Studying Early Judaism: Building Your Reference Library

A Guide to Resources for New Testament Studies

Studying Early Judaism

We recently kicked off this studying EJ series, check out the first post.

In this post, we are recommending reference resources to build your personal library, tools that you can use over and over again in order to study the New Testament insightfully and responsibly in context.

IVP Bible Background Commentary (Craig Keener)

This is an incredible resource with loads of information packed into one volume. Award-winning, best-selling and all of that. You can always trust Keener to be up to date on scholarship.

The Jewish Annotated New Testament

This is kind of like a study Bible, with the notes written by Jewish scholars shedding light on the NT in the context of early Judaism. This is an academic resource, not a “devotional” study Bible.

The World of the New Testament: Cultural, Social, and Historical Contexts (ed. Green and McDonald)

40+ essays from respected scholars, covering all kinds of cultural and historical elements of the early Jewish and Greco-Roman world of the NT. Great book for college classroom use, btw.

Behind the Scenes of the New Testament (ed. Longenecker, Shively, and Lang)

Similar to the “World of” volume mentioned above, but this one is newer and much longer (60+ essays). Great scholarship. I’ve already used it several times, and it only came out a few months ago!

Eerdmans Dictionary of Early Judaism (ed. Collins and Harlow)

This is the go-to resource on EJ, written by the world’s leading experts. This is a MUST-HAVE. Get it now.

Dictionary of New Testament Background (ed. Evans and Porter)

An amazing resource, well-worth having, now a little bit outdated (~25 years old), but there’s really nothing else out there that covers the same ground so well—and very affordable from IVP. I hope IVP does an update soon.

Dictionary of Daily Life in Biblical and Post-Biblical Antiquity (ed. Yamauchi and Wilson)

2000+ pages! I love this resource, you can look just about anything up from furniture to clothing to dance, cosmetics, fishing, weapons, laws, even dentistry and medicine!