Seven Stories Review

Mike Morrell’s Speakeasy has supplied me with another free book this month in exchange for an honest review no matter how critical (i.e. I have no obligation to be nice). The title of this book is Seven Stories: How to Study and Teach a Nonviolent Bible, written by Anthony Bartlett.

This is the first book I have read by Bartlett, but he proves himself to be a brilliant thinker. He is well read in theology, philosophy and more specifically Girardian philosophy which emerges often in this book. Seven Stories is set up in a textbook fashion that is ideal for, but not limited to, teachers, small groups, pastors and their staff. I, however, found it also to be an enjoyable solo read.  At the end of each section he offers lesson questions, reflective questions, a glossary of terms used, literary resources for more on the subjects he is discussing and cultural references that have touched on these topics (e.g. movies and books). While I initially felt it was written for more of an academic audience, this did help toward making it accessible for others.

Bartlett employs solid interpretative tools for looking at scripture in that he constantly minds historical-criticism, literary-criticism and further employs Girard’s anthropological considerations. He takes his readers through seven stories, but they are “stories” in the sense that each chapter/story is broken up into three lessons which begins by picking up on a theme and theological issue that occurs early in the Bible (often within the Pentateuch) and shows how it travels and evolves throughout the rest of scripture for how people think about and relate to God in their experience and communal life. Bartlett reveals by “lesson three” of the story how each one finds fresh revelation that reshapes their understanding and sores to new heights in Jesus.

This is not in the sense that there is a univocal voice tidily linking the canonical books together but rather he makes full use of the view that the text (as Rene Girard says) is “in travail” and wrestling with itself. His storied themes show how in the messiness of it all that God is always progressing his people to somewhere new and striving toward new meanings especially in terms of what justice, vindication and redeemers look like.

While reading it I was reminded of a quote attributed to Novatian (though I cannot corroborate that, but it’s germane to the topic) in which he said, “The Israelites viewed God not as God was, but as the people were able to understand. God, therefore, is not mediocre, but the people’s understanding is mediocre; God is not limited, but the intellectual capacity of the people’s mind is limited.”  In a sense this book meets a need in the church right now that struggles to remember how God’s self-revelation in the midst of this is constantly moving humanity in life affirming directions and thus causing (as Bartlett terms it) a “semiotic shift” in the later authors’ view of everything.

 I really don’t have many gripes about this book other than wishing he would have expounded a little more on “Story 1” about the Hapiru as I think that will be a bombshell to many coming from evangelical streams and could be easily misused by those prone to anti-Semitism, but it is very important topic for us to be discussing.

Nevertheless, Anthony Bartlett sets out to offer a new lens to interpret the Bible through and he does it very well and will certainly challenge our thinking and assumptions. To me, that alone makes it a quality book to grapple with whether anyone walks away agreeing with him or not.