We typically star in our own life narratives. Conclude Part 1 of Jesus the Forgiving Victim by imagining yourself as a bit player inside someone else’s story. In this story, the protagonist is the presence of the risen and Forgiving Victim. What might your part in the story be?
If the protagonist is a victim who forgives, then it would appear t…[Read more]

Do you wish that Luke had included everything that Jesus told the disciples on the Emmaus road?
Honestly, I am (as much any as any of those preachers James says totally miss the point) tempted to wonder how an outright word-for-word dictation of Jesus interpreting excerpts from Hebrew scriptures would read. However, James’ point is well taken; L…[Read more]

To begin to get inside the disciples’ experience of that reversal, think about the difference between being a dinner party host, and being a guest. When you are the host, what gift or experience do you hope to give to your guests?
Thinking metaphorically, I might describe a host as someone who, first, sets the stage for an improve show and, t…[Read more]

I had a peculiar occasion a while back in which I was left wondering if I hadn’t got a glimpse of a fleeting deity, in the way that is similar to what James says is characteristic of the depictions of YHWH in the Bible generally … in a similar way to how James says Luke framed the resurrection appearance of Christ in its concluding chapter. I s…[Read more]

What might it mean for us to be listening to the unheard voice in the midst of confusing and traumatic events in our own communities or society?
If Cleopas and his companion are our example, then listening to the unheard voice in the midst of trauma and confusion means listening to something foreign. I found Alison’s commentary (in the essay) on t…[Read more]

Does it help or hinder your approach to reading the Bible to place importance on the hermeneutic, or method of interpretation?
It helps. I believe I read the Bible better when I am conscious of how I am approaching the Bible. Maybe that’s because I’m a novice. Perhaps it is a habit I’ll fall into overtime and someday I’ll stop being so conscio…[Read more]

Sheelah, no, I haven’t yet read _Decite, Desire and the Novel_; although, I did attempt it a couple of years ago. Regrettably, I can be a bit overly fastidious when I sit down to read and with every page turn I felt myself to be more and more inadequate of a reader—as I hadn’t (at that time) ever read a single page of Cervantes, Flaubert, Stend…[Read more]

James used the term “hermeneutic” at the opening of this module. Do you recall what that word means?
I take it as a reference to the study of those methods by which people interpret messages. Somebody told me that the root of the word hearkens back to Hermes.

What hermeneutic have you used or been taught to use for reading Scripture?
I was rai…[Read more]

Sheelah, I’m glad there is a tech person out there looking into your missing post. In the meantime, know that, even on those occasions when your posts don’t upload to the public Forum properly, they DO seem to be forwarded on to those of us who have subscribed to receive private notifications of postings. [I briefly thought about posting your com…[Read more]

Sheelah, I’ve signed up to receive notices each time someone posts on these Discussion Forums. You posted yesterday, I read it in my email, but now I don’t actually see it on the JFV website itself. Perhaps there is some technical problem with the Module 1.4 Forum? I wonder this because I see that for some reason one of your responses to Rich from…[Read more]

Share your favorite news sources. Can you defend your news source as “objective”? How would you describe its editorial bias?

It just so happened that a “smart” phone came into my possession just last week. I could wax ambivalent for no short moment on what I think about becoming a human with an open internet portal perpetually in his pocket.…[Read more]

Share ways in which you have noticed the content, questions or insights from the previous Module showing up in your lives.

As someone who is expected to lead people in Bible study at least once a week, I endeavor to be circumspect about what I ask others to do when they read scripture. I don’t want to dazzle a class into a fixation that p…[Read more]

Why do you think the title of the accompanying essay for the first three Modules of the course is, “Don’t speak until you’re spoken to”?

The command not to speak could be taken to mean the one giving the command is taking charge of a situation.

I think Alison’s point is a bit different. The command not to speak until spoken to entails conscious…[Read more]

“To understand how God is communicating with us through Jesus and through the Bible, we need at the same time to understand ourselves”. I agree with this culminating statement and all that James said leading up to it. However, let me point out two ways of reading the language he uses: one I find I can accept quite comfortably and the other is—…[Read more]

– James describes our memories as being constructed from our attempts to start to tell a story about ourselves. What memories play an important role in your story?
I’d have a very difficult time telling a single story about myself. I’ve lived in several different places among discrete communities that know very little to nothing of each other. The…[Read more]

— Write some ways you would complete this sentence: “Good people are good because they…”

… can (i) wrangle other people’s aggressions with creative dexterity and (ii) reject the excuses people regularly make when they want to vent their frustrations on another. I think the Bible calls the first one grace and the second one mercy.

— Why might…[Read more]

— Share ways in which you have noticed the content, questions or insights from the previous Module showing up in your lives.

Yesterday evening* during a Sunday School class I was leading, one participant put forward a reading that was incompatible with the one I had put forward. The specifics are immaterial to us here (I believe), but I’ll m…[Read more]

–Share your thoughts on how recognizing our dependence on the social other changes how we understand ourselves.

If I can be a self apart from others, then presumably I can understand myself through a solitary self-sustained contemplation of selves (with “me” being one example).

If, by contrast, I cannot be a self apart from the social other,…[Read more]

Yes, I can and will put aside the words “peer” and “equal” when I talk about internal mediation. However, please know that I am confused as to why I should. The phrase you use to define internal mediation (“same immediate life setting”) seems to be equivalent in substance to what people regularly mean by “peer.” In fact, I can’t think of a more c…[Read more]

I think Girard is probably right to affirm the possibility that a larger group can tell the truth in a way that does not scapegoat. My point is that, when this happens, the larger group is not speaking to a peer. Rather, they are speaking to a companion who is misinformed or deceived. This companion, however, should not be viewed as an equal…[Read more]