By David Atkinson
IVP 'The Bible Speaks Today' series
173 pages. £8.99
ISBN 0 85111 166 1
David Atkinson is in his element in the book of Proverbs, delighting in its portraits (especially of the lady Wisdom), its swift sayings and the kaleidoscopic scene it thrusts before us.
About the last of these, the heap of aphorisms in the central chapters, he remarks that: 'perhaps its jumbled-up aspect is even a deliberate ploy to reflect life as it is!' - but he is ready to do some sorting of the pile, subject by subject, combining clarity with comprehensiveness. This he manages by quoting a representative saying or two on a given topic in his main text, while adding another dozen or so, verbatim, in a substantial footnote on the same page. So we neither lose our way nor go short of data.
