Ancient Hebrew Poetry

Cynthia Nielsen’s Introduction to Gadamer

The blogosphere, when all is said and done, is a medium like any other. Most of what appears there deserves, the day after it is written, to be forgotten. Most books and most peer-reviewed articles fall into the same category. But there are wonderful and mysterious exceptions. For example, Cynthia Nielsen’s Four Part Introduction to Hans-Georg Gadamer.

What I find remarkable about Jim West

The reports of his death are, many suspect, greatly exaggerated. It’s hard to say. Perhaps he has decided it’s time to retire from active duty in the blogosphere.

The Uncensored Newsletter of the Hobbins-Benecchi Family

A benefit of blogging: the sense the genre gives you that you can say whatever you want. Here is the family newsletter I would have liked to have written but didn’t, given the peer review it would never have passed.

A Language without Literature is a Disemboweled Corpse

I love languages. Speaking in tongues. The whole nine yards. In the narrative of scripture, the curse of Babel, the confusion of language into mutually incomprehensible species (Gen 11), is not reversed by way of conflation into a unitary language. If one reads as far as Acts 2, the reversal consists of their preservation and sanctification. One fine Shavuot (Pentecost), the great variety of languages became, one language at a time, vessels of the word of God, media of truth and salvation.

Happy New Year Newsletter from the Hobbins-Benecchi Family

In mid-December of every year, I write and send out a family newsletter to more than 500 addresses. The best thing about doing this: we receive several hundred cards and letters in return. Our living room is plastered with them. The problem I face is that every paragraph I write for the letter gets bowdlerized by other members of the family before it reaches its intended readers. Below the jump, the censored version sent out via snail mail. It’s still a fun read. Before the night is out, I plan to put up an uncensored version, and pics.

Debunking Pantheism

James McGrath has a provocative post up in which he chides a-theists and a-Santaists in one and the same breath. It’s good to see McGrath take on the “new atheists.” At this time of the year, they are juicy targets. McGrath comes across, as liberal Christians often do in their more hopeful moments, as saying “I believe, help thou my unbelief.” Christmas does that to a lot of people.

Elizabeth Celi on the Abuse of Men by Women

Andrew Barry of Australia notes the following:

J. I. Packer Interview Appears in the Washington Post

For the interview, go here. Chris Brady touches on Packer’s eloquent insistence on the fact that the inerrancy of Scripture extends to the text as prepared for publication. That is, a high view of Scripture will affirm that the editorial process which gave us the Bible was subject to God's providence such that the words we have, not the ones we wished we had, are those God intended us to have. Whether particular words go back to an “author” or an “editor” (slippery terms in any case) is beside the point.

When Apologetics Incur God’s Wrath

Theodic discourse, that is, pious justification of evil and suffering, provokes God’s anger in the book of Job. In the book of Job, it is the sufferer, the one who screams bloody murder from a location within God’s jaws; it is the screaming sufferer who unlocks those jaws. Accusatory Job encounters divine favor, and is commended by God for having spoken rightly and sincerely about God.

It’s not what you say. It’s who you say it to, in what context. God, it appears, can take whatever *%#! we throw at him.

It’s right there in Job 42:7-8. Below the jump, text, translation, and commentary.

An Alternative to Coercive Forms of Justice

Retributive and redistributive styles of justice are practiced widely by states, movements, and individuals. The use of force is necessary, seldom or often, to make these styles of justice work. All too often, violence appears to be their means and end. If it were shown that it is possible to do without justice in either sense, the world as we know it would be superseded.

Enthusiasm for Retributive Justice

In his discussion of a work by Anne Burnett listed below, Michael Lloyd remarks (The Classical Review 49 [1999] 348-349; 348):

The Politics and Ethics of Lamentation

It’s about time that the research of ethnographers and classicists on the politics and ethics of lamentation impact the world of biblical studies. A strength of Helene Foley’s research is her concomitant attention to examples of lament in Greek tragedy on the one hand and to studies of lament by ethnographers on the other.[1] Key grafs:

An Online Guide to the Study of the Chronology of the Kings of Israel and Judah

We are all indebted to David Reimer for the “OT Chronologies” page he has put up on his excellent website. Go here. Besides the tables, the list of online resources he has collected is well worth perusing, in particular, the articles by James Barr, John F. Brug, Gershon Galil, and Leslie McFall.

