Red Mosquito

The Argonaut wrote:This morning, I finished a book I've been making my way through all year: The Bible. Specifically the fifth edition of the New Oxford Annotated Bible, New Revised Standard Version, with the Apocrypha. I read all the books, all the introductory and explanatory essays, all the footnotes.

This seems to be the study bible most commonly used in academic courses in this field, and it certainly was an education all in itself. There's a lot of great info in there, focusing especially on the history of these texts and the context of the times they were written. I've been atheist and anti-spiritual since I was about 14, so this was not a religious exercise for me. It was more a historical and literary exploration.

It's not an especially good or interesting or wise book by itself, a lot of it is stupendously boring and irrelevant. Some of it is briefly interesting. The book of Ecclesiastes is great, struck me as very Epicurean. The book of Jonah is also great, very funny and short. The Gospels are also pretty good, there's some good stuff in there in between the supernatural stories of Jesus curing lepers and whatnot. Revelation was also pretty interesting to read.

But I read the thing, cover to cover. I feel like a more informed person now.

bart wrote:Asher and Burt, highly recommend Christianity:The First Three Thousand Years by Diarmaid MacCulloch

Rangi Guy wrote:

bart wrote:Asher and Burt, highly recommend Christianity:The First Three Thousand Years by Diarmaid MacCulloch

How does that work? Christianity has only been a thing for a little over 2000 years

BurtReynolds wrote:prequel trilogy.

If you're super bored, I thought this lecture series was interesting: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=P ... dMUujXfyWi

Steve Albini wrote:Whenever there's active promotion on the part of somebody else, whenever I see somebody all dolled up for a fancy photograph and someone's handing out flyers or whenever there's active promotion for something like that, as an imposition on my day, I hate all those people and I want them to fail. I have a visceral reaction to advertising and promotion. There's just something about salesmanship that grates on me on a very base level and I react very negatively towards it. I want those people to suffer and I want their enterprises to fail.

tragabigzanda wrote:

dad wrote:Wellness by Nathan Hill

I’m intrigued by this one but scared it could turn out like Franzen

Steve Albini wrote:Whenever there's active promotion on the part of somebody else, whenever I see somebody all dolled up for a fancy photograph and someone's handing out flyers or whenever there's active promotion for something like that, as an imposition on my day, I hate all those people and I want them to fail. I have a visceral reaction to advertising and promotion. There's just something about salesmanship that grates on me on a very base level and I react very negatively towards it. I want those people to suffer and I want their enterprises to fail.

Steve Albini wrote:Whenever there's active promotion on the part of somebody else, whenever I see somebody all dolled up for a fancy photograph and someone's handing out flyers or whenever there's active promotion for something like that, as an imposition on my day, I hate all those people and I want them to fail. I have a visceral reaction to advertising and promotion. There's just something about salesmanship that grates on me on a very base level and I react very negatively towards it. I want those people to suffer and I want their enterprises to fail.

Steve Albini wrote:Whenever there's active promotion on the part of somebody else, whenever I see somebody all dolled up for a fancy photograph and someone's handing out flyers or whenever there's active promotion for something like that, as an imposition on my day, I hate all those people and I want them to fail. I have a visceral reaction to advertising and promotion. There's just something about salesmanship that grates on me on a very base level and I react very negatively towards it. I want those people to suffer and I want their enterprises to fail.

The Argonaut wrote:The NRSV translation tries to be ecumenical, meaning useful to all churches. Accurate, but also legible to today's English speakers. But still useful in liturgy. The result is sometimes awkward because I'd read something that reminds me of a common expression but isn't quite what I'm familiar with. But when I look up the KJV of the same verse, that's where I find the phrasing I'm familiar with. And it's better, more poetic and impressive in the KJV. I was thinking of re-reading just the Gospels in the King James version, because that's where I noticed it the most.

Steve Albini wrote:Whenever there's active promotion on the part of somebody else, whenever I see somebody all dolled up for a fancy photograph and someone's handing out flyers or whenever there's active promotion for something like that, as an imposition on my day, I hate all those people and I want them to fail. I have a visceral reaction to advertising and promotion. There's just something about salesmanship that grates on me on a very base level and I react very negatively towards it. I want those people to suffer and I want their enterprises to fail.

Simple Torture wrote: