It’s the September Septuagint Studies Soirée! Come on in–you won’t have to stay long. It was a quiet month in the Septuagint blogosphere, at least as far as I could find. Everyone is back to school, it seems. But there are still some noteworthy posts.
Suzanne at BLT (Bible*Literature*Translation) wrote about “several curious matters in the vocabulary of Amos 6:1 in Hebrew, in Greek and in English.” It was an early September post, but that verse was included in the OT lectionary reading for today, incidentally.
James Dowden also posted about the vocabulary and translation of a single verse (or part of a verse): Lamentations 3:35a. This one compares Hebrew, Greek, English, and Welsh.
CBD says this beauty is in stock now
“Where is the center of gravity for LXX studies?” asked T. Michael Law. It’s a spot that may still be “for the taking,” in his analysis. TML also announced a new series on the history of interpretation of the Apocrypha, by Oxford University Press. He and David Lincicum are editing it together.
John Meade posted two parts of a response to Law’s When God Spoke Greek. In part the first he inquires as to just what kind of a book it is. Part the second focuses on the vexing question of canonization and seeks to “interact with a crucial part of chapter three [of Law’s book]: Was there a Bible before the Bible?” Meade promises future posts on the book.
A Septuagint symposium called “Looking Ahead for Dialogue. A Multiplicity of Approaches in Septuagint Studies” will be taking place in Belgium in October. (This via Jim Aitken on the FB, who will be presenting.)
Did I miss anything? Feel free to leave more September 2013 LXX links of interest in the comments. And in case you didn’t see it, the first Septuagint Studies Soirée is here.
Amazon has announced “Kindle Matchbook,” coming in October. If you have bought a book new from Amazon, you can get the Kindle version at a greatly discounted price. They write:
For thousands of qualifying books, your past, present, and future print-edition purchases will soon allow you to buy the Kindle edition for $2.99, $1.99, $0.99, or free.
As soon as I announced the first-ever Septuagint Studies Soirée (and here it is!), J.K. Gayle responded with “Breast God: women in the male literary imagination of Genesis 49.” Find his post here. In it he writes about how the Greek translators of Genesis 49 rendered God’s Hebrew title Shaddai… or, rather, didn’t:
Then I recall what the Septuagint translators did with Shaddai in Genesis 49. They were men, weren’t they? Yes, breasts are mentioned, and womb. These motherly wifely womanly female images are in the Hebraic Hellene. And absence, margin, lack is there.
James Dowden offered further lexical analysis (I loved the detail) with a response here. These two gents are fine thinkers. And they are, indeed, gents. Gayle makes a point to recognize this in his WOMBman’s Bible blog, with a post in which he asks whether the Septuagint itself might not be some sort of soirée. I always need to spend some time with Gayle to really plumb the depths of his insights, but it’s time well spent. A sampling:
In many fascinating ways, this act of translating into Hellene opens up the text. It opens the text up into the debates over how Greek males (such as Alexander’s teacher Aristotle) may control the Greek language for elite educated men of the Academy. The language control was to exclude not only women but also sophists, rhetoricians, ancient epic poets, more contemporary poets, colonists such as those in Soli who committed “solecisms” in writing, and BarBarians who spoke in foreign barbarisms.
Along similar lexical lines, Suzanne McCarthy (Gayle blogs with her at BLT) tackled “another pesky Hebrew gender question” via Hebrew, Latin, English, and, of course, Greek. McCarthy also wrote about Adam’s nose (rendered “face,” but should it be?) here.
LXX Leviticus. Source: The Schøyen Collection
Jim West complained about Septuagint-o-mania (has he read the New Testament? has he read BLT blog???) but then posted a bunch of LXX-related links not long after (phew–he has read his NT, at least).
In two of the more substantive Septuagint posts this month, Nijay Gupta (who has impeccable taste in seminaries) wrote about the importance of the Septuagint (with an eye to pastors, among others). Part 1 is here. His Part 2 looks more closely at the Apocrypha. (“There is ample evidence to show that Jesus, Paul, James, and others certainly were acquainted with the Apocrypha and probably positively influenced by texts like Wisdom of Solomon and Sirach.”) His part 2 concludes with the promise of more to come.
Speaking of which, Jessica Parks was posting some great stuff on LXX Susanna earlier in the summer, so keep an eye out for anything LXX-related she may post in the future. She is now posting on Cataclysmic blog.
Brian LePort posted a good bit on the Septuagint in August (and before). He wrote about exegeting the Septuagint (with attention to its literary context) and even theologizing from it!
