Here is a link to a post on Art Boulet’s site entitled “Adam’s Rib or Adam’s Baculum?” He discusses an article which proposes that “rib” is a mistranslation of... well, something else. You’ll have to read the post to find out what.

Tags: Old Testament Study, Interesting

God sometimes gets a bad rap for his actions in the Old Testament. If you want to see this in practice, just go on over to Yahoo! Answers and search “Old Testament.” You can bet that many of the results will be questions like “Why is God so great and wonderful in the New Testament and so horrifically evil in the Old Testament?” For those who study the Old Testament, these types of questions can get a bit wearisome (SEE THIS POST).

First, the questions assume there is nothing difficult about God in the New Testament. I can only assume that those who ask these questions have never read the Book of Revelation or thought deeply about the concept of an eternal hell. Second, these questions miss a great deal in the Old Testament about the love of God. Don’t get me wrong. There are some verses/passages in the Old Testament that absolutely make me want to vomit (like 1 Sam. 15.3). And, this is not to say that the depiction of the love of God in the Old Testament is not in some ways difficult (he delivers his people from Egypt [a good thing] by killing Egyptian babies [a bad thing]?) But, to make it out like God is completely and thoroughly wicked in the Old Testament is a serious misreading. Sometimes there are different voices in the Old Testament that are saying different things. With that said, today I am providing a list of seven verses from the Old Testament that pertain to the love of God. If you have any other favorites feel free to comment below.

1. For love of your fathers he chose their descendants and personally led you out of Egypt by his great power... (Deut 4.37 - from today’s lectionary reading).
2. When Israel was a child I loved him, out of Egypt I called my son (Hos 11.1 - God depicted as father. Sound familiar?)
3. As a mother comforts her son, so will I comfort you; in Jerusalem you shall find your comfort (Is 66.13 - God depicted as a mother comforting her child).
4. I will heal their defection, I will love them freely; for my wrath is turned away from them (Hos 14.5 - God depicted as a healer who loves freely).
5. It was not because you are the largest of all nations that the LORD set his heart on you and chose you, for you are really the smallest of all nations (Deut 7.7 God’s reasoning for choosing Israel).
6. ...the LORD appears to him from afar: With age-old love I have loved you; so I have kept my mercy toward you (Jer 31.3).
7. The LORD, your God, is in your midst, a mighty savior; He will rejoice over you with gladness, and renew you in his love, He will sing joyfully because of you,... (Zeph 3.17).

Read More...

Tags: Lectionary Readings, Old Testament Study, Deuteronomy

I have previously posted on henotheism in the Old Testament and explained what this is. Today's Psalm contains another statement that reflects henotheism. It reads as follows: "For you, LORD, are most high over all the earth; You are very highly exalted over all gods" (emphasis added). Here again the existence of other deities is not denied (though this does happen later). Yet there is only one deity who is deemed worthy of worship.

Tags: Psalms, Lectionary Readings, Old Testament Study

I guess Brooke Lester's post about the Obama-Antichrist video got Bryan over at Hevel.org stirred up a bit. In a similar vein, he decided to address this Bible Code nonsense. I feel very much like Bryan. This kind of silliness distracts people from actually reading the Bible. Be sure to read Bryan's post but also keep in mind these considerations:

1. Bible Codes would require a text of the Hebrew Bible which is certain; however, the text of the Hebrew Bible is not certain. For instance, there is significant uncertainty with regard to the text of Jeremiah. Even for the Book of Isaiah, which is one of our more certain texts, we have manuscripts with spelling differences. Even if one letter is missing or added to a manuscript this would make any finding from Bible Code "research" invalid (see this post about how an entire word may be missing/added in Isaiah).
2. The original text of the Hebrew Bible contained no vowel letters. In Bible Code "research" these would have to be supplied by the "researcher." What if they are supplying the wrong vowels?
3. Finally (though much more could be said), the same practices used for finding Bible Codes have been found to work for texts like Moby Dick. Was Melville writing under divine inspiration?

Read More...

Tags: Old Testament Study

Today's lectionary reading contains one of the more popular statements in the Old Testament, namely that Moses was the meekest/most humble (or however it is translated in your version of choice) person among all people. I have always found this very interesting because Moses' actions do not really line up with modern conceptions of what it means to be meek or humble. Growing up I always thought a person who was humble or meek was reserved and showed a bit of weakness. But, this really in no way depicts Moses. Take for example Numbers 25.4, which reads as follows:

4 The Lord said to Moses, “Take all the chiefs of the people, and impale them in the sun before the Lord, in order that the fierce anger of the Lord may turn away from Israel.”

