Week 3: Hebrew Bible Topics: Noah & Babel - Samson & Daniel

Starting Assumptions

Instructions for the Starting Assumptions assignment:

Your Starting Assumptions post needs to be a minimum of 150 words long. Make sure you do a spellcheck and a word count, and that you proofread your post by reading it out loud. You need to include the words "Starting Assumptions for Week ___" in the title you give to the post ("Starting Assumptions for Week 2," etc.). You must answer the question(s) marked **in bold with red asterisks**. The other questions are there to help give you some ideas about what else you might want to write about in your post.

When you are done, complete the Gradebook Declaration.

Here are some questions to get you started:

• Is the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) an important text in your life? do you consider yourself to be familiar with the stories of the Bible? are you interested in Biblical prophecy?
• is there a particular translation of the Bible that you like to use?
• are you able to read Hebrew? Greek? Latin?
• Do you like reading historical fiction based on the Biblical text? (like Anita Diamant's The Red Tent, Walter Wangerin's Paul, etc.)
• *** Have you taken any classes where the Bible has been read as a text in class? Was this a valuable educational experience? ***
• What comes to mind when you think of "Noah"? Are you interested in the archaeological debates about where Noah's ark might have landed?
• What comes to mind when you think of "The Tower of Babel"? What about "Nimrod"?
• What comes to mind when you think of "Samson"? Have you seen the vintage Hollywood blockbuster, starring Victor Mature?
• What comes to mind when you think of "Daniel" in the Bible? Do you know what the "feet of clay" are? The "writing on the wall"?
• If you already know that you are going to choose the Noah & Babel mythology unit, what are your reasons for choosing that one? What interests you about these stories? What would you like to learn about them? Which of the two interests you more - the story of Noah or the story of the Tower of Babel?
• If you already know that you are going to choose the Samson & Daniel mythology unit, what are your reasons for choosing that one? What interests you about these stories? What would you like to learn about them? Which of the two interests you more - the story of Samson or the story of the Daniel?
• Take a look at some of the images for this week's units (click on the image to see a larger view and learn more): do you recognize some of these images? do any of the images really capture your imagination and make you curious?