J-terms, on a more serious note: Prophets

the end of yesterday's incredibly LONG lesson and the beginning of today's mercifully shorter lesson was on the Prophets of the Old Testament. Some interesting points my professor had about the Old Testament prophets (the ones who were of God, not the false prophets, obviously):

~The word "Prophet" in hebrew is "Navi,' and has two disputed origens. It comes either from the word meaning "to bubble up" like an underwater spring, OR 'To cry aloud, to call out." Hebrew words come from tangible roots. Example, knowledge comes from the word, "to cut, to slice, sharp object' and soul comes from the word also used for 'throat.'

~Unique features of the prophets of Israel:

* Unlike all the other nations in antiquity, Israelite prophets were not humanly appointed and they never became prophets through inheritance. They were only divinly appointed by God.

*Only in Israel was prophesy NOT associated with magic or sorcery.

* Only in Israel did the message of the prophets have a moral componant. in Israel, prophets were required by the Lord to live up to the high moral standards that they proclaimed.

* In Israel, there was an institution known as "The Sons of the Prophets." this is first encountered during the time of Samuel. It was a residential campus where young men were trained and supervised by established prophets. Most detail about this group is found in the accounts of Elijah and Elisha, who in their turn were each the head of this institution. (see 2 Kings 6)

~Characteristic concepts of prophetic religion in Israel:

*The Prophetic office was a sacred trust. That calling required the prophet to live AND work AND speak in ways that the Lord commanded. A prophet was perpetually "on call" by the Lord. No one was subsidising the prophets, and this was a time when the number one cause of death was starvation. Those who didn't work usually did not eat unless cared for by someone else. However, the prophets had to be willing and able to drop everything when they recieved an assignment from God.

*Fundamental feature of prophetic emphasis in Israel was that all of life comes under the authority of God, and thus under the authority of God's CALLED prophets. The kings and people of Israel understood and recognized that when the prophet spoke, GOD spoke. The prophet was a conduct of god's word. Even the KING was subordinate. This was very unusual during a time when most cultures considered their kings, rulers, emperors, pharohs, etc. as the local deity.

*Prophetic religion in Israel explained the meaning of historical events. Most kingdoms during that time period recorded chronological events, but not HISTORY as defined by cause-and-effect. The writing of history is a gift from ancient Egypt and Israel. The prophets' goal by recording HISTORY (cause and effect) was not merely to keep a record of the past but to TEACH the people WHY things occured. Such as when Israel ignored their responsibilities to the Lord, calamaty insued. When they fulfilled their responsibility, they prospered immensly.

*The prophets INSIsted that God's demands are always moral. not only did the prophets TELL of God's demands, but they LIVED UP TO THEM. But also: they revealed that God Himself is moral, and it is the morality of God, it is that character and conduct which makes up His Holiness. This is captured in Leviticus: I the lord am Holy, therefore you too must be Holy)
Every deity outside of Israel was immoral. The deity existed for it's own satisfaction and pleasure. It was capricious, selfish, arbitrary, and did not recognize the restrictions it itself demanded or inflicted on it's worshipers.
But in Israel, the recognition of the necessity of morality was immenent, and they were called to follow God's example.
Not only was Israel unique, but the God of Israel is unique. No other deity is similar.

*The Israelites defined rightness and morality by asking the question, "What does God say?" however, in other cultures and religions of the day, the pagans demanded immorality: human sacrifice, fornication, etc.

*The prophets insisted that the nation be courageous enough to criticize itself and hold itself accountable.

*The prophets were concerned with leading the people into greater knowledge of God and a more intimate relationship with Him.

*All sin is rebellion against God. The concept of crime is a concept of Mosaic law. Crimes against property are not considered as grevious as crimes against persons today. "I can do what i want as long as i don't hurt anybody else" is the attitude. However, ALL SIN is against God, it is an affront to Him. It is NOT the effect on others that is a biblical concept, but the affront and rebellion to GOD.

*The prophets dealt in principles more often then they dealt in 'situational". (Legal codes found in Leviticus and Numbers are good examples of 'situational')In the Law God gave to Israel, there are governments of typical situations. That is not what the prophets did. They were concerned with teaching God's people certain ways to do things, or pirnciples that could be applied to any situation. They were principles given by God to guide our lives and inform our standards.

