Beneath the giant dome of the Mormon Tabernacle, the harmonious voices of the famous Mormon Tabernacle Choir rise into the air, melding sweetly. Whether it’s a Biblical hymn or a medley from The Music Man, each selection sung by the 330-member choir reverberates with a rare purity in this hallowed hall. Established in 1847, the…
Tag: Bible
Review: The Bible Is History
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Anyone attempting a serious book about the Bible’s status as history steps wilfully into a morass of difficulties. The first is what is meant by the word “Bible”? Is it the Tanach of the Jews (consisting of the 24 books of the Torah, Nevi’im and Ketuvim)? Does it include the later Christian testaments? The solution,…
Kohelet is a knotty and naughty book
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“Futility of futilities! All is futile!” I heard someone mutter recently while glancing up with darkened brow from the pages of Kohelet, the Biblical book also known as Ecclesiastes. The utterance was understandable, since most commentators, if they agree on anything at all about Kohelet, seem in accordance that it is a most vexing and…
Exodus Decoded features Toronto’s Indiana Jones
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Toronto filmmaker Simcha Jacobovici, in conjunction with Ontario-born film producer James (“Titanic”) Cameron, has produced a slick new two-hour television documentary about the Biblical Exodus that has more offbeat theories than The Da Vinci Code and more wizardry than anything you’ve ever seen in Harry Potter. The Exodus Decoded, which is scheduled for viewing on…
Prince of Egypt transforms the Exodus story
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Based on the Biblical story of the Exodus, Dreamworks Studio’s visually stunning animated musical The Prince of Egypt opens across North America during the lucrative Christmas market (1998), and the studio hopes to see profits on the $70 million production soon. The first full-length animated film to focus on a Biblical narrative, The Prince of…
A name riddle from the Bible
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Unnamed characters, such as Lot’s wife, Jephthah’s daughter, Pharoah’s baker and the medium of Endor, abound in the Bible. Why dispense with a name? Adele Reinhartz, currently on sabbatical from her position as professor in the Department of Religious Studies at McMaster University, has studied the question in depth. Her book “Why Ask My Name?”:…
Biblical novel set in 1st century
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Andrew Sanders, a resident of both Toronto and Haifa, is the author of a new work of historical fiction, Hanina My Son: A Novel of the First Century (Gefen, 2001), which has already appeared in Israel in Hebrew translation. Hanina My Son is set during a time of fighting between the Pharisees and Sadducees, the…
Harold Bloom’s Book of J
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She lived in Jerusalem almost 3,000 years ago, in the time of King Solomon and his hapless son and successor, Rehoboam. A contemporary of the historian who chronicled Solomon’s court, she wrote in the Phoenician-Old Hebrew script, probably using a reed pen on sheets of papyrus that were later glued into scrolls. Known to modern…
