One of my classes this term is studying the history of Israel, beginning with the patriarchs and moving through the monarchy to the exile and beyond. It's fascinating and I'm so thankful for the opportunity to really sit down and sort through all of the details of the history of this chosen nation. And, please, if you know me personally, feel free to remind me that I said this as I'm grumbling my way through one of the intense writing assignments that is required for this class!
As I study, though, one thing comes to mind that has flitted across my thoughts in the past: what's with these royal names? We start with Saul, which is fine. Next we have David, still not a problem. Then Solomon. Okay, another syllable has been added but nothing too difficult. Not long after that, it starts to go downhill. Oh, sure, the names may still be fairly easy to pronounce, and there may be an easy one thrown in along the way, but so many of these names sound alike that they start to all mesh together inside a wee brain like my own. Toss in the rulers of places like Assyria and Egypt and you have one large tongue twister.
So while those names may have been well and good at the time, I'm thinking they just aren't helpful or relevant to our ultra-hip Christian church today. That is why I am considering pitching the idea to the publishers of
The Message so-called 'bible' that they make some alterations to these multisyllabic names in the next edition of their aberrant 'translation.' There is no reason that we can't be reading about King Jack, King Bob or King Brad.
The Message already distorts, diminishes and even deletes extremely important portions of the biblical text, that something as minor as changing a few names shouldn't be that big of a deal, right? And if
The Message won't do it, then maybe I'll just write up my own bible 'translation.' Hey, if Eugene Peterson can do it, why can't I?
Okay, I suppose instead of altering the biblical text, I could just come up with a clever way to remember all of these interesting names. While I work on that, please sit back and enjoy your week in review (kind of):