There has been a bit more discussion on the blog in regards to the 10th century abecedary inscription discovered at Tel Zeitah. See the additional posts by Jim West (here and here), while Joe Cathy responds to his detractors here. There is also a good discussion of the origin and order of the Hebrew alphabet on the Daily Hebrew blog.

As a point of clarification, the AP picture that I included on my previous blog entry on the inscription did identify P. Kyle McCarter as the individual in the photograph. The photograph was taken at a news conference at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary on Wednesday 9 November 2005.

Here is another AP photograph of the stone with Ron E. Tappy, the project director of the excavations, in the foreground. This side of the stone has a bowl-shaped hollow was carved in the side, which may suggest (according to Tappy) that the stone had been a drinking vessel for cult rituals.

BTW: The picture of the inscription by itself which is surfacing on the blogosphere is just a cropped version of the AP picture with P. Kyle McCarter in the foreground.

The latest Review of Biblical Literature has been posted. There are a number of Hebrew Bible related reviews as well as some interesting Second Temple ones. Here is a complete listing:

• Walter Brueggemann, Worship in Ancient Israel: An Essential Guide. Reviewed by Nijay Gupta and Thomas Hieke
• Bernd Janowski and Peter Stuhlmacher, eds., The Suffering Servant: Isaiah 53 in Jewish and Christian Sources (Translated by Daniel P. Bailey). Reviewed by William Barker
• Rolf P. Knierim and George W. Coats, Numbers. Reviewed by Reinhard Achenbach
• Eckart Otto and Reinhard Achenbach, eds., Das Deuteronomium zwischen Pentateuch und Deuteronomistichem Geschichtswerk. Reviewed by A.G. Auld
• Madaline Vartejanu-Joubert, Folie et Société dans l’israël antique. Reviewed by Walter Vogels
• David A. deSilva, Introducing the Apocrypha: Message, Context, and Significance. Reviewed by Eric Noffke
• Jean Duhaime, The War Texts: 1QM and Related Manuscripts. Reviewed by Annette Steudel
• Anthony Hilhorst and George H. Van Kooten, eds., The Wisdom of Egypt: Jewish, Early Christian, and Gnostic Essays in Honour of Gerard P. Luttikhuizen. Reviewed by Tobias Nicklas

Filed in: Reviews RBL

The list of the top 100 Spiritually Significant Films has been posted at the Arts and Faith Message Board.

I did a quick count and I have seen over 40 of the films listed. I agree with most of the list (not necessarily the ranking, but that they belong on the list), though there are always some that are absent and others that you wonder if they should be included in the top 100. I was somewhat surprised that I had not even heard of the top film: Rosetta (Jean-Pierre Dardenne and Luc Dardenne, 1999). It looks interesting. I will have to put that on my “to view” list.

I was happy to see one of my favourite films, Magnolia (P.T. Anderson, 1999) on the list at #27. I just presented a lecture on “Redemption in Magnolia” in my Religion and Popular Culture class last week — Going through the film again made me realize why I like that film so much. Brilliant!

OK, this advertisement for St. Paul Property and Liability Insurance is absolutely hilarious.

Thanks to Talmida for the heads up!

OK, time for a Friday night rant. I personally find a lot of Christian advertising and marketing to be somewhat vacuous and mildly offensive — OK “offensive” may be too strong, perhaps “irritating” is more accurate. I think much of it cheapens the gospel.

In particular, this ad has bugged me for a while (I was using it as a coaster for my big gulp).

What bugs me about this ad is the (neopagan) association of ecstatic feelings with prayer and (perhaps more disturbing) the use of sex appeal to sell books about prayer. I’m not saying that prayer is never emotional (of course it is). In my mind this just one-to-one association between prayer and ecstatic emotions feeds the superficial nature of a lot of Christian spirituality where people go from one prayer/worship “fix” to another like junkies. This doesn’t engender serious discipleship, IMHO.

Oh, yeah, BTW, I “photoshopped” the picture to remove the name of the bookseller (I also changed the books in the picture; I was surprised to find “Idiot’s Guide” and “Dummies” books on prayer!).