The Narrative Unity of Luke-Acts: A Literary Interpretation (2 vols.)

Tannehill’s main objective . . . is to show how narrative parts contribute to the impact of Luke’s literary whole . . . His study shows how [Luke’s use of recurring words, patterns of repetition and contrast, irony, pathos, and many other features of his narrative] contribute to the total fabric of Luke’s masterpiece.

—Concordia Theological Monthly

The author demonstrates how the repetitions of ideas and formal structures function both to reinforce concepts and to achieve narrative and ideological progression. . . . Tannehill’s approach is quite fruitful. His style is unconvoluted, and the parallels and links he suggests almost never seem contrived or forced.

—Virginia Seminary Journal

Tannehill’s book is of a genre that should . . . challenge the reader, not necessarily to see altogether new things in Luke’s Gospel, but certainly to see old things differently. . . . What is new is the new way in which Tannehill leads the reader into a conversation with different methods, questions, and perspectives. These challenge and provoke the reader to ‘come clean’ with his or her own questions and perspectives.

—Circuit Reader

Tannehill does a fine analysis of narrative plot and characters, in close dialogue and continuity with previous Lucan scholarship. . . . His book is very readable, for he avoids technically literary terms not in wide use by biblical scholars and explains those he does use . . . He stresses not Lucan theology, but how the narrative rhetoric tries to influence readers, so modern readers can have ‘their eyes open to the narrator’s purposes and to the crucial life issues involved.’ His narrative approach brings new insights to old debates.

—The Catholic Biblical Quarterly

In this ‘new kind of commentary,’ Tannehill eschews discussion of the historical questions that interpreters of Acts have regarded as central. . . . Acts is studied as a story that uses particular literary techniques to influence its readers. . . . The work will stand alongside more traditional commentaries on Acts for many years to come. It will be of great value to scholars, pastors, and students alike.

—Journal of Biblical Literature

This volume follows plot order with attention to a wide range of narrative dynamics . . . These different perspectives provide some fresh views of Acts not readily available in standard historical-critical commentaries. . . . With its companion first volume, it must be consulted for any serious narrative study of Luke-Acts.

—Catholic Biblical Quarterly

[This] is a successful study of Luke-Acts that will stimulate imaginative readings to a greater degree than ordinary commentaries, and a suggestive example of how future commentaries might be written. . . . The breadth of his reading, the clarity of his prose, and the depth of his insight mark this new commentary as a singular contribution.

—Theological Studies

Deciphering the Lukan narrative rhetoric, Robert Tannehill has achieved a quantum leap beyond traditional exposition on Luke-Acts. . . . His two volumes deserve to be read start to finish. . . . This is a commentary for serious scholar, serious pastor, and serious seminarian.

—Theology Today