Yes, excited!
Excitement is what we send you from Jerusalem for the year of grace 2023,
Dear colleagues, collaborators and friends.
The construction of our biblical studies cathedral continues to progress, and the month of greetings is an excellent opportunity to give you an update on the first semester.
In Jerusalem, at the heart of the École Biblique :
- The assistants are at their workstations, making progress in the revision of our translation and in the enrichment of our annotations. The weekly latin bible translation seminar has benefited from the insights of prof. Kevin Zilverberg, who was teaching and researching at the École in the first semester.
- The editorial committee meets every Friday. We received from prof. Marc Girard a progress report on his work on the Psalter: his impressive book 1, at the end of a sustained editorial collaboration with Bieke Mahieu, the general assistant of the Program, is being edited by Peeters.
- Thanks to the tireless work of fr. Marc Leroy, our book on Paul will finally see the light of day during this month of January (see the “Books” section of our blog). Finally, to meet the expectations of friends who want to know our work, we are experimenting with a series of lectures, the “Pépites from the Bible in its Traditions”.
- For a change, we present recent or ongoing activities of some members of the editorial board: fr Łukasz, fr. Olivier, fr. Olivier-Thomas, as well as a vision of our program by fr. Jorge.
In other news, friends participated in international research:
- À Haïfa, Gad Barnéa, one of the developers of our program, now a doctor of the university, convened in mid-December an important symposium on Yahwism in the Achaemenid Empire.
- Several of you have published works related (more or less) to The Bible in its Traditions.
Of course, digital development continues: developed by Spyrit, the English version of our portal is available. Thanks to Pierre Hennequart, our multimedia library has been enriched with new tools that make it easier to manage the thousands of records it now contains. And fr. Kevin Stephens has just arrived for three months of intensive development.
This beautiful “Emerald Heart” nimbed with red, a work of Mangù, an important painter of our time who joined us with several remarkable paintings, is a symbol of living Hope :
Beyond all difficulties, the activity of the workers in the Vineyard of the Lord continues!
Fr Olivier-Thomas Venard o.p., director of La Bible en ses Traditions, and the Steering Committee