, , , , ,

Bible trivia time for hard-working religion scribes: What is a cubit? A shekel? An ephah?

, , , , ,
Bible trivia time for hard-working religion scribes: What is a cubit? A shekel? An ephah?

THE QUESTION:

Bible trivia: How long is a cubit? What does a shekel weigh? How much does an ephah contain?

THE GUY’S ANSWER:

Readers of the Bible, particularly those wedded to the revered King James Version from four centuries ago, will keep running across esoteric words for weights and measures in ancient times. Many editions today help out by providing modern equivalents in the text or footnotes.

But don’t take those equivalents too literally. Specialist Marvin Powell’s advice is that “measures have always posed a special problem for translators.” He said it’s “almost impossible” to fix equivalents with much precision so we’re talking about rules of thumb — literally the thumb in one example below.

Ancient usage was approximate to begin with, and meanings varied by districts and eras. There appear to be differences before and after Israel’s exile in Babylon that began in 526 B.C., and between the Old and New Testament cultures. Powell figured that any proposed equivalents have a margin of error of plus or minus 5 percent if not more.

This gets us into the development of metrology, the science of measurement. The Guy here relies especially on two historians of the ancient world, Powell of Northern Illinois University, writing in the Anchor Bible Dictionary, and D.J. Wiseman of the University of London, in the New Bible Dictionary.

Consider the Old Testament prophet Amos, who denounced corner-cutters who “trample on the needy” by dishonestly selling wheat so as to “make the ephah small and the shekel great” (8:5). That indicates measurements were inherently a bit flexible as tradesmen bargained over weights and prices in their ancient marketplaces.

The most frequent such term in the Bible is the famous “cubit,” which measured length.


Please respect our Commenting Policy
, ,

About Todd Bentley and 2020 prophecies: How are reporters supposed to cover this stuff?

, ,

If you had been at a women’s tea at my church last weekend, you would have seen several women pull out lists — from the internet and other sources — of prophetic pronouncements for the coming decade. There were oohs and aahs of appreciation as these women read out loud upbeat forecasts for the future.

Go to almost any charismatic Christian website or ministry these days and you’ll see lists of things that one is supposed to think or pray about for the next decade or what God supposedly will be carrying out. There’s even prophetic conferences in the early part of this year whereby you can go and find out what’s up in heavenly realms and meet individuals who cast themselves as modern-day “prophets” and “apostles.”

Interestingly, none of these charismatics prophesied the killing of Iran’s top general, Qassen Soleimani, last Friday. What’s also not mentioned on any of these sites is the coming environmental catastrophe that secular prophets are saying is up for the coming decade. I’m reading David Wallace-Wells’ The Uninhabitable Earth: Life after Warming, which claims that global warming is so far advanced, large portions of the Earth will be too hot to live in sooner rather than later. As we gaze at news broadcasts of eastern Australia burning up, Wallace-Wells sounds more accurate than these other folks.

Not everyone is in lockstep. Charisma magazine just came out with a blistering editorial slamming false prophets. I find this sort of inside-baseball debate fascinating, since it often points to topics that are in the news or lurking in the background. Here’ a key quote from that.

“… the prophetic nonsense must stop. Not once have I read or heard about any prophecy for 2020 that includes judgment, correction, rebuke or warning. To stuff our spiritual faces with nothing but happy prophetic thoughts is utter foolishness at best. At worst, it will seal the fate of our nation as one that started out godly and ended suddenly under God's wrath.

After mentioning some of the ills and sins committed by the American public,

To publish word after word about how blessing and promotion is our portion in 2020 will do little to nothing to prepare the people for what is to come… Where are the prophets who are warning the church that God himself will come against it? Where are those who are shaking people out of their mediocrity and casual connection to God, awakening them from a lethal slumber?

Bob Smietana of Religion News Service just wrote a very interesting piece about a disgraced prophet that dates back to events that happened almost 12 years ago. His name is Todd Bentley and he made tons of headlines for his starring role in a revival that played out in Lakeland, Fla., back in 2008.