Those do not really sound like the words of someone who is reserved or who displays any weakness whatsoever. I am not sure what it would take for me to tell someone to impale another human being "in the sun before the Lord." In fact, I in no way condone the statement here in Numbers 25.4. However, I think the passage can help us to redefine in our minds what the Bible means when it speaks about meekness.

What does Jesus mean when he says that the meek will inherit the earth? Taking into consideration the meekness of Moses, he certainly does not mean that those who are mild mannered and do not display fierce anger will inherit the earth. In fact, if we hold a proper kind of righteous indignation back, it is probable that we are not really being meek at all. We are being something else altogether. Read More...

Tags: Numbers, Old Testament Study, Lectionary Readings

John Hobbins over at Ancient Hebrew Poetry has put together a decent little summary of the Hebrew Bible in 1,000 words or less. With that type of restriction it would be easy to quibble about not enough space being given to this or that. But, I tend to agree that you have the Primary History and everything else can be seen in relationship to that. Read his summary HERE.

Tags: Old Testament Study

There is a very concentrated concern in the Book of Exodus that acts are being performed "so that you/he/they will know that I am the Lord," sometimes "the Lord your God." This goes both for pharaoh and for the Israelites. It seems strange that no one knows who the Lord is at this point in the Biblical story, at least with regard to the Israelites. Apparently there is some disconnect. The years of servitude must have made them forget. But, I think this is one of the lessons that the later generations learned (at least in principle, though it may not have made it into common practice) and that we find in the responsive reading for today. Psalm 78.3-4 reads as follows: Read More...

Tags: Exodus, Old Testament Study, Lectionary Readings

Chris Brady of the blog Targuman has posted the audio from a lecture he gave related to the book of Lamentations. Beforehand, he described the lecture as follows:

I will be exploring how the rabbis responded to the destruction of the Temple, how they responded to the text of Lamentations, and what that in turn can teach a community of faith about responding to our own times of crisis.

To listen to this lecture click HERE. Read More...

Tags: Old Testament Study, Lamentations

Do you get confused about the festivals and offerings in Leviticus? Lauren Stouffer has put together a "Leviticus Primer" for download in pdf format. In it, she has several charts that can be helpful for keeping the festivals and offerings straight. To get this download click HERE.

Tags: Leviticus, Old Testament Study, Lectionary Readings

In one of the e-mails that I send out to my e-mail list, I note some of the other websites that I like for studying the Old Testament. One of those is Ralph Klein's website, and today I am going to point there once again. Today's lectionary reading is on the Tabernacle. Since this section of the Old Testament is one of the...okay I'll just come right and say it, more boring ones to read, many people are unfamiliar with the Tabernacle. So, this topic requires a bit more than a brief blog post for those who want to understand it. Fortunately, Ralph Klein has written a good little introduction to the Tabernacle. You can find it HERE. Read More...

Tags: Exodus, Lectionary Readings, Old Testament Study

The lectionary reading for today presents probably one of the more interesting issues I have encountered. The word translated something like "had become radiant" or "shone" (vs. 29) also has a tradition of being translated "grew horns." Both translations seem possible, and some have tried to find a way of combining the meanings. I would go into this issue in more detail; however, John Hobbins over at Ancient Hebrew Poetry has already done a very good job of dealing with this issue. Check out his post HERE. Read More...

Tags: Exodus, Lectionary Readings, Old Testament Study

Last week I blogged on the opportunity to download a free copy of the older version of the International Critical Commentary. I put a link to what I thought was all volumes; however, I realized in going back through the list that Exodus is not there. That is because it is not in the University of Toronto collection that I linked to in that post. It has, however, been uploaded by Princeton University. The Exodus Commentary is here. Read More...

Tags: Exodus, Old Testament Study

Today's lectionary reading presents an interesting issue. Did Moses see God face to face? For some there are two streams of thought in the Old Testament with regard to seeing God face to face. According to one, no person can see God face to face and live (Ex. 33.20-23). And according to the other, people can see God face to face with examples being Moses (Ex. 33.11) and (perhaps) Jacob. For others the use of the terminology face to face is an idiom that attempts to relate the intimacy of the relationship between God and Moses. These words are not to be taken literally and thus are not evidence that different sources are being used or that there are different streams of thought.

What do you think? Do you think there are two different streams of thought here? Or, do you think the "face to face" language is idiomatic? Or, is it some other option? Feel free to comment below. Read More...

Tags: Exodus, Lectionary Readings, Old Testament Study

Can you guess what is wrong with this picture? Scroll down to see the answer.

