Book Review: Elias Chacour's 'Blood Brothers'

I'm leading a trip to Israel with Prairie College in 2020, so as part of my preparation I'm trying to get a handle on the history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The first book on my list was Elias Chacour's Blood Brothers, which has been recommended to me several times. It was a fascinating read!

Chacour is a Palestinian Christian leader who came of age in the midst of great turmoil in the Middle East. He tells of his peaceful childhood in a Christian village in Galilee where his family had owned and tended the land for generations. They understood themselves to have been grafted in to the "olive tree" of Abraham through faith in Jesus. Chacour's father regularly did business with Jewish villages nearby, treating them as brothers. Like the rest of the watching world, his family sympathized with the plight of European Jews. Chacour's village was ready to welcome new Jewish settlers fleeing Europe to live among them and farm the land. But they were never given this chance.

The peace of their community was shattered when Zionist soldiers arrived after WWII, kicking Palestinian residents off of their own land and confiscating their property. The violence of the war seems to have infected the "peacekeeping" troops, who were funded by a variety of nations with special interest groups. Unlike their Jewish neighbors, these troops were violent and their aim was conquest. It was the beginning of a decades-long conflict that is still unresolved today.

Chacour has devoted his life to working for peace between Arabs and Jews. A Nobel Peace Prize nominee, he has watched communities transformed by hope and brotherhood. So although this story is a brutal one, the undercurrent is hope -- hope for a peace made possible by restoring the dignity of every human being.

Given the almost unqualified support for the state of Israel extended by many American Christians, this story is vitally important for us to hear. Chacour does not call upon Westerners to reverse history and force Jews out of Palestine, but rather to withhold judgment on who is terrorizing whom when we lack the proximity to make such judgments. He laments, "How terribly sad that men could ignore God's plan for peace between divided brothers, even supporting one group as it wielded its might to force out the other" (142). We must learn to listen and heed the teaching of the prophet Isaiah, "Practice justice and righteousness, and then you will have peace" (227). If we want to walk in the way of peace, Chacour will be an able guide.

prostitutes, polygamy, and other gnarly things in the Old Testament

The Old Testament is full of fodder for questions. Gnarly questions about violence and sexual deviancy and deception and war. Every year new books are released that try to wrestle with these questions from a Christian point of view. Here are a few examples from recent years, most of them focused on violence in the Old Testament:

• The God I Don't Understand: Reflections on Tough Questions of Faith by Christopher J. H. Wright (Zondervan, 2008)
• Is God a Moral Monster? Making Sense of the Old Testament God by Paul Copan (Baker, 2011)
• God Behaving Badly: Is the God of the Old Testament Angry, Sexist and Racist? by David T. Lamb (IVP, 2011)
• The Violence of Scripture: Overcoming the Old Testament's Troubling Legacy by Eric A. Seibert (Fortress, 2012)
• The Morality of God in the Old Testament: Christian Answers to Hard Questions by Gregory K. Beale (P&R Publishing, 2013)
• Did God Really Command Genocide? Coming to Terms with the Justic of God by Paul Copan & Matt Flannagan (Baker, 2014)
• The Skeletons in God's Closet: The Mercy of Hell, the Surprise of Judgment, the Hope of Holy War by Joshua Ryan Butler (Thomas Nelson, 2014)
• Tough Questions about God and His Actions in the Old Testament by Walter Kaiser Jr. (Kregel, 2015)
• Wrestling with the Violence of God: Soundings in the Old Testament by J. Blair Wilgus & M. Daniel Carroll R. (Eisenbrauns, 2015)

Last year David Lamb added a second book of his own to this collection: Prostitutes and Polygamists: A Look at Love, Old Testament Style (Zondervan, 2015). I was asked to review it for Themelios, the digital journal of The Gospel Coalition. My review went live yesterday.

I hesitated to accept. The book struck me as edgy and irreverently playful on a subject matter that deserves steady and non-sensational reflection. Frankly, I didn't seem to fit the target audience. But the editor had reasons to ask me (my gender, my cross-cultural experience, and my background in Old Testament ethics), so in the end I agreed to write a review. You can read it here. You might find it to be just the thing for the college group at your church, but I hope my review will help guide your group discussions in order to avoid some of the potential pitfalls of Lamb's approach.

While I have your attention, I'll put in a plug for two books I like better. Wright's book, listed first above, is an outstanding yet accessible introduction to tough issues involving suffering and evil, the Canaanites, the cross, and the end of the world. (His more scholarly tome, Old Testament Ethics for the People of God, is also well worth reading, if your attention span can last nearly 500 pages.) Paul Copan's book, listed second above, comes highly recommended as well. I haven't read the whole thing yet, but I find his approach much more satisfying than Lamb's.


