Bloggers at SBL

Here’s an updated list of the bloggers reading (not presiding) at SBL 09 in New Orleans. Rooms will be listed when they are available. Entries are listed by date, time, congress, blogger, paper title, and reading order. Please let us know if we’ve missed anyone.

As of now, no bibliobloggers are reading Friday night. Search the program book for more info.

Saturday the 21st
9AM-10:30AM – African Biblical Hermeneutics – Celucien L. Joseph “The Ethics of Justification and the Question of Race”. 2nd of 3 readers.

9AM-11:30AM – Scripture in Early Judaism and Christianity – Jeffery Garcia “The Bible Rewritten: Stephen’s Speech and Early Jewish Biblical Interpretation in the Second Temple Period”. 4th of 5 readers.

11AM-1:30PM – Institute for Biblical Research – Peter Enns. Respondent to Craig Bartholomew’s “Trinitarian Old Testament Commentary”. 1st of 4 respondents.

1PM-3:30PM – Bible and Cultural Studies – Roland Boer “Bloodthirsty Little Bastards Brats, or, the Child’s Desire for Biblical Violence”. 1st of 6 readers.

1PM-3:30PM – Bible and Visual Art – Chris Heard “Drowning in Paint: The Deluge in Western Art”. 4th of 5 readers… though Chris himself isn’t a “reader” but a “presenter” as he comments below.

1PM-3:30PM – Biblical Hebrew Poetry – Ros Clarke “Come My Love, I Will Give You My Love: An Analysis of the Poetic Structure of Song 7.11-13″. 6th of 6 readers.

1PM-2:30PM – Careers Outside the Classroom – Chris Spinks. Panelist. 3rd of 3.

1PM-2:30PM – Christianity in Egypt: Scripture, Tradition, and Reception – Christian Askeland “Was There a Coptic Translation of John’s Gospel Without Ch 21?”. 1st of 3 readers.

1PM-3:30PM – Contextual Biblical Interpretation – Joseph Kelly “Is YHWH Faithful to Israel: Joel and Jonah’s Use and Non-Use of Exodus 34.6-7″. 3rd of 6.

1PM-3:30PM – Disability Studies and Healthcare in the Bible and Near East – Bryan Bibb “Swift Warriors and Stumbling Victims in the Prophetic Rhetoric of Violence”. 4th of 4 readers.

1PM-3:30PM - Early Jewish and Christian Mysticism - Jim Davila. Book Review Panelist.  4th of 4 panelists (then the respondent).

1PM-3:30PM – Redescribing Early Christianity – James Crossley. Panelist. 3rd of 4 10 min presentations then 90 min all-skate discussion.

1PM-3:30PM – Second Corinthians: Pauline Theology in the Making – Sean Winter “The Meaning and Function of Paul’s ‘Comfort’ Language in Second Corinthians”. 1st of 4 readers.

4PM-6:30PM – Biblical Greek Language and Linguistics – Steve Runge “Verbal Aspect of the Historical Present”. 4th of 5 readers.

4PM-6:30PM – Computer Assisted Research – Mike Heiser. Representing Logos in the “Bible Software Shootout”. 1st of all the shooters. Somebody call the cops.

4PM-6:30PM – Intertextuality in the New Testament Consultation – James McGrath “On Hearing (Rather than Reading) Intertextual Echoes: Methodological Considerations Related to Aurality, Orality, and Intertextuality”. 1st of 4.

4PM-6:30PM – Levites and Priests in History and Tradition – Stephen Cook “Those Stubborn Levites: Overcoming Levitical Disenfranchisement”. 3rd of 6 readers.

4PM-6PM – Nag Hammadi and Gnosticism (Celebrating Pagel’s Gnostic Gospels) – April DeConick. Respondent. 2nd of 4.

Sunday the 22nd

9AM-11:30AM – Hebrew Scriptures and Cognate Literature – David Melvin “Divine Meditation and the Rise of  Civilization in Mesopotamian Literature, Gen 1-11 and Jewish Apocalyptic”. 1st of 5 readers.

9AM-11:30AM – Johannine Literature – Ken Brown “Tabernacle, Sinai and the Beloved Son in John’s Prologue”. 1st of 4 readers.

9AM-11:30AM – Josephus – David Miller “The Mosaic Legislation on Prophets in Antiquities 4.218″. 3rd of 4.

9AM-11:30AM – Linguistics and Biblical Hebrew – Steve Runge “The Effect of Redundancy on Perceptions of Emphasis and Discontinuity”. 2nd of 4 readers.

9AM-11:30AM – Textual Criticism of the Hebrew Bible – Daniel McClellan “Anthropomorphisms and the Vorlage to LXX Exodus” 3rd of 6 readers.

