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discussion

Finding a book about the people of the Bible

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brenda
Jul 17 2008
03:37 pm

A couple of the ones that come to mind are:

Frederick Buechner’s book, [i:057f188238]Peculiar Treasures[/i:057f188238]. In this book, he just gives glimpses of several characters in the Bible, highlighting certain events in a character’s life and/or trying to re-paint their story for today. It would be a great book to draw people further into the Bible, to see things that they might have missed or never known, as well as helping the Bible become more real.
I’m not sure if Buechner has another similar book, although I have a sense he does.

Ellie Wiesel,‘s book [i:057f188238]Messengers of God[/i:057f188238] might also be ideal.I haven’t read this, although I have heard about it. It provides a lot longer (and fewer) insights into certain characters of the Bible and can be somewhat speculative at times. However, it would make the reader think more about what is happening in the story. It also provides a significant amount of commentary from Jewish sources, so that could be also something of interest.

And the final suggestion/possibility that I have is Rabbi Joseph Telushkin’s book, [i:057f188238]Biblical LIteracy[/i:057f188238]. Its goal is to provide people with further insight into the Bible – and thus is not only character centred, but goes more through the text and stories, although it does touch on certain people at certain times. This source provides a lot of insight into the text without being as speculative about the characters (unless you call Jewish commentary on the text speculative).

So hopefully one of the above will help.

Brenda