The prophets were similar in their focus to Jesus' message: Love God, Love others.

*Prophets were practical. They were problem/solution oriented. Unfortunately, that's not something people liked to hear then, and they haven't changed much today either.
Prophets weren't social archetects, they were problem solvers.

*The prophets guided the people from asking "What may I do? What is permissable? what is allowed?" to "What SHOULd i do? what does the LORD require of me?" (Micah 6:6-8)


~Personal character of the prophets:

*They were to be courageous and unafraid to deliver God's message reguardless of the consequences. A prophet understood that people may be mean, cruel etc. but when you are deciding 'who to cross', it's always better to choose making people mad rather than choosing to make God mad.

*They were to be totally honest with one concern only: to tell God's people the Truth (Jeremiah 12-17)

*The prophets were scrupulously moral and demanded that God's people be scrupulously moral, and that they live by high ethical standards.

*They prophets were compassionate, and were always concerned for the poor, the needy, the oppressed, the widow, and the orphan. This may be the biggest element of a prophet as it best illustrates the character of God.

(part of the reason Jesus was so feared by the Jewish authorities was He was so beloved by the Jewish PEASANTS)

*the prophets were from a variety of social classes in Israel. They were from the peasant, royalty, illiterate, highly educated, humble, proud, etc.

*SOME prophets SOMETIMES enjoyed a positive response to their messages, but most did not. Often their message was either ignored or met with extreeme hostility. At times they were jailed or killed. From an appocraphal source, which is verified by the New Testament, we know that after four decades of service, Isaiah was sawn in two by a wood-saw.

*During their monarchy, court prophets gave religious and political advice to their kings. They kept a record of their King's preformance based on his faithfulness to God. The book of Kings is these prophets' evaluation. only occaisionally did a court prophet yeild to tell a King what he wanted to hear vs. what he needed to hear. When that happened, the consequences were always tragic. (1 kings 13)

-after the Jewish civil war, no king in the north was Righteous, and they chose their own prophets. -


Anyway, I am not sure that each bullit point is universally accepted by scholars everywhere, and on some of the universal statements about all prophets in Israel (such as the court prophets) I need to cross-reference with my readings of the Old Testament. But for the most part, they are accurate, and they make ya think. :-)

Two more days of this intensive, Friday I get to move back into my dorm room, Saturday I have a job training session, and Monday classes start for Spring Semester, 2009.

Whew!

~Princess Ouch~

J-terms

Okay so I've been el lame-o as far as posting the last month. But I had finals, J-term (mid-term), Christmas break, and then two more J-terms. SO... would apologize but as I feel fully justified in my behavior and plan to continue in the future, don't really see the point... :-)

In other news, I thought it'd be fun to post some quotes of us in the J-terms so you can see how much we learned between tangents and bickerings on American slang that differs from region to region, etc. Hope you enjoy:

Student 1: "Want another piece of gum?"
Student 2: "No thanks. I have to drive tonight and I'm limiting my consumption."

Professor: Big words get A's.

Professor: "Bacon greese in ANYTHING is good. You cook the bacon and keep the greese. Den you fry food in it. I'm tellin gyou, fried food is amazing. Christians fry their food. Fried is good Christian food. Sushi is pagan! Now how many of you salt your food before you taste it?"
student: "Sir, I salt my food before, during, and after tasting it!"
Professor: "Good man! That get's an A!!"

Student: Did you know that Fountain coke is better because it uses local water and carbonizes it on the spot, whereas bottled water uses water from wherever the plant is. So fountain coke is better 'cause you're used to the bugs in the water.
Professor: That sounds like contextualization! That's a mission word! Coke is contextualization!!"

Professor: That was a joke. Mock-serious.

Student: You gotta get us closer to the kitchen 'cause I can't smell what you're cookin'.
Professor: "I think your grade just lowered to an F. Are you saying I wasn't clear?
Student: Yessir.
Professor: Oh gosh. Alright, pay attention now....