1PM-3:30PM – Academic Teaching and Biblical Studies – Karyn Traphagen “Taking the Distance out of Distance Learning”. 1st of 5 readers.
Tim Bulkeley. “Degrees of Presence: Using Various Technologies to Provide Distant Students with a Degree of “Presence”. 2nd of 5 readers.
G. Brooke Lester. “The Contribution of Distance Learning Strategies to Brick-and-Mortar Learning”. 5th of 5 readers.

1PM-3:30PM – Exile (Forced Migrations) in Biblical Literature – Stephen Cook “Second Isaiah and the Aaronid response to Judah’s Exile (Force Migrations)”. 4th of 5 readers

4PM-6:30PM – Early Jewish and Christian Mysticism – April DeConick “Star Gates and Heavenly Places: What Were the Gnostics Doing?”. 1st of 4 readers.

4PM-6:30PM – Second Corinthians: Pauline Theology in the Making – Ben Blackwell “Becoming Gods?: 2 Cor 3.18 and Theosis. 3rd of 3.

Monday the 23rd

9AM-11:30AM – Aramaic Studies – Chip Hardy “The Tell Fekheriyeh Stele: Dialect, Word Order, and Scribal Symbiosis”. 4th of 5 readers.

9AM-11:30AM – Chronicles-Ezra-Nehemiah – Chris Brady “Restoration and Recovery Through Scripture”. 2nd of 4 readers.

9AM-11:30AM – Construction of Christian Identities – J. Brian Tucker “Baths, Baptism, and Patronage: The Continuing Role of Roman Social Identity in Corinth”. 2nd of 5 readers

9AM-11:30AM – Greco-Roman Religions – Phillip Harland “Other Diaspora: Syrian Immigrants, Ethnic Identities, and Acculturation”. 1st of 5 readers

9AM-12PM – International Organization for Septuagint and Cognate Studies- Phillip Marshall “Aramaic Influence on Greek Translations of the Hebrew Bible”. 4th of 5 readers.

9AM-12PM – Nag Hammadi and Gnostcism - Deidre Good. Book Review Panelist. 2nd of 4.

9AM-11:15AM – National Association of Professors of Hebrew – John Hobbins. Panelist on Poetry and Pedagogy. 2nd of 3.

9AM-11:30AM – Pauline Epistles – Jason Staples “Gentiles Who Keep the Law: Paul’s Law-Keeping Gospel”. 1st of 5 readers.

9AM-11:30AM - Sacrifice, Cult, and Atonement – Andrew McGowan “Sacrificing Eucharists: The Earliest Christian Ritual Meals and their Cultic Context”. 4th of 5 readers.

9AM-11:30AM – Synoptic Gospels – AKM Adam “Too Much Study is Driving You Crazy: Growth, Formation, and Gospel”. 4th of 4 readers.

9AM-10:30AM – Things I Wish I Knew about Doing a PhD – Kevin Scull. Panelist. 4th of 4.

1PM-3:30PM – Best Practices in Teaching Workshop – Karyn Traphagen “Examining Our Exams: What to Include, Exclude, and Revisit Biblical Language Exams”. 2nd of 5 presentations.

1PM-3:30PM - Book of Psalms -Art Boulet “The Prayer of Manasseh: A Window into the Shape and Shaping of the Hebrew Psalter”. 3rd of 5 speakers.

1PM-3:30PM – Teaching Biblical Literature in an Undergraduate Liberal Arts Context - Bryan Bibb “From Biblical Literature to Ultimate Questions: Shifting Contexts and Goals for Introducing the Bible”. 3rd of 4 readers.

4PM-6:30PM – Assyriology and the Bible – Alan Lenzi “A New Edition of Ludlul Bel Nemeqi” 3rd of 6 readers.

4PM-6:30PM - Christian Theological Research Fellowship – AKM Adam “Come On, Save Your Soul Tonight”. 1st of 3 readers.

4PM-6:30PM – Computer Assisted Research – Robert Cargill “Scholars Behaving Badly: Charles Gadda, Ralphael Golb, and the Campaign of Anonymity on the Internet to Promote Norman Golb and Smear His Rivals”. 1st of 5.
Mark Goodacre “How and Why the NT Gateway was Rebooted, Revitalized, and Relaunched”. 3rd of 5.

4PM-6:30PM – Early Jewish and Christian Mysticism – David Larsen “And He Departed from the Throne: The Enthronement of Moses in Place of the Noble Man in Exagoge of Ezekiel the Tragedian”. 4th of 4.

4PM-6:30PM - New Testament Textual Criticism – Tommy Wasserman “Text-types and the Evaluation of Readings in New Testament Textual Criticism” 4th of 6 readers.

