"Sound Bytes" are quick-ish quotations that I come across that seem interesting and relevant for me to share, but I feel they do not require further comments or explanation at the time.
"In 1968 our progressive Jewish youth movement hosted a group of young Czech Jews for a conference near Edinburgh...We studied some Bible texts and they were incredibly good at understanding them, picking up all the nuances very quickly. I was surprised as they had never studied the Bible before. 'It's easy,' they explained. 'You see, in Czechoslovakia, when you read a newspaper, first you read what is written there. Then you say to yourself, "If that is what they have written, what really happened? And if that is what really happened, what are they trying to make us think? And if that it what they are trying to make us think, what should we be thinking instead?" You learn to read between the lines and behind the lines. You learn to read a newspaper as if your life depended upon understanding it--because it does!' Sometimes the same applies to the Bible, you just have to learn how to read."
-Jonathan Magonet, A Rabbi's Bible (London: SCM Press, 1991), 25; as quoted in Elisabeth Schussler Fiorenza, Rhetoric and Ethic (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1999), 14.
9 years ago
No comments:
Post a Comment