Professor: (When reading about Baptist Reformers and the biography only gives their last name but not first name:) When in doubt, John. John Leland, John Ryland, etc.

Professor: Anyone considering a winter wedding? Don't do it! It's STUPID!
Student: But they are so beautiful!
Professor: It can be beautiful AND stupid! Don't do it!

Student: I'm from California of the last few years. See, we're normulative. Normative, minus the L."
Professor: Yeah that's cuz you have no culture!

Professor: You don't have to be big to be great! Mini-moon pies is how they were meant to be! Them full sized ones is too much!

Professor: You're SODA, you're NORTHERN!
Student: No, it's Pop.
Professor: What! You asked for Pop in South Carolina, you gonna get HIT!

Professor: I ordered grits at Cracker barrel and they gave me dis' puny little cup full of grits. Barely enough to cover my eggs! And de darn thing cost me #3.50! Lemme tell you what, you go to South Carolina for #3.50 worth of grits you better back your PICKUP truck!!

Professor: It's PEE-kahn, NOT "pe-KAHN." Dat's a bunch of uppity people up dar. *snidely in british accent* peKAHN... eaten Clahm CHOWdah!
Student1: What do you call the thing you call the thing in the shopping center you put your groceries in?
Professor: Dat's a buggy.
Student1: Thank you.
Student 2: No it's NOT! It's a shopping cart!
Professor: Lor' have mercy, we're surrounded by a bunch o' Yanks here! Now I say "ax' like, 'You gotta question, ax me somethin'.
student2: You say ax I say, 'why do you want to kill me?"
Professor: yeah you would kuz you a homeschoolER!

Student who is black: Not every black person like rap! Dat's like me assuming every white person like country music! Which, unfortunately, some of you do...

Student1: Whitecastle fast food? Dats stuff's NASTY! Yo' meat shoul' NOT be GRAY!"
Student2: You know Whitecastle started because all other hamburgers were unhealthy.
Student 3: Wow. Talkabout an organization who lost their MISSION!!
Professor: Yah, anyplace that refers to a burger as a 'slider,' I'm outta dar!

Student1: Is there going to be a study guide for the test on Baptist History?
Professor: Yes. We been doin' study guides for the past three days! Your notes are your study guides!
Student2: I have a real question. Will it be a group effort?
Professor: NO. It's individualistic.
Student2: We prefer convention style to society.
Professor: You think that's funny but it's NOT!
Student2: That WAS funny!
Professor: Don't be arrogant!

Professor: And he made the other guy look like... what's the word my grandma used to use... a nincompoop!!

Student: I put the 'pro' in 'procrastination'.

Professor: When you get money involved, people get all wierdo.

Student: (during class) Yes, the documentary is on the website.
Professor: Are you sure?
Student: Yessir. I just downloaded it.
Professor: Kewl.


Finally, I wanted to include an excerpt from one of the books I had to read for class and do a book report on. I wish I could put this in my report, but I don't think it's quite what my professor is looking for. So I think I'll put it here. It's from the book "Baptists, the only thorough religious reformers" by John Quincy Adams (not the president of the USA, the Baptist Reformer of the 1800's.)

"Here Paul (the apostle), according to his usual custom, met the Jewish rabbis and teachers, and reasoned with them out of the Old Testament Scriptures, concerning Jesus of Nazareth - proving to them that He was the Messiah. His reasoning on this subject was so forcible, that many of the Jews were convinced, and professed their faith in the Savior. This stirred up the hatred and envy of the discomfited rabbis; and, finding themselves unable to cope with the superior logic and masterly reasoning of Paul, they enlisted the prejudices of the rabble, and gathered a mob, and created a riot, and endeavored to lay violent hands on the disciples, and thus accomplish by force and superior numbers, what they could not effect by fair argument." (page 14)
To this I reply that I wish we could express ourselves the way they did in the 1800s. My Dad and I like to debate, or turn our disagreements into debates. Since my dad has about four more degrees than I do and has a higher IQ and wisdom from living and all that, he usually wins the debate. I sometimes don't agree with him in the end any more than I did in the beginning, I just have run out of arguments and he has dozens of debate classes worth of arguments still coming. One of these days i would like to stand up and say,
"My father, I am overcome by your forcible argument, yet not convinced. This has stirred up the envy of my discomfited self. Finding myself unable to cope with your superior logic and masterly reasoning, I am running upstairs to enlist the prejudices of the rabble-ous younger siblings, who, struck with cabin fever in this frigid winter, shall be easily gathered to create a riot. Thus we shall endeavor to lay semi-violent hands upon thee, and what I could not effect by fair argument I shall by superior numbers!"
But, it wouldn't be entirely true, and by semi-violent I mean we would all end up tickling each other and Mom would come down and tell us to behave ourselves and stop acting like heathens. Which would put a premature end to my coup and probably land me with a few loads of dishes to wash. :-)

