Tuesday, June 30, 2020

The problem of metaphors

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That is not, however, the end of the matter, because the notion that the God of the Bible is masculine rather than feminine is false. Despit...

Well, did it or did it now happen?

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We do not believe the flood story of the Bible is myth, but neither do we believe the author of Genesis 6-9 intends to give us a straightfor...
Monday, June 29, 2020

Keep making those cakes!

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As long as a church is patriarchal, or indeed outright misogynistic, as long as it is a means for men to worship and reinforce their own pow...

About those statues…

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"Social memory theory maintains a group’s memory of the past is always socially constructed—never how it actually was. The past has run...

Inclusio

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When the theme of order by means of divine presence is recognized in Genesis 1-2, and when the restoration of divine presence is recognized ...
Friday, June 26, 2020

Augustine and the dea nutrix

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At the roots of monotheism, then, there began a kind of theological dance in the tension between the desire to preserve female imagery for G...

Who are they?

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In contrast, focus on the use of terminology in the Bible suggests that “sons of God” (as rare as it is) refers consistently to the members ...
Thursday, June 25, 2020

Filling the void

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The polemic against dea nutrix imagery for God is deeply connected with the process by which Israelite religion came to focus on a single d...

Here's where inspiration lies

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[I]f we wish to get to the core of the authority of the author, we have to focus on what the author (who has been vested with God’s authorit...
Wednesday, June 24, 2020

The nourishing God

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Blending the imagery of flowing milk into that of flowing water, the passage goes on to promise that the wealth of nations will be “like an ...

Quick! Hit the reset button!

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The naming of Noah could indicate that he will be the one through whom order is preserved and restored in the aftermath of the insurgence of...
Tuesday, June 23, 2020

El Shaddai as mother?

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Significantly, one of the major theological perspectives that makes up the HB did understand Shadday as related to childbearing. David Biale...

Vengeance is mine! I will repay, says who?

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[W]e also receive a glimpse of the persistent disorder personified in the boast of Lamech (Gen 4:23-24). Here we find a warped perspective o...
Monday, June 22, 2020

He's there, hiding in plain sight

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Yet a fuller recognition of chance as a divine look-alike for YHWH in ancient Israel serves to highlight the strong account of providence ev...

Chaos ensues

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In Genesis 4 it is evident that Cain and Abel are seeking to remain in contact with God as they offer their sacrificial gifts (by the label ...
Friday, June 19, 2020

Hiding in plain sight

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In style as well as content, the biblical literature invokes a God who is relentlessly present but whose actions are characteristically disg...

Not a dichotomy, a trichotomy!

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It is common for people to think that we live in a world of dichotomy between good and evil. The previous interpretation suggests a further ...
Thursday, June 18, 2020

Is it chance? Or is it God? Or can it be both?

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What the chapter [1 Sam 9, Saul and the lost donkeys] evidently means to thematize is not simply a high view of providence but also the cont...

Chaos!

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Divine presence in the ancient world has significance not just in regard to enabling relationship of some sort between humans and deity but ...
Wednesday, June 17, 2020

Deterministic?

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miqreh can be employed for both “fortune” and “misfortune,” which offers a vantage point for understanding one of the HB’s most profound an...