4PM-6:30PM – Pseudepigrapha – Jim Davila “Practical Challenges in Publishing: The More Old Testament Pseudepigrapha Project”. 1st of 5.

Tuesday the 24th
9AM-11:30AM – Bible Translation – John Anderson “A Trickster Oracle in Gen 25.23: Reading Jacob and Esau between Beten and Bethel”. 1st of 6 readers.

9AM-11:30AM – Book of Acts – Kenneth Schenck “Acts and the Temple: Possible Insights from Hebrews”. 1st of 5

9AM-11:30AM – Construction of Christian Identities – Pat McCullough “The Agents of Jesus Meet All Nations: Adapting Jesus Cultic Reform for the Eschaton”. 1st of 4.
9AM-11:30AM – Function of Apocryphal and Pseudepigraphal Writings in Early Judaism and Early Christianity – Stephen Carlson “Origen’s Use of the Gospel of Thomas”. 4th of 4

9AM-11:15AM – Ideological Criticism - James Crossley “NT Wrong and the Bibliobloggers”. 2nd of 5.

9AM-10:30AM – Intertextuality in the New Testament Consultation – Nijay Gupta “A Methodological Reconsideration of Paul’s Use of Scripture in Philippians”. 1st of 3

9AM-11:30AM – Matthew – Ben Witherington “Wise and Sagacious Vistas: The Past and Future of a Sapiential Reading of Matthew”. 3rd of 4.

9AM-11:30AM – Textual Criticism of the Hebrew Bible – Michael Langlois “The Christian Palestinian Aramaic Version of Isaiah” 1st of 5.
Mike Heiser “Their Valley, Your Strength, or the Anakim?: An Explanation and Defense of LXX Enakim in Jer 47.5 and 49.4″. 3rd of 5.

You’re Not Paul…

… so please stop proof-texting Scripture. He’s the only one who can get away with that!

If during a theological discussion you’ve ever told someone that they are leaning on their own understanding with that twinkle of contempt in your eye (assuming you’re both believers), thinking you’ve won the argument by a poor invocation of Proverbs, then this post is for you. Let’s read a bit of Proverbs 3 before we go around quoting it.

Prov 3.1-5 Text, a Messy Translation, and Some Thoughts
בְּנִי תוֹרָתִי אַל־תִּשְׁכָּח וּמִצְוֹתַי יִצֹּר לִבֶּךָ
כִּי אֹרֶךְ יָמִים וּשְׁנוֹת חַיִים וְשָׁלוֹם יוֹסִיפוּ לָךְ
חֶסֶד וֶאֱמֶת אַל־יַעַזְבֻךָ קָשְׁרֵם עַל־גַּרְגְּרוֹתֶיךָ כָּתְבֵם עַל־לוּחַ לִבֶּךָ
וּמְצָא־חֵן וְשֵׂכֶל־טוֹב בְּעֵינֵי אֱלֹהִים וְאָדָם
בְּטַח אֶל־יהוה בְּכָל־לִבֶּךָ וְאֶל־בִּינָתְךָ אַל־תִּשָּׁעֵן

1 My child, may my teaching never be forgotten by you and may my commands be observed by your heart!
Our translation has clearly rendered the two Hebrew negated volitional verbs as passives. We’ve sacrificed “accuracy” in this regard to be more accurate about the information structure of the verse. Teaching and commands are parallel, fronted topics (each in their respective clause) in this verse, something obscured in most English translations. Thus, as we read it, those constituents are the most salient.

2 For longs days and years of life and peace will they add to you.
Why is the final לך marked as feminine? A masculine suffix ך was used in v1, in addition to the masculine vocative בני. Why is the grammatical gender changed here? And why do commentaries ignore this sort of thing?

3 May chesed and emet never leave you! Tie them around your throat! Engrave them on the tablet of your heart.
When not sure how best to translate, its okay not to and explain why. In this case there’s the obvious need to alert John Anderson that his blog is in the Bible. Apparently, the wise will heed to Anderson.
Then there’s the issue of the 14 other instances of the exact same phrase (which we think John should post on! Gn 24.49; 47.29; Ex 34.6; Jos 2.14; 2Sam 2.6; 15.20; Ps 25.10; 61.8, 85.11; 86.15; 89.15; Prov 14.22; 16.6; 20.28) plus others that are close but not exact (like Gn 32.11) which is why the NET Bible calls it a nominal hendiadys. A hendiadys is English for a Greek compund meaning one-through-two, in case you didn’t know. Its like saying rock-and-roll. Rock-and-roll is one thing but we use two words (plus a conjunction) to say it. But what exactly does it, chesed ve-emet, mean? We’d like to hear John’s answer.

4 So obtain favor and good esteem in the eyes of God and man.
מצא here has clearly been semantically extended from a simple sense of find. Favor and good esteem were not lost and now the Sage commands them be found. Rather they are goals taught for the child to pursue.

