I sat down with Jione Havea to discuss his new book, Losing Ground. We discuss the book of Ruth, reading it amidst climate catastrophe, how Jione built this book through talanoa and bible studies with Pasifika people across Australia, Aotearoa, and the Pacific, opening up academic biblical studies, and how this book "seeks to make any notions of white supremacy absurd."
Read MoreI spoke to Ali Robinson about teaching the New Testament, that little book of Jude, harsh language, conflict, and struggling to stick to a topic of research.
Read MoreI sat down with U-Wen Low to talk about the Book of Revelation as drama, resistance literature, and message of hope. We also discuss postcolonialism in biblical studies, and how he found himself in the middle of all this fascinating (if not highly controversial) research.
Read MoreI sat down with Rhiannon Graybill to talk about how we tell biblical rape stories and how we might tell rape stories differently (content warnings for discussions of rape and sexual violence). We discuss the twofold sense of "after": 1) after Phyllis Trible and related approaches of feminist biblical interpretation, and 2) after the event of terror (as in not letting the suffering or darkness of the texts consume all the interpretive space around them). We also discuss her framework of fuzzy, messy, and icky, as well as what it means to do unhappy readings. Along the way we explore the Graybill's use of millennial and Gen Z women's fiction, why predation might not be the best fit when talking about King David, and why we need more than more than consent as the arbiter of whether a story is a rape story.
Read MoreI spoke with Anne Elvey about her new book, Reading the Magnificat in Australia. We discuss her approach to the project as a poet and biblical scholar who has creatively engaged the Magnificat for many years, and how this combination connects to a hermeneutics of creative imagination and need for creative writing to 'turn the breath' toward empathy and resistance. We talk about keeping an aspect of unknowing central to the book's epistemological frame and the hermeneutic of restraint. I also ask about how the Magnificat offers a call to "reconfigure the learned desire of the will of white possession", and finally the concept of entanglement as a way toward a broader (less anthropocentric) reading and rewriting of Magnificat.
Read More"Paul is probably the least interesting thing about Paul’s letters." I sat down with Joseph Marchal to talk the way his book reaches past questions of what Paul 'thought' (or how his texts can be read in 'inclusive' ways) toward far more fascinating queer figures before and after his letters: "androgynes, eunuchs, slaves, and barbarians—each depicted as perversely gendered and strangely embodied figures in their own distinctive, though interrelated ways”. We discuss his intentionally anachronistic style of juxtaposition, and how this leads his work on 1 Corinthians 11 and Paul's concerns about the women prophesying, to considerations of ancient figures of androgyny and contemporary work on female masculinity. And much, much more!
Read MoreHow does Luke's understanding of the end of history reshape experience in the present? I sat down with Kylie Crabbe to talk Luke/Acts, eschatology, history, and how ancient writers make sense of negative experience. I also ask Kylie to argue the case for Luke as the best gospel and attempt to disprove the theory that Acts is actually kind of boring.
Read MoreI sat down with Josh Jipp to talk about the messianic identity of Jesus as the presupposition for and primary content of New Testament theology. We discuss balancing unity and plurality within the New Testament, the benefits and risks of centring the messianic identity in light of the history of Christian supersessionism, the kind of kingdom this messiah brings, and (just in time for Easter) how the Passion narratives establish Jesus' messianic identity - hint, it has much more to do with the Psalmist's Davidic King than Isaiah's suffering servant.
Read MoreI sat down with Vicky Balabanski to discuss her Eco-Stoic reading of Colossians; a new addition to the Earth Bible Commentary Series with T&T Clark. We talk about stoicism – the ins and outs, its popularity in the New Testament era, and how it shapes the letter to the Colossians. We then pick up how an eco-stoic reading can guide the church trying to untangle itself from certain assumptions, readings, and patterns that contributed to the ecological crisis we now face and lead us into action.
Read MoreIs it possible for the exploited and their allies to reclaim the Bible from the dominant powers?
