The five episodes cover:

1. How making signs on clay, wood or parchment enabled the development of human culture.
2. The impact of the invention of the book.
3. How the invention of writing influenced the spread of religion.
4. How the written word, originally used for accountancy, gave rise to human literature.
5. How the invention of writing made the scientific revolution of the Enlightenment possible.

Listen to the five parts before they’re gone. (The BBC doesn’t usually archive programs for long.)

“He said to himself, from his earliest years that God suffers in the great multitudes whom his sacred word cannot reach. Religious truth is captive in a small number of manuscript books, which guard the common treasure, instead of diffusing it. Let us break the seal which holds the holy things; give wings to the truth, that by means of speech, no longer written at great expense by the hand that wearies itself, but multiplied as the air by an unwearied machine, it may fly to seek every soul born into the world!”

The invention of the printing press was but the breaking of one seal which “holds the holy things.” The aim of Bible translation is to further “give wings to the truth.”

Here’s the method I use to copy and paste text from Kindle for PC.

Step #1: Enable Public Notes

Login to your Amazon/Kindle account at http://kindle.amazon.com. Browse to the book you want to copy and paste from.

And enable public notes by clicking the unlock button.

Step #2: Highlight in Kindle for PC

Open Kindle for PC and highlight the text you wish to copy and paste.

Step #3: Sync to Update

In the Kindle for PC menu click Tools and select Sync to Furthest Page Read.

Step #4: Refresh and Copy and Paste

Refresh the book’s kindle.amazon.com page and look for your highlight in plain text.

There you go. Now you can copy and paste.

In the end, I decided on and ordered a UBS Reader’s Greek New Testament (one without textual notes as I already have a UBS GNT, but without dictionary), a Hebrew Bible Insert (a concise syntactical guide to keep with your Hebrew Bible), a Greek New Testament Insert and a volume edited by Dr. Dave Black called Linguistics and New Testament Interpretation: Essays on Discourse Analysis. Why the last book? Well, while I’m familiar with discourse analysis, this passing comment on Dr. Black’s blog really convicted me:

5:54 PM Got the parts but now lack the proper wrenches. Can’t do the work without the right tools. It’s like trying to interpret a Greek letter without knowing anything about discourse analysis.

Who knew plumbing could be a means of sanctification!?

As you may be able to tell the books I chose reflect a investment for the long-run rather than temporary thrills. With slimming down my library I’ve had to make a lot of choices concerning books and which ones I’ll keep. My new aim is to hang onto and acquire those book which will most likely benefit those whom I am preparing to serve through work with Wycliffe as a Bible translator.

I see it this way: I am one to whom much has been given (e.g., the gospel!); therefore I must give much away. I’m not just talking about books but even more so education. I went to seminary to give it all away. I study linguistics to give it all away in the form of Bible translation. And look at this blessing of a $50 gift certificate. (Thank you, WTS Books!) I can only use that to give more away.

My first teaching was back in November and covered the whole of John 13:1-20, “God the Son Dressed as a Servant” (MP3). In preparation for teaching that Sunday I researched the historical and cultural background of footwashing. I was blessed to discover what a deep and unique exhibition of love God the Son’s washing was. I understand it to be completely unprecedented in the ancient world for a superior to wash an inferior’s feet. But not only did Jesus wash his disciples’ feet, even more staggering than that, he washed his betrayer’s feet. This is the sort of radical savior we have, who made himself nothing, assuming the garb of a lowly servant to actually, physically serve his disciples by washing their feet. I was quite frankly overwhelmed at meditating on Jesus’ love in this story. Amazing.

My second teaching was only two weeks ago and covered John 16:4b-15, “The Ascended Sovereign Sender” (MP3). I love the fact that I got to pick up at John 16:4b. Well, versification isn’t original anyways, so why not accent it with letters of the alphabet, too! What I loved about teaching this passage is the surety of the savior’s ascension. “I was with you.” He speaks as if he’s already gone. Too, we daren’t miss the eschatological perspective of the ascended savior’s sending of the Spirit. We get a clear picture of this through Peter’s Pentecost sermon in Acts 2. It’ll come as no surprise to most readers that in my preparations for teaching this section I disappointingly found a dearth of Reformed/Calvinistic material on the Holy Spirit. The Reformed systematic theologies I have on my shelf (both physical and virtual) give little space to the One who fills all space. So, to what better place to turn than the Apostle Peter’s interpretation of Joel and the sending of the Spirit. That’s good enough for me!

