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The Son Of Laughter (novel)
''The Son of Laughter'' is the twelfth novel by the American author and theologian, Frederick Buechner. The novel was first published in 1993 by Harper, San Francisco. In the same year it was named ‘Book of the Year’ by the Conference on Christianity and Literature. Plot summary Buechner relays the well-known Genesis narrative from the perspective of his protagonist, Jacob, whose reminiscences on his life are rendered somewhat cloudy by his considerable age. Beginning in Mesopotamia, the narrator recounts his sojourn in the house of his uncle, Laban – a wealthy livestock owner, and worshipper of local deities. Jacob’s attempt to marry Laban’s beautiful youngest daughter, Rachel, is thwarted by his uncle, who tricks him into a union with his older daughter, Leah. Following several further years in the house of Laban, Jacob makes off with his wives, much of his uncle’s livestock, and, unbeknown to him hidden in Rachel’s tent, his household Gods. Following an emoti ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Frederick Buechner
Carl Frederick Buechner ( ; July 11, 1926 – August 15, 2022) was an American author, Presbyterianism, Presbyterian Minister (Christianity), minister, preacher, and theologian. The author of thirty-nine published books, his work encompassed different genres, including fiction, autobiography, essays and sermons, and his career spanned more than six decades. He was best known for his novels, including ''A Long Day's Dying'', ''The Book of Bebb'', ''Godric (novel), Godric'' (1981 Pulitzer Prize finalist), and ''Brendan (novel), Brendan'', his memoirs, including The Sacred Journey, ''The Sacred Journey'' and ''Telling Secrets (memoir), Telling Secrets,'' and his theological works, such as ''Secrets in the Dark: a life in sermons, Secrets in the Dark'', ''The Magnificent Defeat'', and ''Telling the Truth: the Gospel as tragedy, comedy, and fairy tale, Telling the Truth''. Buechner was named "without question one of the truly great writers of the 20th century" by viaLibri, a "major ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Abimelech
Abimelech (also spelled Abimelek or Avimelech; ) was the generic name given to all Philistine kings in the Hebrew Bible from the time of Abraham through King David. In the Book of Judges, Abimelech, son of Gideon, of the Tribe of Manasseh, is proclaimed king of Shechem after the death of his father. Etymology The name or title ''Abimelech'' is formed from Hebrew words for "father" and "king," and may be interpreted in a variety of ways, including "Father-King", "My father is king," or "Father of a king." In the Pentateuch, it is used as a title for kings in the land of Canaan. Abimelech can be translated in Arabic as well into "My father is king", "My father is owner" or "Father of a king," where () means father or my father while () means king or () for owner. At the time of the Amarna tablets (mid-14th century BC), there was an Egyptian governor of Tyre similarly named Abimilki, Abimelech of Gerar Abimelech was most prominently the name of a polytheistic king of G ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Writings On Faith And Fiction
Writing is a medium of human communication which involves the representation of a language through a system of physically inscribed, mechanically transferred, or digitally represented symbols. Writing systems do not themselves constitute human languages (with the debatable exception of computer languages); they are a means of rendering language into a form that can be reconstructed by other humans separated by time and/or space. While not all languages use a writing system, those that do can complement and extend capacities of spoken language by creating durable forms of language that can be transmitted across space (e.g. written correspondence) and stored over time (e.g. libraries or other public records). It has also been observed that the activity of writing itself can have knowledge-transforming effects, since it allows humans to externalize their thinking in forms that are easier to reflect on, elaborate, reconsider, and revise. A system of writing relies on many of t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
A Memoir
