Amos 4 – Amos calls the rich owners of livestock “cows of Bashan.” They oppress the poor and the needy. They “will be dragged out with hooks” and driven out in the direction of Assyria [not named but alluded to].

The superficial religious rites they participate in will not save them. Yahweh has sent famine, drought, fire and locusts but they do not come back to Yahweh. He sends plague and war and plundering, but they do not return. “This therefore, Israel, is…

Amos 3 – The prophet here addresses all of the tribes of Israel, those whom God has “chosen” on the earth to love in a special way. “You alone, of all the families of earth, have I acknowledged; therefore it is for all your sins that I mean to punish you” (3:2). The prophet’s call comes from God. It cannot be resisted and the prophet must proclaim what God has conveyed to him. “Therefore, the Lord Yahweh says this: An enemy [Assyria] is going to invade the country, your…

Amos 2 – Amos continues to “channel” God’s words to the wicked nations of Moab, Judah and Israel.

Judah has “rejected the Law of Yahweh and failed to keep his precepts, because the false gods which their ancestors followed have led them astray” (2:4).

Israel’s crimes are laid out in great detail: they have “sold the virtuous man for silver and the poor man for a pair of sandals” (2:6). They “trample on the heads of ordinary people and push the poor out…

I am a Communist because it is the logical outcome of my childhood Pentecostal faith in Jesus. I am a Communist, because Jesus was a Communist.

I am not a Christian, because Jesus was not a Christian. Jesus was a Jewish rabbi who mobilized a mass movement to usher in the Kingdom of Heaven on earth, that is Communism. Communism is the logical fulfillment of the teachings of Jesus.

The story of Pentecost was at the heart of my childhood faith. As the story goes, a group of 120…

Introduction to the Book of the Prophet Amos: Amos is the oldest of the “minor prophets” included in the Hebrew canon. The “minor prophets” were not necessarily less important than the “major prophets” but the texts were shorter. There were twelve book of “minor prophets” included in the Hebrew canon.

Amos was a shepherd from the town of Tekoa on the western bank of the Jordan in the northern kingdom where the religious center was Bethel. He preached under Jeroboam II…

When my Quaker minister* announced she was giving her message on darkness, I nearly fell off the pew. …

1 Maccabees 15 –Antiochus VII Sidetes, the younger brother of Demetrius II, sends a letter to Simon, asking for his help in re-establishing Seleucid strength. He promises to continue tax remissions that the Jews have enjoyed and he says he will permit them to mint their own coinage and to forgive all their debt. Some texts open the chapter with a reference to “Antiochus, son of King Demetrius” making it very confusing. They are both children of Demetrius I.

In 138 BC,…

 Saturday was a long day at Farmland Friends Church.  Indiana Yearly Meeting’s Representative Council gathered there to consider, in a meeting for worship for business, the recommendation of a Reconfiguration Task Force about whether and how the yearly meeting ought to divide itself. 

As weary Friends began their drives home late in the afternoon, no schism had been approved, but all knew in their bones we were several steps closer. 

I found myself thinking about what might…

1 Maccabees 14 – It is 140-139 BC, and Demetrius II, whose home-base is now the city of Seleucia [on the west bank of the Tigris River right at the point where the Tigris and Euphrates converge]. He ventures into Media to get help. The king of Persia, Mithridates I (called Arsaces VI here), defeats him and takes him captive.

There follows a peon of praise to Simon, some of which is here:

                      “He sought the good of…