Medicine Hat Joe

Week 22  Ecclesiastes

One of the reasons I read the bible is to help myself find answers to questions. The bible is complicated and since I prefer simplicity I’m hoping for a gradual process of decomplicating the things I read.
In my experience the bible does explain & unravel some things. But other things stay pretty obscure – or are maybe only partially clarified. So I end up being partly in the light and partly in the fog.
I think there’s a good chance that over time some things that are already fairly understandable will get even more clear for me and that genuinely obscure questions might get a bit less fuzzy. But my suspicion is that even if I had 10,000 years to mull over the bible’s content I’d still end up with some cryptic hangers-on – vague & hidden & still unresolved. I’m pretty sure that my 10,000-year bible reading plan wouldn’t resolve everything.
I figure two things:
First is that I’ve got to make my peace with the inevitable mental-psychic vacuums. Try not to throw up my hands. Accept reality.
Second thing though is to working-away at trying to see whether the void has anything at all to divulge. It could be that it doesn’t. But who knows? And even if I can’t get to the bottom of a complicated thing it’s (likely) helpful to recognize that some things don’t have a bottom I can get to.

 

 

Week 22  Job 41

I was thinking about Leviathan.
I realized yesterday that I really couldn’t say for sure what a Leviathan was. At first I thought my problem was solved when my bible had a note in the margin that said Leviathan meant “crocodile”. But when I checked other bible versions I found most did not use to the more well-known & familiar word crocodile. They preferred Leviathan.
I checked a cross-reference to one of the very few other references in the bible to Leviathan: you (the Lord) crushed the heads of Leviathan; you gave him as food for the creatures of the wilderness. The bible’s margin said that Leviathan was a sea monster and not – as it said in Job – a crocodile.
In the only other psalm where Leviathan is mentioned the margin said Leviathan was a sea monster. I’m tempted to think the word monster might be being used here as a kind of exaggeration-for-emphasis (for instance “that wrestler is a real monster”). But I’m not so sure when is see the expression the heads of Leviathan. Why ‘heads’? I check other versions. Most of them agree that Leviathan had heads – plural.
So now Leviathan is sounding less like a crocodile and more like something else. A one-off. A solo act: nothing on earth is like him, one made without fear. He looks on everything that is high; he is king over all the sons of pride.

Note: quotes from Psalm 74:14 & Job 41:33-34 (NASB). And see Psalm 104:26

Week 21  Job 38-41

Chapters 38 & 39 have a long section that I think of as the Animal Episode. A bunch of animals are discussed: lions ravens goats deer donkeys oxen ostriches horses & hawks. 33-verses about animals.
The Animal Episode seems to end there and the next chapter moves on to another topic – a short (but serious) conversation between Job and the Lord. But then for some reason the rest of chapter 40 & all of 41 goes back to animals. This time it’s a short list of just two animals: Behemoth & Leviathan. 40-verses about them.
The margin of my bible says that Behemoth is a hippopotamus and that Leviathan is a crocodile. It looks like the two weird creatures are regular animals but I check a couple of dozen other versions for Leviathan. Only one of them said crocodile (a couple of them used sea monster). If Leviathan is a crocodile why not just use crocodile?
I checked online looking for Leviathan and saw that Leviathan was thought to be a demonic sea serpent. And Behemoth? A primitive chaos-monster. So this sounds more-and-more like Behemoth isn’t a regular hippopotamus and Leviathan isn’t a regular crocodile.
Leviathan is used just six times in the bible. And Behemoth? Just this once. Making them pretty rare species in the bible.
With lions ravens goats deer donkeys oxen ostriches horses & hawks I figure I’m on pretty safe zoological grounds. But with Leviathan & Behemoth I think I’m getting out of my depth.

Note: Behemoth & Leviathan info from Wikipedia.

