Features

Seven Luminous Days
The creation mosaics of Monreale By Molly Dewsnap Meinhardt

In the Bible, God creates through speech. He says the Word, and it is. “God said, ‘Let there be light’ and there was light” (Genesis 1:3). But in the various depictions of God in the Creation mosaics of the Cathedral of Monreale, Sicily, he never opens his mouth. His creative work requires only the […]

The Song of Songs
An ode to intimacy By Robert Alter

Human interactions in the Bible are on the whole seen from a certain distance. The paucity of narrative detail regarding setting, appearance and posture can make even the most intimate of conversations read like an exchange between talking heads. Physical contact between characters in the rapid narrative reports is usually reduced to the basest […]

How an American Coal Miner Acquired Sacred Biblical Papyri
The Chester Beatty Collection By Kathleen Ritmeyer

The Chester Beatty Library was once one of Dublin’s best-kept secrets. I often found myself the only visitor when I went there as a student. The library was tucked away in the leafy Dublin suburb of Ballsbridge, on Shrewsbury Road, amidst foreign embassies and the wealthiest homes in the city. Going there was like […]

Exodus
A book of memories By Ronald S. Hendel

“tradition (which is a product of oblivion and memory)”

Departments

What the Left Behind Series Left Out
A biblical text taken out of its original context can mean whatever anyone wants it to mean. By Ben Witherington III
From Storm to Scroll
How the thundering voice of God became sacred scripture. By Mary Joan Winn Leith
Gallery
Solomon and the Temple