re some questions from a new christian ofm responds to a query about reference works aside from a commentary you might also want to consider an introduction these are books intended for use in undergraduate bible courses they give historical background discussion of literary styles etc and generally they have good bibligraphies for further reading i typically recommend kee froehlich and young s nt introduction two other intros to consider the introduction by ku mmel is a translation of a strandard nt text the references are slightly dated and the style is somewhat dense but the book contains a wealth of information perrin and duling s intro is also very good it s somewhat more modern than ku mmel s but not quite so densely packed also the authors tend to go through the books of the nt in the historical order of composition this gives a very useful perspective on the development of the nt there are also some good one volume commentaries probably the best recommendation these days would be harper s bible commentary a slight dissent i think the harper s is ok but not great one particular problem i have is that it tends to be pretty skimpy on bibliographic material my feeling is that it is ok for quick look ups but not real useful for study in depth e g i keep a copy in my office at work i think there may be a couple of books with this title so far as i know there is the only one book with this exact title james l mays general editor harper and row although i think i recall a older series under the name harper commentaries also there s a separate harper s bible dictionary most of my comments on the hc also apply to the hbd my favorite one volume commentary is the new jerome biblical commentary the njbc is rather catholic in focus and somewhat biased towards the nt the reader can decide for her or himself whether these are pluses or minuses in any case the scholarship is by and large excellent note the njbc is a completely reworked updated version of the jerome biblical commentary copies of which can still be found on sale nichael
