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How to Think Like a Biblical Theologian
To those who mainly regard the Bible as a source for answering their every question about God and the world, biblical theologians can be a real pill, and biblical theology can feel more than a little...
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6 Pieces of Practical Advice about Learning Biblical Languages
In a busy world, I find that most prefer to give me advice rather than help. “You should be doing X,” (not ecstasy, just X as in “blah” or “fill in the blank”). “You need to [read this book] [use this...
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Concubine as Paradigm
In considering the meaning of a simple word like concubine one finds an excellent example of the challenges that face modern attempts to represent many biblical terms. Sometimes we not only lack the...
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The Limits of Biblical Theology
One of the advantages, or disadvantages as the case may be, of being a biblical theologian, in which my phenomenological (i.e. believer’s) approach to the text within a historical grammatical and...
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Hallelujah is a Sentence
At the risk of sounding like a petulant child… well, a petulant child that complains about the frequent misuse of ancient Hebrew in weekly church services…. Which now that I think about it isn’t really...
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What’s in a Name?
In our own western culture the connection between names and meaning is rather slight. I know this, in part, because I am one of those annoying, but well meaning, people who goes about attempting to...
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A Tribute to the Musical Story Teller
One of the great things about learning Hebrew is the ability to share in the feel of the stories beyond raw content. Good writing uses language as more than just a mechanism for passing data; it...
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Tweaking Your Enemies Hebrew Style
In my previous blog, “What’s in a Name?” I started a discussion on the importance of paying attention to the meaning of names in the Bible. Sometimes what comes out of these names can be shocking. The...
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Why the Word “God” Makes me Uncomfortable
One of the problems with being a biblical theologian is the discomfort I suffer whenever someone’s question crosses lines between biblical and “Christian” categories. We have our way of talking....
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A Colored Past to Dye For
I’ll never forget a visit I made many years ago to a full scale temple model with my wife. The woman running the guided tour was just chuck full of… interesting tidbits… you thought I was going to...
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Dying for a Vision?
I’m not sure which is worse, the constant misuse of Proverbs 29:18a (KJV) or how many times I find myself saying, “That’s not a good translation,” whenever I try to explain the whole proverb. Now, I...
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Hallelujah: Call “of” Praise or Call “to” Praise
After discussing, in my recent blog post, “Hallelujah is a Sentence,” that the biblical “term” Hallelujah has grammar and that we should both be aware of that grammar and use the phrase accordingly in...
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There is no Jehovah
Being that few of my friends and neighbors have names that really mean something to us, (Other than Marsha Mello, Amanda Lynne, and Justin Case Yelle). I am intrigued about the psychological impact of...
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What’s Good for the Gander is Good for the Goose: “The Foreigner at the Well”...
In recent blogs[1], I’ve been considering the alluring and powerfully theological type-scene “Foreigner at the Well.” It is common for people to develop in their entertainment of any form typical...
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Fearsome Holiness
Though appearing over 1000x in Scripture, HOLY is a tricky notion to express in modern secular communities. Few raised in the modern western tradition today have the proper mental and emotional...
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Technical Terms We Only Think We Understand: Gospel in Mark 1:1
SONY DSC There are many bingo phrases that Christian’s throw around at church that I am convinced they barely understand. If you ask them what their favorite terms mean, you will, more than likely, get...
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It Depends What the Meaning of the Word “As” Is: Mark 1:2-4 as a Single Sentence
There is a certain beauty in translation. It is not only a science, but also an art… some would say not even a science. There are all kinds of philosophies that govern how a given translation attempts...
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A Baptism in Confusion: 3 Baptisms in Mark 1:2-13
In our last episode, we introduced the bare bones essence of water baptism as an ancient covenant ratification act saturated with typical death imagery and corresponding OT interests in ordeal (the...
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Getting out the Pagan Within Part 1: A Biblical Theology of I Samuel 15:27-31
Even a brief scan of 1 Samuel 15 should be enough to perplex the average reader. Here YHWH commands Samuel to command Saul to utterly destroy a people called the Amalekites. (Sounds like a somewhat...
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Jesus as Gospel: Is there Emperor Typology in Mark 1:1?
Some have suggested that the “OF” case in Mark 1:1 in the phrase “Gospel of Jesus” is objective… meaning that Jesus is the gospel and not merely the preacher of a Gospel, though Mark 1:14-15 will show...
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