The latest Review of Biblical Literature came this morning. I was initially excited to see Hutton’s Fortress Introduction to the Prophets listed, as I have never found a satisfactory textbook for my undergraduate Prophets course. But, alas, after reading the reviews by Camp and Polanski, it doesn’t look like this book will do the trick either. I can’t believe that an introduction to the prophets (especially as part of a major publisher’s new series) would ever be published that doesn’t even talk about Ezekiel, Zechariah, and Daniel, among others! (OK, Daniel I could understand if they were either omitting it because it is not among the prophets in the Hebrew Bible or if they considered it more of a midrash)

I also don’t understand why such a book would be published that doesn’t include notes. I personally don’t think that books should ever be published without at least having endnotes. Especially for a book that may be adopted as a textbook. We try to teach our students about proper documentation and citing your sources, etc., but then are expected to use a textbook that doesn’t? I would think that for a potential textbook you should include footnotes/endnotes if even only to guide the student to further discussions.