For Protestants, one of the best pieces of news in the past century has been the revival of biblical studies among Catholics. It’s been said (by Mark Noll, of all people!) that, with the new Catholic lectionary, more Scripture is read in Catholic worship than in most Protestant denominations.

As prolific Catholic theologian Aidan Nichols points out in the Prface of his recent overview of the Old Testament, Lovely Like Jerusalem (Ignatius), Catholics often have problems getting a sense of the overall shape of the OT, and understanding its purpose in the church.

Not only Catholics: As Nichols rightly argues early in the book, Protestant scholarship, and hence Protestant church life, have been ruined by neo-Marcionite hostility to the OT (Nichols names Schleiermacher, Harnack, and Bultmann as culprits).

Drawing on recent OT scholarship, recent Catholic thought, as well as on the church fathers, Nichols’s book attempts to guide average Christians in a Christian reading of the OT. He succeeds very nicely.

In Part I, Nichols gives an overview of the Old Testament, summarizing each book and section of the Tanakh. This is the weakest part of the book. His summaries are too scant to orient lay readers, and he gives too much credence to some of the conclusions of critical scholarship.

There are good things even in Part I. Nichols regularly emphasizes the crucial necessity of affirming the historicity of the OT, and he is far from a blind advocate of historical criticism.

But Nichols takes off in the subsequent sections, which constitute the bulk of the book. He claims that the unifying theme of OT and NT is the messianic hope.

As Nichols rightly insists, this hope is inseparable from the theme of Israel’s calling and its fulfillment in Jesus, the true Israel. Israel is called to be exclusively devoted to the worship of Yahweh, and to be His instrument for turning the nations to this exclusive faith. Yet, the OT reveals Israel’s impotence to fulfill her commission, and leaves her awaiting God’s final act that will bring the nations to Zion.

Nichols expounds this overall theme through a series of subthemes. Yahweh promised Israel a Davidic king, the gift of the Spirit, new creation, the restoration of a spiritual center in Jerusalem, the redemption of the bride. And all of this hope is realized in Jesus.

Nichols further fills out his treatment by typological explorations of Adam and Adam’s sleep, the flood, the sacrifice of Isaac, the exodus, and he closes the book with selected examples of typological interpretation from the church fathers and Thomas.

Though drawing on contemporary scholarship, Nichols writes for laymen, and his book provides a very fine introduction to some of the main concerns of the OT.