Bible Study
The Bible is not a dream dictionary and never assigns a fixed meaning to a dream symbol. Here is what it does contain: a handful of specific dreams, and an interpreter who says every time that the meaning is not his own.
Ruth Callaway ·
Bible Study
Blasphemy against the Holy Spirit appears in three Gospels and in one specific scene. Here is the literal text, what Mark 3:30 says the accusation was, and how each Christian tradition defines the sin today.
Ruth Callaway ·
Bible Study
Four different words are translated “hell” in English Bibles, and none of them describes Dante's nine circles. Here is what the biblical text says about both destinations, and where the Christian traditions diverge.
Ruth Callaway ·
Reflections
The Bible does not answer this with a single sentence. Ecclesiastes, Luke 23, Philippians 1 and 1 Corinthians 15 say different-sounding things, and the Christian traditions assemble them differently.
Ruth Callaway ·
Bible Study
Only two angels are named in the sixty-six-book Bible, and a third in the deuterocanonical books. The nine choirs, the guardian angel and most of the famous names come from elsewhere. Here is the line between them.
Ruth Callaway ·
Bible Study
The word “rapture” is not in the Bible, and the pre-tribulation reading of 1 Thessalonians 4 is roughly two centuries old. Here are the passages, the four main Christian readings, and what the texts refuse to supply.
Ruth Callaway ·
Bible Study
The Bible names some of its writers, leaves others anonymous, and mentions two secretaries by name. Here is what the text says about its own production, and how sixty-six or more scrolls became a single volume.
Ruth Callaway ·
Bible Study
Seven books and some passages separate the two canons. The difference is older than the Reformation, involves a Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures, and the Orthodox churches count differently again.
Ruth Callaway ·
Bible Study
One verse in the whole Bible mentions tattooing, and it sits inside a list of mourning practices — directly after a rule about haircuts and beards that almost nobody quotes alongside it.
Ruth Callaway ·
Reflections
The Bible treats divorce in four blocks of text that do not say quite the same thing. Here is what each one says, why Matthew records an exception Mark does not, and how each tradition handles remarriage.
Ruth Callaway ·