[This was first posted May 24,2012. Updated for this repost. —Admin1.]     “Inconvenience” is defined by the dictionary as “trouble or difficulty caused to one’s personal requirements or comfort” and, may we add, difficulty caused to one’s desire to do as he wishes.  God’s Truth is inconvenient to the man who would rather ignore […]

[This was first posted May 28, 2012.  Recently Sinaites had a discussion about details of this narrative and none of us could remember exactly how old Noah was before and after the flood, how many years did it take him to build the ark . . . we don’t blame our forgetfulness on so-called ‘senior […]

[This was first posted October 25, 2014.  These are introductions to the first book comprising the TORAH.  They are from two of our MUST READ/MUST HAVE resources:   one is from our translation of choice — Everett Fox (EF), The Five Books of Moses while the second is from Robert Alter (RA) who has also done his […]

[NASB]   And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed; He shall bruise you on the head, And you shall bruise him on the heel.   [AST] I will put enmity between you and the woman,  and between your offspring and her offspring.  He will pound your head, […]

[This is a wild guess, but there must have been 8 or more pharaohs throughout the whole 430 years that the Israelites were destined to live in Egypt. Why 8 and not 5,  wouldn’t the pharaohs have enjoyed longevity just like other biblical figures? They could, if they followed the biblical diet.     A […]

This chapter concludes the Book of Beginnings.   A commentator noted how gloriously this book began with the Creator speaking “In the beginning . . . “ and how the book sadly ended with this final phrase:  “a coffin in Egypt.”  Thus ends the story of the patriarchal stage in the formation of a people ‘set […]

[For gentiles like us to read these blessings, we feel like someone eavesdropping on a phone conversation where we can hear only one side and we don’t know what they’re talking about.  What is Jacob referring to in some of these blessings?  We don’t dare make bigger fools of ourselves, this is where we defer […]

[As usual, in our thinking aloud while rereading the final chapters in this book of beginnings . . . Here is yet another switching of the younger for the older son in the bestowal of blessing upon the firstborn.   As dim as the eyes of Jacob were and even with Joseph’s guidance on which […]