Please respect our Commenting Policy
, , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

After decades of fighting, United Methodists avoid a visit from ghost of the Episcopal future?

, , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

It’s the Methodist question I have heard the most from GetReligion readers (and even locals here in East Tennessee) over the weekend.

I will paraphrase: If the conservatives have been winning the big votes at United Methodist conferences for the past couple of decades, then why are news reports saying that the traditionalists have agreed to “leave the United Methodist Church”?

This is the response that popped into my head a few hours ago after round of news reports, Twitter and online buzz: Basically, I think conservative Methodists have been visited by the Ghost of the Episcopal Future.

Methodist traditionalists are not interested in 50 years of hand-to-hand legal conflict with the entrenched United Methodist principalities and powers. Hold that thought. Meanwhile, I will admit that it’s hard to see the logic of this statement in any one news report. Let’s start with some math from the Associated Press:

Members of the 13-million-person denomination have been at odds for years over the issue, with members in the United States leading the call for full inclusion for LGBTQ people. 

The rift widened last year when delegates meeting in St. Louis voted 438-384 for a proposal called the Traditional Plan, which affirmed bans on LGBTQ-inclusive practices. A majority of U.S.-based delegates opposed that plan but were outvoted by U.S. conservatives teamed with delegates from Methodist strongholds in Africa and the Philippines.

By the way: The numbers in that first paragraph are accurate, as opposed to the following circulated by Reuters: “The United Methodist Church lists more than 13 million members in the United States and 80 million worldwide.” That’s way off, but quite a few online and broadcast outlets picked up that error and ran with it.

Accurate math really is important here. So are the doctrines that are at stake, which are much broader than battles over marriage and sexuality (see my two “On Religion” columns about these trends here, and then here).

The key is two realities that are in constant tension.


Please respect our Commenting Policy
, , , , ,

Plug-In: Why Texas minister talked to Bobby Ross -- only -- about deadly church shooting

, , , , ,

A few minutes after noon Sunday, my iPhone started pinging with messages from friends — alerting me to a shooting at the West Freeway Church of Christ in this Fort Worth suburb.

“One of my friends’ parents goes there,” my sister, Christy Fichter, texted. “Said her dad was carrying … not sure if that means he shot the shooter or not. A little too close to home for sure.”

As it turned out, her Facebook friend Jaynette Barnes’ father — Jack Wilson — was the heroic church security team leader who stopped the bloodshed.

The former reserve sheriff’s deputy gunned down Keith Thomas Kinnunen, 43, after he fatally wounded two beloved Christians: Richard White, 67, and Anton “Tony” Wallace, 64. The shooting lasted just six seconds but felt like so much longer to those who endured it.

As I searched online for any reliable details, I came across a link to the church’s YouTube livestream of its Sunday morning assembly. I fast-forwarded through the video until I came to the part that will be seared in my brain forever. 

I heard the shots. And the screams. 

I saw the bodies fall. 

And I burst into tears.

However, I quickly composed myself because I am a journalist.


Please respect our Commenting Policy
, , , , , , , ,

Thinking along with Emma Green: Sen. Josh Hawley dares to tilt at many GOP windmills

, , , , , , , ,

It’s the question that many politicos have been asking: What happens to the Republican Party after the Citizen Donald Trump era?

Here’s another question that is linked to that: What happens to cultural and religious conservatives — those that backed Trump and those that opposed him (openly or privately) — after this fever dance of an administration is over?

That was the topic looming in the background of a recent Emma Green think piece (yes, another one) at The Atlantic that ran with this headline: “Josh Hawley’s Mission to Remake the GOP.”

In most press coverage, the Missouri freshman is painted as a rather standard-issue conservative in the U.S. Senate. After all, those conservatives are all alike — even if libertarian folks often clash with religious conservatives in ways that don’t get much ink.