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Tags: Exodus, Lectionary Readings, Old Testament Study

I came across a helpful set of resources yesterday from the Virginia Theological Seminary called Bible Briefs. They are very short introductions to Biblical books, both Old and New Testaments. The set of books is not complete yet; however, if you are studying a particular book, it would be valuable to check to see if one of these resources is available for it. They are in pdf format and are available for free download. If you want to check them out, click here. So far the volumes include:


Old Testament

Genesis

Exodus

Leviticus

Job

Psalms

Isaiah

Jeremiah

Lamentations

Daniel

Amos

Obadiah

Micah


New Testament

Matthew

Mark

Luke/Acts

John

Romans

1 Corinthians

Galatians

Ephesians

Philippians

1 & 2 Thessalonians

Hebrews

Revelation Read More...

Tags: Old Testament Study

I have been away from blogging on the lectionary readings for a couple of days (busy week at work). I sat down to look at the Old Testament reading for today and bam - The Decalogue. Impossible not to post on that. Then, I started thinking ... "The" Decalogue. Is this a proper name for this passage in Exodus 20?

One of the important exercises that I had students do when teaching the Pentateuch was to have them compare versions of the commandments side-by-side. Many beginning readers of the Old Testament do not realize that there are at least three versions of these commandments. The first set is here in Exodus 20 from which we get today's reading. The second version is in Exodus 34 and the third in Deuteronomy 5. The two sets in Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5 are very close to one another, but not exactly the same. For instance, the Sabbath has a different motivation in each and the last commandments have a slightly different structure. However, the version in Exodus 34, often referred to as the Cultic Decalogue (or something like that), is very different. Yet there are enough connections to think that this is another version of the Decalogue (see vv. 14, 17, 21).

Why not try this exercise for yourself? Read the passages in Exodus 20, Deuteronomy 5, and Exodus 34 and see what you think? What are the similarities? What are the differences? What do these say about the different authors? Read More...

Tags: Lectionary Readings, Old Testament Study

Kudos to Rob Kashow at Tolle Lege! (I found it through John Anderson at hesed we'emet) for finding this! It is a full version of the old International Critical Commentary series online. They are publishing new commentaries and the old ones are out of copyright. The uptake for you is that the older ones are all online for free in pdf format. Obviously some of the information in these texts will be outdated, but there is still an abundance of good material in them. This link will definitely be making its way onto my website and to my e-mail list (be sure to join so you can keep up to date on things like this). Thanks again John. Read More...

Tags: Old Testament Study

I've noticed a bunch of these "Seven Blogs I Read Most" posts lately. It looks like the posts started with number one in the list below. Most of the blogs listed on these pages are related to Biblical Studies, both Old and New Testaments. If you are interested, check out the lists on the links below. I've subscribed to a number of RSS Feeds today just from checking out the links within these posts: Read More...

Tags: Blogs, Old Testament Study

In today's responsive reading (which comes from Exodus 15 rather than Psalms), the Exodus is presented as a Type of creation. This is suggested by verse 5 of the chapter, which reads "The floods/deeps covered them." The word "deeps" is the same word from Genesis 1 where darkness is over the "deep." In both scenarios, something important happens in relation to a watery chaos. WIth this link back to creation, it is beneficial to think of the Exodus as the creation of something new. Scholars have noted that this is the creation of a nation. Whereas Israel goes down into Egypt as a family, they come out as a nation. Read More...

Tags: Exodus, Old Testament Study, Lectionary Readings

In today's reading (Ex. 14.5-18) we find a potential example of what is referred to as redaction, which is basically another word for editing. It looks like there may have been two sources for this particular story that were combined together by an editor. This can be seen in an abrupt shift that takes place. I will briefly trace out the story line: Read More...

Tags: Exodus, Old Testament Study, Lectionary Readings

Form critical scholars who have studied the prophetic books have identified a number of common forms of prophetic speech. Today's reading from Jeremiah 23.1-6 is an example of a prophetic "Woe Oracle." These oracles begin with the Hebrew word that is translated "woe," and there are strings of these types of oracles in places like Isaiah 5 (or in the NT Matthew 23). However, this is not the most interesting aspect of the woe oracle. Read More...

Tags: Prophets, Old Testament Study, Lectionary Readings

I wanted to post this earlier but was unable. I hope that it will still prove useful for some. This is an excerpt from Cardinal Ratzinger/Pope Benedict XVI's Introduction to Christianity in which he deals with today's Old Testament lectionary reading from Exodus 3. It is one of my favorite passages in the book: Read More...

