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Logos Free Book of the Month for February 2019 – Mark Seifrid, Christ, Our Righteousness

Logos has an excellent book on offer for their Free Book of the Month. All three of the free and “almost free” books are part of the New Studies in Biblical Theology from InterVarsity Press. From the IVP Website, this series “Addressing key issues in biblical theology, the works comprised by New Studies in Biblical Theology are creative attempts to help Christians better understand their Bibles. The NSBT series is edited by D. A. Carson, aiming to simultaneously instruct and to edify, to interact with current scholarship and to point the way ahead.”

For the month of February, you can download Mark Seifrid, Christ, Our Righteousness: Paul’s Theology of Justification (IVP Academic, 2000). Seifrid’s work is solid and represents the traditional / reformation perspective on Paul (see my “What was the Old Perspective?”). His published dissertation was Justification by Faith: The Origin and Development of a Central Pauline Theme (NovT Supp; Leiden: Brill, 1992) and he has contributed numerous essays and articles on Paul’s theology, such as “The ‘New Perspective on Paul’ and its Problems,” Themelios 25 (2000): 4–18. He wrote the Pillar Commentary on the New Testament on 2 Corinthians. When I mentioned this book in an article back in 2013, I said “is a brief treatment of the topic but among the very best and most accessible for the layman.” My physical copy of this book is well-read and marked, a sure sign of a stimulating book.

In addition to Seifrid, you can add Peter G. Bolt, The Cross from a Distance: Atonement in Mark’s Gospel (IVP Academic, 2004) for $1.99. Bolt “explores why the cross is so prominent in Mark’s Gospel, what Mark’s teaching contributes to our understanding of the atonement, and how it can inform, correct, and enrich our own preaching of the gospel in the contemporary world. He helps us to stand in wonder before God who has come close to us in the cross of Jesus Christ and to live in hope for the better things to come.”

Perhaps most exciting to me, Craig Blomberg’s Contagious Holiness:Jesus’ Meals with Sinners (IVP Academic, 2005) for $2.99. This book came out about the time I started by PhD work, and I did not discover the book until I was well into my dissertation research. Reading the book was a bit depressing since Blomberg was doing the very thing I wanted to do in my dissertation (and doing it better than I would)! The thesis of his book: “In sharing food and drink with His companions, He invited them to share in the grace of God. He revealed His redemptive mission while eating with sinners, repentant and unrepentant alike. Jesus’ “table fellowship” with sinners in the Gospels has been widely agreed to be historically reliable.” I ended up with some of the historical Jesus material, but focused on table fellowship as an anticipation of the messianic banquet (which Blomberg includes briefly).

The bottom line is that you can add three excellent, academic books to your Logos Library for about $5. Any of these books are worth the investment at full price, so a big thanks to IVP Academic and Logos for making them available so inexpensively.You can also enter to win a 22 volume set of “The Bible Speaks Today: New Testament.”

In case you have not seen the announcements, Logos Bible Software released a major upgrade last week. I did a “first look” review of Logos 8 here. There are plenty of new features to justify an upgrade and the software runs much more efficiently than the previous version. Everything seems to run faster than Logos 7. Through February 7, You can save 25% on any upgrades to Logos 8 and pick five free books when you upgrade to Logos 8. Follow the link and used the code READINGACTS8.

Logos “Free Book of the Month” for January 2019 – John Goldingay, Isaiah for Everyone

Logos Bible Software is starting 2019 off right by offering a copy of Isaiah for Everyone by John Goldingay for free in January. From the blurb, “In this volume on Isaiah, John Goldingay explores the first of the great prophetic books. Isaiah is a compilation of the prophetic messages of several prophets. Their messages to the people of Judah and Jerusalem included a call for injustice to be recognized, a message of liberation and hope from the oppressors of the people, and a message of the coming day of judgment.” Goldingay is always a good read, and I have used his The Theology of the Book of Isaiah as a textbook in a grad class on Isaiah several times.

Seriously, all you need to know is it is a free copy of a commentary on Isaiah by John Goldingay. If you are a Logos used, then you should get this book!

Since Logos is partnering with Westminster John Knox for the give away this month, they are also offering two excellent books as “almost free” add-ons. First, for only $1.99 you can add Douglas Stuart’s Old Testament Exegesis (Fourth Edition): A Handbook for Students and Pastors, and for $2.99 more you can add Gordon Fee’s New Testament Exegesis (Third Edition): A Handbook for Students and Pastors. I have used the Fee book as a textbook in a NT Exegesis class for years, it is very good introduction to NT exegetical method. I was assigned Studart’s book in a PhD seminary on Hebrew Exegesis and used it the last time I taught a Hebrew exegesis course

You can also enter to win the Westminster John Knox Theology Collection (6 vols.; $180 value). The set includes The Drama of Doctrine: A Canonical-Linguistic Approach to Christian Theology by Kevin J. Vanhoozer and there are several ways to enter.

