Bible Review, April 1995
Features
An intriguing image frequently appears on the walls of ancient Christian catacombs and on carved reliefs of early Christian tombs—a mummy-like creature emerging from a small booth. Nearby, a man holding a wand taps or points at the mummy. The scene is stunning, even slightly horrifying. The door of the tomb is open. The […]
I propose to raise two seldom-asked questions about the Book of Job: Why is there a Book of Job? And what does it do to you when you read it; what is its effect on you as a reader?
His curved tail tipped with a poisonous barb, the scorpion signals peril in Scripture as in life. The word for scorpion (akrab) appears nine times in the Old Testament and five times in Greek (scorpios) in the New Testament. It occurs dozens of times in the rabbinic writings of the Talmud. We know from fossils […]
Is it a coincidence? The opening chapters of Genesis depict situations that parallel modern anthropological theories about the transition from a gathering/hunting society to an agricultural/herding society. And conversely, recent economic studies may help us interpret Adam and Eve’s role in the Garden of Eden story. Earlier anthropological theory understood the introduction of agriculture as […]