Last week in my third teaching I picked up where my second left off and covered John 16:16-24a. I titled this “I Will See You Again and You Will Rejoice” (MP3). Here Jesus poses somewhat of a riddle to his disciples and, fortunately for us, he goes on to clarify what he means. While I found J. Ramsey Michaels’ new commentary on John (NICNT) really useful for preparing, on this particular section (Jesus’ “riddle” in particular [my quotes not his]) he proceeded with a somewhat idiosyncratic interpretation for which he didn’t convincingly argue. In plain, whether naive or not, I stuck with what I think to be a common sense reading of the passage that sees “after a little while you will not see me” as Jesus’ crucifixion, death and burial, and “after a little while you will see me” as his resurrection. Additionally, I was sure to leave room for a second adventual dimension to Jesus’ statement as we see hints of future eschatology in the subsequent verses (e.g., Jesus’ childbirth parable [allusion to  Isaiah  66?] and his words “in that day”). Overall, I loved teaching this section. As sure as Jesus is truth he will see us again and we will rejoice! Halelujah, what a Savior!

Man of Sorrows! what a name
For the Son of God, who came
Ruined sinners to reclaim.
Hallelujah! What a Savior!

Bearing shame and scoffing rude,
In my place condemned He stood;
Sealed my pardon with His blood.
Hallelujah! What a Savior!

Guilty, vile, and helpless we;
Spotless Lamb of God was He;
“Full atonement!” can it be?
Hallelujah! What a Savior!

Lifted up was He to die;
“It is finished!” was His cry;
Now in Heav’n exalted high.
Hallelujah! What a Savior!

When He comes, our glorious King,
All His ransomed home to bring,
Then anew His song we’ll sing:
Hallelujah! What a Savior!

Don’t spend your precious time on the Internet. It teaches you neither how to read significant texts nor how to think through questions of importance. It mainly is a disconcerting distraction from real life.

Boom.

You might be thinking that a library would never want that kooky pseudo-Christian how’d-it-get-published mess you unearthed in your parent’s basement or the random book you snagged in a thrift store far, far away, but you’d be wrong! I’d argue–despite the fact I hate people saying “I’d argue” because they never actually argue their point, but rely on the assumed force of “I’d argue” to be blunt enough to bull the argument over–I’d argue that that is precisely the book you should give. Somebody sometime will need your book in their research.

Check this out as a testimony to bibliotec benefaction. In the batch of books I recently donated there was one that I’ve had for years that I snagged from a rather fundy Baptist conference I attended while in college. I donated that action to my library and now SEBTS, according to WorldCat, is the only library in North Carolina to have a copy! I’ve also got a book on how Christians should respond to Y2K. Y2K! Somebody will need that book. And look at it this way: when you give a book to your library, you’re making it available to the world via interlibrary loan. My fundy book or my Y2K book could go anywhere in the world because I gave it up for my library. Won’t you do the same? Softly and tenderly your library’s calling…

You can view the complete list of books in the WTSBooks enews archive.

The podcast features recordings from mechon-mamre.org and an enclosed text translation from the English Standard Version. The readings alternate from the Tanak: Torah, Prophets, and Writings. Yesterday’s edition was Genesis 1. Today’s is Joshua 1 and tomorrow’s will be 1 Chronicles 1.

I have it set up to deliver straight to my Droid where I collect numerous podcasts and listen through them daily. I’m already listening through a daily English reading plan, so original language daily reading makes a lot of sense.

Let me know if you subscribe or have any thoughts or suggestions.

However, I recently watched a movie without reading the synopsis first. I loved it. Then, after watching, I went back and read the synopsis. I was surprised to see how inadequately the synopsis “sold” the movie. I don’t think I would have watched it had I read the synopsis first.

This left me wondering if I even know how to read a movie synopsis. Do you read hopefully assuming that there’s more in store than is detailed on the back of the box? It’s somewhat of a toss-up even after reading the synopsis, isn’t it?

What weight do you give to synopses? How do you read them? Do you read them?

photo credit: laurenfarmer