In the last podcast episode we continued our series on studying the Bible in light of its various types of literature its literary genres. We looked at parables and offered some guidelines for interpreting them. In this episode, we're going to briefly look at...
Interpretation
Naked Bible Episode 026: Advice for Interpreting Parables
In the last podcast episode I continued the series on studying the Bible in light of its various types of literature its literary genres. I looked at an example related to the New Testament how the literary features of Greco-Roman phantom tales and post-mortem...
V. P. Long and the Theological History of the Bible
Last week in the office while I was gone we had Phil Long in for some filming of our own on the OT historical books and biblical historiography. I only got to spend two days with Phil due to my Nashville trip, but enjoyed the time. I regularly use portions of his...
Taking Genesis 1-3 at Face Value: Is it Compatible with Recent Genome Research?
[Addendum 7/27/2012: I hope readers will have a look at the comments on this post when they are done reading the post. There are some good, coherent questions asked. I hope readers will see that these questions only *appear* problematic *since* they are asked from the...
Allegorical Interpretation of the Names in Genesis 5
I've had several readers over the past several months ask me to comment on a post authored by Chuck Missler entitled, "Meanings of the Names in Genesis 5." The essay puts forth the idea that the list of names in Genesis 5, stretching from Adam to Noah, can be read as...
Naked Bible Podcast: New Series on Bible Study Begins
I just uploaded the latest episode of the podcast. Wasn't sure I'd get to it this weekend with all the "last minute" MEMRA stuff, but I did. I expanded my "Heiser's Laws for Bible Study" essay into an introduction for a series on learning how to move beyond merely...
How Mike Approaches the Bible
On Using Rabbinic Material to Interpret the New Testament
I'm still in the process of getting things together for the posting of my ETS papers (both of which were well received). I'll have that ready by the end of the weekend. However, I decided to post something else that I have recently run into. I'm not sure why it hasn't...
Thoughts on Prophecy: Embracing the Messiness
Some of you know via other interactions that I'm currently teaching a four-week class at my church on interpreting prophecy. (Yes, I got talked into it). This past Thursday was the first session. My goal throughout the four weeks will be to convince people that...
Were New Testament Writers Hermeneutical Hacks?
For those of you who read comments what follows will be familiar. I've been chatting back-and-forth with someone named John Loftus, who is an atheist and has a blog called debunking Christianity. One of the issues upon which John focused was what he perceives as...
Heiser's Laws for Bible Study
I was doodling today, and this came out. Really. Last night when I should have been grading some papers I was in the mood to do some work on my next four-week teaching session at church. You'll know how unusual that was when I tell you it's going to be on prophecy...
Camping Crackpottery Survey Update
Contest voting is pretty tight, as the graphic shows. No sign of a clear consensus yet, so I'll be leaving the survey live for a while yet. Not sure if Harold Camping's latest nugget of incoherence will sway voters, either. In case you haven't heard you're blessed,...
Harold Camping, Bible Crackpottery, and a Contest
In honor of today's blazingly stupid (and failed) rapture prediction by Harold Camping, I thought I'd coin a new term to use for Bible crackpottery. I can't decide between two alternatives. I was actually hoping he'd be right since I've been grading (mostly poor)...
Urban Legends (Unconscious Lies) Preachers Tell
Had to direct you all to this succinct list of spurious material that many of you have probably heard from a pulpit or on the radio. Kudos again to Todd Bolen for alerting me to this. Here are some that made the list, along with some links for more detail): The “eye...
Reflections on Jesus for Liberal Theologians and Their Hermeneutic
A little more than a month ago I attended the Northwest regional meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society. The society had invited two guest speakers: Craig Blomberg, a professor at Denver Seminary and Marcus Borg, now professor emeritus at Oregon State. Both...