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PAUL A. BARKER, The Triumph of Grace in Deuteronomy: Faithless Israel, Faithful Yahweh in Deuteronomy (Paternoster Biblical Monographs; Milton Keynes: Paternoster, 2004). Pp. xxii + 269. Paper £19.99.
This volume by Paul A. Barker is a "largely unchanged version" of his doctoral thesis, supervised by Gordon Wenham at "what was then the Cheltenham and Gloucester College of Higher Education" (p. xv). B. offers an interpretation of three selected passages in Deuteronomy: the retelling of the incident of the spies (chaps. 1-3), the recounting of the story of the golden calf (chaps. 8-10), and what he identifies as the future prediction of Israel's failure of faithfulness and its subsequent exile (chaps. 29-30). B. has chosen these particular sections of Deuteronomy for study because, in his view, they all look on Israel's failure, both past and present, as upholding Yhwh's covenant. As B. frequently points out, this work is primarily theological, as is evident in his central thesis. B. contends that a nuanced synchronie reading of these passages reveals that in the theology of the writer of Deuteronomy, Israel was incapable of being faithful to the covenantal demands. Hence, its only...