Week 21  The Psalms

In one way I’m glad to be finished reading the psalms. But in another way it seems too bad. I’ve been reading one psalm per day since January and I’ve gotten into a bit of a nice reading-rhythm.
I remember that a couple of years ago I was reading where a guy suggested devoting time each day to a psalm. Not just a couple of minutes. He recommended spending 30-minutes of reading & reflecting time. I thought it was a good idea and wondered about trying it. But in the end I didn’t.
There are 150 psalms and if I spent 30-minutes a day on each psalm that alone would be 75 hours. I remembered that it takes a bit less than three days to read the whole bible – something under 72 hours. So if I decided I wanted to read the bible and also spend 30-minutes a day on a psalm then I’d be increasing my ‘bible’ time to about 150 hours a year.
Thinking about it I figure I’d have to make a choice: either a) read the bible through or b) think about / meditate on one psalm each day. But I realize that would only be the case if I decided that 75 hours was my ironclad maximum. If 75 was negotiable I could carve out time from one of my daily time-waster commitments. I have a couple of those.

Note: a man named D. Bonhoeffer made the 30-minutes per psalm suggestion.

Week 21  Psalm 1-150

It’s the 142nd day of 2025.
Back on January 1 after I read Psalm 1 I got a fresh sheet of paper. At the top I wrote: 2025 Psalms. Below that I wrote the number 1. Now 142 days & 4 1/2 columns later I wrote the number 150. I made the list for two reasons. One was  to keep track of what psalm I’d read. The other was to look for highlight psalms – if a psalm was exceptional it got a checkmark . I look at the list now and see that I check-marked 11 out of the 150 psalms: 1 8 15 16 33 34 37 49 73 103 & 139.
I’ve been reading the same bible for several years and I’ve red underlined the psalms I thought were good. So I decided to cross-check and compare Then & Now. I page through my bible looking for red-underlined titles. There are twenty-five: 16 19 20 31 32 34 36 37 39 42 44 46 49 50 51 65 66 73 78 89 90 103 106 139 & 145.
I see that Psalms 16 34 37 49 73 103 & 139 are on my 2025 list and are red-underlined.
Looking at those seven psalms I don’t know what to make of it. I don’t think I can draw any definitive conclusions. About all I can say is that seven psalms that I liked in 2025 were psalms that I liked in the past.
One other thing I notice is that psalm 73 is the only one with two checkmarks on my 2025 list. And I was surprised to see in my print bible it was red-underlined twice. So Psalm 73 impressed me on more than one occasion.

 

Week 21  Psalm 147

Great is the Lord and mighty in power; his understanding has no limits.
So…the Lord’s understanding has no limits. I check a couple of other versions and I see the same thing. The Lord’s understanding is beyond comprehension. It’s beyond measure. It’s infinite & boundless & beyond-all-telling & has no end.
A couple of things come to mind.
First thing is that the Lord’s power & understanding puts me at a distinct and worrisome disadvantage.
Second thing is that one practical result of the Lord’s unlimited understanding-of-things is that I should – realistically & common-sensically – be referring to him to find out his view.  I should – technically speaking – be adopting a high degree of deference to the Lord. Given this state-of-affairs it would be stupid for me to advise the Lord or make recommendations to him. He’s the consultant & I’m the consultee. He’s the advisor & I’m the advisee. Director-directee. Counselor-counselee. Mentor-mentee. Leader-follower. Teacher-student.
That’s not to say I can’t just decide to usurp the Lord’s position and flip things back-to-front. But if I did that I’d want to be pretty sure about a couple of things:
1. that the Lord isn’t as great as advertised
2. that he doesn’t have incontestable power
3. that his understanding – extensive as it might be – has limitations.
If I could be certain about those three things then I’d be more confident about becoming my own advisor.

Note: quote from Psalm 147:5 (NIV)

Week 21  Psalm 147

It usually catches my attention when a writer puts together a list. One example is right here in the first paragraph of 147:
The Lord builds up Jerusalem
He gathers the outcasts of Israel
He heals the brokenhearted
He binds up their wounds
He determines the number of the stars (and) he gives to all of them their names
Great is our Lord, and abundant in power; his understanding is beyond measure
The Lord lifts up the humble
He casts the wicked to the ground.
There are eight items in the list (or maybe ten items depending on how I dissect the sentences).
I see right away that verses 2 3 & 6 go together pretty well. But verses 4 & 5 seem out-of-place. The list looks like it mixes elements.
I’m not saying the items are incompatible. Not saying the Lord can’t be both the Determiner of Stars and also be concerned about needy people. But the list isn’t quite as tidy & coherent as I’d like it to be. So I’m wondering: why didn’t the writer just make separate lists?
Anyway even though I have this issue that (I think) might be a compositional glitch the bigger thing for me today is the reminder that the Lord is keenly aware of people’s needs. I’ve seen this idea again-and-again in the psalms. The Lord is attentive to the needs of people…and especially attentive to the needs of really needy people.