5 Trust to Yahweh with all your heart, and to your own insight do not place confidence.
What’s up with אֶל? Trust to Yahweh? Why not trust ביהוה in Yahweh (as most translations would have you think) like Isa 26.4, Jer 17.7, Ps 21.8; 37.3; or 40.4? What’s the difference, if any, between בטח ביהוה and בטח אל־יהוה? How much semantic overlap is there between ב and אל?
There’s a small chiasm of VP+PP//PP+VP.

To be continued…

Back

We’ve been home in Texas now for about 2 weeks. Half of us are working and half of us are visiting family. Neither of us have been posting.

Here are a few things we don’t miss about South Africa…
Waiting until later when people say ‘now’.
The appaling lack of Mexican food.
The bus drivers.
South African beer.
Shoeless undergrads roaming the streets and classrooms of Stellenbosch.

That being said, we will miss the time to just study, the slower pace of life, our church, the mountains, and all the wine.

We are glad to see there has been no shortage of posts in our absence. Our friends Kris and Jayna Lyle are also blogging now (Kris most recently on Psalm 37). They studied with us at HBU and are also trying to make their way to South Africa.

We are also happy to report that this blog has now been up for one year (on Halloween). For those interested, here are some 1-year anniversary stats, of course given in the form of Top 10 lists.

Top 10 posts

The Death of Johnny Cash
Adam the Artist
BSC XLVI
20 Qs with Traphagen
20 Qs with Heiser
SA Election Results Online
Bloggers at SBL
Psalm 136 – Vol. 1
20 Qs with Brown
More on Vocab

Top 10 Referrers

Christian Colleges
Jared Calaway
Top50
Hobbins
Calvin and Mandy
Doug Magnum
John Anderson
Karyn Traphagen
Accordance Blog
Biblioblogs

Thank you!

Top 10 Search Engine Terms

johnny cash
waynes world
human anatomy
romeo and juliet
hebrew and greek reader
yhwh in hebrew
is lost good
robert rezetko
bum fights
wu tang

Top 10 Clicks

Karyn
Cook-Holmsted Textbook
Adam’s Resources
Josh and Bri
Phillip Marshall
Danny Zacharias
Charles Grebe
Heiser
Mike Aubrey
Cambridge Ulpan

We Want More For Our Money

We’ve been happy to hear the wonderful podcasts by bibliobloggers. But we have one request from us and the rest of the so-called third world who listens: please make smaller MP3 files. That would make your podcasts more accessible to people with limited funds and internet access.

There is no such thing as a free wireless hotspot in South Africa (though that is suppose to change in the next two years) and most people who use the internet do not have a monthly contract. Rather, we pay for data. So the bigger your MP3 file is (or the bigger your webpage is), the more your podcast costs.

To date, the most expensive podcast we’ve downloaded is Mark Goodacre’s first glimpse at Thomas, which comes in at around 11 mb and is only 12 minutes long. We can download Democracy Now from KPFT for 10mb and that, as all you informed listeners know, is an hour long. So please dear bibliopodders, sacrifice a bit of audio quality (if you’re just talking, you won’t notice a thing… we promise) and give us more affordable podcasts!

By the way, we’ve been busy packing (and not posting) as we are coming home this week to see family, make some money, and buy books at SBL. We’ll be back in Africa next year for thesis-writing. So fortunately, we only have to deal with this limited internet access for a few more days.

Hobbins on Accordance

We’ve created an Accordance user tool compiling many of John Hobbins‘ posts on biblical Hebrew and translations of various passages of the Hebrew Bible. We hope you find it useful. As of now, its only up through 2007. We’ll apprise you of updates. We’ve also created a user tool of some articles by Dan Wallace on textual criticism. Both user tools are available here.

Still waiting on approval from the Accordance exchange and hoping that one day WordPress will allow us to upload zip files.

UPDATE: Karyn is hosting the files. Who needs WordPress?

Biblical Studies Carnival XLVI

Welcome to the 46th Biblical Studies Carnival and the first BSC to be hosted from Africa.

Big Deals

Three things were big deals this month: the NIV 2011, gender, and the SBL affiliation with bibliobloggers.

Rick Mansfield announced the coming revision of the NIV, the NIV 2011 (and hence the discontinuation of the TNIV). There were many interesting responses to this news, the funniest of which had to be Danny Zacharias. Other bloggers responded, some even with suggestions.

Doug Magnum, Matthew Montonini, More from Rick, Peter Kirk, Michael Metts, Wayne Leman, Jim Getz, Jason Staples, Rick Brannan, and John Hobbins

April DeConick asked why there are so many male bibliobloggers and so few females and in so doing created the discussion for the month. Some of the resulting conversation was productive. Some of it was not. Here’s a handful.

