Abstract
Not a typical commentary, Joseph H. Hellerman’s Exegetical Guide to the Greek New Testament: Philippians seeks to provide in-depth exegetical analysis to a reader who has some, but not an advanced, knowledge of Greek. Ministers who have had some training in Greek and students preparing for ministry will receive the most benefit from this volume. Hellerman’s work is heavy on parsing, glosses and discussions of Greek syntax, which will serve an intermediate Greek student well.
The text of Philippians is divided into sections according to an exegetical outline of the book, and the commentary is given phrase-by-phrase through the verses of each section. Following each section is a bibliography providing further references for the themes of the section. After the bibliography for each section, a few homiletical suggestions are provided. The result is a book that is easy to navigate for one looking for help with a specific word or phrase in Philippians and especially useful to one preparing to preach or teach through a section of the book.
Readers of this commentary will benefit richly from Hellerman’s expertise in Roman Philippi. Throughout the work, Hellerman supplements his exegesis with relevant details about Roman culture and practice. He provides illustrations from contemporary inscriptions, highlighting their relevance to the text being considered.
Hellerman’s work is light on matters of textual criticism, but, in view of the commentary’s intended audience, this aspect should be seen as an advantage. Hellerman does discuss textual variants listed by the UBS5, but as the commentary is intended to serve intermediate rather than advanced students, he rightly leaves extended treatment of text-critical issues to other commentators. By dealing lightly with textual variants, Hellerman benefits students who are still refining their abilities in syntax and exegesis by not burdening them unnecessarily with heavy discussions of manuscripts and variant readings.
This book is an excellent resource both for students of the Greek New Testament and also for pastors who have some background in Greek, but desire a resource to aide with Greek exegesis. Greek instructors will find it a valuable resource for the classroom. Hellerman’s commentary would be well-used as a textbook for an intermediate Greek course on Philippians, complementing larger commentaries by providing more parsing and discussion of Greek syntax than the average commentary as well as providing relevant historical backgrounds to illuminate the text. Hellerman is to be commended for producing such a useful resource.