In case you have not seen the announcements, Logos Bible Software released a major upgrade last week. I did a “first look” review of Logos 8 here. There are plenty of new features to justify an upgrade and the software runs much more efficiently than the previous version. Everything seems to run faster than Logos 7. You can save 25% on any upgrades to Logos 8 and pick five free books when you upgrade to Logos 8. Follow the link and used the code READINGACTS8.

Logos “Free Book of the Month” for December 2018 – John S. Feinberg, No One Like Him

For the  month of December Logos users can download John S. Feinberg, No One Like Him: The Doctrine of God (Crossway, 2001) for free, Graham Cole, He Who Gives Life: The Doctrine of the Holy Spirit for $2.99 and Bruce Demerast, The Cross and Salvation: The Doctrine of Salvation for $4.99.

These three books are part of The Foundations of Evangelical Theology from Crossway. In Feinberg’s general introduction to the series, he indicates the intention of the series is “to address all areas of evangelical theology with a special emphasis on key issues in each area. While other series may be more like a history of doctrine, this series purposes to incorporate insights from Scripture, historical theology, philosophy, etc., in order to produce an up-to-date work in systematic theology. Though all contributors to the series are thoroughly evangelical in their theology, embracing the historical orthodox doctrines of the church, the series as a whole is not meant to be slanted in the direction of one form of evangelical theology. Nonetheless, most of the writers come from a Reformed perspective. Alternate evangelical and non-evangelical options, however, are discussed.”

You can also enter the Logos giveaway for the Crossway Studies on the Bible (8 Vol. set).

In case you have not seen the announcements, Logos Bible Software released a major upgrade last week. I did a “first look” review of Logos 8 here. There are plenty of new features to justify an upgrade and the software runs much more efficiently than the previous version. Everything seems to run faster than Logos 7. You can save 25% on any upgrades to Logos 8 and pick five free books when you upgrade to Logos 8. Follow the link and used the code READINGACTS8.

Head on over to the Logos Free Book page and get yourself a nice Christmas present (or two).

Logos Free Book – Craig Evans, The Reliability of New Testament Manuscripts

For July 2018, Logos Bible Software is offering one of their Mobile Courses as their “Free Book of the Month.”  Craig Evans, The Reliability of New Testament Manuscripts (Mobile Ed: NT308). If you have not used a Logos Mobile Course, this is your chance to sample a good one.For $9.99 you can add Mark Strauss, “Introducing Bible Translations” and for $19.99, you can add the three hour course by Craig Keener, “Critical Issues in the Synoptic Gospels.”

Craig Evans, The Reliability of New Testament Manuscripts, Logos Bible Software

The courses are set up like college classes. There is a syllabus with course description, course outcomes and a final exam. The outcomes for The Reliability of New Testament Manuscripts are:

Upon successful completion you should be able to:

• Detail the number of pre-Gutenberg NT manuscripts we have and describe their quality
• Explain how the NT manuscript record compares to that of other ancient works
• Describe practices of ancient scribes and scholars that contributed to the longevity and quality of NT manuscripts
• Describe the preservation of the NT in ancient translations and commentaries
• Discuss how the various forms of historical attestation demonstrate the reliability of the NT text

This free Mobile Course is considered a “one hour course” based on the content (about an hour of video content). This course has eleven segments. A segment will have a short video lecture from Evans as well as a transcript of that lecture. Following the transcript there are several links to “Suggested Reading” and other resources Logos offers. These are not bibliographies, but links to books you your Logos Library such as the Lexham Bible Dictionary. Naturally Logos would be glad to sell you these books if you do not already own them! One advantage reading the transcript is key terms are linked to definitions and Scripture references are tagged. Floating over P87 in a transcript, for example, will open a small window giving the basic info on the papyri drawn from Philip Wesley Comfort and David P. Barrett, The Text of the Earliest New Testament Greek Manuscripts (Wheaton, IL: Tyndale House, 2001).

Occasionally a lecture segment is a ScreenCast video demonstrating how to use Logos. For example, “Exploring Ancient Manuscripts and Resources” coaches the user on how to download and use the Perseus collection and the Duke Databank of Documentary Papyri. “Accessing and Navigating the Textual Apparatus” demonstrates how users who own the UBS fourth edition in Logos can examine the textual apparatus. These are not narrated by Evans but are useful tutorials for using the potential of the Logos system (as well as advertisements for upgrading Logos to include more features and resources). This is a feature of all Logos Mobile courses and Logos intends to update courses to include additional resource “in the future for no extra charge.”

