by Andy Roland | Sep 21, 2022 | Bible, History of Israel and Judah
1 The Musical Solomon In 1748 Handel composed the oratorio ‘Solomon’, based on the stories about him in the Bible. The music is glorious. But it takes far too rosy a view of Solomon himself: “From the east unto the west,Who so wise as Solomon?Who like Israel’s...
by Andy Roland | Aug 19, 2022 | Bible
In 2017 ‘Bible in Brief’ got published. In 2022 I am still discovering the benefits of my website. Here’s the story. PUTTING THE CART BEFORE THE HORSE Normal practice is to write a book and then seek a publisher. I did it the other way round. Chris...
by Andy Roland | Aug 4, 2022 | Bible, Church, Psalms
Bishop Tor and me JULY 2022 PSALMS AND PILGRIMAGE SPECIAL DAYS The end of teh month was all about psalms and pilgrimage. The first two and a half weeks had several special days in them. Our son Peter and his girlfriend Helen stayed with his grandfather for a...
by Andy Roland | Jul 18, 2022 | Bible
TOO LONG, TOO CONFUSING, TOO VIOLENT ? INTRODUCTION “I don’t read the Bible because it is too long and too complicated.” That’s what I put on the back cover of my first book, ‘Bible in Brief’. I wrote the book explicitly to help people who...
by Andy Roland | Jun 14, 2022 | Bible, Pentecost
WHERE? I made my first visit to Jerusalem in December 1963. It was then split between Israel and Jordan, and I had no access to the Old City. The owner of the Holyland Hotel in West Jerusalem had compensated by creating a very large model of 1st...
by Andy Roland | May 29, 2022 | Bible
Sapiens In his magisterial book ‘Sapiens’ (2011) the Israeli historian Harari sets out to cover the whole of human history. The crucial period was the Cognitive Revolution of 70,000 to 30,000 BCE. Suddenly (in a geological sense) Homo Sapiens was able to...