Tags: Old Testament Study, Lectionary Readings

In todays' reading, Moses encounters the Lord in a burning bush that is not consumed. The Lord identifies himself by saying "I am the God of your father..." In the phrase "God of your father," we find what Albrecht Alt identified as one of the distinctive elements of the faith of Ancient Israel. There is a certain level of complexity to this issue that I do not want to go into here, but to get a good summary you might check out this link to a limited preview of the text In Search of God in Google Books (scroll down a little). What I mainly wanted to point out in relation to Alt's work is that having a "God of the fathers (i.e. ancestors)" was a distinctive element of Israel's faith because many of the deities in surrounding areas of the Ancient Near East were gods of "places." In other words, these gods were tied to particular sites, such as Assyria, Babylon, Persia, etc. Read More...

Tags: Old Testament Study, Lectionary Readings

Today's Old Testament lectionary reading provides one of my favorite parallels between the Old Testament and other writings from the Ancient Near East. I am not sure why this one stands out to me in particular when there are a lot of other interesting parallels out there. I think that maybe it has to do with the fact that it is one of the more transparent parallels. The lectionary reading is the story of the Egyptian pharaoh seeking to kill the male children of the Israelites, particularly about how Moses escapes this fate by being placed in a basket/ark, which is then placed in a river. For this story, there is an Ancient Near Eastern parallel in the Legend of Sargon. For those unfamiliar with this text, you would do very well to read it. There is a free online translation of the text here. Read More...

Tags: Old Testament Parallels, Old Testament Study, Lectionary Readings

The lectionary reading for today comes from Exodus 1. In this passage, a "new pharaoh" reigns over Egypt who does not know Joseph. To say that there has been a significant amount of debate over the years about who this pharaoh was and about the historicity of the Exodus would be perhaps the understatement of the century. With that said, the purpose of this post is to introduce the my readers to this debate, and as such the primary link in this post will present information that may be "old hat" to some professional academics (though depending on one's area of specialization it could also be very helpful for academics like myself as well). For an introduction to the debate about the identity of the "new pharaoh" as well as the broader issues related to the historicity and dating of the Exodus, I would suggest that you begin with this set of posts on Higgaion, the blog of Dr. Chris Heard (begin reading from the bottom and see explicitly Part 2 of the Extended Review for the issue of the Pharaoh of the Exodus). Read More...

Tags: Old Testament Study, Lectionary Readings

Today's lectionary reading from the Old Testament is Amos 7.12-15. It is one of the more revealing passages in the book bearing his name because it shows several obstacles to the people listening to his message. I will look briefly at three: Read More...

Tags: Prophets, Old Testament Study, Lectionary Readings

Today's lectionary reading is one of the most enigmatic in the entire Hebrew Bible. It is the story in which the patriarch's name is changed from Jacob to Israel. There are all sorts of questions that remain after reading the passage. Who is the man with whom Jacob wrestles? How should the name Israel be translated? How does one punctuate the explanation of Jacob's name change? What was the original purpose of the story? Read More...

Tags: Genesis, Old Testament Study, Lectionary Readings

Today's lectionary reading from the Old Testament comes from Ezekiel 2. In it we find the most common title applied to Ezekiel by the Lord. This title is "Son of Man," which is a complex phrase in the Old Testament especially when one takes into consideration the usage in Daniel 7.13. However, the usage in Ezekiel is a bit more straightforward. It means something along the lines of "human being," or if you want to go a bit further, "mere mortal." The phrase is used in the early chapters of Ezekiel to contrast the majestic deity from the lowly prophet. Read More...

Tags: Prophets, Old Testament Study, Lectionary Readings

If you are looking for a new and different way to read or listen to the Old Testament/Hebrew Bible, I would suggest trying to listen to the books in the traditional Hebrew ordering if you have never done so. Read More...

Tags: Old Testament Study, Audio Bibles

I added two new videos to the site this week, but was unable to post about them. One is a video of Lawrence Schiffman lecturing on Judaism, Christianity and the Dead Sea Scrolls. This video should be excellent. I have listened to Schiffman's course on the Dead Sea Scrolls in the Modern Scholar series, and it was very enlightening.

The other video is David Noel Freedman lecturing on Biblical Scholarship. This video is a phenomenal opportunity since Freedman passed away in April of 2008. He was a preeminent scholar in the field of Biblical Studies. And, this video has preserved an opportunity to actually watch him speak about this subject. Read More...

Tags: Old Testament Study

It seems that a lot of you came to the site yesterday to see the video of Jon D. Leveson teaching about Abraham in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. So, I figured you must all like Levenson. In that case, I have posted another video by Levenson today on The Aqedah, or The Binding of Isaac. Unfortunately, this is the only other Levenson video that I could find; however, it is a long one. So, enjoy:

Levenson on The Aqedah Read More...