So thar it is. In other news, I am currently going through Old Testament 2, with a professor who reminds me of the Pastor on "The Englishman who went up a hill and came down a mountain". Yeah, REverend Jones plus "Barney" from the Andy Griffith show, minus the humor. He believes that the NASB translation is THE only translation worth reading, not all translations are created equal. One should NOT translate the MEANING of the words, one should only translate the words EXACTLY. Otherwise, who are you to judge the meaning of the Word/word, and what kind of interpretation is that anyway! And he also believes that the worst thing we ever did to the Bible was add chapters and verses. *sigh* A classmate had the brave yet foolish inclination to question the professor on that one, and I made the brave yet foolish mistake to back up my colleague's argument, and as a result the professor didn't let us out early but in fact kept us past the time we were supposed to let out. Hehe... woops.

Alrighty. Going back to write my book review. :-)

Cheers,
~Princessouch~

p.s. the picture is one my friend Allison took last week while we were studying together for J-term.

Plane ride from Purgatory

The other passangers were calling it,"The plane ride from Hell." My personal thought is that if it were the plane ride from Hell, we would have crashed and blown up, burning to death. But we didn't, we were just simply refined and had our faith stretched, our patience expanded, and our stomachs excercised as we fought off severe nausia and motion sickness.

So here's what happened. I fell asleep around 1 or 2 AM on the 8th of December. Part of it was excitement that I got to go home for Christmas. The other part was some girls decided that they were going to go outside my window and express their joy at freedom from school by feral screaming. I guess they forgot that some people still think nighttime is for sleeping.
Anyway, I then woke up at 5 AM the next morning and got ready to go. Nicole drove me to the airport and we hugged goodbye and wished each other a Merry Christmas.
Once at the ticketbooth, the guy was convinced that it would be faster if I changed my flight from flying into Minneanapolis and then flying to Omaha to drive home, to flying into Memphis then Omaha, and then driving home. I said I didn't want to change it but he insisted and I was too tired to argue.
Biggest mistake of the day!!!
I found out later that a flight to Minneanapolis was cancled and the person was pretty sure it was my flight. I can only hope, because it helps ease the intense frustration I felt at the poor dude at the ticket counter.
So I got onto the airplane. Business as usual. Normal safety procedures demonstration, normal introducing yourself to the person sitting next to you and then pulling out your book, normal, "Why on earth are you reading Albert Mohler's latest book for PLEASURE?!" conversation (okay I've never done that before but the conversation that insued was pretty normal. 'What are you doing with your life and why, hunh okay you are interesting but wierd' conversation) etc.
Until we got to Tennessee. Then the nice normal scenery of cool bumpy carpet-like clouds below us and wispy clouds above us changed to complete white of clouds all around us. And they started to get grey. The Captian announced that Memphis was experiancing some storms, but not to worry, we would land soon.
The turbulance started getting bad and my stomach began commenting about how it would like to either land or go home now.
The stewardess or flight attendant or whatever we call them these days then got on and said that we still couldn't land and would be circling for a while.
A half hour later it was announced that we were going to fly into Nashville as we were running out of fuel.
Oh joy.
So we landed in Nashville and parked. We then noticed that there was a plane that had landed before us and three others were pulling up. Not good.
They finally gave us a gate and we pulled in. I was able to get out and call my friend who was going to pick me up at the airport in Omaha and call my parents to let them know what was up. CNN said that flights in Memphis and Baltimore were backed up by an hour. Joy.
I decided that I didn't really want to go to Memphis at that point. I could re-switch my flight and go to Minneanapolis as planned. Unfortunately quite a few other people had the same idea and as soon as I was the next person in line the Captain came running down the gangway and told everyone to get back on the plane.
So we did, and fifteen minutes later we took off again. They had re-fueled and were going to try to land in Memphis.
