Sheep and Goats and Matthew 25:31-46

Ian Paul has an excellent discussion here of Matthew 25:31-46 and he is spot on concerning the identity of "the least of these."

The Latest Issue of the Review of Biblical Literature

The latest issue of Review of Biblical Literature is out. Reviews can be accessed by clicking the links below but unfortunately you must be a SBL member.

Noga Ayali-Darshan, Treading on the Back of Sea: The Combat between the Storm God and the Sea in Ancient Near Eastern Literature [Hebrew]
Reviewed by S. David Sperling

Cilliers Breytenbach and Christiane Zimmermann, Early Christianity in Lycaonia and Adjacent Areas: From Paul to Amphilochius of Iconium
Reviewed by Rosemary Canavan

Douglas S. Earl, Reading Old Testament Narrative as Christian Scripture
Reviewed by Benjamin J. M. Johnson

Jörg Frey and Enno Edzard Popkes, eds. Jesus, Paulus und die Texte von Qumran
Reviewed by Peter Porzig

Anthony Giambrone, Sacramental Charity, Creditor Christology, and the Economy of Salvation in Luke’s Gospel
Reviewed by Timothy W. Reardon

Christoph Heilig, J. Thomas Hewitt, and Michael F. Bird, eds. God and the Faithfulness of Paul: A Critical Examination of the Pauline Theology of N. T. Wright
Reviewed by Nijay Gupta

Christoph Levin and Reinhard Müller, eds. Herrschaftslegitimation in vorderorientalischen Reichen der Eisenzeit
Reviewed by Andrew Knapp
 
Alicia D. Myers, Blessed among Women? Mothers and Motherhood in the New Testament
Reviewed by Matthew S. Collins

Christian R. Thauer and Christian Wendt, eds., Thucydides and Political Order: Concepts of Order and the History of the Peloponnesian War
Reviewed by Thomas P. Nelligan

K. Lawson Younger Jr., A Political History of the Arameans: From Their Origins to the End of Their Polities
Reviewed by Stefania Mazzoni 

Esther from Memory

I was recently perusing through Morris Adler's The World of the Talmud and came upon the comment. It really does put my memorization efforts to shame.

"The process of writing text in Rabbinic times was both a difficult and costly process. Few could own copies, even of Scriptures. Rabbi Meir once came to a Jewish community in Asia Minor and could not find a single copy of the Scroll of Esther. Being a scribe by profession and a scholar by advocation, he was able to write on from memory" (The World of the Talmud. 2nd ed. [New York: Schocken, 1963], 33).

The Problem with Prophet, Priest, and King as a Modern Leadership Typology

Timothy Paul Jones has a very good caution here against using the roles of prophet, priest, and king as a pastoral leadership typology.

Raising Support for Seminary

Two posts here and here are are entitled, "How to afford Seminary," but they are really more about how to raise support for seminary. That being said, there is helpful advice to be had. Although, my approach was a bit different, support raising is one reason that I was able to complete three degrees with zero debt.

Free Dead Sea Scrolls Resource

Frank Turek has partnered with Rose Publishing to make their Dead Sea Scrolls booklet/brochure available as a free PDF download. You can access the offer here. You do have to sign up with your email to get this resource.

Psalm 139

The Zondervan Academic blog has posted here an excerpt from the new commentary on Psalm 139 from a new commentary by W. Dennis Tucker and Jamie A. Grant.