#3 at Amazon

Greg Gilbert at 9Marks on what he contends is Rob Bell's careless scholarship:

...[H]e writes with amazing confidence about certain facts (word meanings, Jewish backgrounds, historical issues), and yet if you just pick up a dictionary or google a quote, you realize that what he's saying is simply wrong. Pointing these things out isn't just a matter of "picking on" Bell, either. It's a matter of doing our best to make sure little errors don't become part of our atmosphere. Otherwise, before we know it we'll have people in our churches saying, as if everybody knows it already, that Luther was a universalist and that the Bible doesn't have a concept of "forever." ....

Gilbert goes on to discuss what he argues are serious errors in Bell's book, including Bell's contention that the Greek word aion never means "forever." I haven't read the book [and don't intend to] but Gilbert argues that pastors should since they will probably have to deal with parishioners who have:

As a pastor, you should probably read the book and be ready to answer questions about it (it's selling at #3 on Amazon today, after all). But don't go in thinking it's a serious scholarly work, or a tightly-reasoned theological argument. Just open your Bible beside it, along with a basic lexicon and Google for quotes like the Luther one, and I think you'll find that it's a suprisingly easy book for you to answer. [more]

Two Cents, and Not a Penny More, on Love Wins. | 9Marks