Cranfield Calls

When I was working at my desk the other day, I ran out of space and had to move some books out of the way (it happens quite often). So I picked up the two volumes of John Chrysostom's homilies and put them on the shelf just under the printer and forgot about them. Dammit - forgot the sun swings round during the course of the day so that by two in the afternoon that shelf is bathed in full sunlight - which did my two new acquisitions absolutely no good at all!

So much for letting them dry out slowly: the bottom-most one was OKish, but the front cover of the upper one was bent as a banana by the sun's unrelenting warmth.

I had to call in LSJ (my biggest book) as well as a couple of concordances BDAG and BDF to weigh the b*gger down and flatten the cover out again. I curse my oversight. Now I need to conserve the spine with some appropriately organic glue. Fish bone or hooves, I think.

It still being Lent, and having finished The Book of Margery Kempe, I am going to turn my attention to Julian of Norwich's 'Revelations of Divine Love'. I bought this Penguin Classics version second-hand a number of years ago and now intend to re-read it as a spiritual companion piece of contemporaneous medieval piety. I also have 'The Cloud of Unknowing' (again a second-hand Penguin Classics) which I may read during Easter week if I have finished Dame Julian's book.

The Douglas Moo commentary on Paul's epistle to the Romans is most excellent: his attention to the textual and linguistic issue puts it squarely in my field of interest. However, as I am currently looking in great detail at Romans 5:12-14, I find my self time and time again directed towards C.E.B Cranfield's two-volume ICC commentary, constantly cited as THE authoritative voice on this epistle. And can I find a pre-owned copy? Well, yes I can, but not for less than £40! I have the Sanday ICC precursor to Cranfield and that is quite adequate, but it's the Cranfield that I really hanker for. It IS on Google books, but as is so often the case, the very pages that I wish to consult are 'not part of this preview'. Most vexing. Nor will the all-in-one Cranfield commentary fit the bill, as in its drive to become more compact and, I suppose, more user-friendly, it has omitted the very textual matters that I find so interesting. That's a shame because the compendium volume is easily and cheaply available brand-new. Ah!....but I LIKE the older ICC's with their green cloth covers and gilt titles, and their slightly musty smell and damp feel......I promise I will not let them sunbathe neglected on my shelf.....