This pre-dates August, but Blog of the Twelve posted a few LXX-related resources for consideration. And while we’re still dipping (but only briefly) back into July, Brian Davidson wrote about Matthew as a new Genesis.
Larry Hurtado mentioned that a book he co-edited with Paul L. Owen is now in (affordable) paperback. It’s called “Who Is This Son of Man?” The Latest Scholarship on a Puzzling Expression of the Historical Jesus, found here.
These are not blogs proper, and not terribly active of late, but still worth checking out are this B-Greek forum (link malfunctioning at time of posting) and this Yahoo! group for LXX. The IOSCS (mentioned above) has a great page with some news and announcements here.
Feel free to leave more August 2013 LXX links of interest in the comments.
Last call for nominations for any blog posts (or articles, etc.) you think should be nominated for the Septuagint Studies Soirée. I’ll be posting it in just a couple of days, so let me know if you see anything you think should be included.
You can comment here or on the original post, or email me using this form.
A dear friend recently remarked (wryly) that he saw a lot of “for dummies” books on my shelves. One of those books is a sort of bible of blogging: Blogging All-in-One for Dummies.
Why blog? I answered that question a year ago, shortly after starting Words on the Word, and again six months in. More than a year later, I’ve had the chance to spend some time with Susan Gunelius’s massive work.
It consists of “8 Books in 1,” or “minibooks,” as Gunelius describes them inside. Each minibook (and each chapter therein) is meant to stand alone. (It’s easy to read and use the book this way.) The minibooks range from 65 to 136 pages each. A basic glossary and carefully compiled index round out the 700+ pages in the book. It carries like a phone book, but with thicker paper, still of the newsprint variety.
The work aims to be (and is) “a complete guide to blogging, all in one place.” The author writes “primarily for a beginner audience–people who have never blogged,” but as noted below, there is plenty of advanced information for even the “skilled bloggers” she also has in mind.
Here are the eight overarching topics that Gunelius treats:
Book I: Joining the Blogosphere
Blogging 101–from the history of blogs to the types of blogs, including motivations behind different blogs and how to make them successful. This is a sort of quick start guide. Particularly helpful for beginners here are the screenshots showing the various parts of a blog (comments, trackbacks, home page, etc.). The “Blogging Rules and Ethics” section is essential reading.
Book II: Niche Blogging
Niche blogs “usually fill a void that other, larger blogs are missing but audiences want.” There are some drawbacks to niche blogging, Gunelius notes, like a smaller audience and less traffic, but there are still unique opportunities for monetization (which she treats more at length later in Book VII) and building relationships with others who have a similar area of interest.
Book III: Corporate and Business Blogging
Using examples of business blogs (“Companies That Do It Right”) like Southwest Airlines, Zappos, and Wine Library TV, the author shows how to build an online brand through blogging. She notes a “fine line… between publishing promotional content on your business blog that is useful and valued by readers and publishing so much promotional content that your blog is viewed as all marketing and no substance.” There are practical, simple pieces of advice, too: have a giveaway contest, include social media links for sharing your blog posts, responding to comments. The content here is not exceedingly advanced, but addresses appropriately the target audience of … well… dummies (i.e., beginners).
Book IV: Choosing a Blogging Application
This is one of the most useful minibooks. Even if a would-be blogger is ready with good content, topics, and publicity, knowing what medium to use can be a challenge. Here Gunelius offers a guided tour (again, complete with screenshots) of WordPress, Google Blogger, TypePad, and Tumblr. She includes both free and paid options in her analysis. I’ve been using WordPress for a year, and had no idea about all the free themes available at the WordPress Themes site she mentioned.
Book V: Blogging Tools
Once you’ve got a blog, this minibook looks at SEO (search engine optimization), measuring blog traffic, using images, blog feeds, and more. This is probably the most advanced material in the book, that even non-beginners will find useful. Her almost pastoral admonition to “try to refrain from checking your blog’s statistics every day” (i.e., “worrying about daily traffic fluctuations”) is a needed one for many bloggers.
Book VI: Promoting and Growing Your Blog
More advanced material here. She covers contests, guest blogging (whether you do it elsewhere or host it on your blog), “social bookmarking,” and other ways to increase site traffic.
