Tragedy of the Commons
A Christological Companion to the Book of 1 Samuel
Imprint: Cascade Books
Tragedy of the Commons invites readers into a fresh exploration of the book of 1 Samuel, which tells the story of Saul, Israel's first monarch and the personification of its chronic sins. Stulac's unique voice combines sensitive exegesis with probing meditations on culture, art, literature, memoir, and Christian spirituality. He cuts deftly through the moralistic reductions of Old Testament stories for which the church too often settles, and in doing so, reveals the life-giving rhetoric of a biblical book aimed squarely at the reader's transformation of mind and heart. "Israel's common tragedy," writes Stulac, "will be solved through a lengthening and a deepening of the tragedy itself. Finding his people up to their eyeballs in sewage, God dives into the polluted abyss, swims to the bottom, and unplugs the pipe below their flailing feet." From Hannah's miracle baby to Saul's suicide, Tragedy helps readers to recognize both their own predilection for idols as well as the surprising ways that 1 Samuel anticipates the gospel of Jesus Christ. "King Saul serves not as a finger-wagging argument for God's disengagement from his people's fate," Stulac claims, "but as the shocking conduit of God's incarnational involvement in their corporate mess."
Daniel J. D. Stulac is assistant professor of the Old Testament at Briercrest College in Caronport, Saskatchewan. He is the author of History and Hope: The Agrarian Wisdom of Isaiah 28–35 (Eisenbrauns, 2018), Life, Land, and Elijah in the Book of Kings (Cambridge University Press, 2021), and Gift of the Grotesque: A Christological Companion to the Book of Judges (Cascade, 2022).
"Building on his earlier reading of Judges, Gift of the Grotesque, Daniel Stulac's latest book whisks the reader on a ride through 1 Samuel with a bevy of cultural interleaves, prodigal reflections, and the discovery of divine grace in a wasteland of confusion."
--Keith Bodner, professor of religious studies, Crandall University
"Daniel Stulac finds in 1 Samuel an engrossing mix of intrigue, anguish, paradox, brokenness, and hope. He finds all these in our own world too. The gift he gives us, with vivid prose and lively imagination, is a (rocky) path to joining the two worlds together, letting Scripture bleed color deep into the cracks of our modern times. The result is a life-giving and wonderfully thought-provoking book."
--Richard S. Briggs, visiting research fellow in Old Testament, Cranmer Hall, Durham University
"Daniel Stulac refuses to oversimplify the biblical narrative into manageable morality tales. Instead, using gorgeous poetic language--and drawing on art, movies, novels, and texts from the New Testament--he guides us into reading 1 Samuel as theological literature. Reading this text in this way may break our hearts, but this tragedy can ultimately transform us."
--Sara M. Koenig, professor of biblical studies, Seattle Pacific University and Seminary
"Daniel Stulac's Tragedy of the Commons is a breathtaking sequel to his earlier Gift of the Grotesque. In a stunning, truly remarkable interpretation that combines biblical scholarship with memoir and homily, and that engages poetry, film, contemporary culture, and his own life, Stulac models what he says the Bible wants from its readers: unconditional surrender. This is christological interpretation unlike anything you've read before. Stulac writes with a depth and insight unmatched except for a precious few. Prepare to be blown away."
--Brent A. Strawn, professor of Old Testament, Duke University
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