Deidre Good, More from April, Julia O’Brien, Loren Rosson III, Stephen Carlson, Jim Linville, Sue McCarthy, Judy Redman, James Crossley, Kevin Scull, Brenda Heyink, Claude Mariottini, Bryan Bibb, and Rachel Marszalek.

Jim West announced (well, Kent Richards announced it, but he ain’t a blogger) the new affiliated status that bibliobloggers have with SBL. Reactions to the news were mixed. Daniel McClellan created the list of reactions.

Book Reviews and Interviews

Ben Blackwell continued his interview with Mike Gorman. Jared Calaway reviewed Mark George’s Israel’s Tabernacle as Social Space. Adam the Artist reviewed Garrett and DeRouchie’s Modern Grammar for Biblical Hebrew. Mandy thoroughly reviewed the first edition of Kittel and Hoffer. Matt broadcast his interviews with Robert Yarbrough and Richard Bauckham. Nevada reviewed Horton’s book on Wright/Dunn NPP. Calvin reviewed Leslie Wilson’s The Book of Job: Judaism in the 2nd Century BCE. And Skinner interviewed Thomas scholar Nicholas Perrin.

General

Dutch Bible bloggers launched BiblioblogNED, so now we’ve got a regular job for the Google translator. Perhaps anticipating all the affiliation hub-bub, Nijay Gupta asked what the conferences are for anyway. Charles Halton released a pre-publication of his article in ANES. A number of bloggers attended the British New Testament Conference. Simon Holloway shared beautiful Bible pics. Scott Bailey whined his way onto our blogroll. Mike Kok started the popular Top 5 Female Biblical Scholars meme, results here. Loren Rosson III collected memorable moments from the heretic preacher Steven Anderson. Jared Calaway told us what pathos is. We all learned of the origins of biblioblogging. Bloggers remembered where they were on 9-11-01. JK Gayle combined the book and female scholar meme lists. Mark Goodacre held online office hours. Tony Siew encountered a very cool blogger related issue with a student. Matthew Thiesen offered his complete paper Luther and the Jews. More of us need to put our formal work online. Much thanks to him and Charles for doing so. Brandon Wason discussed what to do about blogs and CVs. Roland Boer pointed out some facts about SBL. McGrath halted the perpetuation of bullshit on the Butler campus. Gupta posted on the Wright conference (Chaplin responded with 10 Wrightian talking points). Wiggins wigged over The Boss… or at least his tight jeans.

Archaeology/Culture/History

ANE

Mike Heiser babbled about Genesis, Sumeria, and Akkad. Jared Calaway announced the horde of Bar-Kochba coins more. Theophyle broke down ancient Israel’s divided monarchy under the Assyrian Empire. Jim Getz turned into a zombie. Daniel McClellan decoupled Yahweh and El. Duane got punny in Akkadian. Claude Mariottini and others posted on the Egyptian “Joseph” coins.

1st cent

Benji Overcash said that the baby Jesus had a star on his head… me too! Ken Schenck posted part 2 of Paul’s Unknown Years. Julie Clawson looked at Jesus in the temple. Deidre Richardson posted on women deacons in the east. Josh Mann flushed the toilet in his first century apartment next to his household idol. Todd Bolen and others posted on the synagogue found at Magdala.

Theology/Reception

Rachel Barenblat enjoyed a bit of divinity as she entered the third trimester of her pregnancy. R Joseph Hoffman got philosophical and coined the phrase Pharisaic Humanism. Michael Carden theologically howled at the moon. Peter Enns thought out loud on the new atheism. Rachel Marszalek jumped in the comp/egal conversation. Mike Heiser performed some naked baptisms. Ben Byerly mixed in some African theology. James Pate read Neusner on messiah. Loren Rosson III preferred a Sanders/Esler approach to Paul rather than a Wright/Dunn approach. Julie Clawson discussed implications of Kingdom of God theology. Art Boulet got started on the literal Adam  (also James Anderson and Nick Norelli). Sue McCarthy said we are slaves to one another and offered a list of those in the feminine language for God conversation. Colin reflected on one of O’Brien’s posts, part of which became a quote of the day. Wiggins offered us two choices: religion or death? And Elizabeth Young provided a family tree for understanding dispensationalisits (which we plan on using).

HB/GNT Studies and Bible Translation

Sue McCarthy compared Ryken vs Köstenberger on translation. JK discussed sheep and ανθρωποι and consolidated the ανηρ posts (at the bottom of his post). More here.