Book VII: Making Money from Your Blog
Most bloggers (hopefully) realize blogging is not a terribly lucrative business, especially not in its initial stages (i.e., first couple years). But there are still ways to make money from blogging–whether that is through ad placement, merchandising, or participation in affiliate programs. Gunelius begins this minibook as she so often does, with the big picture: “[Y]ou need to determine what your blogging goals are and then decide whether publishing ads on your blog in an attempt to make some money matches those goals or runs counter to them.” Especially helpful is the short section on the Federal Trade Commission’s guidelines for any “material connection” a blogger has with a company or product they are reviewing or advertising.
Book VIII: Microblogging with Twitter
Ah, Twitter. I wrongly predicted its demise just months after its inception. “Microblogging” might be too strong a word for how some people use the site (“wordbutchering” could be more appropriate?). I’m not sure Gunelius’s “Everyone is tweeting!” assessment is completely on target, but she is right, I think, that Twitter and other “microblogging” services go beyond what just 140 characters of text can offer. And because microblogging is “convenient, far-reaching, and free,” bloggers ought to pay attention to it. Gunelius takes the reader deep into the world of tweeting, URL shorteners, hashtags, and third-party Twitter applications.
Blogging All-in-One for Dummies is engaging and easy to read. Gunelius is clearly an expert on this topic, and this encyclopedic work bears that out. Copious screenshots and diagrams give visual reinforcement to the text throughout. The index and clearly delineated chapters make it a highly useable reference work–one which I know I’ll turn to often as I continue to blog! It’s a great one-stop shop for bloggers or those who would be bloggers. Yes, even still in 2013.
You can see more about Blogging-All-in-One for Dummies at Amazon here (affiliate link) or here (Wiley’s product page, including an excerpt and the full table of contents). The book’s “cheat sheet” is available here. Many thanks to Wiley for the gratis review copy for the purposes of my writing an objective review.
Right now there are four good-to-own biblical studies books on sale for less than $3 (and two of these are less than $2).
How to Read the Bible for All Its Worth (Fee and Stuart), $1.99 on Kindle (here). I’ve read this, though it’s been some time now. Solid book.
Holman QuickSource Guide to the Dead Sea Scrolls (Craig A. Evans), $2.99 on Kindle (here). I just got this–haven’t read it yet, but flipping through, it looks like a great introduction to the Dead Sea Scrolls.
Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church (N.T. Wright), $1.99 on Kindle (here) and iBooks (here). I haven’t read this (I know! I need to get on it) but several folks have highly recommended it to me.
Paul’s Letter to the Romans (Pillar Commentary Series), Colin G. Kruse, $2.99 on Kindle (here). The couple times I’ve used this have led me to think this is a good resource.
(This blog participates in the Amazon Associates Program, so any purchase from Amazon that comes from a link on this site sends a small percentage of the purchase price to upkeep and maintenance for Words on the Word.)
Blogger and personality Jim West (lots of personality) is offering his own rogue carnival each month. This was particularly good on August 1, when an only slightly more official carnival did not post because no one volunteered to cover July.
Of the upcoming September 1 rogue carnival, in his call for submissions, Jim says:
* Interesting topics include just about everything related to Biblical studies except the LXX. These days you can’t go to the bathroom without someone opening the stall door and shoving a LXX or a book about the LXX in your face. Sure, it’s a great text, but everywhere? All the time? In the words of Jesus ‘life is more than the belly and the greek translation of the Hebrew Bible. Therefore do not concern yourself with it to the exclusion of everything else. Let him who has ears to hear, hear’. Accordingly, in obedience to Jesus, the August carnival (posting 1 September) will be a LXX free zone.
LXX-free zone? You’d have to leave your Bible on the shelf for that to obtain!
But it inspired me to do something that I think is perhaps long overdue–institute a Septuagint-themed carnival of my own.
Each month I will highlight the best of the Web when it comes to Septuagint studies. I’m calling it…
This one (though it’s not the exclusive focus of Words on the Word)
The International Organization for Septuagint and Cognate Studies (IOSCS) has a nice news page here, too, with links to plenty of resources.
There may be other LXX bloggers that I don’t know about… which is why I’m calling on you, dear reader, to please alert me to good posts that have to do with the Septuagint/Old Greek translations of the Hebrew Scriptures.
Comment right here to let me know of something that should be in the first Septuagint Studies Soirée. I’ll post as soon as I’ve got a good dose of links.
Words on the Word now sports a new layout and address.
We’re at abramkj.com now, though all your old links to previous posts will still work. Going to abramkj.wordpress.com still directs you here.
I’m open to thoughts? Feedback? You can check out the home page here (which shows the most recent post and some “featured posts” beneath that), or see what it looks like when you click on an individual post.
We’re here; we blog about the Bible; get used to it.
