The Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society's "Revelation: Its Grand Climax at Hand!" is a fairly substantial commentary of John's Apocalypse (319 pages) that claims wide distribution, with apparently 16.6 million copies in its various incarnations printed in 51 languages by the time of the 1988 edition in my possession...

John Lennon's debut solo album, John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band (1970), includes the remarkable "God." The former Beatles' well known distrust of religion is on display in this album as he announces "There ain't no Jesus gonna come / from the sky" ("I Found Out"), likens Jesus and Paul with junkies...

Stories involving metamorphoses of people into new states of existence are ancient and widely represented in literature -- at least since the Latin writer Ovid (43 B.C.E.-17 C.E.) gathered up his collection of tales about "bodies ... transformed into shapes of a different kind" -- and they remain surprisingly commonplace...

The American naturalist William Bartram published his account of travels in North and South Carolina, Georgia, and East and West Florida in 1791. His book Travels is a remarkable text combining scientific reporting, complete with Linnaean taxonomies of excruciating detail, and surprising poetic flourishes. One quickly grows accustomed to reading...

Zombies loom large in popular culture these days. Max Brooks' "World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War" (2006), the Jane Austen, Seth Grahame-Smith mashup "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies" (2009), and Melissa Marr's "Graveminder" (2011), to name but a few recent novels, enjoy a wide readership. There...

The charming and occasionally humorous Book of Tobit appears in the Greek Septuagint and has a place in the Roman Catholic and Orthodox (Greek and Russian) canonical traditions. The setting of this fairy tale-like romance is Nineveh in the late eighth and early seventh centuries B.C.E. where the titular character...

Gerard Genette's "Paratexts: Thresholds of Interpretation" (1997) calls attention to an aspect of reading not often considered, namely those elements of books separate from the text proper that contribute to, and even shape a reader's experience of the work. He coins various terms to help identify extra-textual items found on...

During the 2011 leg of U2's 360 tour, Burmese activist, author, Nobel Peace Prize laureate (1991) and long-time political prisoner Aung San Suu Kyi greeted audiences by video, thanking them for their support. Aung San Suu Kyi has fought tirelessly for human rights and the restoration of democracy...

Anne is that other Brontë, easily and often overlooked next to her better-known sisters Charlotte and Emily, the authors of Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights respectively. For readers interested in the intersections of theology, the Bible, and creative writing, however, Anne Brontë's two novels, poetry, and correspondence offer a wealth...

In 2008, HarperCollins published The Green Bible, an edition that raises awareness of environmental concerns and promotes good stewardship of the earth. Its most distinguishing trait is the use of green font for passages mentioning the environment, including animals. Look up Deuteronomy 25:4 in that edition and you see the...

February 7, 2012 is Charles Dickens' two hundredth birthday, an occasion recognized by all manner of tributes and celebrations (see e.g., http://www.dickens2012.org/). To get into the spirit of things, I started this bicentenary year by rereading that perennial favourite Oliver Twist; or the Parish Boy's Progress (1838). There...

Heavy metal regularly mines Christian discourse for its often-otherworldly style of lyrical storytelling, and occasionally, buried deep in the mix and obscured by the roar of power cords, we find clever, witty and thoughtful dialogue with the Bible. This often involves rewriting and repackaging its terms and narratives in support...

The austere Malvolio in William Shakespeare's Twelfth Night, or What you Will is a classic wet blanket, an insufferable moralist quick to find fault in others and voice disapproval when they have too much fun. The mischievous and fun-loving Maria calls him "a kind of puritan." Few take him seriously....

Each mortal thing does one thing and the same:
Deals out that being indoors each one dwells;
Selves -- goes itself; myself it speaks and spells,
Crying What I do is me: for that I came.
--Gerard Manley Hopkins, "As Kingfishers Catch Fire" (1877)

Though writing...

Do Christians have moral obligations to animate creation? Many say no, citing the mandate to "have dominion" over all living things (Genesis 1:28) as reason enough to dismiss notions of animal welfare as a religious obligation. This verse is unambiguous, they argue, demonstrating that animals are a gift from God,...

The highlight of the academic calendar for me is the Society of Biblical Literature's annual meeting. SBL is "the oldest and largest learned society devoted to the critical investigation of the Bible from a variety of academic disciplines" (http://sbl-site.org/aboutus.aspx). Its annual conference "is the largest gathering of biblical...

Ah yes, the beginning of a new school year. There is always such good energy on campus when students arrive, and, as is often the case, a new semester gets me thinking about my own educational path and the reasons why I do what I do. Ultimately, I blame it...

Arcade Fire's 2010 album The Suburbs is a commercial and critical success, winning a Grammy for Album of the Year among other accolades. For those who enjoy exploring religious dimensions in poplar culture, this Montreal-based band has much to offer, with clever lyrics every bit as original as their distinctive...

It is fascinating when musicians use songs to communicate religious ideas. Audiences may or may not pay attention but there are many examples of the attempt. Consider, for instance, George Harrison's posthumous Brainwashed (2002), a welcome gift to fans still grieving the loss of the silent Beatle who died Nov....

Like many who follow religion in the media, I found it hard to look away when reports of Harold Camping's doomsday scenario began circulating.

The Family Radio Bible teacher announced the world would end on May 21, 2011, and just as it was with William Miller and a thousand...