Blue Cord

Since many of my readers will be traveling to Boston this weekend for the Society of Biblical Literature Conference, I thought I would draw your attention to an exhibit that is at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts.

composite triple beat“Art and Empire: Treasures from Assyria in the British Museum”online casino is currently on display. As the title suggests, these are all artifacts that are housed in the British Museum. They are on loan to the Boston Museum of Fine arts from September 2008 to January 2009.

I have not seen the exhibit yet, but a colleague of mine at Merrimack College said it was very well done. She is not a biblical scholar, but by her description of one of the reliefs, I believe the scene depicting Sennacherib’s siege of Lachish is one of the pieces on display. I have not been able to find an official list of the artifacts in the exhibit, so I cannot confirm this.

If you want to attend, please keep in mind that tickets are required. You can purchase tickets for specific times of entry on the MFA web site, and the ticket is only good for that time slot. The exhibit tickets are $25 (plus “convenience fee”), and that is on top of the general admission of $17 (plus “convenience fee”).

You can visit the exhibit’s web siteмебели пловдив for more details.

I am pleased to announce that the newest volume in the Conversations with Scripture series is available. The current release is 2 Isaiah by Steve Cook of Biblische Ausbildung. As a member of the editorial board of this series, I saw an early version of this book and I can highly recommend it.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with the series, it is published by Moorehouse Publishing in conjunction with the Anglican Association of Biblical Scholars. It is intended for use by groups in church or for personal Bible study. So far the series comprises volumes on the Gospel of John, the parables, Hebrews, and the book of Revelation. My own contribution was on the law in the Old Testament.

Congratulations to Steve on his latest publication!

Today was my first day of teaching at Merrimack College. I think it went well (i.e., no one got injured in the class). The classroom in which I teach was rather warm, but at least it is not receiving direct sunlight during the hours I teach in there. It should be quite nice by the end of September. It is not wired for technology, but I am told that can be brought in on an ad hoc basis. It does have a piano, however, as it is on the same floor as the fine arts department. I have always thought that Leviticus would work better as a musical, so perhaps this will be the year to try it out.

I am teaching two section of “Introduction to Religious and Theological Studies,” which all students are required to take. All of the intro classes I have taught up to this point have been either introductions to the whole Bible or introductions to the OT or NT. I have never done a general religious studies or theological class, and this intro combines both into one semester.

I am using three books for the course. For the religious studies section, I am having them read The Sacred Quest: An Introduction to the Study of Religion by Lawrence Cunningham and John Kelsay. It was recommended by some other professors in the department, and I am enjoying the reading I have done in it so far. For the theological segment of the course I am using Theological Foundations: Concepts and Methods for Understanding Christian Faith by J.J. Meuller et al. It is a team-written book that explores doing theology within a Roman Catholic framework. Each chapter has a segment on doing theological research using library resources, which will be helpful to first year college students. For the final week, the students will read Henry Chadwick’s Augustine: A Very Short Introduction. This college is run by the Augustinian order, so it is appropriate to have the students learn a bit about St. Augustine.

Because of my particular interests, the biblical studies section of my class will cover a few more class meetings than is usual, but I don’t think St. Augustine would mind. Tolle lege!

I was editing an article yesterday on the Acts of Philip, a 4th–5th century apocryphal work about the Apostle Philip. As I read it, I came across a line where the author says that Philip “converses with a penitent leopard.” It made me giggle, because obviously the author meant to say that Philip was talking with a penitent leper. Of course, the spell checker wouldn’t catch this, because both “leopard” and “leper” are valid words.

Just because I am a stickler for detail, however, I wanted to make absolutely sure that it was supposed to be a leper and not a leopard before I made the correction. So, I found the Acts of Philip online. And, lo and behold, it contains the story of Philip conversing with a leopard who is sorry for having attacked a goat (Acts Phil. 96–101).

So there you have it: a penitent leopard. I guess they can change their spots after all, at least metaphorically (Jer 13:23).

The SBL just announced a new book that I will have to pick up at the annual meeting this fall. It is entitled The Chronicler’s Genealogies: Towards an Understanding of 1 Chronicles 1–9. For most people, the endless lists of who begat whom and who forgot to begat are rather boring, but I love them. Although beset with problems, those genealogies provide lots of information about the priesthood in the postexilic period. In fact, I own Gary Knopper’s commentary on 1 Chronicles 1–9, but I never got around to buying the volume dealing with the rest of the book. Who needs a bunch of commentary on narratives when you could be reading about genealogies!