A comprehensive model of theological interpretation using Psalm 90 and its prayer for a heart of wisdom as the focus.

Gaining a Heart of Wisdom helps ministers, students, and Christian readers bring together the best features of religious and critical approaches to reading the Bible. Jones describes a comprehensive model of theological interpretation using Psalm 90 and its prayer for a heart of wisdom as the focus. The book delves into the text through a series of conversations with the church, biblical scholars, Christian theologians, and the contemporary world. The result is an approach to biblical interpretation that is grounded in thechurch, informed by critical scholarship, guided by Christian faith, and directed toward discipleship and ministry.

Barry A. Jones is professor of Old Testament and Hebrew at Campbell University Divinity School, where he has taught since 2000. He earned a Ph.D. in Hebrew Bible and Semitic Studies from Duke University. His earlier book, The Formation of the Book of the Twelve: A Study in Text and Canon, studied the writing and preservation of the Minor Prophets as an example of the development of the biblical canon. His teaching and writing focus on the nature of the Old Testament as Christian Scripture and on its interpretation for the life and ministry of the church.

Praise for Gaining a Heart of Wisdom

Pedagogical gold! Barry Jones has produced an illuminating and moving guide to theological interpretation, framed as a sustained exploration of Psalm 90, and drawing on categories developed by theologian Gabriel Fackre. Jones hoped to show his students how to appreciate both traditional and critical approaches to Scripture while also moving beyond them. He has succeeded admirably, and now I can thankfully use his book with my own students. -Stephen B. Chapman, Associate Professor of Old Testament, Duke Divinity School

More than a recent trend in biblical and theological scholarship, theological interpretation of Scripture is nothing less than the church’s engagement with the Bible as Christian Scripture and not merely as a collection of ancient Mediterranean religious texts. But how to practice this approach to reading Scripture is a daunting challenge for ministers trained in historical-critical interpretive methodologies (as well they should be). Barry Jones provides theological students and theologically educated ministers with a helpful apprenticeship in this art-not a theoretical introduction, but an invitation to join him in the actual practice of reading a particular biblical text theologically. -Steven R. Harmon, Associate Professor of Historical Theology, Gardner-Webb University School of Divinity