A, or a, is the first letter and the first vowel of the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''a'' (pronounced ), plural ''aes''. It is similar in shape to the Ancient Greek letter alpha, from which it derives. The uppercase version consists of the two slanting sides of a triangle, crossed in the middle by a horizontal bar. The lowercase version can be written in two forms: the double-storey a and single-storey ɑ. The latter is commonly used in handwriting and fonts based on it, especially fonts intended to be read by children, and is also found in italic type. In English grammar, " a", and its variant " an", are indefinite articles. History The earliest certain ancestor of "A" is aleph (also written 'aleph), the first letter of the Phoenician alphabet, which consisted entirely of consonants (for that reason, it is also called an abjad to distinguish it fro ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Brendan (novel)
''Brendan'' is the eleventh novel by the American author and theologian, Frederick Buechner. It was first published in 1987 by Atheneum, New York, and it won the Christianity and Literature Book Award for Belles-Lettres in the same year. Plot summary ''Brendan'' is a reimagining of the life of Brendan the Navigator, a fifth century Irish saint, ‘born in 484 in what is now Tralee, Ireland’, whose entrance into the world, as recalled by Bishop Erc, was attended by a miracle: the spontaneous combustion of a patch of nearby woodland. Erc's decision to set aside the life of the new-born child in service of the “new faith” sees Brendan separated from his parents, Finnloag and Cara, and raised ‘to the glory of the new and true grand God’, at the school of Abbot Jarlath. Equipped with Latin and accompanied by his childhood friend, Finn, the adolescent Brendan is sent out on a mission to bring a blessing to the castle at Cashel, where a new king is to be crowned. Their j ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Magnificent Defeat
''The Magnificent Defeat'' is a collection of meditations on Christianity and faith by Frederick Buechner. It was first conceived as a series of sermons, delivered at the Phillips Exeter Academy throughout 1959. It was subsequently published by Seabury Press, NY, in 1966. ''The Magnificent Defeat'' is Buechner’s first non-fiction publication. Composition Buechner delivered the sermons included in ''The Magnificent Defeat'' as the ‘new school minister’ at the Phillips Exeter Academy, a role he took in 1958 following his graduation from Union Theological Seminary, New York. In his autobiographical work, '' Now and Then'' (1983), Buechner reflects on the difficulties of writing and delivering sermons for a young and unreceptive audience, ‘most if not all of homwere there so much against both their wills and their principles’. He continues: ‘My job, as I saw it, was to defend the Christian faith against its “cultured despisers”, to use Schleiermacher’s phrase. To ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Potiphar
Potiphar ( ; Egyptian origin: ''pꜣ-dj-pꜣ-rꜥ'' "he whom Ra gave") is a figure in the Hebrew Bible and the Quran. Potiphar is possibly the same name as Potiphera () from Late Egyptian ''pꜣ-dj-pꜣ-rꜥ'' "he whom Ra has given." Potiphar is the captain of Pharaoh's guard who is said to have purchased Joseph as a slave and, impressed by his intelligence, makes him the master of his household. Potiphar's wife, who was known for her infidelities, took a liking to Joseph, and attempted to seduce him. When Joseph refused her advances, and ran off, leaving his outer vestment in her hands, she retaliated by falsely accusing him of trying to rape her, and Potiphar had Joseph imprisoned. What happened to Potiphar after that is unclear; some sources identify him as Potipherah, an Egyptian priest whose daughter, Asenath, marries Joseph. The false accusation by Potiphar's wife plays an important role in Joseph's narrative, because had he not been imprisoned, he would not have met the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Joseph (Genesis)
Joseph (; he, יוֹסֵף, , He shall add; Standard: ''Yōsef'', Tiberian: ''Yōsēp̄''; alternatively: יְהוֹסֵף, lit. 'Yahweh shall add'; Standard: ''Yəhōsef'', Tiberian: ''Yŏhōsēp̄''; ar, يوسف, Yūsuf; grc, Ἰωσήφ, Iōsēph) is an important figure in the Bible's Book of Genesis. He was the first of the two sons of Jacob and Rachel (Jacob's twelfth child and eleventh son). He is the founder of the Israelite Tribe of Joseph. His story functions as an explanation for Israel's residence in Egypt. He is the favourite son of the patriarch Jacob, and his jealous brothers sell him into slavery in Egypt, where he eventually ends up incarcerated. After correctly interpreting the dreams of Pharaoh, however, he rises to second-in-command in Egypt and saves Egypt during a famine. Jacob's family travel to Egypt to escape the famine, and it is through him that they are given leave to settle in the Land of Goshen (the eastern part of the Nile Delta). The compo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Benjamin
