Studying lectionary texts? Here are some starting places for study at ATLA this week. If you are the graduate of an accredited U.S. theological school, you may have free access to these articles through your school. Check ATLAS access options. You can find full lists of ATLAS recommended articles for this week at The Text This Week's page for this week's texts:
http://www.textweek.com/yearc/properc19.htm
Proper 19C / Ordinary 24C / Pentecost +17
September 15, 2013
Brooks, Claire Vonk, "Between Text and Sermon: Psalm 51," Interpretation, 1995.
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Interpretation’s “Between Text and Sermon” from 1995. “Below are suggested points of contact, so that the worshiper's encounter with the Holy Spirit through Psalm 51 may be both wrenching and healing.”
Balentine, Samuel E., "Turn, O Lord! How Long?"Review & Expositor, 2003.
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Abstract: “Psalm 90, the only psalm attributed to Moses, reflects the torah that instructs who God is and who God's people are to be. The focus is the tension of hope and lament before God in the face of suffering. From this tension rises the question of whether God will respond. There is exploration of the reverberations in Psalm 90 of Exodus 32:7-14, where Moses prays for God's faithfulness to God's own character for the sake of the people. The essay considers tensions faced in contemporary exegesis and liturgical leadership, concluding that those who hear this Psalm are enjoined to live as mortals before God and pray as servants of God and God's people, wrestling with hard questions; honest about pain while hopefully insistent upon faithfulness to the divine character.”
Slivniak, Dmitri M., "The Golden Calf Story: Constructively and Deconstructively," Journal for the Study of the Old Testament, 2008.
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Abstract: “Unlike other postmodern reading practices, deconstruction suppresses the figure of the reader: the text is viewed as both engendering and undermining its meaning, while the reader's role is only to discover these processes. Yet, when one deconstructs biblical texts, 'anarchic' and 'lacking logic' according to traditional Western criteria, the illusion vanishes, and it is hard to get along without the reader as an active figure. The reader's role is actively to construct the meaning of the text, before it gets deconstructed. This is the reason why in some recent works the deconstructive reading of the text is preceded by a 'constructive' one. In this article the Golden Calf story (Exod. 32) is read both constructively and deconstructively. The constructive reading focuses on the opposition 'normative cult-deviant cult' which is viewed as central to the story. Normative cult and deviant cult are represented by the Tablets of the Law and the Golden Calf respectively. The deconstruction of this opposition is based on the fact that the tablets and the calf receive the same treatment: Moses destroys both of them.”
Tiemeyer, Lena-Sofia, "The Compassionate God of Traditional Jewish and Christian Exegesis,"Tyndale Bulletin, 2007.
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Summary: “The comparison in the Zohar (Noah, 67b-68a) of Noah, Abraham and Moses serves as the starting point of this paper. Its aim is to investigate how traditional Jewish (e.g. the Targum, Midrashim, the Talmud, the medieval commentators) and Christian (e.g. the New Testament, the Church Fathers, Luther and Calvin) exegetes interpret the responses of these three individuals to divine foreknowledge (Gen. 6-7; 18:16-33; Exod. 32:10-14). Two main responses are suggested - intercession and/or proclamation of repentance. As shall become apparent, strikingly similar answers are given. First, foreknowledge is seen by nearly all scholars, regardless of religious affiliation and historical background, as a veiled hint at the possibility of influencing God, with the desired result of cancelling the prediction. Secondly, the majority of scholars read intercession and/or repentance into these texts to a greater extent than the texts themselves warrant. This uniformity suggests that the questions asked are shared by people across the borders of time and specific denominations. Even so, there are differences: Jewish scholars tend to emphasise the motif of intercession, existing or non-existing, on behalf of the guilty, while Christian ones are more prone to stress the idea of repentance.”
Stulman, Louis J., "Jeremiah as a Messenger of Hope in Crisis," Interpretation, 2008.
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“The book of Jeremiah not only gives speech to the disaster, but it also functions as a complex polyphonic response. The text's judgment-salvation schema and its embedded cacophony of voices and counter-voices create a thick meaning-making map, a tapestry of hope, designed to help at-risk and displaced people survive a world in which irrationality, violence, and loss are more tangible than moral coherence and meaning.”
Bond, L. Susan, "Between Text & Sermon: 1 Timothy 1:3-17," Interpretation, 2006.
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Interpretation’s “Between Text and Sermon” from 2006. “There are two homiletical approaches to this text. The first would be to embrace the theology of 1 Timothy, to contrast ‘false teachers of the law’ with teachers of ‘sound doctrine.’ … The other approach would be to subvert the Pastor's rhetorical agenda by appealing to the genuine Paul.”
Anderson, Garwood P., "Seeking and Saving What Might Have Been Lost: Luke's Restoration of an Enigmatic Parable Tradition," The Catholic Biblical Quarterly, 2008.
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A look at the material exclusive to Luke’s gospel. ”I have argued that a distinguishing feature of the Lucan parables is their startling employment of characters of questionable rectitude who respond to crises with dubious virtue. Luke's parabolic characters resist binary labels as ‘good’ or ‘bad.’ Not a few, but indeed most, of the Lucan parables are beset with this moral ambiguity. This is the enigmatic parable tradition that Luke inherited.”
Ross, Art, "Luke 15:1-10, Between Text and Sermon," Interpretation, 2007.
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Interpretation’s “Between Text and Sermon” from 2007. “Repentance leads to a life of faith marked by attributes such as those the shepherd and the woman embodied: love for the lost; persistent pursuit of the well being of others; joyful, generous friendship; and sharing with one's friends and neighbors. A life of disciple-ship is a life that begins with repentance, leads to the faith of Jesus, and embodies the love of God. Discipleship turns away from grumbling and toward a life of joy—joy for God and joy for the disciple.”
Schertz, Mary H., "God's Party Time," The Christian Century, 2007.
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Living by the Word from The Christian Century for 2007. “From Luke's perspective, the interesting question is who the lost are. Are they the tax collectors, the sinners, the town girls? Or are they the Pharisees, scholars and church girls?”
Reid, Barbara E., O.P., "Beyond Petty Pursuits and Wearisome Widows: Three Lukan Parables,"Interpretation, 2002. (See also, "Parables," issue focus of Interpretation 56.3 (2002).)
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“The three Lukan parables that feature female characters have often been interpreted as stories about women tending to trivial tasks. Yet these figures reveal the divine work of transforming and feeding, extravagantly seeking after the lost for redemption, and persistently pursuing justice until it is achieved.”
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