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Micah 5.1-4 – Thomas Paine on Prophecy
Today’s Old Testament lectionary reading is from Micah 5.1-4a. This text reminded me of a discussion I had in one of my classes when I was teaching prophets to seminarians. We dealt a bit with the New Testament treatment of the Old Testament and the problems of thinking of prophecy as prediction. One of the…
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"Judges" or "Chieftans"?
This morning as I was reading in the Book of Judges in the New Jewish Publication Society (=NJPS) version of the Tanakh, I came across the word traditionally translated as “judges.” The NJPS renders the word as “chieftans.” I have also seen it rendered as “leaders/rulers.” I think the NJPS and those that render it…
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How Luz Gets Its Name – Judges 1.23-26
I was reading the Book of Judges this morning and though it was interesting how Luz supposedly get its name. (Check here for the wider context of Judges 1.23-26). Judges 1.23-26 23 The house of Joseph sent out spies to Bethel (the name of the city was formerly Luz). 24 When the spies saw a…
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Jim West's Endorsement of Lawrence Schiffman
It’s nice to see Jim West endorsing Lawrence Schiffman, his exact words being “He’s awesome.” I have used two of Schiffman’s audio courses before from the Modern Scholar Series, The Hebrew Bible and The Dead Sea Scrolls: The Truth Behind the Mystique. However, I had heard about issues concerning Schiffman (a charge of plagiarism, or…
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Niditch – Ban as Sacrifice versus the Ban as God's Justice
It is not easy for humans to kill others. To participate in mass killing in war is destructive of individual psyches and of the larger community’s mental health. The ban in either trajectory is a means of making killing in war acceptable. How does the ban as sacrifice and the ban as God’s justice differ…
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Joseph Kelly Reviews Mark Smith's the Priestly Vision of Genesis 1
I recently posted about Mark Smith’s book Memoirs of God, and in the relation to that post, Jim West recommended that I read Smith’s newest offering The Priestly Vision of Genesis 1. I have not had time to tackle that text yet, but Joseph Kelly gives a fairly thorough review of it HERE. Check it…
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Psalm 85.11 – Translation Comparison
Psalm 85.11 (English verse 10) is the kind of verse in comparing parallel translations that could drive a sane man crazy. Five different translations and three different renderings of the word hesed and three different renderings of the verb tenses. Parallel Comparison of Psalm 85.11 Here are the parallel translations in BibleWorks: Notice that the…
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Isaiah 45 – A Litany of Montheistic Texts?
Today’s Old Testament lectionary reading is a litany of monotheistic-sounding statements spliced together from Isaiah 45. Or, at least in my seminary training I was taught to think in that manner. However, Daniel McClellan has a helpful post on why this is likely not the case HERE (If it looks familiar, I’ve linked to it…
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Psalms by Westermann (A Review)
I have always enjoyed reading Westermann for some reason or another. I just finished reading Westermann’s book entitled Psalms for the second time with the first time being a very long time ago back when I was in seminary. And, I would have to say that I would heartily recommend the book. It is a…
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The Crusading Idea in the Hebrew Scriptures …
What Bainton calls the crusading idea in the Hebrew Scriptures is, in fact, not unique to Israelite culture. And within the Hebrew Bible the sort of war of extirpation waged against the Canaanites in Joshua is one among many war ideas as Bainton himself implies (46), a war ideology with which the authors of Chronicles…