As soon as we got close to Memphis the clouds went from white to dark gray and the turbulance was terrible. My stomach said if I didn't do something it would go on strike. So I closed my eyes and began praying kind of hard.
We kept that up for what felt like an hour but was probably 15 minutes before the Captian announced that once again we were running out of fuel and would have to find someplace else to land, and Huntsville Alabama would probably be it.
"What, are we doing a tour of all the 'ville' airports in the South?" Someone asked.
So we arrived in Huntsville, Alabama. We were all glad to be on the ground but starting to wonder how we were going to make our connecting flights as it was 11 at that point.
The captains voice crackled on the speaker, "Uhhh.. Ladies and Gentlemen, we will deplane as soon as we can, but no one is answering us at the airport and we don't know if they have a gate for us or not... so as soon as we get ahold of someone, then we'll let you know what we know."
Seriously?!?!
"What, no one noticed there's an extra plane just parked out there?" A businessman asked.
Several minutes later another voice crackled over the intercom.
"This is the manager of the airport. We want to welcome you to Huntsville, Alabama. Right now we are experiancing an unusual situation with the storm in Memphis, and we have a lot of people in our airport who don't belong. So we're gonna just ask you to sit tight till we figure something out."
"They are not going to make us sit here the whole time! How long is that going to be?" people started asking. It was now almost 12 and our flight had left at 7:30 am.
"This is the manager of the airport again. The Captain has requested that we allow you to deplane. So we'll allow you to come up to the gate, but do not I repeat DO NOT enter the main airport or we will not allow you to come back. You don't have a boarding pass for any other flight as you aren't even supposed to have landed here. We will let you know once we know something what your next course of action will be." He then told us about their coffee shop/snack shack/'hot dog stand' where we could get food in the airport and repeated a few warnings about not leaving the terminal we were in.
So we went into the airport and got lunch. Ten bucks for a tea, a water, and a sandwhich. I hate eating in airports. It's SO not worth the money!!
So I ate with two other ladies from my flight and we watched in growing perturbation as CNN announced that the storm system in Memphis was slowly taking over the midwest.
"They had better not leave us here!" One lady commented, and the two began saying how this was the plane flight from hell.
Hmm... no, more like the plane ride from purgatory! We hadn't crashed, we had just all felt somewhat sick during the turbulence and were having beautiful opportunities to practice patience!
I personally stayed in Huntingville (or huntsville, I still can't remember it's name) until 5:30. They were able to change my flight so that I could fly into Cincinnatti and then straight home instead of flying into Omaha. Yay!!
So i arrived around 9:45. At 10:00 I discovered that while I was able to make the flight to Cincinatti, none of my luggage had!! Part of the problem was that I had switched from Northwest Airlines to Delta, and my bags apparently made it to Omaha, where i was originally supposed to go!! So the bags apparently made it to Omaha this morning, and should get here tonight or tomorrow. Usually it's the younger sister stealing clothes from the older sister's closet, but apparently my sister and I are gonna pull a switch-er-oo on the ol' tradition. Fortunately we're built pretty similar she's just taller and has a shorter torso.
Okay I want my own clothes!!

So anyway. There's my latest adventure! I was able to help out a pregnant mom by playing with her six-year old and four-year old (and every once and a while her 13 month old) daughters by coloring with them and playing on the wheelchair with them. So my arms hurt now but we had fun. :-D
So yeah.... there's my wonderful traveling story for this six-month period. Woot woot!

So now I'm home, which is great, and have been shown or am discovering the latest changes and updates and recent homework and cooking victories by my siblings and catching up with mom. Yay!!
And I still need to finish reading Acts through Revelation and write an 8 to 20 page paper on a summary of one of those books before next week. *sigh* Ah well. I sort of brought it upon myself by signing up for so many D-and-J-terms.

More later!

~Princess Ouch~