Friday, February 19, 2021

S1E3 - Two Pivotal Stories: Joseph & Solomon's Temple

My attempt at explaining Temples within the context of a small study series I put together for my church. In recent years the Bible, particularly Israel's Scriptures (the OT) has come alive to me in powerful new ways. This has been due to a range of authors exploring more carefully the ancient world as a setting for the Bible. So many terms that people have argued over for generations actually have specific meaning in Egypt and Mesopotamia. I've done my best at researching this series but I am sure I don't always get it right. The inspiration for this talk was when I heard a lecture by N. T. Wright where he mentioned temples. That clicked into place for me a pile of readings that revolve around temples but do not explicitly unpack the meaning. Go to this reference for a really fascinating read on ancient temples and images of gods. The details on the daily treatment of the images of gods comes from here. Hundley M. B. 2013 "Gods in Dwellings- Temples and Divine Presence" SBL. Beal, G. K. (2008) "We Become What We Worship: A Biblical Theology of Idolatry", IVP. is pretty interesting.

S1E2 - Early in Genesis

In terms of references, this is a good short video by John Walton on Babel.