Four papers presented at
Faculty and Postgraduate Student Workshops
at the International Baptist Theological Seminary, Prague, 2006-12
Wilderness in the Bible and the Wild Places of the Earth, JEBS, Vol 7 No 1, September 2006.
A paper examining the work of two Old Testament scholars, Robert Barry Leal and Terry L Burden, in their understanding of biblical wilderness alongside the wilderness writings of John Muir.
Maximising Our Inheritance. A Broad Brush Approach to Biblical Hermeneutics, JEBS, Vol 9 No 3, May 2009.
The last twenty years has seen a plethora of new readings and interpretations of familiar Bible passages — feminist, liberationist, third world, Afro-American, ecological and so on — which, added to some deliberately stirred up controversies on sensitive theological, moral and ethical issues, with creationism and homosexuality heading the list, has left many Christians, never mind the general public, wondering what the Bible really says, what they can believe and who is right. The purpose of this paper is to set the subject in a wider context and the starting point is two recent books on how to read the Bible. one by Karen Armstong and the other by David Harris.
The Gospel According to Ibsen, JEBS, Vol 10 No 2, January 2010.
An exploration of the life and work of Henrik Ibsen against the background of the Gospel. What light does he throw on the gospel? What might the gospel have to offer to bring his writing to life?
Literature as Midrash. A Fresh Look at Genesis 4:7 in the Light of John Steinbeck, JEBS, Vol 12 No 2, January 2012, simultaneously published in a fuller version as A Steinbeck Midrash on Genesis 4:7 in Michael J Meyer and Henry Veggian (eds), East of Eden. New and Recent Essays, Editions Rodopi, Amsterdam-New York, 2013.
For many people Genesis 4:7 is a crucial text in the Genesis story. Scholars have made many contributions. In this case we have one from a well-known writer with no specific Christian convictions but with a strong desire to understand life and people, and in relation to this text.
Two other papers, (Biblical Imagery in The Grapes of Wrath and To Kill a Mocking Bird. Perceptions of ’the Other’) also read at IBTS Workshops were published separately.
Music as Midrash