Brueggemann brings the "transformative potential" of the biblical texts to bear on critical contemporary contexts, including but not limited to economic disparities, racial injustice and white supremacy, climate and care for creation, and the power of memory and mentoring. He delves deeply in the Psalms, which he says, "provides a foundational script for living into the fullest and deepest realities of human existence." And he draws from the Prophets his foundational concept of totalism, which he defines as "automated fragmentation of social life such that we habitually and callously disregard our relations with others."
Walter Brueggemann was William Marcellus McPheeters Professor Emeritus of Old Testament at Columbia Theological Seminary until his death in 2025. An ordained minister in the United Church of Christ, he is still regarded as the premier Old Testament interpreter and biblical theologian. Among his many publications are Prophetic Imagination and Old Testament Theology
Davis Hankins is an assistant professor of religious studies in the Department of Philosophy and Religion at Appalachian State University in Boone, NC.