One of my favorite questions as a Bible-scholar-lady is “So, what’s the best translation?” I love this question not only because it opens the door to substantive discussion that can last for the better part of a class period… no matter how long the meeting. But I also love it because we get to talk …
This morning, I ran across Cristina Peri Rossi’s State of Exile. Or rather, I learned of its existence, of her work, her experience as a woman without country… finding a way to live new. I happened on it through Ginsberg’s Kaddish as published by the wonderful City Lights Books, San Fran in handy pocket size. …
At what point in writing does one book become another? In the editing, rewriting, re-editing and re-rewriting of a project engaged over years, should we just call it a different book? (The shadow question is, of course, at what point does one pack it away, brush off one’s hands, and turn to something else?) In …
Here’s what I just posted on Huffington Post… and then, here’s the problem with it. Now if only there were about three hundred more 300‘s. Maybe not in blood and gore but movies with kick-ass women from ancient Persia and Greece. Then, more people would get what has so captivated me about Amytis, Cassandane, and …
300, Awesome Ancient Women, and the Perils of Historical Fiction Read More »
Rich guys, all — Herod, the half-blood king of Judea enjoying extravagances still evident today; and those magi, bearing gifts of rare value. Today is epiphany, in western Christian tradition, remembered as the moment when Jesus’ importance became evident to the greater world. Setting aside belief about Jesus’ divinity and all that for a moment …
Herod and the Magi, a Study in Contrast on Epiphany Read More »
And so we’re off! — 2014, a new year, ready or not. Resolutions or not, there’s something about recognizing the end of a year and the beginning of a new one that’s downright refreshing. The earliest public celebrations that we know about are Babylonian, dating back thousands of years. I’ve been spending a lot of …
*A version of this article is also available on The Huffington Post. “We, three kings of Orient are,” intone the guys in robes and crowns. But were they really three, or kings for that matter, and from where exactly did they come? Every year at this time, questions about historicity – what really happened (and …
It was only when I began revising an essay that I discovered what it was about. I had thought the piece would be a simple meditation on what I’d learned about Cyrus the Great over these past few years – the sexy “messiah” byline, author of the first declaration of human rights, all that… and …
These mid-August days, some 2500 years ago, witnessed a violent turn-about in power — regicide followed by a week of king-less days. Imagine for a moment the uncertainty, the chaos. Imagine the mother of the assassinated king. Still alive, for the time being — a foreigner in a court conflicted about its cosmopolitan nature, a …
If I had to pick one grand architectural image to go with the Cyrus Cylinder, I think it would be the Ishtar Gate (though built by Nebuchadnezzar II, not Cyrus). Oddly enough, the best place to see the ruins from Babylon of a gate complex named for the Mesopotamian goddess of love and war is …
