I started this interview a couple days ago, but then was beautifully interrupted with the birth of our son. Now that we’re all home from the hospital, I’ll post the second installment of my interview of Dr. Ryken.
Do you see this study Bible being used in high school and college courses on the Bible as literature?
Dr. Ryken: It became evident early in the editorial process that an evangelical bias was evident in our commentary, even though our focus was on literary issues. Realistically speaking, therefore, while our study Bible is ideally suited for Bible-as-literature courses, it is unlikely to find much use beyond Christian schools and colleges. But I will not prejudge the matter, since my books on the Bible as literature have regularly been used in secular universities, and an online course that I composed and taught for Barnes and Noble University built around one of my books on the Bible as literature was one of their most popular courses.
Speaking as a professor of English at Wheaton College, might you offer your top-ten list of great Christian fiction?
Dr. Ryken: Such a list always reflects personal taste, of course, and this is reflected in my list. Additionally, although in common parlance fiction is virtually synonymous with the novel, the realm of fiction actually extends well beyond the novel. With those provisos in place, here is my own list of top eight: Homer’s ODYSSEY; Shakespeare’s MACBETH and HAMLET; Milton’s PARADISE LOST; Hawthorne’s THE SCARLET LETTER; Dickens’ GREAT EXPECTATIONS; Tolstoy’s THE DEATH OF IVAN ILYCH; C. S. Lewis’ CHRONICLES OF NARNIA. If I were to add two works to make the number ten, the additional two would not quite be at the high level of the works I have named.
What is the role of Christian literature in the spiritual lives of believers?
Dr. Ryken: Several years ago I agreed to compose an address on literature and the spiritual life. This was a different topic from the one on which I had written books and articles, namely, literature in Christian perspective. When I undertook research to uncover personal statements and anecdotes about how Christians had been spiritually influenced by their reading of literature, I was astounded to discover how important literature is in the lives of many Christians. I had underestimated the degree to which Christian literature can nurture one’s spiritual life and even become the instrument by which people come to faith. I am a Miltonist (specialist in John Milton) by profession, and out of the mass of scholarship that I have read on Milton, my very favorite piece of commentary is the opening statement of someone’s testimony offered when he became a member of Tenth Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia: “I was led to the Lord by John Milton.”
How should Christians interact with highly-regarded non-Christian literature?
Dr. Ryken: They should interact in the same way that they interact with all of life. They should affirm and be edified and entertained by what is true, good, and beautiful in such literature, and they should set up resistance to what is false and depraved.

Awhile ago I mentioned the newly released ESV Literary Study Bible, edited by Dr. Leland Ryken and Pastor Phil Ryken. Dr. Ryken, the Clyde S. Kilby professor of English at Wheaton College, was kind enough to answer a few questions about the project. I’ll post part 1 of the interview now, and part 2 late tomorrow.
What motivated you to organize this type of study Bible?
Dr. Ryken: The primary motivation was my awareness that the Bible is, in terms of its external format, a literary anthology. That being the case, it deserves to be printed with critical apparatus (as it is called in my discipline) that is literary in nature, along the lines of THE NORTON ANTHOLOGY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE. Secondarily, I was motivated by my discontent with conventional study Bibles. Conventional study Bibles are useful as reference books, chiefly in their ability to solve localized difficulties in the text, but in my view they do not provide practical help in interacting with the biblical text. Our literary Bible helps readers enter the text and move through a passage.
How long has producing this study Bible been a desire of your heart?
Dr. Ryken: I have been an advocate of the literary study of the Bible for four decades, but it never occurred to me until recently that I could put my knowledge about the Bible as literature into the format of a study Bible. For me the exciting thing in the venture is that a literary study Bible has allowed me to provide literary commentary on the whole Bible. I want to record a huge debt of gratitude to Lane Dennis, president of Crossway Books. Lane gave me two big breaks–the go-ahead to do a whole book on Bible translation and then to do a literary study Bible.
What need to you see it filling?
Dr. Ryken: Many Christians acknowledge in theory that the Bible is a literary book, but they do not know what this means. A literary study Bible shows plainly what it means that the Bible is literary in nature. Additionally, I view a literary approach to the Bible as a common reader’s approach, in contrast to the highly specialized approaches of biblical scholarship. Literary commentary is of practical use in such things as the structure and unity of a passage, the experiential content of a passage (inasmuch as the subject of literature is human experience), and the ways in which an author has embodied his content (the “how” of a piece of writing). I would hope that preachers would use this literary study Bible in their sermon preparation, inasmuch as just a modicum of literary awareness would add a lot to an expository sermon.
Has the literary appreciation of the Bible diminished over the centuries?
Dr. Ryken: Awareness of the Bible as being literary in nature has ebbed and flowed through the centuries. During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, scholars like Luther and Calvin, as well as most English literary authors, had a grasp of the literary dimension of the Bible. The Romantic movement of the nineteenth century represented another flowering of literary interest in the Bible, but it was unaccompanied by an evangelical view of the Bible’s status as God’s inspired word. In the last half century there has been a discernible interest in the Bible as literature by literary critics and biblical scholars. It is fair to say that few Bible readers today read the Bible with literary awareness.
Update: Read Part II of this interview.
Update: This resource is now available for 40% off ($29.99).