If you're wrestling with some of these tough questions, please know that there are answers. From our vantage point we may never be fully satisfied with the ways that the Old Testament narrates the story of Israel's faith. It's too foreign and too far in the distant past to make perfect sense to us. But if we apply ourselves diligently to the text of Scripture and broaden our understanding of its ancient context, we can come a long way toward making sense of the Old Testament. It's a journey worth making!

does the new NIV distort the Scriptures? - part 5

Today I'm tackling the second part of an accusation against the NIV translation of the Bible. The first (which was part 4 of this series) addressed the issue of single words being changed, such as "Jehovah." What's more, some Christians are deeply concerned that the new NIV has removed entire verses from the Bible.

In a way, they are right. If you compare the KJV to the NIV, you'll discover that some verses have dropped out. But the important question is WHY?

Is this an attempt to take out statements that are uncomfortable or to water down the message of Scripture?

In a word, no.

Those who translated the Bible into English in the early 1600s did the best they could with what they had, but since then hundreds of other ancient manuscripts of the Bible have come to light, including those known as the "Dead Sea Scrolls." These manuscripts are much older than those available to the translators of the King James Version, sometimes by a thousand years, and in many cases they preserve a more accurate biblical text.

"The Shrine of the Book" at the Israel Museum,
where some of the Dead Sea Scrolls are housed
Photo: D. Camfferman

The process of discerning which manuscript is better is called "textual criticism" (not because it's "critical" of the text, but because it's trying to determine the "critical" text). The goal of most textual critics is to reconstruct the oldest and most accurate text possible by identifying and removing any mistakes or later additions.

Those responsible for the translation of the NIV (the Committee on Bible Translation) want you to be confident that you hold in your hands the Word of God, not a text filled with well-intentioned additions— however "true" they may be. In some cases, a word, a verse, or even a whole paragraph was added to the text at some point in history in order to clarify the meaning or harmonize a text with a similar passage in another book. This is especially common in the Gospels, where multiple books recount the same event. Either by accident or on purpose, scribes would fill out the shorter text with details from the longer text.

The NIV translators carefully examined the manuscript evidence. In cases where a new (older) manuscript suggested that a verse was a later addition to the biblical text, they chose to eliminate it.

Here's an example:

Matthew 18:11 (NIV) - Photo: C. Imes

In the KJV, Matthew 18:11 says, "For the Son of man is come to save that which was lost."
In the NIV, there is no verse 11. Instead, a footnote reads, "Some manuscripts include here the words of Luke 19:10."
Sure enough, Luke 19:10 reads, "For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost."

Luke 19:10 (NIV) - Photo: C. Imes

In other words, even without this statement in Matthew 18:11, no theology has been lost. The truth that Jesus looks for and saves sinners is still in the New Testament. In the cases where a verse does not appear elsewhere, it was never supposed to be there in the first place. Thankfully, no doctrines of consequence rest on those verses.

Ironically, as with this example, many of the "missing" verses listed by concerned readers are found elsewhere in the Bible. Think with me here. If the NIV translators were trying to change the Bible, they didn't do a very thorough job.

For Zondervan's answer to this question (a shorter version of what I've said above), click here.

I've saved the most controversial objection to the NIV for last. Stay tuned!

life in the middle of nowhere

Does life have you doing circles in the desert?

If so, you're not alone. And God hasn't given up on you.

Last week, the summer edition of the Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary Alumni Magazine, Contact, was released. It includes the devotional I gave at the Gordon-Conwell Alumni Breakfast at SBL last November, as well as a write-up of Anne Doll's phone interview with me, where we talked about how to make it in grad school as a family of five.

For those of you who are "in between," waiting to step into a season of fulfillment, this devotional is my gift to you, the fruit of my own desert wanderings. Here's a snippet:

In those "in-between" places, we are faced with many questions. We are no longer certain about who we are. We are not sure how God is leading, or even if he's leading. In our desperation to restore a sense of order to our lives, we're always in danger of adopting the wrong narrative. But God has us right where He wants us. He has lessons to teach us that can only be learned in a state of dislocation. Lessons about who we are. About who He is. And how He's calling us to be in the world. 

Read the rest here. You can find my contribution on pages 30–33.

visit the holy land for free!

I've spent part of the day weeding in my back yard, cooking dinner, and hanging out with my kids. I spent the rest of my day exploring Jerusalem. No kidding.

