Friday, October 18, 2013

A note on Year D's Old Testament and alternative gospel lections

I think a reply to Steve Thorngate may be in order where the Old Testament selections in Year D are concerned. By conceding that a greater degree of subjectivity may well be involved in making these selections, I simply meant that this is an inevitable result of having to work from a much broader field of possibilities as we find in the larger testament. I did not mean to suggest these were purely subjective selections. Readers should not overlook the textual evidence of literary and thematic connections between Old and New Testament passages that I have identified and enumerated in Chapter 4.

Perhaps I should also add that, in suggesting a fresh body of gospel texts, other than the familiar and well used narratives, for the high holy days, I am not suggesting the preacher neglect the story, but that these alternative texts can lend a new revelatory angle on the familiar story that, owing to the occasion, is (for many people) already in mind. 

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