Bully’s Blog

or Insanity and Spiritual Songs

Van Gogh’s work has been regarded by some as “hallucinatory,” however his letters show that few artists were as intelligent and rational. His work was not the product of his dark times but of his struggle against them.

“I am feeling well just now… I am not strictly speaking mad, for my mind is absolutely normal in the intervals, and even more so than before. But during the attacks it is terrible—and then I lose consciousness of everything. But that spurs me on to work and to seriousness, as a miner who is always in danger and makes haste in what he does.” [1]

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From James B. Jordan’s Trees and Thorns: [1]

The water in the ground of the garden is associated with Eve.

What Adam was to guard was the Garden, and preeminently Eve, its mistress. This is precisely what he refused to do. Later in the Bible, new Adams meet their Eves at wells, and defend them there. Eliezar met Rebekah at a well, and brought her home to Isaac (Gen. 24:11ff.). Jacob met Rachel at a well, and unsealed it for her — a sign as it turned out of his coming marriage to her (Gen. 29:10-11). Good Shepherd Moses met Zipporah at a well and defended her against bad shepherds (Ex. 2:16-19).

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From James B. Jordan’s Trees and Thorns: [1]

The land and garden of Eden were watered by a spring. Why call attention to the fact that God did not send rain? Why not just mention the spring and leave off the statement about rain? The reason, I believe, is to call our minds back to Genesis 1:2-9. We find in Genesis 1:2 that there was an ocean over the original earth. Then God created the firmament, and separated the waters above from the waters below. On the third day God gathered the waters below into areas below the surface of the land.

Now we have a clear distinction between waters above the firmament, the source of rain, and waters below, which would have to come up from under the earth. Both Genesis 1:2-9 and 2:5-6 set up the distinction eschatologically; ground water comes first, and then heavenly water.

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or Who Is My Neighbour?

“The early taverns were not opened wholly for the convenience of travellers; they were for the comfort of the townspeople, for the interchange of the news and opinions, the sale of solacing liquors, and the incidental sociability; in fact, the importance of the tavern to its local neighbors was far greater than to travellers.”

B’s and V’s get swapped a lot, in Hebrew particularly. Our Old English word tavern (a meeting place) derives via Old French from the Latin taberna, a hut or a dwelling. It is also possibly related to tabula, a table or board, from traberna, which is in turn related to timber beams from trees.

So, we can loosely stitch together a meeting place, alcohol, tables, timber and trees. The Feast of Tabernacles was also known as ingathering, and it involved a lot of expensive meaty sacrifices, and lots of strong drink, with willing strangers welcome to be “ingrafted” as branches into the holy Tree: the perfect picture of the New Covenant Church of God.

This is the theme of Jesus’ parable of the Good Samaritan in Luke 10. A ‘Covenant literary analysis’ uncovers some pure gold in the structure of Jesus’ words.

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Here’s my go at the structure of the first of these seven praise psalms. (The introduction is here.) Apparently, it has five verses, following the Covenant structure. Within this, each stanza also has five lines, which echo the same structure while maintaining the theme of the stanza. The only exception is verse 4 which concerns the Sanctions. It has seven lines. As I maintain, the 5-point Covenant model expands into the 7-point matrix as Ethics gets split into three: Law opened/Death under the Law/Resurrection fulfilling the Law. 5-point Word creates 7-point History. The Sanctions correspond to the Day of Atonement (Conquest) which has the theme of the resurrected body ascending to govern under God. On that Day, every year, Israel died and rose again.

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Does the Bible really contain everything the man of God requires? The curve balls of history call the church to greater and greater wisdom, but the principles remain the same. What if one of the oddest books of the Old Testament contained crucial advice for modern western culture and the Christians attempting to deal with its tragi-comic apostasy? Continue reading

A lot of very smart Christians believe that the Creation account was written as a foil for Ancient Near Eastern creation myths. It was written by Moses to rally Israel culturally, to set a boundary between the Hebrew identity and that of the nations.

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Art is man’s interpretation of the world, but the world itself is the original art. Everything is physical, literal, historical, but everything is also symbol. This is not an interpretation imposed upon what we observe. The Creation was actually made as symbol. Without the Word of God, we are rendered unable to interpret it. [1]

The meaning of the sun, moon and stars in Genesis 1 is not simply a poetic idea. The purpose of the heavenly lights is actual and practical. Moreover, it will be measured out in human flesh over and again throughout history.

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Adam couldn’t face God. Cain’s face fell. Moses’ face shone with reflected light when he returned from the mountain of God. Bezalel and Aholiab constructed the Table of Facebread, which corresponded in the cherubim to the Face Of The Man. David and his men ate the facebread. Saul feared Goliath, but David’s face was red, literally “filled with blood,” before he bloodied Goliath’s face and the usurper fell facedown. [1]

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or Postmillennial Rubbish

Does thinking about the Great Pacific Garbage Patch give you the eco-jitters? Do you shudder at the thought of the world running out of space for landfill? Worry no more. We finally have the answer.

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