But a Samaritan… by Cortney Haley (graphic for Luke 10:25-37)
Don’t go down that road again!
During the four Wednesdays of February we engaged parables from Luke in Sacred Stories class at the Montgomery County Jail. Our first story was the parable of the Good Samaritan. Here are some of the things we wondered about that story and the background info about it which we read-around:
- If it was such a bad place to be, why were the priest and the Levite walking alone with no protection?
- Why didn’t the priest stop? Seems like he’s a man of God, a holy man; you’d think that he would be the one to stop.
- Do they still have temples in Jerusalem?
- Why is he walking down that road in the first place?
- I don’t understand the law about not touching someone who needed help.
- Are the priests supposed to pray for them?
Then there was the question that led to our key take-away from this parable that day: “I was just wondering whatever became of the man who came to the inn. Did he get better? I bet he won’t go down that road again… We should all tell ourselves: ‘Don’t go down that road again!’”
We all laughed at this sound wisdom—the spirit at work among us. Gave me a whole new take on this familiar parable.
Peace and good cheer, Amelia
Bible Study Magazine
Writing for Bible Study Magazine
“Mark as Performance Literature” by Tom Boomershine will appear in an upcoming issue of Bible Study Magazine. According to the Logos site, this publication “delivers tools and methods for Bible study, as well as insights from respected Bible teachers, professors, historians, and archaeologists.”
Here is an excerpt from Tom’s article:
A new way of experiencing and studying Mark’s story has emerged called performance criticism. We have traditionally approached Bible study with our eyes, reading the text in silence and looking for what we can discern about the meaning of Mark’s story in its original context and in the context of our lives today.
This practice has been associated with the assumption that Mark was originally a text read by readers who sat with a manuscript in hand and read it, usually in silence. Recent research on the media world of antiquity reveals that this assumption is an anachronism, a reading back into the ancient world of silent reading of texts by readers that only became prevalent in the 18th-19th centuries…
To read the full essay, subscribe to the magazine.
The Big Fix
We’re so pleased with our new GoTell site and hope you like it, too. BUT, one thing we didn’t foresee was the need to fix all the links from the Resource section of the Network of Biblical Storytellers’ site to GoTell’s story pages. We’re talking well over 300—two for every Gospel lection. The links were broken as a result of the GoTell site redesign.
Thanks to a helpful NBS site user we got word about the problem and have now fixed those links. It was a tedious job but we’re grateful for the presence of GoTell resources on the NBS site, so we’re glad to have done it. In the process we discovered some missing info on our end, which we’ll work on filling in over the next few weeks. If you haven’t visited the NBS site lately (or ever), do so today! Here’s the link: http://www.nbsint.org