This month the Logos giveaway is a four-course bundle: Text of the Bible Bundle. In addition to Evans, the bundle includes Mark L. Strauss, Introducing Bible Translations (also available for $9.99 this month), Michael S. Heiser, How We Got the Old Testament and How We Got the New Testament (also by Heiser). This is another eleven hours of video content, so enter early and often to win this bundle. They are also running a 40% off sale on some huge Mobile Ed packages during July.

Be sure to get these resources before the end of July 2018 when the offer expires.

Logos Free Book – Roland Murphy, Ecclesiastes (Word Biblical Commentary)

Logos Bible Software is offering Roland Murphy’s Word Biblical Commentary on Ecclesiastes (1992) for free during the month of June, and you can add John Durham’s Exodus commentary (1087) for $1.99 and G. R. Beasley Murray’s John (Second Edition, 1999) for $9.99. This means for a mere $12 you can add three major commentaries to you Logos library (well over $100 if purchased at Amazon, although much less for the savvy shopper who knows how to navigate a used bookstore).

Murphy was the George Washington Ivey Professor of Biblical Studies at Duke University for many years and was  co-editor of both the Jerome Biblical Commentary and the (New) Jerome Biblical Commentary. His Ecclesiastes commentary is excellent and will be a fine addition to a Logos library.

The Word Biblical Commentary series are serious exegetical commentaries. Each unit begins with a short bibliography including monographs and peer-reviewed journals (including German and French sources). These are often a great place for students to start a research project, although they are only complete up to the publication of the volume. The authors focus on the original languages and deal with technical details of translation and technical variations via footnotes on a new translation of each section.  Following the translation is a section entitled Form/Structure/Setting. In some of the the earlier commentaries this section included something like source or form criticism, but usually the literary structure of the Hebrew or Greek is in view. Following this section is the commentary proper, proceeding verse by verse with attention to the original text (which is included without transliteration). Each unit concludes with a brief section entitled explanation, although the content of this unit varies from volume to volume.

The Word Biblical Commentary series was originally published by Word Books (Waco, Texas) in 1983. The first few volumes are all still very valuable: Trent Butler on Joshua; Ralph Klein on 1 Samuel; Leslie Allen on Psalms; Gerald F. Hawthorne on Philippians; Richard J. Bauckham (2 Peter & Jude. The series was purchased by Thomas Nelson, but after HarperCollins acquired both Thomas Nelson and Zondervan, the series was moved to Zondervan. The series is nearly complete, with Steven J. Walton’s Acts commentary and Andrew D. Clarke on 1 Corinthians still listed as “forthcoming.”

As typically happens with an aging commentary series, Zondervan is revising or replacing some earlier volumes. Ralph Martin’s Second Corinthians commentary was revised by a few of his students by adding a few additional sections (conveniently marked with gray pages; see my review here); Trent Butler completely revised his Joshua commentary, adding a second volume with extremely detailed geographical notes on the second half of Joshua. You can read my review here, originally published in Journal for the Evangelical Study of the Old Testament 5.1 (2016).

One serious advantage to the Logos format of this commentary is that all the Logos features are available. This includes searching English, Hebrew and Greek words, fuzzy searches, etc. By right-clicking a Hebrew word, the user can open their Hebrew lexicon of choice, right-clicking an English word opens up many options, including searching the user’s entire library, or limiting that search to a preferred Bible dictionary. A used can hover over abbreviations and a popup will identify the source, if it is a resource in the Logos library then it is clickable. References to other parts of the commentary are hyperlinks (so, “see notes” will go right to the section to which the author refers. All scripture reference are links as well, so the user can hover over the link and read the verse, to click to go to the preferred translation. Perhaps the most useful tool is how Logos cites sources. If the used copies a chuck of text and pastes it into a word processor, Logos will create a footnote citing the source in the user’s preferred format. I usually paste as plain text then edit the citation myself so it conforms to the format I prefer. What is important here is these digital books have real page numbers so they can be cited as if you have the real book in your desk. To me, this is a critically important feature. Nothing is more frustrating than students trying to cite a Kindle book in a research paper (in fact, just don’t try, find a real copy of the book and cite it properly).

As with most Logos resources, all resources are available on any Logos platform. I usually work with Logos on my desktop computer, but I can also read the books using my iPad and the Logos Bible App. All notes and highlights are synced with the user’s Faithlife account so I can read, make a few notes on a book, then pick up those notes on my desktop when I return to the office and incorporate them into whatever document I am working on at the time. If the user downloads the book to their device, footnotes appear at the bottom of the page (like a real book). Unfortunately, Logos removed the real page numbers from the iOS app, this is a major step backward (although I hear the page numbers will be restored in the future).

Logos usually does a giveaway with these free and almost free books, so this month they are giving away the Zondervan Theology Collection (7 volumes, $155.99 value).

Be sure to get these books before the end of June 2018 when the offer expires.