HB

Brady and others went back-and-forth on Genesis 1. Here’s a roundup of relevant posts. There’s a good response to Peter Lopez’s reading of Genesis 1 from newcomer Seth the Biker.  Deane Gailbraith posted on how innovative the satan is in Job. George dropped science on the ten commandments. Simon Holloway criticized a translation of JRR Tolkien (response here). John thought she-ass was a word people use in English (guess they do in the vast farm wilderness of Wisconsin),  and he offered a few good translations, focusing on the particle כי. Julia O’Brien asked if Jacob, or anyone for that matter, changed. Colin blogged on animal apocalypse in Daniel and Enoch. Roland critiqued the criqiute of idolatry from Isaiah 44.9-20. His critique is critiqued here.

GNT

Alan Bandy revisited TNIV issues. He must be trying to squeeze it in until the TNIV is no more. Stephen Carlson posted on the ending of Mark. Ken Brown introduced the gospel of John. Mike Bird blogged on Paul’s speech in Acts 13. Mark Goodacre offered a fantastic podcast on Junia mentioned in Romans 16 (with follow up here). McGrath asked if Matthew used Luke, Goodacre answered and Carlson also jumped in. Then McGrath asked if Jesus claimed to be God (He’s quite the explorer!) and Chaplin and Brennon answered. Peter Head got text critical on Hebrews 2.8 in the NA27. William Varner proposed Jude as the author of Hebrews. David Miller on Romans 2. And Joel compared AIDS to leprosy in Bible translation.

Linguistics

Steve Runge examined historical presents in the synoptics. Rod Decker explained the function of tense switch in the imperatives of Mark 8.34. We noted that substitution is a more frequent use of תחת than the spatial sense of ‘under’. DLC explained some Hebrew etymology. Mike offered his linguistic wisdom with a  sweet post on language change. Finally, Duane knew how to use a lexicon (and Answers in Genesis didn’t).

Pedagogy

J Brian Tucker posted a lesson on the NT Greek writing system. Eutychus listed ten things to do while learning Greek and the value of quotes. Matt Malcolm recounted story-telling methods of teaching Greek. John Anderson continued to muse on why he loves teaching. Brooke Lester offered help for students writing papers. Just who is their audience? Karyn noted some fun items she uses to teach Hebrew. A subsequent contest with a prize for one of the items is now underway. Nijay Gupta decided to blog through teaching Greek for the first time, more here. Brenda Heyink talked PhD programs.

Hermeneutics/Criticisms

Doug Magnum got tense about retribution. Alan Lenzi’s nerve was struck (Sept 1 South Africa time, Aug 31 in CA) about something Hobbins wrote and he wondered why there aren’t more apostate biblical scholars. Hmm… He must have been reading DeConick’s mind. James Kennedy explained what Russian Formalism has to do with the Bible. Lenzi used the M-word. Targuman responded. Phil Sumpter taught us about proportional exegesis. April got critical on the origins of the gospels of John and Thomas. Christopher Skinner replied to DeConick., and Skinner doesn’t look from nowhere, by the way. April said separating confession from work is the greatest issue for her generation (Responses: Doug Chaplin, Mark Goodacre, Mike Whitenton). Ben Shaw offered truth for students on over-interpretation. James Harding offered a blow-out on historical method and raised more questions. April offered her 10 commandments of historical criticism (Responses: Skinner, Chaplin, JK, April rebuts, Mike DeVries, McGrath, Redman). John Anderson offered a modest proposal on the relationship between science and religion.

Technology

Karyn informed us of iPhone apps for the Hebrew Bible. BibleWorks 8.0 was reviewd by both Greg and Ben. Joel Willitis told us the story of he and Accordance.

Be sure to catch next month’s carnival at Kevin Scull’s Paul of Tarsus!

Carnival Coming

The next BSC to be hosted right here is 4 days away. Submit your posts now. By the way, make sure they have something to do with the Bible.

You can also submit posts by emailing them (biblical_studies_carnival@hotmail.com) or leave submissions in a comment on this post.

Place Your Orders Now

I’ve been knitting and crocheting for about a year now. Here are some pics of things I’ve made.

A shirt for me.

A hat for Daniel.

Baby clothes for a friend’s new niece here in Stellenbosch.

Vocabula 4

We’re busy working on תחת in Reinier de Blois’ new program Vocabula 4 and I thought I’d share. Its a cool program, though it has no (intended) purpose beyond making entries for SDBH.

In the left-hand column is a list of all the Hebrew words that are (or will be) covered in SDBH. FYI, no Aramaic, just Hebrew (this needs changing in the future, though for now goes beyond Reinier’s stated purpose). תחת is not highlighted (sorry), but it is the entry in view. תחת is first from the bottom in the left-hand column.

You click your lexeme (in this case תחת) and the editable entry opens up. I have made three categories for תחת: relationals, nominals, and idiomatic phrases. Each category has some sub-units.

