Solomon

Quote of the Day

/ Luke Wisley / 1 Comment

Right now I’m doing some research on the nature of wisdom in Solomon’s judgment over the case of the two women claiming the same baby. I came across this great quote from Richard Briggs:

Complaints against the supposition that this is a paradigm of wise judgment have come thick and fast from various quarters, including the rabbis, some feminist critics, and most memorably, Mark Twain. We shall take our cue from Mark Twain, if only because he is generally more fun than most scholars (83).

Richard Briggs, The Virtuous Reader, Baker Academic 2010.

Checking-in

/ Luke Wisley / 3 Comments

I recently received a very passive rebuke from Matt on not posting on the blog in a long time. Which is strange because Matt is usually anything but passive. He was correct, however, in that I’ve been very absent from the blog. Because of that, I thought I would write a quick update on what is going on.

Since about October I’ve been in Cambridge working away at trying to get my thesis question more precise. I had been flirting for quite a while on the topic of Solomon and wisdom and I think it is finely focused enough. My overall question is how Solomon is characterised in the canon. It means lately that I’ve been spending a lot of time in the 1 Kings narrative trying to figure out what is going on. My conclusion so far is that it is anything but simple. I think there is a real tendency when we read to try and force characters in polar categories (good/bad, etc). This doesn’t appreciate the complexity that a character is represented as.

In other news, I was contracted to write a few dictionary articles (along with many others) for the new Lexham Bible Dictionary for Logos. This was a good experience and I’m happy I did it. But also a lot more distracting than I had anticipated and I am happy that I can concentrate on a few other things now.

Lastly, a paper of mine was accepted for an upcoming conference at Oxford in May. I will be presenting on the role of wisdom in the temple building account in 1 Kings. Now I just need to write it. Which is generally the trickier part.