Scripture and the Authority of God

by N. T. Wright

Publisher:

SPCK

, 2005

Overview

In this provocative book, N. T. Wright approaches the debate on the authority of Scripture from a different angle. It is, after all, God himself who possesses all authority and that authority is primarily about his sovereign, saving purposes being accomplished through Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit. What does it mean for the Bible to be a channel for that powerful authority?

This question brings up new angles on many other issues: the relation of Scripture, tradition and reason; the place of experience; the many-sided problems of the use and abuse of the Bible in relation to personal and public life. N. T. Wright’s contribution to this intense debate will bring fresh clarity to many puzzling questions.

Product Details

• Title: Scripture and the Authority of God
• Author: N. T. Wright
• Publisher: SPCK
• Publication Date: 2005
• Pages: 112

About N. T. Wright

Nicholas Tom Wright, commonly known as N. T. Wright or Tom Wright, is Professor of New Testament and Early Christianity at St. Andrews University. Previously, he was the bishop of Durham. He has researched, taught, and lectured on the New Testament at McGill, Oxford, and Cambridge Universities, and has been named by Christianity Today a top theologian. He is best known for his scholarly contributions to the historical study of Jesus and the New Perspective on Paul. His work interacts with the positions of James Dunn, E. P. Sanders, Marcus Borg, and Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury. Wright has written and lectured extensively around the world, authoring more than forty books and numerous articles in scholarly journals and popular periodicals. He is best known for his Christian Origins and the Question of God Series, of which three of the anticipated six volumes are finished.

Sample Pages from the Print Edition

Contents

Top Highlights

“We now arrive at the central claim of this book: that the phrase ‘authority of scripture’ can only make Christian sense if it is a shorthand for ‘the authority of the triune God, exercised somehow through scripture’.” (Page 17)

“scripture is more than simply ‘revelation’ in the sense of ‘conveying information’; more” (Page 22)

“Since these are themselves ‘scriptural’ statements, that means that scripture itself points—authoritatively, if it does indeed possess authority!—away from itself and to the fact that final and true authority belongs to God himself, now delegated to Jesus Christ.” (Page 17)

“To affirm ‘the authority of scripture’ is precisely not to say, ‘We know what scripture means and don’t need to raise any more questions.’ It is always a way of saying that the church in each generation must make fresh and rejuvenated efforts to understand scripture more fully and live by it more thoroughly, even if that means cutting across cherished traditions.” (Page 67)

“Scripture is there to be a means of God’s action in and through us—which will include, but go far beyond, the mere conveying of information.” (Page 22)

Product Details

• Title: Scripture and the Authority of God
• Author: N. T. Wright
• Publisher: SPCK
• Print Publication Date: 2005
• Logos Release Date: 2011
• Language: English
• Resources: 1
• Format: Digital › Logos Research Edition
• Subjects: Bible › Evidences, authority, etc; Word of God (Christian theology)
• ISBNs: 9780281057221, 0281057222
• Resource ID: LLS:SCRPTAUTHRGOD
• Resource Type: Monograph
• Metadata Last Updated: 2025-04-07T21:50:55Z

About N. T. Wright

Nicholas Thomas “Tom” Wright (1948–) is a New Testament scholar, Pauline theologian, and Anglican bishop and currently Research Professor Emeritus of New Testament and Early Christianity at St. Mary's College in the University of St Andrews and Senior Research Fellow at Wycliffe Hall, Oxford. Christianity Today named him one of today's top theologians. 

Wright was born in Morpeth, Northumberland, and recounts an awareness of God's presence from a young age—and that relationship with God ever since is reflected in his life and work. He's a prolific author; one of his most popular books, Surprised by Hope, frames the resurrection of the dead as the appropriate hope for all believers rather than an overemphasis on just "going to heaven when you die." He's among the leading theologians in the New Perspective on Paul debate. Wright has several honorary doctoral degrees, and in 2014, the British Academy awarded him the Burkitt Medal "in recognition of special service to biblical studies." In 2015, he was made a fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh.

Wright served as chaplain at Cambridge from 1978 to 1981, then as assistant professor of New Testament language and literature at McGill University in Montreal. Before becoming a chaplain, tutor, lecturer, and fellow at Oxford in 1986, Wright served as dean of Lichfield Cathedral, canon theologian of Westminster Abbey, and the bishop of Durham from 2003–10. In addition to the entire New Testament for Everyone Series, some of N. T. Wright's books include The New Testament in Its World: An Introduction to the History, Literature, and Theology of the First Christians, Who Was Jesus, The New Testament and the People of God, God and the Pandemic, Evil and the Justice of God, Surprised by Hope, and Simply Christian. He coauthored Jesus the Final Days with Craig A. Evans.