Thursday, May 05, 2011

J. R. Michaels, Commentary on The Gospel of John (Eerdmans 2010)

Down below, Steve quoted from this commentary, and of the many things I’ve learned from reading Triablogue over the years, it’s the value of commentaries. Steve and I have had many discussions about commentaries. One of my fervent wishes is that he would expand and bring up-to-date his commentary page, hint, hint.

Whenever I see a new commentary, I try to at least check it out, Amazon being the typical source I would check for such things (I try always to buy used books if I can). My comment below was, “Who is Michaels, and why does his commentary sell for $130.00, when other commentaries in the series are in the $50.00 range?” Amazon was selling it for $130.00 new and $165.00 used.

Fortunately, CBD is selling it at a more normal price, as is shown in the photo on the left.

(With my “income tax refund” this year, I had a choice to buy a lot of books – again this year I’ve passed on Bavinck’s Systematic Theology, and Muller’s “Post Reformation Reformed Dogmatics,” – each $100+ sets, in order to stock up on commentaries. I’ve come to see how good commentaries are foundational when we want to try to understand, “what saith the Lord?”)
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2 comments:

  1. Unknown5/05/2011 8:36 AM

    Hey,

    We at Eerdmans noticed your blog post about the new Michaels commentary on John and the high price that Amazon has it listed for. Just wanted to let you know that the page listing you noted is for an Amazon associate selling their copy of the commentary for probably three times what the Amazon main page is selling it for (right now $40.94). If you have any other questions about what Amazon is charging send me a quick email at tdevries@eerdmans.com.

    Thanks so much for commenting on this commentary and on commentaries in general. We're glad to hear they are useful to you!

    Tom

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  2. John Bugay5/05/2011 8:56 AM

    Hi Tom -- Sorry for the confusion. I see now that the Amazon page shows an "Amazon Associate" -- I only did a quick search, copying and pasting the attribution that Steve gave to the book, and this was the first page that came up.

    I've noticed that some harder-to-find books are all in the very pricey range at Amazon. In fact, I wonder now why this "associate" would think they could get away with charging such a price.

    My hope is to continue to discuss commentaries in the future. I think that several of these series' (especially the NICNT, which is this one, and the NIGTC) are exceptional resources.

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