Though resting a theological case on a linguistic “accident” would be a mistake, it is intriguing that the Hebrew word for “convert” is the same as the Hebrew word for “go apostate.” The word in both cases is SHUB, “turn,” which means “turn . . . . Continue Reading »
Greeks are adolescents; Achilles is an overgrown hyper-sensitive hyper-muscled teenager. A student points out that this applies also to humor: Greek humor is adolescent humor. Consider Aristophanes, the only extant Old Comedian. Case closed. . . . . Continue Reading »
A Second Dream, 1 Kings 9:1-28 INTRODUCTION Solomon?s great building project was the house of Yahweh, which included the temple, the palace, and the government buildings (1 Kings 6-7). But Solomon also built a number of other buildings, fortresses and cities. 1 Kings 9 describes both Yahweh?s . . . . Continue Reading »
Commenting on Deuteronomy 30:9ff in his new translation of the Pentateuch, Robert Alter offers the following comment on “Who will go up for us to the heavens, etc”: “The Deuteronomist, having given God’s teaching a local place and habitation in a text available to all, . . . . Continue Reading »
A guest on Ken Myers’ Mars Hill audio magazine discusses the humor of The Ladykillers . What, he asks, are we laughing at when we see the plots of criminals return on their own heads? He suggests that we are laughing at the folly of humanity, and at the way human weakness foils the . . . . Continue Reading »
Doug Jones suggests the following, promising Trinitarian account of the quadriga: Literal - Father (origins) Allegorical - Son (obvious enough) Anagogical - Spirit (completion) That of course leaves the tropological, but this has to do with the formation of the believer. In a Trinitarian . . . . Continue Reading »
1 Kings 8:2 Like the Christian calendar, Israel?s festival calendar did not cover the whole of the year. It began with Passover in the first month of the liturgical year, went through Pentecost in the third month, and climaxed with a series of feasts in the seventh month: the feast of trumpets on . . . . Continue Reading »
We have some difficulty understanding the biblical picture of prayer because we live in a country that sharply separates politics and prayer. Ancient Israel did not do that. The dedication ceremony for the temple began with the transport of the ark of the covenant from its location in the ?city of . . . . Continue Reading »
As I’ve discussed in a previous post (and, more fully, in a forthcoming article in the Tyndale Bulletin ), Kings is organized by three parallel narratives: the story of the united kingdom (Solomon to Zedekiah and Jehoiachin); the northern kingdom (Jeroboam to the fall of Samaria and the . . . . Continue Reading »
I read from Genesis 2:21-23 So the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and he slept; then he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh at that place. And the Lord God fashioned into a woman the rib which He had taken from the man, and brought her to the man. And the man said, . . . . Continue Reading »
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