Bible Review, June 2004
Features
Did the gospel writers whitewash the role of Pontius Pilate on Good Friday, portraying him as a magistrate who condemned Jesus only under pressure from a Jewish prosecution, when in fact Pilate really wanted Jesus on the cross? This revisionist portrait of Pilate—presented to BR readers by Professor Stephen J. Patterson in “The Dark […]
Professor Maier’s extensive rebuttal of my earlier essay is a most welcome engagement from an authority who has written widely on the figure of Pilate.1 I am happy to offer a reply.
I thank Professor Patterson for his thoughtful response, to which several brief comments may be appropriate. I used the word “revisionist” as the neutral term it is for “one who,” according to the dictionary definition, “revises, or favors the revision of, some accepted theory, doctrine, etc.” Professor Patterson’s reappraisal of the Passion story would surely seem a fair example.
Few biblical women seem more scandalous than Delilah. A harlot and a temptress, she uses her beauty and her wiles to ensnare the mighty Samson. A great deceiver, she tricks her lover into revealing the secret source of his strength. For selling that secret to Samson’s Philistine enemies, she is thought of as a […]
Adam and Eve’s disobedience in the Garden of Eden serves as the foundation for Western theologies of the way we are: sinful and guilty. As the New England Primer of 1683 succinctly states: “In Adam’s fall, We sinned all.” For their sin, Adam and Eve are expelled from the Garden in Genesis 3.
A few weeks ago, my family went ape. Literally. Within the space of seven days, we visited the primate exhibits at the San Diego Zoo, watched an IMAX film about Jane Goodall, borrowed an educational video about apes from the library and viewed 2001: A Space Odyssey. (We gave the Planet of the Apes […]