Didn't get anything done, either at werk-werk (obviously, been home coughing on things), or w/ the projects of the year. Presumably this is the devil's way of kicking me when I'm up. Have dabbled a bit the last couple days at reorganizing the journal (see above) to get personal friends etc. in the top slots, and something more like a 'blogroll' below. I would rail about how shiny the del.icio.us links are, but yinz probably already ignore them or have better things to do. If they weren't shiny, you see, I wouldn't bother with them. :>

Still assaulting my rebuilt music collection too. About 1/7th is unrated in iTunes, which skews the shuffle functions unacceptably. I know, such travails. Bugs me, though.

Have laid in a bit of a store in Old Testament lately; it's not so much that I feel I was underserved in seminary, just more that my ambitions (all, and various) demand that I be able to field the area pretty well. Mostly I'm building toward OT history and suchlike. Working on Eugene Merrill's Kingdom of Priests, which is pretty good, a very conservative work, of course. The rigidity of most ''traditional'' exegesis get him seized up into knots in some of his dating exercises -- it's not just that he wants to defend the accuracy of the biblical accounts, it's that he can't let a single stray number go. Hilarity ensues, I assure you. The essential humor, to me, is that his overall case for the early/traditional date of the Exodus, which anchors so much of traditional exegesis, is pretty decent, and he links both internal and archaeological evidence carefully. The attempt to cram high-precision dating and exact figures into his ancient sources is highly incongruous. Nonetheless, it's a good read.

One of the other things I'm trying to work out of the OT accounts, esp. the critical period of the judges up to Solomon, is a sense of the Biblical perspective on justice and society -- specifically, the questions of the monarchy, violence, and whether an 'anarchist' stance is implicit in the Scripture. It rather seems to me that the only thing more critical than the 'in those days there was no king, and every man did what was right in his own eyes', is the word to Samuel, that 'they have not rejected you, but rather they have rejected me from being King over them.' The monarchy is apostasy, the kings are curses, the man of blood cannot build the sanctuary... Not sure how to put it together yet, but it does seem to hang together, phrased that way, no?

Look forward to mellowing weather again; not that there's any real hardship here, compared to civilized parts, but there's so much mellow weather around "spring" and "autumn" that I'd like to take advantage again and hop on the bike. Which I have to get fixed. batZ.

Anyroad, stay tuned for more shiny links, and if there's old amigos out there who're blogging, drop me a line, eh?

we're overwhelmed by some sensation
of something long ago
and far away