Brief Insights on Mastering the Bible is one of three volumes in Michael S. Heiser’s 60-Second Scholar series, published by Zondervan. The other two similarly titled volumes have to do with Bible study and Bible doctrine. Each book contains 80, two-page chapters that explain the topic sentence which constitutes the chapter’s title. For example, the title of chapter 43 is “Most of the Material in the Prophetic Books Isn’t About Predicting the Future,” and the chapter goes on to explain why this is the case.

Heiser is scholar-in-residence at Logos Bible Software, as well as an erstwhile professor at several evangelical schools. He’s the host of the Naked Bible Podcast and author of The Unseen Realm (reviewed here), among other books. He blogs regularly at drmsh.com.

Brief Insights on Mastering the Bible is a quick, helpful read, especially for those seeking an introductory text on how to interpret the Bible. It covers similar ground as Gordon D. Fee and Douglas H. Stuart’s excellent How to Read the Bible for All Its Worth (4^th ed.), also published by Zondervan.

Though I enjoyed Heiser’s book and plan on reading the other two in the series, I still recommend Fee and Stuart’s as my first choice for an introductory level text on biblical interpretation. Where Heiser’s material is short and suggestive, Fee and Stuart’s is longer and more detailed.

Book Reviewed
Michael S. Heiser, Brief Insights on Mastering the Bible: 80 Expert Insights, Explained in a Single Minute, (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2018).

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