Acknowledgements (7 of 7)

The most recent series (beginning with the crumb on St. Paul) is heavily indebted to Gabriel Josopovici’s book on the bible, The Book of God. I mentioned this at the beginning of the series, and I quoted him in the middle, but I want to go back here at (what I think is) the end and highlight some ideas that Josipovici explores that I’ve used in the past several posts:

• the emphasis on action and speech and the shortage of subjectivity in the Old Testament;
• the introduction of a more modern type of subjectivity in Paul’s epistles;
• the tendency of the OT not to tell us how we are to interpret its events;
• the variation in the Gospels with regard to how much power and vulnerability Jesus seems to have.

In addition to these specific points, my general style of reading and thinking about the bible comes from Josipovici. I think, by and large, I've found my own valences and configurations of his ideas, but if, in some places, I have done nothing more than summarize his position, that would not have been a bad use of anyone's time.