However, journalists who parse the texts produced by Hawley will notice strange subplots, like the fact that he is known for, as Green puts it, “casually citing the philosopher Edmund Burke and the Christian monk Pelagius in a single stretch.” But here is the paragraph where things get serious:

His speeches around town, including one he delivered … while accepting an award at the annual gala of the American Principles Project Foundation, a socially conservative public-policy organization, are bracingly defiant of Republican orthodoxy: He rails against income inequality, condemns the policy deference afforded to corporations, and speaks warmly about the civic value of labor unions. He often talks about the “great American middle” being crushed by the decline of local communities, the winner-take-all concentration of wealth, and the inaccessibility of higher education. And he said that the modern Republican Party’s split over competing impulses toward free-market economics and social conservatism has led some conservatives to ignore the effects of their policies on the middle and working class. “It’s time to do away with that,” he told me.

You need another clash?


Please respect our Commenting Policy
, , , , , , , ,

There he goes again: New York Times Editor Dean Baquet on journalists getting religion

, , , , , , , ,
There he goes again: New York Times Editor Dean Baquet on journalists getting religion

There he goes again.

Yes, the GetReligionistas noticed the online hubbub caused by that Chuck Todd remark the other day on Meet the Press, when he read part of a letter to the editor sent to The Lexington Herald-Leader that took a shot at, well, a certain type of Bible reader that went to the polls in 2016.

The problem, you see, is not a matter of politics — strictly speaking.

The problem is with that these knuckle-draggers have the wrong religious views, when it comes to the Bible. Here’s the key language, as it ran in Newsweek:

"[Why] do good people support Trump? It's because people have been trained from childhood to believe in fairy tales," the letter read. "This set their minds up to accept things that make them feel good. ... The more fairy tales and lies he tells the better they feel. …

“Show me a person who believes in Noah's ark and I will show you a Trump voter."

Well now, that was certainly a quote worth discussing in this week’s “Crossroads” podcast (click here to tune that in).

I argued that this Meet the Press exchange was, in a way, a modern version of the classic shot at Richard Nixon voters that was reported in the classic Joe McGinnis book, “The Selling of the President.” Old folks like me will remember that quote, which said Nixon was “the president of every place in this country which does not have a bookstore.”

In other words, there are smart people and dumb people and people whose biblical views do not match those of NBC News are in the second camp.

As I have been saying for years, religious conservatives are wrong if they think that many elite journalists are anti-religion. That’s a simplistic thing to say. Many journalists believe that there are good religious people and bad religious people and that one of the duties of the press is to advocate for the views of the good religious people. Journalists get to tell us which doctrines are true and which ones are false.


Please respect our Commenting Policy
, , , , , , , , , , ,

Ryan Burge combination punch: Concerning Republicans, Democrats and gaps in pews

, , , , , , , , , , ,

Attention religion-news professionals and all of your news consumers. Do you remember where you were in 2012 when you read your first news report about the stunning rise of the “nones,” as in religiously unaffiliated Americans? Or, in terms of style, is it just Nones, at this point?

I sure do. In my case, I was actually at the press conference to announce the Pew Research Center survey results that became known as the “Nones on the Rise” report.

The religious implications of these numbers were stunning, especially for America’s declining Mainline Protestant flocks. However, the political implications were just as important — something noted by a scholar who has been following the “pew gap” phenomenon for decades. What is the “pew gap”? Here is the basic concept: The more a person (especially if she or he is white) attends worship services, the more likely they are to vote GOP.

Here is a bite of info from my “On Religion” column about that event, including a very prophetic quote from the pollster and scholar John C. Green of the University of Akron. Ready?

The unaffiliated overwhelmingly reject ancient doctrines on sexuality with 73 percent backing same-sex marriage and 72 percent saying abortion should be legal in all, or most, cases. Thus, the "Nones" skew heavily Democratic as voters — with 75 percent supporting Barack Obama in 2008. The unaffiliated are now a stronger presence in the Democratic Party than African-American Protestants, white mainline Protestants or white Catholics.

