Wednesday, April 09, 2008

John Currid

I'm always delighted to learn about scholars who take up blogging in the service of the church. Here's the latest: John Currid, who is blogging at his church's website. It's worth bookmarking, with a steady stream of insightful posts.

Here's the faculty bio on Currid:
Dr. John Currid is Carl McMurray Professor of Old Testament at the Charlotte campus [of Reformed Theological Seminary]. A Ph.D. graduate of the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago in Syro-Palestinian Archaeology, he has extensive archaeological field experience. He was the Director of the Agricultural Project at Tel Halif, Israel; Field Archaeologist of the UNESCO Project at the excavation of Carthage, Tunisia; and staff archaeologist at Tell el-Hesi and Bethsaida, both in Israel. He has written several commentaries in the EP Study Commentary Series and serves as editor for that series. He has also written two books in the discipline of archeology and has recently published another book about suffering. Personally, he is a hopeless Cubs fan who plays the guitar and loves Elvis. Dr. Currid and his wife Nancy have two children, Elizabeth and David.
I've actually been meaning to blog on Currid's work for some time. As his bio mentions, he is the editor for the Evangelical Press Study Commentary Series. The series (in my experience) is not well known. But within this series, Currid has managed to accomplish a very rare feat: (1) he's written commentaries on each of the five books of the Pentateuch; (2) he's combined a number of wonderful traits: literary, archaeological, and theological insights along with appropriate application, building on the best of scholarship in an accessible way.

I would warmly recommend each of these commentaries for students of God's Word: