Category: General

How Rolling Dice Helps Save Leopards

How Rolling Dice Helps Save Leopards.

Then, the researcher asked questions like “In the last 12 months, did you kill any leopards?,” and before the farmer answered, he rolled the die. If he rolled a 1, he should say “no,” no matter what the correct answer was, and say “yes” if he rolled a 6. For all the other numbers, he should answer honestly. The fact the researcher never had any way of knowing whether the farmer was saying “yes” because it was the truth or because he rolled a 6 gave the subject a sense of safety.

What an awesome way to get an honest answer: find a way to assure anonymity while looking them right in the face.

The Preacher As Road Engineer

The Preacher As Road Engineer.

[Speaking of orthotomeo in 2 Tim. 2:15] “Modern versions prefer something like ‘rightly handling’ the Word (RSV), or handling it ‘correctly’ (NIV), but these are too vauge. For the word has a more precise meaning, namely to ‘cut straight’, and the image conveyed is either that of the ploughman or of the road maker” (Stott, Between Two Worlds, p. 136).

I like it a lot.

The Spirit of the Lord Rushed upon David

1 Samuel 16:13,

“Then Samuel took the horn of oil and anointed him in the midst of his brothers. And the Spirit of the LORD rushed upon David from that day forward. And Samuel rose up and went to Ramah.”

You read a text often enough, and you start to wonder what’s behind it. Who wrote 1 Samuel? Did he interview people? How did he know that? What does it mean, that the Spirit of the Lord rushed upon David?

I’m assuming David told somebody, later, that he felt something. How else would he know that the Spirit “rushed” on him? The ’84 NIV says that the Spirit “came upon him in power.” Which begs the question of what it means to come upon somebody in power, as opposed to just coming upon them the normal way. We’re still left with the impression that David had some kind of experience that he felt. Maybe that experience had later results in terms of supernaturally increased ability to lead or sing (prophesy?), or go to war. But for it to be noticeable, at just that moment, David had to have an experience.

That semi-mystical experience then had enough theological value to be included in the text of scripture as an example of what it means to have the Holy Spirit come upon you.

Aw, Come on!

Reading in 1 Samuel today, and I come to the passage in chapter 15 where Samuel has to come to Saul and tell him that God has rejected him as king. Samuel says, “The LORD has torn the kingdom of Israel from you this day and has given it to a neighbor of yours, who is better than you. And also the Glory of Israel will not lie or have regret, for he is not a man, that he should have regret.” Then, six verses later, the text says, “And the LORD regretted that he had made Saul king over Israel.”

I mean, come on! Six verses between “God doesn’t regret” and “God regrets”? I don’t care what your theories are on how or by whom the bible was written. The guy who put that in there had to see that coming. I mean, really.

I’m reading the ESV, and I don’t really have the time to go looking to see what other translations put down, much less try to look up the Hebrew, so I’m stuck having to parse out all on my own in what sense God does regret and in what sense he doesn’t.

Universities Begin to Offer Online High School Diplomas – High School Notes (usnews.com)

Universities Begin to Offer Online High School Diplomas – High School Notes (usnews.com).

What d’ya bet these programs cost less than the average expenditure per student at the local public school? The public school has the added cost of being a day-care and a free YMCA.

When Avoiding Inclusive Language Becomes Mistranslation

When Avoiding Inclusive Language Becomes Mistranslation.

It’s always possible to get that modifier in the wrong place, but that’s also the danger of Hebrew in general, since it expects the reader to think.

I never can get past reading a verse that I would never be allowed to write, and yet which makes perfect sense as long as you don’t deliberately misconstrue: “Let him deliver him, since he delights in him.” I mean, how hard is it to figure out which him is He and which is him?