Lamentations 3:51: A New Proposal

Lam 3:51 as it stands is a conundrum. Delbert Hillers notes that “the MT is corrupt and yields no acceptable sense” (1992:118). Adele Berlin adheres to “the usual rendering although it is less than intelligible” (2002:83). Here is Lam 3:51 in context as I would reconstruct it:

Gender and Theology: Quotes from an Essay by Sarah Coakley

The essay is online: "Is There a Future for Gender and Theology? On Gender, Contemplation, and the Systematic Task," Criterion 47:1 (2009). HT: Ben Myers.

The Women of the Wall in Jerusalem: A Roundup of Articles and Posts

“She weeps and weeps in the night, tears on her cheek” (Lam 1:2a). For reasons which are perfectly clear to anyone familiar with Lam 1-2 and related passages in the Tanakh, the task of weeping and praying at the Wall in Jerusalem has been one that large numbers of Jewish women have shouldered with a sense of calling since it has been possible to do so in the last four decades. Two articles are worth reading on the subject:

Introducing Robert George

A lengthy essay by David Kirkpatrick in the New York Times does just that. Go here. A distinguished professor at Princeton who co-teaches a course with Cornel West, “Robby” George, a true blue Thomist Catholic, was the prime mover-and-shaker behind the Manhattan Declaration (released November 20, 2009). The essence of the declaration, in its own words:

Best Publishers in Theology 2009

Ben Myers has a fine list of best theological books of 2009: go here. In this post, I build a list of best publishers in theology 2009 on that basis.

Out of 16 books in theology, biblical studies, and cognate disciplines Ben lists, publishers score as follows:

A United Methodist from Nebraska becomes the decisive vote on health care reform

Mark Tooley has an informative discussion of the alliance of evangelicals and Catholics who have promoted compromise on the question of federal funding of abortions. In the opinion of this alliance, the greater good is the set of changes contained in the comprehensive health care reform bill Congress may yet finalize in the new year; the lesser evil, a watering-down of the 33 year old ban on federal funding of abortions. Go here.

Round-up of posts on Luke 2:14

I count ten (UPDATE: twelve). The pattern of agreements and disagreements is unusual, for those who follow these things. 

Is Evangelicalism Losing Its Mind?

That’s the question Frank Bellizzi poses, and he suggests, based on coverage of Old Testament studies in Christianity Today magazine, that the powers-that-be among evangelicals today are not interested, though they used to be, in keeping the rank-and-file of the movement up-to-date on developments in the field. Go here.

Charitable Donations: Who Gives and to Whom

For a very interesting visual introduction, go here. HT: Justin Taylor.

Is Garrison Keillor Jewish?

Apparently not. Perhaps it’s just satire when he whales on Jewish songwriters who “trash up the malls with Rudolph” “and the rest of that dreck,” but if so, he mixed in too many value judgments that do not seem satirical at all. Besides, what’s wrong with Rudolph? Jeez Louise, what a Grinch. Or a pitch-perfect – too pitch-perfect, spoof thereof. 

A Package to Drool Over

All the best books, of course, are printed in Germany. But they cost an arm and a leg. It’s nice to see that German publishers are beginning to send bloggers review copies of their excellent stock. Below the jump, an image of an address label of a package I just received. Merry Christmas to me.

What the Copenhagen summit is really about

It’s not about saving the planet. It’s about protecting the prerogatives of special interest groups on the planet: the investments of big business in non-carbon emitting energy sources, in particular, nuclear power. Think France, China, Japan, and Finland. It’s not about protecting poor countries from the effects of climate change. It’s about engineering aid to poor countries, aid which will be used for things which are for the most part unrelated or flat out in contradiction to the principles of conservation, clean air, and clean water. It’s not about reducing carbon emissions per se. It’s about making Europe more competitive from an economic point of view vis-à-vis countries like the United States and China whose economies are more energy-intensive and depend more on cheap energy.