Benjamin ( he, ''Bīnyāmīn''; "Son of (the) right") blue letter bible: https://www.blueletterbible.org/lexicon/h3225/kjv/wlc/0-1/ H3225 - yāmîn - Strong's Hebrew Lexicon (kjv) was the last of the two sons of Jacob and Rachel (Jacob's thirteenth child and twelfth and youngest son) in Jewish, Christian and Islamic tradition. He was also the progenitor of the Israelite Tribe of Benjamin. Unlike Rachel's first son, Joseph, Benjamin was born in Canaan according to biblical narrative. In the Samaritan Pentateuch, Benjamin's name appears as "Binyamēm" ( Samaritan Hebrew: , "son of days"). In the Quran, Benjamin is referred to as a righteous young child, who remained with Jacob when the older brothers plotted against Joseph. Later rabbinic traditions name him as one of four ancient Israelites who died without sin, the other three being Chileab, Jesse and Amram. Name The name is first mentioned in letters from King Sîn-kāšid of Uruk (1801–1771 BC), who called himself “K ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Shechem (biblical Figure)
Shechem ( ), also spelled Sichem ( ; he, שְׁכֶם, ''Šəḵem''; ; grc, Συχέμ, Sykhém; Samaritan Hebrew: , ), was a Canaanite and Israelite city mentioned in the Amarna Letters, later appearing in the Hebrew Bible as the first capital of the Kingdom of Israel following the split of the United Monarchy. According to , it was located in the tribal territorial allotment of the tribe of Ephraim. Shechem declined after the fall of the northern Kingdom of Israel. The city later regained its importance as a prominent Samaritan center during the Hellenistic period. Traditionally associated with the city of Nablus, Shechem is now identified with the nearby site of Tell Balata in the Balata al-Balad suburb of the West Bank. Geographical position Shechem's position is indicated in the Hebrew Bible: it lay north of Bethel and Shiloh, on the high road going from Jerusalem to the northern districts (Judges xxi, 19), at a short distance from Michmethath (Joshua 17:7) and of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dinah
In the Book of Genesis, Dinah (; ) was the seventh child and only daughter of Leah and Jacob, and one of the matriarchs of the Israelites. The episode of her violation by Shechem, son of a Canaanite or Hivite prince, and the subsequent vengeance of her brothers Simeon and Levi, commonly referred to as ''the rape of Dinah'', is told in Genesis 34. In Genesis Dinah is first mentioned in Genesis 30:21 as the daughter of Leah and Jacob, born to Leah after she bore six sons to Jacob. In Genesis 34, Dinah went out to visit the women of Shechem, where her people had made camp and where her father Jacob had purchased the land where he had pitched his tent. Shechem (the son of Hamor, the prince of the land) then took her and raped her, but how this text is to be exactly translated and understood is the subject of scholarly controversy. (E-book edition) Shechem asked his father to obtain Dinah for him, to be his wife. Hamor came to Jacob and asked for Dinah for his son: "Make marriages ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Simeon (son Of Jacob)
Simeon () was the second of the six sons of Jacob and Leah (Jacob’s second son), and the founder of the Israelite Tribe of Simeon, according to the Book of Genesis. However, some Biblical scholars view this as postdiction, an eponymous metaphor providing an etiology of the connectedness of the tribe to others in the Israelite confederation.'' Peake's commentary on the Bible'' With Leah as a matriarch, Biblical scholars regard the tribe as having been believed by the text's authors to have been part of the original Israelite confederation. However, the tribe is absent from the parts of the Bible which textual scholars regard as the oldest (for example, the ancient Song of Deborah). Some scholars think that Simeon was not originally regarded as a distinct tribe. Simeon's name The text of the Torah says that the name of ''Simeon'' refers to Leah's belief that God had heard that Jacob preferred her sister, Rachel, implying a derivation from the Hebrew term ''shama oni'' ( ''šāma ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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