Review: How to Read the Psalms

How to Read the Psalms by Tremper Longman III
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

While this book may have gotten a 4 or 5 star review score in the stone age era of 1988 (the book was published the same year I was born), today's digital age takes away much of its shine. A new edition would be welcome for several reasons.

Firstly, Longman III could update the quotes/interactions with and bibliography/recommendations with more recent commentaries/scholarship (not too difficult with reference to his 2013 Commentary Survey). It would be immensely useful to update the 30-year-old illustrations/explanations/analogies.

Secondly, although I found Longman III's how to read Genesis (also published by IVP) exceptional, Genesis' genre being a narrative allowed it to be taught through the medium of a book. But because the Psalms is poetry, it is arguably an art more than a science. A video or audio lesson about understanding, interpreting and preaching the Psalms is likely to result in better comprehension for the student. Longman III's text-based approach (without any graphics or diagrams) to explain synonymous or antithetical parallelism was a great challenge for me to understand, even though I have attended a two-week undergrad class in seminary on Wisdom Literature. I'd imagine other lay readers would struggle even more.

Thirdly, although in the preface Longman III indicated his intention to "make the book readable for the college student while still providing enough substance to make it appropriate for a seminary course on Psalms," the brevity of this title severely affects its depth and comprehensibility. I would argue that he misses the mark on the latter.

As one of the premier OT scholars, I hope that IVP work with Longman III on releasing an updated version to serve today's readers.

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