Photo Copyright: Israel Antiquities Authority and
the Urban Simulation Team at UCLA

Did you know you can walk the streets of Jerusalem and pan around major archaeological sites right from the comfort of your own home?

At SBL in November I attended a session where various professors shared ways they are using technology to help their classrooms come alive. It was a fascinating session—with video games, classroom games, virtual tours, and maps on Google Earth. Today I tried some of the websites to see which ones will work best for my class on the Gospels at Multnomah. Bingo.

Here are a few of my favorites:

A virtual ascent from the pool of Siloam to the Temple in Jesus' day, with music. This is the route priests would have taken during the Feast of Tabernacles, carrying water from the lower pool to pour out upon the altar. See John 7 and 8.

Several short videos highlighting this same route through the City of David (the oldest part of Jerusalem) to the Temple.

Stunning, 360-degree interactive photos of dozens of key biblical sites. The professor who was showing us this resource (his favorite) at SBL was delighted to discover that the creator of this website was in the audience!

Brief 3-D animated videos of many holy sites in and around Jerusalem, high resolution photos, and interactive virtual tours of several of the most important, like the Temple Mount and the Western Wall. You can choose narrated or self-guided tours.

If you've been to Israel before, these sites allow you to relive your experiences. If not, you can get a taste of the world of the Bible. It will help the text come alive like never before. Try it and see!

and the winners are . . .

After many happy hours perusing possible textbooks for my spring course on the Gospels/Acts at Multnomah, I have selected my favorites.

Because I have had little training in New Testament Greco-Roman backgrounds, I found The New Testament in Antiquity to be especially helpful. A trio of esteemed Wheaton professors - Gary Burge, Lynn Cohick, and Gene Green - pooled their expertise to produce a beautiful volume filled with crisp photographs, clear maps, helpful diagrams, and the latest in New Testament research, written for the non-specialist. Although the other volumes I considered would have worked, this seemed to be a book students could continue to use for years to come as they study the rest of the New Testament. It includes the right amount of information, written at the right level for college students.

It's a special bonus to know each of the authors and to have grown personally from interactions with each of them, but what was even more important to me was the testimony of a recent MA graduate from Wheaton who said this was her favorite book from grad school. The New Testament in Antiquity is the next best thing to taking students on a tour of the holy land. Having just been there myself in May, it was easy to tell that the photos in this book (as compared to others I saw) were the most up-to-date.

One of the strategic priorities of Multnomah's new president, Dr. Craig Williford, is to cultivate a diverse learning community. This not only includes variety in the types of students who populate our classes, but also variety in the authors and perspectives to which students are exposed during their studies. For this reason, I'm delighted to introduce students to Kenneth Bailey's Jesus Through Middle Eastern Eyes: Cultural Studies in the Gospels.

Bailey lived and taught in the middle east for 40 years, and his book helps readers take off their western lenses so they can read the text from a cultural perspective much closer to the ancient New Testament world. More than anything else, Bailey helps us consider new ways of reading and understanding the Bible. His book is endorsed by an impressive cadre of New Testament scholars, including Lynn Cohick and Gary Burge (above), Craig Keener, and Craig Evans.

Finally, students will need a good atlas as they follow Jesus' steps through the Gospels and the travels of the early apostles in the book of Acts. I considered a number of atlases, but in the end my favorite happened to be the most compact and affordable as well (that should make students happy!). It's paperback and slightly smaller than our main textbook. My biggest priorities were crisp photos, pleasing graphics, and maps that would give students a sense of the physical topography of the land of Israel. Now that I've been there, I feel that this aspect is so important. Carl Rasmussen's Zondervan Essential Atlas of the Bible provides all of these and more.

Here's my personal favorite, shared with permission from Zondervan:

Just a few months ago I sat on the edge of the ridge just south of Nazareth, looking out over the Jezreel Valley at Mt. Tabor and the Hill of Moreh. Now I can see that just over the ridge beyond Mt. Tabor is the Sea of Galilee. That would have been quite a hike!

