Bucer's 1550/1551 lectures on Ephesians are among the less well-known writings of the reformer's sojourn in Cambridge. Amos's study seeks to give them their long due appreciation as the first full exposition of evangelical doctrine in a Cambridge lecture hall, putting into practice the ethos and methods of biblical humanism. Amos's study circles around the question of how exegesis and theology are concretely intertwined and interdependent in Bucer's lectures.

The first part of the book offers a detailed outline of the historical context: Bucer, who was steeped in humanist learning, mediated by Erasmus and the Rhenish school, was well suited to conform both ‘to the letter and the spirit’ of the 1535 ‘Cambridge Injunctions’ (p. 61). With the typical humanist concern for the literary and historical context, for the author's intention and rhetoric, Bucer helped to realise the curricular revolution set in motion by the ‘Injunctions’, which ordered the Faculty of Divinity to break with Lombard's ‘Sentences’ and demanded lectures on Scripture instead of exercises in (scholastic) doctrine. Amos concludes the first part of the book with some reflections on the extension and order of the lectures, based on the different manuscripts.

The second part of the book deals with the content of the ‘praelectiones’ as examples of biblical humanist exegesis. Amos shows how Bucer shares the conviction of all reformers that exegesis is ‘not the preliminary but principal task of theology’ (p.108). Scripture is its own interpreter, conspicuous in central matters of salvation, yet also demanding pious erudition in the exegete. Amos finally discusses two selected passages from the Praelectiones to give further attention to how Bucer holds exegesis and theology together: unlike Melanchthon, who almost returns to a disembodied and isolated use of biblical texts in his loci communes, and unlike Calvin, who strictly separates the tasks of exegesis (commentaries) and theological exposition (Institutes), Bucer holds a middle position by discussing all of the biblical material but broadening the discussion whenever the text deals with a doctrinally relevant locus, such as election or faith. This expansion is sometimes integrated into the running commentary and sometimes attached as a separate discussion. Bucer's conviction that Ephesians is a compendium of essential doctrines obviously lessens the tension between exegesis and theology. Still, Amos shows that Bucer carefully preserves the text's integrity as a coherent discourse, whose rhetorical scope (in this case ‘the increase of piety, not only in knowledge, but also in practice’) guides the interpretation of individual passages.

This fascinating study opens a window into biblical scholarship at a crucial turning point for Academy and Church. The reader is sometimes left wondering whether the term ‘theology’ points to systematic presentation or to scholastic speculation, or simply to a broad sense of doing exegesis from a self-consciously Christian perspective. Despite this weakness the book brings out clearly that, for Bucer, as for all pre-modern exegetes, the distinction between exegesis and theology and the shifting of authority within the process did not yet lead to a separation of the two exercises: as Amos's comparison with selected exegetes’ voices from the patristic to the Reformation era shows, ‘Bucer's treatment of the text was not radically different from what had been done before’ (p. 174).