Before we get going, we need data. So, since we’re already in תחת, we click References>Concordance and Vocabula builds a list (far right) of all the occurnces of תחת, according to the Westminster morphology database. Now we can start with the sub-categories.

You click the sub-cateogory you want to view or edit, which opens up the edit window in the middle, right of the entry window and left of the concordance window. Reinier has made room for just about any kind of information you’d like to include with your category: domain, derivation, valency (if applicable), etc. As of now, we have a very general entry for תחת built. In the future, we’ll play around with this more detailed information, where necessary. Anyways…

Arguably, the most important thing for biblical language lexica to include is references. So we’re in the substitution category of תחת and we want to see which verse references fit.

So you click a verse in the concordance window and it pops up in the reference window at the bottom, complete with morphological tags (by hovering over a Hebrew or Greek form) and the option to view translations if you so wish. If the verse is applicable, double click it in the concordance window and the verse is added to sub-category as a reference. This makes it very easy to be exhaustive when doing lexicography. Gone (for us at least) are the days of a few examples. There is no reason why we can’t examine every instance of every lexeme in Scripture. We intend to be thorough with תחת.

Thought for Accordance: let me build my own lexicon!

That’s the long and short of it. There may be three or four others out there reading who actually use this program (maybe a few more who will…Karyn), but if nothing else, you can see how SDBH is made.

UPDATE: Helen Brown answers our request for making our own database. Looks like we’ll be making greater use of Vocabula.

Tech Question

How does one take a screen shot in XP if one does not have a PRINT SCREEN key on one’s keyboard?

Trying to show y’all De Blois’ Vocabula 4 program, but I can’t take a screen shot. Help please.

Johannine Pic

So tonight’s the last night of our Into to NT bible study at church. Thought we’d share a cool pic.

We’re focusing on the apocalypse tonight and unfortunately have to spend more time talking about why dispensationalism is a problem rather than just reading Revelation.

Change Your BH Vocab Cards

Cause most often, תחת connotes instead and not under. Guess that’s just one card that’s needs changing… for now.

So I’ve taken a first look at all 517 instances of תחת (according to the Westminster morphology) and my current hypothesis (that I’m pretty well convinced is fact) is that in the HB, תחת most often connotes a sense of substitution. Within this substitution category, there is succession (Gen 36.33), replacement (Gn 4.25), and exchange (Gn 30.15).

The numbers will definitely flucuate in the next year as things get tweaked, but as things stand now, תחת connotes instead (substitution) 198 times and under (spatial) 113 times. So your vocab card should have תחת on the front and instead, under (as opposed to under, instead) on the back. Yeah, 198 and 113 isn’t the greatest difference in the world, but its there.

What’s the big deal? Thinking linguistically, it confirms that data from the HB cannot conclusively inform us about Hebrew semantics at large. It can only tell us about what happens in the HB. And in the HB, תחת is used to connote substitution relationships more than spatial relationships. That doesn’t mean that תחת primarily means instead and secondarily under (not that תחת means any English word). If one examines all kinds of Hebrew (from various times and mediums), its easy to see that תחת connotes under at its most basic, “core” level. Its just happens to be that in the HB there’s a lot of succession going on (typically, Y reigns in place of his father X), so תחת does that job more often in these kinds of texts.

So, should we change our vocab cards? As L2 users of Hebrew (if your reading in Israel, ignore this), this data matters and needs accounting for. As of now, if your goal with Hebrew is only to read the Bible, change your vocab card to give priority to instead. If you want to learn Hebrew to watch Israeli movies… though not in Toronto, leave your cards the way they are.

Kirstenbosch

Crypto-Photography

Its been about a week now. The photos would have been much more gruesome had I snapped a few pics before. But still, it ain’t pretty.

So the plastic surgeon made fun of the ER doc who said I need plastic surgery. Apparently, there’s enough dermis that skin should start growing on its own. Just have to drive to Somerset West twice a week to have it re-wrapped.

For all you who are now vomitting on your keyboard, you can thank Matt Malcolm.

King of the Hill

Saturday afternoon, I was skating around town and saw a new hill, at least it was new to me. Wasn’t too steep and I thought I could handle it. Well, it kicked my ass, but before we move back for good, I will conquer that hill.

To make a long story short, I fell. I was going too fast, the board got wobbly, and I fell. The board’s fine though.

My left side, however, is one big scab, but the real fun part is my knee. What will me and half of LA have in common by the end of the week? Plastic surgery. We get to drive to Somerset West today to see a plastic surgeon who is going to figure out how to cover the 4cm hole in my knee. The ER doc said there’s not enough skin to sew up, so plastic surgery is the only resort. So soon, I’ll be undergoing my first, and hopefully last, African surgery.

