My barber’s name is Steve. Looking at my picture (see left), you could imagine that my need for a barber is quite minimal. I have been follically challenged for well over a decade, getting my hair look from my mother, who wore a wig for the final years of her long life. Thus, my hair-growth days are past, at least on the top of my head. I have suggested to several barbers that I will gladly pay them for their... Read more

The short answer to the title of this essay is, “Yes, of course.” If history is defined as a reliable collection of factual events, presented in recognizable order, and provable by multiple sources that can be accepted as equally reliable, then there is in the Hebrew Bible history. However, with regard to the Hebrew Bible’s most significant claims to history, the answer to the question is far more problematic and complex. Concerning the origins of the nation of Israel, from... Read more

Like many of you, I have been deeply distressed that the vaccination goals established by the Biden White House have fallen short, and, as a direct result, the COVID-19 Delta variant is now exploding, primarily in the non-vaccinated population. The figures of the problem are alarming, but not unexpected. Of the increasing number of infections, in some places fully three times what they were a month ago, coupled with increased hospitalizations, and it is feared increased deaths, over 99% percent... Read more

Ten years ago, I published a thin book, entitled Preaching Creation, an attempt to provide for preachers some biblical material that could serve as foundational for any who were looking for resources to address the immediate existential crisis that all humans, and their non-human companions, face, namely the climate crises, calamitous emergencies that threaten the planet in ways too numerous and catastrophic easily to enumerate. In those ten years, things have vastly deteriorated, with obviously rising temperatures and seas, deepening... Read more

Perhaps the most darkly ironic name of any book in the Bible is that of Nahum. The word means “comfort” in Hebrew, found in many places as assuaging grief or finding or giving solace or consolation. The verb from which the noun derives can also mean “to change one’s mind” (Gen.6:5 and Ex.32:14 where YHWH is said to change the divine mind). In short, the term is overwhelmingly positive in its tone, suggesting a posture of hope and peace. Nothing... Read more

I am a decidedly left-wing thinker and actor. This has been true of me since my college days, over 50 years ago, when my earlier Goldwater/Reagan loving parents, were no longer the determinative influence in my political and social life, but rather became to me two persons who had been duped by the increasingly conservative Republican Party leading us into and continuing the tragic war in Viet Nam, into an unreasoned fear of African-American desires for equal rights and fuller... Read more

Yesterday (July 8) was my 75th birthday, making me now 3/4 of a century old. Given the 7 billion people on the planet, odds suggest that several million of them share my birthday and celebrated that fact as I did. Of course, those celebrations were in the main far different from mine, I am sure; I cannot imagine just how different! I wish to say that mine was especially lovely this year and that for several noticeable reasons. I do... Read more

Fully seven months after the November, 2020 presidential election, and the resounding victory of Joe Biden over Donald Trump, both in the Electoral College and in the popular vote, at least 1/3 of US Americans still cling to the big lie that Trump in reality won the election. It was in fact “stolen” from him by a cadre of antifa, socialistic Democratic, Black Lives Matter activist, baby-killing Clintonians, or something like that! It is in short a mad, deranged lie,... Read more

I admit that this essay is a bit late. Our national holiday this year, July 4, fell on a Sunday. I had already written a response to the 2 Samuel text for that day, finding 2 Samuel 5, the tale about David’s capture of Jerusalem for his new capitol, oddly appropriate for our day of national celebration, with hot dogs and beer, or your beverage of choice, capped off with the bangs and bursts of fireworks. David’s strange and odious... Read more

The usual antonym for faith is doubt, but I suggest that the practical opposite is in fact cynicism. The usual antonym for trust is suspicion, but I suggest that the practical opposite is in fact pessimism. Cynicism and pessimism are the major tunes of our time, sung by any number of US Americans, even by many US American Christians, or at least by those calling themselves Christians. Of course, there are Christians and then there are Christians, with the former... Read more