"The latest revision of this comprehensive and systematic text approaches the Bible from a literary/historical perspective and studies it as a body of writing produced by real people who intended to convey messages to real audiences. Avoiding assessments of the Bible's truth or authority, the authors maintain a rigorously objective tone as they discuss such major issues as the forms and strategies of biblical writing, its actual historical and physical settings, the process of canon formation, the sources of the Pentateuch, and the nature of such biblical genres as prophecy, apocalypse, and gospel. "--BOOK JACKET.