Some of you have asked for a summary of where I disagree with Walton on bara’. What follows below is an exchange between John Hobbins (another friend of mine and Hebrew scholar) and Walton. My reservations are essentially those that are expressed by Hobbins.
Here’s something else thrown in: Hobbins on E. van Wolde’s view of bara’.
Umm.. I will look for the monograph. Interesting exchange and another command to look for clarifications directly from the author before criticizing too harshly.
Where’s the monograph by Walton? It is not at eisenbrauns.com
The Hobbins post is a couple years old. I presume the monograph is his book, The Lost World of Genesis One.
In “The Lost World of Genesis One” Walton cites in his notes a “forthcoming” ” “Genesis One as Ancient Cosmology” from Eisenbrauns, (see, for example, note 7 of
prop. 3, p 177). I have assumed that this is the monograph being talked about.
Jim W
okay – I wonder what that is. I’ll have to ask him in November at ETS/SBL.
I believe an article written by Brian Godawa titled BIBLICAL CREATION AND STORYTELLING: Cosmogony, Combat and Covenant, does a pretty good job summing up the Chaoskampf, interpretation of bara and the unique worldview of the Jews against the backdrop of the ANE cultures. You can download it at:
http://biologos.org/uploads/projects/godawa_scholarly_paper.pdf
Thanks… I’ll keep learning
Thanks for the link Jennifer. Much appreciated
Dr. H, since the guy, :”Alan” seemed to be so interested in reading the monograph because it would be more scholarly and the monograph has become the book (I think) and the book is popular (ish)…will it hold no weight academically (with him and other critics)? …what I mean is can monographs (apparently a bar of scholarly approval, just learned the word myself lol) turn into popular works to their reproach? Or is it safe to assume the book is good enough to quote, use as reference etc.
The book is good enough to quote. Some scholars (small number) of stature make an effort to write for all audiences. The difference in such efforts is really level of detail and citation of secondary source material. The best example is probably N.T. Wright, who writes under the name “Tom Wright” when the material is aimed at the non-specialist.
Oh I see, thanks Dr. Heiser!
Has anyone mentioned the work by the late Dr. Custance about his thoughts on bara’?
Custance, Arthur C. (1970A) Without Form and Void: A Study of the Meaning of Genesis 1:2, Reprinted in 2010 by Classic Reprint Press, Windber, PA, ISBN 9781934251331. [Online version at http://www.creationdays.dk/withoutformandvoid/Articles.php, Paperback version at http://www.custance.org]
what about it specifically? Honestly, why bother reading what someone says about bara when you can find all the occurrences in 1-2 seconds and do the research yourself (presuming you have Bible software)? There are less than fifty occurrences of the word. It’s not rocket science or a daunting task.
It’s rocket science to me, I even tried to get the free version of Logos and it won’t download on my computer, the tech support said they would call me back, and that was about a month ago. I’m not going to buy it unless I try it and I know I can use it. No offence, I know the tech support probably can get it to work if I push them, I just don’t have the time, I would love to use it. I use Blueletter and Biblehub and a couple of others as I need them for S School and am really busy. My bad. It’s all on me.