David deSilva’s
“Honor, Patronage, Kinship and Purity”

Page Contents:

Summary
Full Review
Table of Contents
Our Rating of this book

Summary
Full Review Below

Book Reviewed

Our Rating

Title:	Honor, Patronage, Kinship and Purity
Author:	David deSilva
Binding:	Paperback
Publisher:	IVP 2000
ISBN:	0830815724
List Price:	$24.99
Buy Now For:	$17.49 (30%)	Buy This Book Now From Amazon.com
Review Date:	18 February, 2002
Reviewer:	J. P. Holding

Very Highly Recommended

Publisher’ Commentary:

"Contemporary Western readers of the New Testament may find it surprising that honor and shame, patronage and reciprocity, kinship and family, and purity and pollution offer us keys to understanding the methods and message of the New Testament. But as recent scholarship has discovered and David deSilva demonstrates, paying attention to these cultural themes opens our eyes and ears to new facets and overtones within the New Testament documents."

Bookshop Summary: An awesome overview of four major social "engines" in the NT world. Learn them well and realize how different we are -- and thus what the skeptics are missing.

Four Roman Pillars

A review of David deSilva's Honor, Patronage, Kinship and Purity

by
J. P. Holding

This one was so good that it earned status in our Apologetics Arsenal. We can't say it enough: when it comes to the ancient world, their thoughts are not as our thoughts, and if you don't understand how they thought and you are a skeptic attacking the text, you may as well use the Bible for origami as well as read it.

deSilva relates four major ancient social conceptions, demonstrates their effects and purposes from contemporary literature, and shows how these factors relate to the Bible and the interpretation thereof. Honor? As we have shown here, the ancient view of honor shows why the Christian faith was an impossible one to believe in the ancient world. It also explains why Jesus' riposte with the Pharisees is being wrongly viewed by Skeptics -- think of it as modern men "playing the dozens"! Purity? We laid some of the results of that out here. Patronage? Understand why the Christian offer of grace was so hard to swallow! Kinship? Know why it was such a risk to become a Christian and alienate yourself -- it wasn't just a matter of not getting birthday presents!

This is yet another one we can't recommend enough. Pick it up and savor the flavor of the NT world!