I'm grateful to Zondervan and IVP for free exam copies of these books and others as well, and to Zondervan for providing free access to digital photos and maps for use in teaching. While I was not required to write a review of these books, I felt compelled to share these great resources with you.

embracing the ordinary

In the two months that have passed since my most recent post, a lot of life has happened:

• 2 weeks in Israel on a study tour with my Dad, my doktorvater, and my pastor
• 10 days to pack for a cross-country move and say our goodbyes
• a garage sale in Wheaton
• a drive across 7 states to our new home with a 3-day stop in Colorado to be with family
• Easton's 6th birthday
• the death of my grandmother, age 93, in Washington state and her memorial service the day after we arrived in Oregon
• getting settled in our new home and integrating all of my grandma's things into it
• reconnecting with friends and family
• a garage sale in Oregon
• finding a new church in our neighborhood
• figuring out grocery stores, libraries, parks, museums, etc.
• a 5-day camping trip with Danny's mom and all of his brothers and their families
• helping with a week of Vacation Bible School at our home church in Oregon
• getting the kids registered for school
• organizing and re-organizing the garage to make room for Danny's office
• buying a washer and dryer
• beginning dissertation research again after a 4-month hiatus

With the exception of my trip to Israel, this list is not glamorous. It represents a lot of sweat and a lot of stress, and even a good deal of fun, but it does not appear to be a recipe for changing the world (or making a splash in academia, for that matter). This was brought home to me when I encountered a (very blunt) young adult from our home church this week who has watched the adventure of our life unfold over the past dozen years. He remembers when we set out for the Philippines in 2002, ready to reach the lost for Christ. Our early letters, he says, were exciting and inspiring. But then life got ordinary. We moved to North Carolina to work at headquarters, and our "biggest" news then was playing soccer [sic: kickball] with the neighbor kids. He didn't need to even mention our next move -- a journey into academic obscurity in Wheaton -- for me to get his point: we've become rather ordinary, nothing to write home about.

Fair enough, I told him, and moved on with the task of eating my dinner and getting ready to be mobbed by more than a dozen precious kids, well over half of them hispanic, for a loud and crazy night of VBS. All through the crafts, games, snacks, and Bible stories, I pondered our brief conversation. Was he right?

In my younger years, when we started our adventure in missions, I would have agreed with him. Life was too short to waste it on ordinary suburban life -- a house with a cute front yard, a minivan, 2.5 kids, plenty of time with family, and occasional trips to Disneyland. I still agree that if that's all there is to it, something is amiss. But a dozen years in ministry has taught me that the recipe for a transformed life calls for large quantities of patient, ordinary, faithful investment and only an occasional headline-making event. Going to Israel was great, for example, but the true fruit will come from years of Bible teaching injected with personal passion and on-the-ground experience. 

View of Ancient Shechem from Mt. Gerazim - Photo C. Imes

A Samaritan Village on Mt. Gerazim - Photo C. Imes

 On Tuesday night of VBS, we heard the story of the Samaritan woman at the well, which I've blogged about before. I was excited for two reasons. First, the story was being told in first-person by my teenage daughter, who did a fabulous job!  But I was also excited because I have been there. While we couldn't get to the well itself because we lacked a bullet-proof bus, we drove to the top of Mt. Gerazim and looked down into the valley where the ancient city of Shechem (and Jacob's well) has now been swallowed up by modern-day Nablus. 

We drove right through a Samaritan village and climbed off the bus at the site of their annual sacrifice (commemorating the sacrifice of Isaac on -- they say -- Mt. Gerazim). We saw their distinctive dress and saw first-hand how the 600 Samaritans alive today maintain a distinct identity from their Jewish neighbors. 

A Samaritan Priest - photo C. Imes

It was my first opportunity to spice up a Bible lesson with a story from our trip, and I hope there are many more opportunities in the days ahead. Our lives may look ordinary on the outside, but it's never been about us anyway. We carry inside this ordinary vessel the extraordinary power of the gospel:

"For what we preach is not ourselves [good thing!], but Jesus Christ as Lord, and ourselves as your servants for Jesus' sake. For God, who said, 'Let light shine out of darkness,' made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of God's glory displayed in the face of Christ. But we have this treasure in jars of clay [that is, ordinary jars for everyday use] to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. . . . So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal." 2 Corinthians 4:5-7, 18

We have new neighbors who need to meet Jesus, and we'll be far more likely to earn an opportunity to share Christ if we take the time to play kickball with them than if we decide that the effort is not worth our time. So here's hoping for lots of ordinary days . . .

journey to the holy land

As you read this I am boarding a plane bound for Tel Aviv, Israel. Along with 40 others, I have the privilege of assisting Daniel and Ellen Block on a 2-week Israel study tour. This is my first trip to the holy land. My main objective is to come home loaded with photos and stories to liven up my classes for decades to come.

My dear Dad, who deserves a better shirt 

Our "dream team" includes not only my doctoral mentor, but my Dad and my pastor and his wife. I'm so grateful for the opportunity to experience the land of the Bible with people I love. I probably won't blog until I return, but you are welcome to check my friend Maggie's blog for updates along the way!