Originally Posted by greenbaggins

I think I would agree to some extent with Enns on this, though there need to be boundaries set. I do think that ancient history writing differs from modern history writing in some significant ways. However, what Enns does not do justice to is the fact that the biblical writing was always polemical against the ANE. I get the feeling with Enns that there is way too much continuity between ANE writing and the Bible. I remember having a conversation with him at GA last year in which I was commenting on Poole's Synopsis Criticorum. Enns seemed a bit neutral with regard to the work. But he did comment about how we now have the Dead Sea Scrolls. The comment seemed to assume that whole paradigms have shifted in biblical interpretation since the Reformation, by means of discovering such scrolls as these. Now, far be it from me to denigrate using the DSS in seeking to understand the first-century world. I have no doubt that many good insights have come from that. However, the main interpreter of Scripture is Scripture, not outside texts. I wonder how much he would affirm that.