Centre for the Study of Bible & Violence
By CSBV director Helen Paynter The writer of the book of Kings gives us a glimpse of what you would have seen if you had been present in Jerusalem on a particular day in 970 BC. You would have heard
My family and I recently read 1 Samuel 14, the second half of which contains the somewhat odd story where Saul almost kills his son for sampling some local honey. Of course, there’s more to it than that. Saul makes
A few weeks ago in the UK there was an understandable outcry when the former chief schools inspector appeared to suggest that teachers should be prepared to sacrifice their lives in face of the Covid pandemic: “They’ve [health workers] gone
Helen Paynter is the director of the Centre for the Study of Bible and Violence, and a Baptist minister in Bristol, England. This reflection is based on Psalm 59 (see also 1 Sam 19:11), and Luke 22:39-53. In the message
As we approach another Easter, and prepare to tell again the story of the death and resurrection of Jesus, what message will we give about the reasons for the events of that momentous week ? For many preachers I suspect
Rev. Dr. Rhys Llwyd leads a Welsh speaking Baptist Church in Caernarfon, North Wales – Caersalem. Previously he studied for his doctorate in Bangor University where he looked at Christian Nationalism from a Welsh theological perspective. Guest blogs are invited
“The Chernobyl of Christian anti-semitism” This is how the late Israeli writer Amos Oz described the figure of Judas in the gospel stories. As we approach Easter, and our annual retelling of the passion story, maybe it is time to
Dr. Valerie Hobbs is Senior Lecturer in Applied Linguistics at the University of Sheffield. Her book, An Introduction to Religious Language, was published by Bloomsbury in 2021.Valerie has blogged for us several times, and also been a guest on our podcast series Guns
Paul Lusk is the author of The Jesus Candidate: Political religion in a secular age (Ekklesia, 2017). He warned that the extremist religious right was fostering ‘the self-indulgent romance of gratuitous violence.’ Before the 2020 US Presidential election, Paul wrote
Peter King trained at Bristol Baptist College and was ordained in 1988, serving for eight years at Eynsham Baptist Church, Oxfordshire. He now works for the Anglican Diocese of Chichester in adult theological education. He has been involved with the