facing OT studies today (and Christian theology, for that matter). Although there have been other, longer attempts at addressing New Atheism, modern iterations of the heresy of Marcion, and the heresy of the Prosperity Gospel, these three chapters (chs. 4, 5, 6) are thorough, precise, and nuanced, yet succinct enough so as not to become burdensome.
In my final evaluation of the book, Strawn has done an exemplary job of demonstrating not just the need for OT literacy, but how to (re-)instill OT language skills on the tongues of our youth. The arguments are straightforward and not overly complicated, and Strawn's style is, on the whole, engaging and interesting. At times the vocabulary might be challenging for undergraduates. As such, instructors at undergraduate institutions interested in using the book for an OT survey course will need to take that into consideration as they contemplate its adoption as a course textbook. It should pose no problems for seminary students.
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