I sat down with Steve Heinrichs, Director of Indigenous-Settler Relations for the Mennonite Church Canada, to talk about Unsettling the World: Biblical Experiments in Decolonisation, a volume he edited, out now through Orbis Books.
In Unsettling the Word over 60 Indigenous and Settler authors come together to wrestle with Scripture, reimagining ancient texts for reparative futures. With poem, essay, art, proverb, and provocation this is an excellent and essential work.
In this episode we discuss Steve's own journey with Scripture and decolonisation, how this work came together, what surprised him in its compilation, how churches in settler-colonial contexts might start hard, but necessary conversations, what his job entails, and much much more.
Read MoreI sat down with Benjamin D. Sommer, Professor of Bible and Ancient Semitic Languages at the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York. I ask him what happened at Sinai... which is a far more complicated question than you may have previously noticed. We discuss participatory revelation, dissolving the line between Scripture and Tradition, practices of close reading, the way Biblical texts destabalise their own authority whilst maintaining a commitment to Law, and whether we must privilege the redactor over the other voices in Scripture? Listen in iTunes // Watch on YouTube
Read More“All Torah, ancient, medieval, and modern, is a response to the event at Sinai”
I sat down with Melissa Florer-Bixler to talk her new book Fire By Night: finding God in the pages of the Old Testament. This is an exceptional, exciting, and accessible work, drawing us into the nuance, beauty, and challenge of the OT in order to draw us deeper into the life of God. We talk about reading slowly, how difficult texts often reveal parts of ourselves we’d rather turn away from, holiness, justice, Sodom and Gomorrah, and how the Mennonite practice of testimony fits well with the nature of debate and conversation within the pages of the OT. Also, we recorded this a day after the Oscars, so we talk about our desire for a Jael movie. Listen in iTunes // Watch on YouTube
This is a special episode, co-presented with Insights, the magazine of the Uniting Church in Australia Synod of NSW/ACT.
Read More“From page to page, chapter to chapter, book to book, we encounter the human and divine in the same verse, the same ink, as one bleeds into the other.”
“The first rule is to read slowly”
I interviewed Rabbi Shai Held, author of the two-volume The Heart of Torah: Essays on the Weekly Torah Portion. We discuss the character of love in the Torah, the importance of human responsibility, finding theological gems in unexpected places, reading characters as archetypes, particularism and universalism in a pluralistic age, and Judaism’s greatest gamble… also, why we need an Isaac movie.
This is a special episode of Love Rinse Repeat, co-presented with Insights, the magazine of the Uniting Church in Australia’s Synod of New South Wales and the ACT. Listen in iTunes / Watch on YouTube
Read MoreI spoke with Austen Hartke, author of the new book: Transforming: the Bible and the Lives of Transgender Christians. It is a wonderful book, and this discussion gives a great insight into why it is so essential for our times. We talk about what it is like to write a book with helplines in the back, how conversations and the stories of others shape a theological work, what Biblical story Austen would turn into a movie, why the book centres on Biblical studies/exegesis, the connection of experience between Eunuchs in the ancient world and Transgender Christians today, the importance of the body in the New Testament, and a life lived beyond apologetics. Listen in iTunes
Read MoreI sat down with Wil Gafney to talk about her new book Womanist Midrash: A Reintroduction to the Women of the Torah and the Throne. We discuss what drew her to the Hebrew Bible, play some conceptual lightning round, ask her which woman from her book needs a major motion picture, discuss translation, the future of Womanist biblical studies, what its like to write a Biblical commentary, how the Hebrew Bible emphasis on remembering can inform contemporary debates about monuments and history, and I introduce a new segment centred on Amazon reviews... we talk about a LOT, and its a whole bunch of fun. Listen in iTunes
Read MoreA (hopefully) fun, provocative, and encouraging site where I sharing thoughts (blog, talk, video) on faith, world, and self. My name's Liam Miller, I have studied Theology, Social Sciences, and Acting. I enjoy reading radical theology (actually all kinds of theology) and telling stories - the two tend to intertwine on this site.
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