Feb 26, 2024
The very first words of the Hebrew Bible, usually translated as “In the beginning God created…” can also be translated, “In the beginning when God created . . . God said . . . .” What is the basis for this rendition? Dr. Emanuel Tov, the J. L. Magnes Professor of Bible Studies at the Hebrew University...
Feb 19, 2024
The Hebrew term yehudim in modern Hebrew can be straightforwardly translated as “Jews,” but when it occurs in the Hebrew Bible this is not the best translation. Remarkably, more than half the occurrences in the OT are in one book: Esther. The question can be extended into the NT as well. Rabbi Steven Bob, who has...
Feb 12, 2024
In Acts 2:33 there is a completely new thing: Whereas in the OT and everywhere in Judaism it is God, Yahweh, who sends the Holy Spirit, in Acts 2 Jesus has ascended to the right hand of God, received the Spirit from his Father, and himself performs the act of pouring out the Spirit. This should provoke reflection on...
Feb 5, 2024
In his lecture to philosophers in Acts 17, Paul declares that God has so ordered human history that people “would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from any one of us” (NIV). The verb translated “reach out for” (ψηλαφάω) can be illuminated by the blinded Cyclops...