Maybe I’ll get some lipo while I’m there.

The Death of Johnny Cash

was today in 2003. Here are some photos you may view as you listen to American 4 and remember the Man in Black. Jared’s got the middle finger to Nashville photo, if that’s what you were hoping for.

Carnival Thoughts

We’re hosting the next Biblical Studies Carnival, so please submit some posts.

What are your thoughts on the number of links in a carnival? The more the better or less is more?

More on Kenya

Ben has responded to our request for insight into Kenya’s drought. In response to our link to this article, Ben responds (with great insight actually)-

I’m afraid I can’t offer much insight. It’s really bad up in the more arid areas. People there are already living on the edge; I don’t know how they survive in a normal year. A couple of months ago, all the churches and media groups here got together to send food up north, but I haven’t heard anything recently.

Here in Nairobi, life is more or less normal except for that the power is off three days a week. The local newspapers have mentioned the drought a few times, but it hasn’t been a huge headline story in the local media. Last year we had food shortages (price hikes) because the post-election violence meant some of the most fertile land wasn’t planted. So there has been some major food issues 3 of the 4 years I’ve been here.

I know of the blogs on Africa I follow sometimes criticize Gettleman for some of his alarmist reporting, but whenever people are dying, it is a serious matter. The clashes with the Pokot referenced seem constant; they actually predate the drought. One of my Kenyan colleagues did some peacebuilding among them several years ago. Nick, the World Vision guy interviewed in the video actually lives on the school compound here.

It seemed worse in 2005–when they estimate we lost 1/3 of the cattle in the country. I remember talking to a Masai who lost most of his herd then. That year, I actually saw carcasses of dead cows, sheep, and zebras when I went out to visit the inlaws just outside of Nairobi. Even yesterday, I noticed a few Masai herders with scrawny cows in the neighborhood here — we live a couple of kms from one of the big slaughterhouses. There’s a gov’t program that pays them to have their cows slaughtered before they die of starvation–at least then some of their value is redeemed. In 2005, I gave a lift to a Masai herder that had marched his cows more than 200kms to a water source and grazing area closer to us.

One of the big fears here now is the expectations of El Nino flooding next month. Kenya depends on two different growing seasons. September usually has short rains, but if they have too much rain, it could prevent the second crop. It did rain here last week, but we live in one of the wettest sections of the country.

The other big problem–the one that is actually affecting the tourist wildlife–has less to do with the drought and more to do with farming the main water catchment forest–the Mau Forest. The government has determined that all the squatting farmers need to leave so they can replant the forest, but that’s turned into a big political bruhaha too.

Severe Drought in Kenya

The New York Times reports.

Can Ben Byerly offer any insight to this matter?

Bible in Texas Schools

The Chronicle reports-

Some northern Texas school districts are scrambling to interpret a state law that requires public schools to incorporate Bible literacy into the curriculum.
The Legislature provided little guidance, no funding for materials or teacher training when it passed the law in 2007.

The comments responding to this news are interesting. Your thoughts?

The Abraham Faith: 2 of 2

Here’s a long overdue (we’ve got lots of those) conclusion to The Abraham Faith, a post made during last years pistis Christou discussions with NT Wrong (100 reasons why pistis Christou is an objective genitive…. wish we could link to an archive of it!). Here are the old The Jesus Faith posts, vols 1, 2, 3, and 4.

The argument we make is that πιστεως (Ιησου) Χριστου in Galatians is neither a categorical objective genitive nor subjective genitive, but rather functions as a simple genitive  noun phrase that refers to the traditional belief(s) and practice(s) of Jesus and the Jesus movement, the Jesus faith (or more simply for us, Christianity). Later on, when writing his letter to Rome, Paul uses Abraham (ch 4) and his faith and practice (which becomes traditional and used by others after Abraham is gone, like Jesus) as a parallel comparison to the Jesus faith (3.22 and Galatians, in our view).

Just like the Jesus faith in Galatians, Paul contrasts the Abraham faith with εργων (4.2) and νομου (4.13), works and law. This parallel between Jesus and Abraham demonstrates that just as Abraham’s faith was his righteousness (and not his ritualistic circumcision) and those who practice faith like Abraham are righteous like him, so we too are righteous by faith through Jesus (5.1).

Rom 4.13
Οὐ γὰρ διὰ νόμου ἡ ἐπαγγελία τῷ Ἀβραὰμ ἢ τῷ σπέρματι αὐτοῦ, τὸ κληρονόμον αὐτὸν εἶναι κόσμου, ἀλλὰ διὰ δικαιοσύνης πίστεως.
The promise to Abraham and his seed that he should be heir of the world is not through the law, but rather through the righteousness of faith.

More on the intertextuality of Galatians and Romans later.