Systematic Theology is the culmination and creative synthesis of John Frame’s writing on, teaching about, and studying of the Word of God. This magisterial opus—at once biblical, clear, cogent, readable, accessible, and practical—summarizes the mature thought of one of the most important and original Reformed theologians of the last hundred years. It will enable you to see clearly how the Bible explains God’s great, sweeping plan for mankind.
There have been many Systematic Theologies that have been published in the past two centuries dealing with the great themes of Christian theology from various angles and viewpoints, from classics such as Hodge’s three-volume Systematic Theology and Herman Bavinck’s four-volume Reformed Dogmatics to more recent single-volume works such as Wayne Grudem’s Systematic Theology and Millard Erickson’s Christian Theology. So why recommend this particular systematic theology?
Well, for those who are familiar with John Frame’s work, he has published tremendously on various aspects of theology, philosophy and apologetics over the years. He has been instrumental in simplifying and popularizing Van Til’s presuppositional method of apologetics through Apologetics to the Glory of God. He has also provided one of the most comprehensive treatment of Christian ethics in Doctrine of the Christian Life, which is part of his multi-volume Theology of Lordship series (with the combined length of the whole series being over 3,000 pages long). Anyone who has read these other writings of Frame knows that he is a very meticulous scholar who manages to combine both combine both solid biblical exegesis and an astute knowledge of philosophy, which is a rare combination in this day and age.
At around 1,200 pages, much of what is found in Frame’s Systematic Theology is a more concise treatment of what can be found in the Theology of Lordship series. While it covers the kind of topics covered in more traditional systematic theologies, Frame also covers topics that normally fall under the purview of philosophical theology, such as epistemology (in his chapters of the knowledge of God and its relation to man) and ethics (in his chapter on the Christian life). Of particular note is his discussion of the Doctrine of God, which is 16 chapters long, making it perhaps one of the most comprehensive treatments of God’s nature and attributes of any single-volume Systematic Theology.