Note: quote from Psalm 147:2-6 (ESV very slightly revised)

Week 20  Psalm 143

Near the end of the psalm there are four phrases:
Let me experience your faithful love…for I trust in you
Reveal to me the way I should go…because I appeal to you
Rescue me from my enemies…I come to you for protection
Teach me to do your will…for you are my God.
I flip-flop the phrases:
I trust in you. So let me experience your faithful love
I appeal to you. So reveal to me the way I should go
I come to you for protection. So rescue me from my enemies
You are my God. So teach me to do your will.
But it doesn’t change things. Backwards or forwards I still have two elements: a) a request for something from the Lord and b) a reason for why the Lord should respond.
I’m interested in the mechanics of praying and I wonder if this pattern is mandatory. Do I have to give the Lord a reason?
What makes sense to me – for now – are these three guidelines:
I think that a) is more important than b)
I think that even though a) and b) are both worth having a) is essential and b) is optional
I don’t think the Lord needs b). But he does need the a).
I figure I’m on reasonably safe ground with these ideas. I might discover something later that does – or doesn’t – solidify things for me. But I can rejigger.

Note: quote from Psalm 143:8-10 (CSB slightly revised)

 

Week 20  Psalm 135

The verse said: for the Lord will judge His people and will have compassion on His servants. In some previous year I’d underlined the word ‘judge’. So I decided to check the verse in a couple of other versions. What I found was this:
Three of the versions used the exact same language: the Lord will vindicate his people and have compassion on his servants
The other one said: the Lord will give justice to his people and have compassion on his servants.
Hmmm…judging & vindicating. I decided to check a bunch of other versions. I found 19 translations that used the word ‘vindicate’. 17 others used ‘judge’. A pretty even split.
Having versions flip-flop the words ‘vindicate’ & ‘judge’ was a bit of a concern to me. In the modern world vindicate has the idea of me being in a jam but then I get acquitted. Absolved. Exonerated. Pardoned. Released. Getting judged has the sense of some judge weighing evidence – pros and cons – before forming his opinion. He thinks & weighs & deliberates & decides – but he might go one way or he might go another.
So for me judging is sitting down to think and make a decision. With vindicating a decision has already been made. Which seem like two related – but different – things.
I figure translators have good reasons for their word choices. But I know I’d prefer being vindicated than judged.

Note: quote from Psalm 135:14 (NASB CSB ESV NIV NLT)

Week 19  Nehemiah 8

There was a big public gathering in this chapter where Moses’ laws were read out loud to the crowd. Nehemiah says that the readers explained the law. But in the next verse he breaks down the process into several steps. The readers: read from the book, from the law of God, translating (the note in the margin says explaining) to give the sense so that they (the audience) understood the reading.
I wanted to see how other bible versions described this event so I looked at four other translations. They were all pretty consistent in breaking down the exercise into Four Steps:
• Step 1: the readers read the words of the Law
• Step 2: the readers then translated (or clarified or interpreted) the text (the different versions used different words)
• Step 3: the meaning was explained (so a jump was made – a pretty important jump – from What-Does-the-Text-Say? (Step 2) to What-Does-the-Text-Mean? (Step 3)
• Step 4: the final outcome? Hopefully it was understanding.
I negotiate Steps 1 & 2 & 3 so I can get to Step 4.
These steps make complete sense to me. Each day I start by reading. I do my best to make sure I’m clear about the words and the language. Then I can discover the meaning of those words & the meaning of the whole passage. Finally – if I’m successful – I understand.

Note: quotes from Nehemiah 8:7 & 8 (NASB). The other versions I checked were: CSB ESV NIV & NLT. I posted on this chapter five years ago May 18/20 ‘reading the law’.