Charles Spurgeon is reported to have said, “If you have to give a carnival to get people to come to church, then you will have to keep giving carnivals to keep them coming back.”
And so we who blog in the fields of academic biblical studies and theology keep giving carnivals.
So let Words on the Word be among the first to wish you and yours a Happy New Year! Let’s welcome the year ahead with a recap of what went on in the so-called biblioblogosphere in December 2012.
Newtown, Connecticut, December 14
On December 14 there was the horrible news of a shooter who killed 26 other people at an elementary school in Newtown, CT, 20 of them young children. Peter Enns shared some thoughts from an unsettled state. Jim West wrote about it quite a bit and excoriated the NRA.
With the generous lead support of the Leon Levy Foundation and additional generous support of the Arcadia Fund, the Israel Antiquities Authority and Google joined forces to develop the most advanced imaging and web technologies to bring to the web hundreds of Dead Sea Scrolls images as well as specially developed supporting resources in a user-friendly platform intended for the public, students and scholars alike.
A number of bloggers wrote about this, not a few of whom Jim McGrath links to.
That wasn’t all that went online in December. Evangelical Textual Criticism notes quiteafewothermanuscriptsthatare now online. (As proven by the fact that every word of that last phrase is its own hyperlink.) Charles Halton of awilum.com highlights the availability of A. Leo Oppenheim’s Ancient Mesopotamia as a free pdf. Readers of this carnival may also like to take some time with ASOR’s weekly archaeology roundups in December, here, here, and here.
Septuagint
December saw a plethora of posts about παρθένος/עלמה in Isaiah 7:14, and Matthew’s use of that verse. Here is T.M. Law, saying that Greek Isaiah’s use of παρθένος for עלמה is not without precedent in the LXX (“The Greek translator of Isaiah used a perfectly acceptable rendering for עלמה.”). Here’s the Jesus Creed on the virgin birth. Krista Dalton notes, “[T]he author of Matthew is not saying that Isaiah was envisioning the birth of Jesus.” Kevin Brown of Diglotting posts here about it. And, looking at hermeneutics more generally, Brian LePort suggested three paradigms to use in studying the virgin birth.
J.K. Gayle at The WOMBman’s Bible (“An Outsider’s Perspective on the Hebrew Males’ Hellene Book”) posted reflections from Greek Isaiah not 1, not 2, not 3, not 4, not 5, not 6, but 7 times in December. Set aside some time and read them all.
Codex Sinaiticus dropped in price to just under $200 at CBD this month–a facsimile edition, that is. Theophrastus of BLT notes it here. He will later lament (which I, too, lament) that Oxford University Press no longer prints their wonderful Comparative Psalter. And while we’re on those Ψαλμοὶ, did their Greek translator(s) have Aristotle and Greek rhetoric in mind?
Anthony Le Donne is taking on the Wikipedia entry on “Historical Jesus” (best biblioblog comment of the month: here). James Tabor asked how December 25 got to be the day we observe Jesus’ birthday (with more thoughts here). Mark Goodacre produced a Christmas NT Pod in which he “explores the differences between the Birth Narratives in Matt. 1-2 and Luke 1-2 and asks how this can be the case if Luke is familiar with Matthew.” The Sacred Page produced a podcast on “the first Christmas.” For a fresh translation of Luke 1:34-38 (with the Greek reproduced beneath the English), see “She spoke yet-Miriam did.” Daniel Street even gave us some Christmas songs in Greek!
Anglican minister Rach Marszalek calls for nuance in discussions on the Trinity, as well as an appreciation of “the perichoretic beauty” of the Same. Read her “Eternal functional subordination and ontological equality?” here. While we’re on Anglicans, Brian LePort asks whether he needs a Bishop?
Gaudete Theology offers a feminist reading of “the bride of Christ” language. (“The image of the Bride of Christ needn’t be viewed only through the patriarchal perception of woman’s nature as inherently passive, docile, compliant, and receptive.”) Alice C. Linsley at Just Genesis would, I think, agree that the image and office of priest should also not be viewed through a patriarchal lens. She says, “Luther Was Wrong About the Priesthood.”
And, finally, may I offer thanks to Amanda at Cheesewearing Theology for this excellent December 2012 theology roundup? She covers yet more territory in theology than I have already covered here. If you’re disappointed that this carnival is about over, spend time reading the posts she collects.
Ευχαριστω/תודה/Thank you
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Scot McKnight lists the “Jesus Creed Books of the Year” 
Speaking of Greek Isaiah… more than 150 of us are reading through 
Words on the Word 