The Creative Word, Second Edition: Canon as a Model for Biblical Education

Every faith community knows the challenges of inviting new members and the next generation into its shared life without falling into an arid traditionalism or a shallow relativism. Renowned scholar Walter Brueggemann finds a framework for education in the structure of the Hebrew Bible canon, with its assertion of center and limit (in the Torah), of challenge (in the Prophets), and of inquiry (in the Writings).

Incorporating the best insights from his own career and from the fields of canonical criticism, Old Testament theology, and pedagogical theory, Brueggemann offers a vision of how the community can draw on the shape of Scripture to educate its members. First published in 1982, The Creative Word is now updated and introduced with a foreword by Amy Erickson of Iliff School of Theology.

[A] tremendous work of synthesis, allowing the reader to view the function of the three canonical complexes of the Old Testament. Everyone engaged in teaching or proclaiming Gods word needs to struggle with the issues raised by the author to [avoid] prophetic navete on the one hand and institutional ossification on the other.

Trinity Seminary Review

Walter Brueggemann was William Marcellus McPheeters Professor Emeritus of Old Testament at Columbia Theological Seminary until his death in 2025. An ordained minister in the United Church of Christ, he is still regarded as the premier Old Testament interpreter and biblical theologian. Among his many publications are Prophetic Imagination and Old Testament Theology

Amy Erickson is assistant professor of Hebrew Bible and the director of the Masters of Theological Studies (MTS) program at the Iliff School of Theology.