The Narrow Path Ministries

Hello, first time in here.

I have a question concerning study bibles and commentaries. I listened to Steve Greggs "WHen shall these things be" and then ordered 2 books, "Amillenium Today" and "Basis for Amillenial Faith" and Im looking forward to reading them when they arrive. However I found that ALL my commentaries and my study Bibles are Dispensational. John McArthur, even my Thomson Chain Reference Bible which doesnt actually have notes below but points to verses that seem to lean toward a dispensational or pre-mill view. H.A. Ironside, Matthew Henry, Walvoord and more all teach dispensationalism and I have several commentaries.

However I have been searching for Commentaries with an amill view and it seems very difficult to find even one. I have Steve Greggs commentary, so that would be one, but are there complete Bible commentaries available? Or a series that cover a great deal of the Bible books? Or a Study Bible?

Last would anyone like to purchase Dispensational commentaries? :O)

Your input would be helpful?

Robin

Hi Robin,

You know, I don't know much about Matthew Henry's theology, but he wouldn't have been dispensationalist, because he lived too early and died before Darby's time. He could have been premillennial, but that would even surprise me. His commentaries are so devotional that I have not always found it easy to discern his doctrinal leanings.

No commentaries are perfect, but you will not find dispensational bias in the commentaries of older writers, like Calvin and Poole. Among newer commentators, F.F. Bruce is my favorite, and though he was Plymouth Brethren (as was Darby), Bruce was no dispensationalist. The set of commentaries pubished by Eerdmans, called "the Tyndale New Testament Commentaries" and the set published by IVP, called "the Tyndale Old Testament Commentaries" are very good, are written by multiple authors, and are not dispensational.

Any commentaries published by Eerdmans, Intervarsity Press, Baker Book House and Presbyterian-and-Reformed Publishing are not likely to have dispensational slants, while those published by Zondervan Publishing, Moody Press, Multnomah Press or Loizeaux Brothers can usually be counted on to be dispensational. Any author who puts Dallas Theological Seminary, or Moody Bible Institute, or Multnomah Bible College in his resume is usually dispensationalist. There are exceptions to everything I have just said, though.

Study Bibles tend to be dispensational. It was the dispensationalists (C.I. Scoffield) who "invented" the "Study Bible" and most of those who have tried to capitalize on the market have been of the same camp. This, I think, is because dispensationalism cannot be found in the Bible without the influence of dispensational commentary and notes. Most non-dispensationalists trust their readers to be able to find truth in the actual words of the Bible itself.

This is more difficult than it used to be, since it is hard to read the Bible without hearing in our heads the dispensational ideas that popular books and preachers have driven into our skulls. The result has been muich confusion. Most Christians have a framework of dispensationalism already present before they read the Bible. When they read the Bible itself, and find conflicts between its statements and those of the popular teachers, it seems confusing. The solution is to read the Bible a lot, and trust teachers very little.

There are few non-dispensational study Bibles, but those with words in the title like "Reformed" or "Reformation" are likely to not be dispensational (though they will be Calvinistic).

My recommendation would be to get a good Bible without study notes, but get one that has cross-references in the margin or the center column, and one with enough space in the margins to jot down your own observations. Then use whatever commentaries on the side that you may wish, picking and choosing what to accept or not from each author.