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Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - A Spy Story
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - A Spy Story
by SPCK - John Goldingay
A Spy Story NUMBERS 13: 1-14: 38 I like to raise student eyebrows by pointing out occasions when God has abandoned segments of the church. In the first Christian centuries, the eastern Mediterranean (Turkey, the Levant, Egypt, North Africa) was full of lively Christian churches, …
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - A Story about Several Asses
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - A Story about Several Asses
by SPCK - John Goldingay
A Story about Several Asses NUMBERS 22: 1- 23:4 I was once assistant minister in a flourishing suburban church that had a history of having notable rectors, one of whom was by then rector of one of the most high-profile churches in the country. I have never forgotten hearing him …
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - A Wandering Aramean Has Become a Great Nation
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - A Wandering Aramean Has Become a Great Nation
by SPCK - John Goldingay
A Wandering Aramean Has Become a Great Nation Deuteronomy 26: 1-19 Last Friday we had our harvest celebration at the seminary, and a great occasion it was. There was a wide range of food cooked by people of different ethnic backgrounds; there were games for children; there were r…
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - Acknowledgments
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - Acknowledgments
by SPCK - John Goldingay
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS The translation at the beginning of each chapter (and in other biblical quotations) is my own. I have stuck closer to the Hebrew than modern translations often do when they are designed for reading in church so that you can see more precisely what the text says. T…
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - Attitudes to Egyptians (and Others)
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - Attitudes to Egyptians (and Others)
by SPCK - John Goldingay
Attitudes to Egyptians (and Others) Deuteronomy 23: 1-25 I have recently been to two concerts where the band included musicians from British towns within an hour or two of my own hometown—singer Graham Nash and guitarist Slash. Both have lived in Los Angeles for decades, and I do…
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - Beautiful Tents, Jacob
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - Beautiful Tents, Jacob
by SPCK - John Goldingay
Beautiful Tents, Jacob NUMBERS 23: 25 24: 25 As a boy I sang in a cathedral choir. One of my favorite anthems was “How Goodly Are Thy Tents, O Jacob,” composed by a Victorian composer called Sir Frederick Arthur Gore Ouseley, a professor of music at Oxford, a prolific composer …
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - Breaking Faith
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - Breaking Faith
by SPCK - John Goldingay
Breaking Faith NUMBERS 5: 5-31 I remember having a slight fit of jealousy (it was twenty years ago, but I still remember!) when my wife started talking to the man next door. He was another priest, my colleague and friend, but that didn’t make much difference. He was a wise and sp…
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - Curses and Blessings and Curses
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - Curses and Blessings and Curses
by SPCK - John Goldingay
Curses and Blessings and Curses Deuteronomy 27: 1- 28: 68 Last night I had a lovely dinner with some students. I accepted a second helping of pasta and a second glass of wine, and ate a magnificent brownie dessert with strawberries and ice cream. When it came to coffee, I decline…
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - Dealing with Ambition
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - Dealing with Ambition
by SPCK - John Goldingay
Dealing with Ambition NUMBERS 16: 1-17: 13 I am amazed that anyone seeks a position of leadership. We once had a new principal come to the seminary where I taught in England who unveiled his detailed and carefully thought-out vision for its future. The faculty took one look and s…
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - Eating with God
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - Eating with God
by SPCK - John Goldingay
Eating with God NUMBERS 28:1- 29: 40 A week ago, our church had a homecoming/harvest barbecue. Alas, I missed it because I had arranged to be elsewhere, but I was there in my imagination, partly because I know these guys know how to barbecue. As I write now, in my imagination I c…
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - Ensuring justice
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - Ensuring justice
by SPCK - John Goldingay
Ensuring Justice NUMBERS 35:1- 36: 13 A Florida lawyer commented this month that it is becoming more and more common to hear news accounts of people convicted of first-degree murder, sentenced to death, then released many years later after it is determined (usually through DNA te…
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - False Prophets
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - False Prophets
by SPCK - John Goldingay
False Prophets Deuteronomy 13: 1- 18 I received an e-mail this morning from a friend troubled by the evil in the world, as we often are, and wondering why God bothered to create it “if he is all-knowing and so on, and knew that there would be evil, genocide, starvation, dictators…
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - Finding Yourself in Your Family Story
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - Finding Yourself in Your Family Story
by SPCK - John Goldingay
Finding Yourself in Your Family Story NUMBERS 1: 1-2: 34 My son Mark just came across a photo from exactly twelve years ago. My wife, Ann, and my mother are sitting at a picnic table; I am lying on the grass (“typically,” Mark said; I am not sure what to make of that). Somewhere …
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - Five Pushy Women
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - Five Pushy Women
by SPCK - John Goldingay
Five Pushy Women NUMBERS 26:52- 27: 11 I just came across someone’s list of the five feminist biblical scholars who had most influenced him. The idea of “feminist” biblical scholars is that these are people who in their study of Scripture are conscious of their particular identit…
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - GLOSSARY
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - GLOSSARY
by SPCK - John Goldingay
GLOSSARY aide A supernatural agent through whom God appears and works in the world. English translations call them “angels,” but this suggests ethereal figures with wings, wearing diaphanous white dresses. Aides are humanlike figures; hence it is possible to give them hospitality…
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - God Doesn't Go Back on a Promise
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - God Doesn't Go Back on a Promise
by SPCK - John Goldingay
God Doesn’t Go Back on a Promise NUMBERS 22: 1- 23:4 People in traditional societies know there can be a strange power about blessing and cursing. A Nigerian told me about the way in his society people know that their enemies can use curses to cause harm to them, and the traditio…
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - God's Claim on Levi
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - God's Claim on Levi
by SPCK - John Goldingay
God’s Claim on Levi NUMBERS 3: 1-5: 4 Last night I was watching the “Extras” on the DVD of a movie called The Soloist, whose background is Skid Row in Los Angeles, ten minutes away from where I sit. It noted the contribution made by volunteers (of the kind I could be) to the need…
Numbers and Deuteronomy for Everyone - God's Flexibility