Tags: Old Testament Study

Once again the University of California Television program has provided a helpful video for the study of matters related to the Old Testament/Hebrew Bible. Below is a link to a video they put together in which Jon D Levenson of Harvard University discusses Abraham in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. It is often said that Abraham is a figure that unites these three faiths. However, Levenson discusses how he both unites and separates them. Enjoy. And, thanks again to the University of California.

Levenson on Abraham Read More...

Tags: Old Testament Study

When it comes to Old Testament courses online, some readers may wish to study more specialized or advanced topics. However, many of the online courses that are available, particularly on this site, are directed toward more general learners. Yet there is a possible avenue for those that wish to study more advanced topics. The Society of Biblical Literature has published example course syllabi for a significant number of topics related to the Old Testament, New Testament and beyond. As far as I know, no membership to SBL is necessary since I was able to view the syllabi without logging in. These syllabi can be useful for those wanting to study particular topics on their own because there are often book recommendations, a reading schedule, course handouts and more. Read More...

Tags: Old Testament Study

Some time ago I posted a link to a course by John Strong called Literature and World of the Old Testament/Hebrew Bible on the courses page of this site. I was browsing YouTube a bit and found that there is a video preview to the course. So, if you want to find out if this course would interest you before going through the process of downloading everything from iTunes U, check out this video. Read More...

Tags: Old Testament Study

I was browsing through the blog of Dr. Chris Brady this morning and came across a post from back in February of 2009. He deals with the issue of whether or not the material in the Bible can be or ought to be systematized. The post is quite interesting because he is writing in response to one of his students who "took him to task" after asking a question in class. This is a good post to introduce one to the problems involved in systematizing the Biblical material and demonstrates how people from two different viewpoints approach the issue. I hope you enjoy the post and consider following Dr. Brady's feed as the site often includes posts helpful for those interested in the academic study of the Bible. Read More...

Tags: Old Testament Study

In my recent reading, I have come across a commonly occurring mistranslation of the Hebrew of the Old Testament. It involves the word ספר (sorry, have not figured out how to add vowels without creating problems). This word is commonly translated "book" as in the NRSV, ESV, NASB, NIV, and KJV renderings of Deut. 30.10, i.e. "book of the law." The problem is that this word does not mean "book"; it means "scroll." Read More...

Tags: Old Testament Study

Bryan over at Hevel.org has started and intermittently adds to an introduction to the Old Testament prophets. These posts are helpful as they are written for the general reader and they are succinct. If you are looking for a more thorough introduction to the prophets I have linked to a couple of texts below that might be helpful. Or, you may want to check out the Yale Open Course introduction to the Old Testament which I have a link to on the courses page of this site and which is free. However, if you are looking for a good succinct introduction check out Bryan's blog and make sure to sign up for his feed, so you will know when he adds future posts on the topic. Read More...

Tags: Prophets, Old Testament Study

Recently, I have posted a number of YouTube videos on this site and the experience of searching YouTube has reawakened me to the problem of just how much nonsense there is online when it comes to the study of the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament (as well as the New Testament). Other places that make this apparent abound, like Yahoo Answers, where people who are clueless about the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament (=HB/OT) answer questions about it as if they know what they are talking about (e.g. some of them think the HB/OT was originally written in Greek). This makes study of the HB/OT online very difficult, dare I say dangerous. Read More...

Tags: Old Testament Study

For quite some time I have known about the translation difficulties involved in the very first part of the very first verse of the Hebrew Bible; however, until I recently revisited the Hebrew I had forgotten just how complicated things are. Here are three potential translations:

In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, ...(NRSV)

When God began to create heaven and earth... (JPS, R. Alter)

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. (NASB; ESV)

Read More...

Tags: Old Testament Study

In case you missed it, I recently added a video lecture to the site featuring Robert Alter. He has written a considerable number of popular level books on reading the Bible as literature and is considered by many to be the premier scholar in this area. He is probably best know for his books the Art of Biblical Narrative and the Art of Biblical Poetry; however, his translations and commentaries have been growing in popularity. Read More...

Tags: Bible As Literature, Old Testament Study

In recent discussions and in looking at online forums, blogs, social networking sites, etc., I have encountered a lot of people talking about parallels between the Old Testament and other Ancient Near Eastern Literature. Some of these discussions are very helpful, for instance the blog post by G. Brooke Lester entitled Why Do They Have to Be All Wrong. However, in many areas, it seems that people have very little idea what they are actually talking about. This likely has to do with religious (or a-religious) sentiment.
Read More...

Tags: Old Testament Parallels, Old Testament Study