"It may very well be that in the future the unaffiliated vote will be as important to the Democrats as the traditionally religious are to the Republican Party,” said Green, addressing the religion reporters. "If these trends continue, we are likely to see even sharper divisions between the political parties."

As you would expect, this observation leads us to a pair of new charts from political scientist Ryan Burge of the Religion in Public blog (and now a regular here at GetReligion).

Scan on.


Please respect our Commenting Policy
, , , , , , , ,

Prediction for 2020: Lots of adults will keep worrying about teen-agers and morality

, , , , , , , ,

American media are forever fascinated — or frightened — regarding what teens and young adults are up to, especially in matters linked to morality and religion.

The Guy’s October 24 Memo highlighted an important new survey showing, for instance, that only half of “mainline” Protestant young adults still uphold the very basic belief that God is “a personal being involved in the lives of people today,” which is affirmed by virtually all evangelicals. 

Now comes a comprehensive survey of 5,600 U.S. teens who were tracked from 1999 into young adulthood. 

The topline: Those who were raised to attend worship (of whatever faith) on a weekly basis, and to pray or meditate daily, show notably favorable life outcomes compared with others. 

This is highly newsworthy. But, as often the case with academic research, it will be brand new info for most or all journalists, though reported a year ago in the American Journal of Epidemiology.  The authors are Professor Tyler VanderWeele (tvanderw@hsph.harvard.edu or 617 – 955-6292) and doctoral student Ying Chen of Harvard University’s  School of Public Health. The project was supported by the federal National Institutes of Health and the Templeton Foundation. 

The investigators found that in comparison with non-attenders, later outcomes for young adults who worshipped weekly as teens showed greater satisfaction in life, volunteering, sense of personal mission and forgiveness, a lower probability of drug abuse, early sexual  initiation and sexual infections, fewer lifetime sexual partners, possibly less depression and higher rates of voter registration, etc. 

The cautiously worded conclusion: Results “suggest that religious involvement in adolescence may be one such protective factor for a range of health and well-being outcomes. … Encouraging service attendance and private practices may be meaningful avenues of development and support, possibly leading to better health and well-being.” 


Please respect our Commenting Policy
, , , , , , , , , , , ,

End of the year 2019: Trying to understand the blitz of anti-Semitism that's shaking New York

, , , , , , , , , , , ,

Here’s what I saw, two days before Christmas, when wrote my “On Religion” column about the Religion News Association’s poll to pick the Top 10 religion-news stories in 2019.

I saw this item: “A gunman kills 51 worshipers and wounds 39 at two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand. An Australian linked to anti-Muslim and white-supremacist statements faces charges. New Zealand quickly enacts new gun restrictions.” That ended up being the No. 2 story of the year.

But I also saw this: “Gunmen kill one person at a Poway, Calif., synagogue; two others outside a German synagogue; and three in a Jersey City kosher market. Other anti-Semitic attacks and threats increase, particularly in New York City.” That ended up at No. 10 in the poll.

I also saw this: “A terrorist group in Sri Lanka, claiming loyalty to the so-called Islamic State, kills more than 250 and wounds hundreds in suicide bombings at churches and hotels on Easter Sunday.” That slaughter on Christianity’s holiest day fell all the way to No. 17.

Of course, there were other attacks on believers in other sanctuaries during 2019 and I had no way to know what would happen in the next few days — especially in Texas and New York City. In the GetReligion podcast about the RNA poll, I tried to connect all of those blood-red dots (including the role anti-Semitism played in British life in 2019).

I knew that the #MeToo crisis among Southern Baptists was a huge story. Ditto for the concrete signs of schism among Southern Methodists. Still, in my column, I said:

As my No. 1 story, I combined several poll options to focus on the year's hellish uptick in attacks on worshipers in mosques, Jewish facilities and churches, including 250 killed in terrorist attacks on Easter in Sri Lanka.

What is there to say, less than two weeks later, as the sickening attacks on Jews shake New York City?


Please respect our Commenting Policy