Commentary Compass

A good commentary pairing is not simply the two books I happen to rank highest individually. The point of a pairing is complementarity. If two commentaries ask almost identical questions, use the same methods, and regularly reach the same conclusions, owning both may add less than pairing one of them with a work that illuminates an entirely different dimension of the biblical book.

Matthew makes complementarity particularly important. One commentary may be excellent on the Greek but relatively weak on reception history; another may know ancient Judaism exceptionally well but pay less attention to the Gospel’s narrative design. Some excel at documenting the scholarly debate, while others are better at telling the reader which interpretation is actually most convincing.

For Matthew, I would recommend two pairings.

1. W. D. Davies and Dale C. Allison, ICC + R. T. France, NICNT

Why the pairing works

This is the pairing I would recommend first for someone building a serious Matthew library because the two works combine maximum scholarly coverage with unusually strong independent judgment.

Davies and Allison provide the foundation. Their three ICC volumes give extraordinary coverage of the Greek text, Jewish parallels, early Christian interpretation, source and redaction questions, literary structure, Torah, Christology, discipleship, eschatology, and virtually every important interpretive alternative. They are especially valuable when the reader needs to know not merely what one commentator thinks but how a problem has actually been debated and which evidence matters.

France contributes something different. His NICNT commentary is much more selective and much more willing to decide. Because he began his work on individual passages with his own reading rather than allowing the commentary tradition to dictate the questions, he often cuts through debates that can become overwhelming in a larger critical commentary.

The contrast is particularly helpful on Matthew’s use of Scripture. Davies and Allison expose the breadth of Jewish and early Christian interpretive possibilities; France then asks how Matthew’s fulfillment language actually functions within the Gospel’s narrative. On Matthew 24, the ICC gives the reader the large exegetical landscape, while France develops a particularly coherent reading in which much of 24:4–35 concerns Jerusalem’s fall and Daniel 7 shapes the “coming of the Son of Man.”

The pairing also provides useful methodological balance. Davies and Allison are more comfortable with detailed source-critical and community reconstructions. France is generally more sceptical of reconstructions that move beyond what the final Gospel can establish and adopts a more conservative approach to historical reliability. Reading them together prevents either critical reconstruction or conservative harmonization from becoming automatic.

The major overlap is obvious: both are full-scale exegetical commentaries and both know the scholarly literature extremely well. Yet that overlap is productive because their functions are different. Davies and Allison tell me what I need to know; France often helps me decide what I think.

What the reader gains from owning both

With Davies and Allison alone, it is possible to become lost among interpretive possibilities. France supplies proportion, argument, and readability.

With France alone, it is possible to accept a persuasive conclusion without seeing the full range of evidence and competing interpretations behind it. Davies and Allison provide that depth.

Together they give an unusually strong combination of research breadth, independent exegesis, literary reading, theological judgment, and historical seriousness.

2. Craig S. Keener, A Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew + Matthias Konradt, The Gospel according to Matthew

Why the pairing works

If the first pairing combines comprehensive scholarship with decisive exegesis, Keener and Konradt offer an even more methodologically complementary combination.

Keener is strongest on the world around Matthew. His command of Second Temple Judaism, Greco-Roman society, legal practice, rhetoric, honour and shame, marriage, patronage, ancient biography, household relationships, social status, miracle traditions, and Jewish interpretive traditions gives the reader access to assumptions that the first audience did not need explained.

Konradt is strongest on the world within Matthew. He pays close attention to narrative development, recurring motifs, scriptural echoes, Torah, Israel, church, Christology, and the relationship between Jesus’ mission to Israel and the later mission to the nations.

The combination is particularly powerful because each compensates for a tendency in the other. Keener’s enormous quantity of background material can sometimes make it harder to follow Matthew’s literary movement. Konradt continually brings the reader back to the Gospel’s internal architecture and to the way earlier themes are transformed as the story proceeds.

Conversely, Konradt’s narrative and intertextual reading benefits from Keener’s historical documentation. Claims about Jewish practice, social expectations, or ancient interpretation can be tested against the wider evidence rather than inferred solely from Matthew’s rhetoric.

Their different theological instincts are also useful. Konradt’s treatment of Israel and the Gentiles strongly resists supersessionist readings: Matthew 27:25 does not condemn Israel as a whole, and Gentile mission is not God’s replacement for a failed Israel. Keener’s extensive engagement with Jewish sources similarly guards against caricaturing Judaism as crude legalism, though he approaches the issue through historical context rather than primarily through narrative theology.

Konradt’s more sceptical judgments concerning the historicity of parts of Matthew 1–2 also benefit from being read beside a commentator more disposed to take the Gospel’s historical claims seriously.

What the reader gains from owning both

Keener gives the reader an unusually rich historical and social world.

Konradt gives the reader an unusually coherent literary, intertextual, and theological reading.

Together they are particularly strong on Matthew as a Jewish Gospel: one reconstructs the environment in which the text made sense, while the other traces how Matthew reshapes Israel’s Scriptures and story around Jesus.

How I Would Choose

If I were buying only one pairing for general use, I would choose Davies and Allison + France. It is the more complete foundation for sustained research across the whole Gospel, and it works for almost any passage.

If I already owned a strong general commentary and wanted the pairing most likely to broaden my interpretation rather than duplicate what I already had, I would seriously consider Keener + Konradt. The methodological difference between them produces unusually high added value.

There is also a practical distinction. Davies and Allison + France are particularly useful for someone writing exegesis: sermon series, academic papers, commentary notes, or detailed Bible studies. Keener + Konradt are particularly useful for someone asking why Matthew sounds the way it does within its Jewish, social, scriptural, and narrative worlds.

Bottom Line

My first choice is W. D. Davies and Dale C. Allison, ICC + R. T. France, NICNT.

Davies and Allison provide the deepest scholarly foundation; France provides the strongest single-volume independent reading. One broadens the field of evidence, while the other repeatedly helps the reader make a responsible decision.

My second pairing is Craig S. Keener + Matthias Konradt.

This is arguably the more complementary pair methodologically: Keener illuminates Matthew from the outside through ancient context, while Konradt illuminates it from the inside through narrative and Scripture.

A reader who eventually owns all four has an unusually strong Matthew library with surprisingly little wasted duplication.