Luke

This volume by David Garland provides excellent insight and clarity into the Gospel of Luke. For each biblical pericope, this commentary contains a thorough background of the Literary Context, the Main Idea of the passage in. a quick summary, a translation explanation, the Structure and Literary Form of the passage, an Exegetical Outline, a very thorough Explanation of the Text broken down into smaller sections within the broader pericope, and finally Theological Application. This volume is exceptionally helpful for students of the word, Bible study teachers, and pastors.

This book series is within a very long history on Bible Exegetical Commentaries, most of them wrote from XIX century. They are particularly different at lots of aspects, starting from their have a long list of examples from the past to use their best points and to avoid and correct their deficiencies... They are conservative, easy to follow for a medium backgrounded student (you will not need a Ph.D), great didactics and presentation technique. The book design is modern and not the "heavy feeling" found in most of (older) similar texts. Although I had purchased previously two of the books from the series, I have made a big mistake to purchase them at digital format for Kindle. It is an absolute exercise of futility to try learn something on those volumes in the electronic format - make a favor for yourself and go directly to the printed format. Only at printed format this great work will shine at all its glory. I just purchased my first three volumes at printed format: Luke-Romans-James. I really love this book "trinity" as IMO they summarize at 85% the NT contents. I am enjoying the same great feeling I felt long time ago at graduation where each day I learned some joyful new! I Recommend this commentary on Luke.

Great commentary! I can't imagine a commentary for Preachers and "laymen" being any better or more concise. There is a time for critical commentaries but this is ideal for quick reference and it is by no means shallow. The Goal of this set seems to be to aid the person preaching or teaching. This is the first commentary I have purchased in this series and if the rest follow suit, I will want to purchase them all. The NIGTC and the Word Biblical Commentary have some good titles, but they vary in usefulness. I look forward to seeing more from Zondervan.

This review is strictly for the Kindle format and does not concern the content of the book. My 4 stars is simply for the ease of navigation. As a pastor I use Kindle and Logos for digital references. Kindle versions of reference works and commentaries are often very difficult to navigate and not worth the time or effort even at a substantial savings. Having said that, this version seems to be fairly good in terms of navigating a commentary. The only thing missing that would make navigation better would be to put chapter shortcuts in the Document Navigation bar for the MacBook version. Right now you have to click the table of contents in the Document Navigation bar then click the specific chapter. It’s only one more click but for me that one extra click is the difference between 4 and 5 stars. The iPhone has the table of contents in the drop down menu making it very convenient. Also common to Kindle commentaries (this volume included) is that when Greek or Hebrew words are supplied using the original language it appears as a picture embedded in the text - Kindle apparently doesn’t support Greek or Hebrew fonts. It’s a little obnoxious but it’s easy to get used to. I have Kindle for MacBook as well as iPhone and accessing the end notes and getting to a specific passage are relatively easy.

Luke is a must have along with Romans, Revelation and John for a fuller understanding of the Faith we live by and the Future we hope for. Luke gives the geneology of Jesus back to Adam and Eve, Romans gives the full outline of our salvation, Revelation gives a blessing for reading and a curse for adding unto (the only book in the bible that does) , and adding with a good understanding of the first 3 chapters of Genesis that lays the foundation of what we believe as christians. I will get the full series!

Garland's commentary offers a lot of the same exegetical and biblical-theology insights that can be found in Fitzmeyer (great for historical research), Green (literary and socio-rhetorical), Marshall (historical), and Nolland (find his Luke much more helpful than his Matthew), though less exhaustive in this respect. Where Garland excels is in tackling integration of these insights into theological formulations and application for Christian living. Many of the more substantial commentaries on the Synoptic Gospels leave the reader with a bare historical report. Garland pushes the reader to consider the implications of the text for Christian formation.

Fantastic scholarly commentary that deals with the Koine Greek text without getting too deep in the weeds. This is perfect for almost any commentary application, however it does not get into the weeds. If you're looking for a particular passage or seeking clarity on specific issues regarding textual criticisms or hermeneutics, then consider other sources. This book is above undergraduate work but below doctorate. Good for a Master's level, I suppose.

The Zondervan Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament series is the first commentary series I have ever purchased. That being said, I am currently studying Koine Greek in college and I love how this series breaks it down. Each verse is looked at individually, within its grammatical structure, and broadly, within the context of the book. As each verse is broken down, they introduce it by putting in the original Greek. This allows the reader to get a grip of what will be talked about. Then, each verse it given an original translation--which will differ some from an NIV, KJV, or an NASB translation. Even though one might think it would be useless because they cannot read Greek: have no fear! The actual exegesis is profitable to everyone, be it pastor, student, or parishioner.