Wild Olive

Jeanne and Jennifer talk about Revelation to John (Book of Revelation) as political allegory and means of exploring historical trauma, using Sherman Alexie's poem "Crow Testament" as a means of considering what history. trauma, and political persecution have to do with the idea of apocalypse. Help support Wild Olive, Donate Here!   Follow us here! Blog Instagram Facebook   Hosted by Simplecast, an...

-Links to today's material- Shelly Matthews:  The Perfect Martyr: The Stoning of Stephen and the Construction of Christian Identity (Oxford University, 2010)   The Acts of the Apostles: An Introduction and Study Guide: Taming the Tongues of Fire (T&T Clark, 2017) Pamela  Eisenbaum: Paul was not a Christian: The Original Message of a Misunderstood Apostle (HarperOne, 2010) Help support Wild Olive,...

In this episode, Jennifer and Jeanne talk about the conversion stories associated with Saul, who became known as Paul, after he went from being a Jewish Roman citizen who arrested followers of "the Way," to a primary messenger for the Way modeled by Jesus, proclaiming the sonship of Jesus to non-Jewish peoples. Your co-hosts also explore a poem by Nick Flynn, a living American poet who took inspir...

Jeanne and Jennifer revisit Anne Sexton's poem "Jesus Walking," diving deeper into the poem's rhythms, the process of experiencing poetry, and how literary strategies also get used to illuminate the Jesus of the Gospels. Close reading reveals that the Jesus of each Gospel is highly distinct from the Jesus of the other Gospels, with each Gospel emphasizing different ideas about Jesus and even descr...

This week, Jeanne and Jennifer explore the poem "Jesus Walking" by Anne Sexton, which refers to the "Temptation in the Wilderness" scene from Luke Chapter 4. The poem and the Gospel scene engage with concepts of divinity, humanity, temptation, and the idea of mission. The idea of "temptation" can be thought of as anything that diverts or distracts a person away from their mission. Help support Wil...

This week, Jennifer and Jeanne dive deep into "The Annunciation" by Edward Muir. Pairing it with Luke Chapter 1, they discuss conception, purity, motherhood and how other interpretations can affect our understanding of the story. Help support Wild Olive, Donate Here!   Follow us here! Blog Instagram Facebook   Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See https://pcm.adswizz.com for information ab...

Jeanne and Jennifer explore "Mrs. Lazarus," a poem by the Scottish poet Carol Ann Duffy. The poem remixes the story of Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead. As they engage the Gospel story alongside Duffy's poem, your hosts discuss the meaning of resurrection as a life-death-life pattern that appears in the Hebrew Bible, the Newer Testament and, metaphorically speaking, in life outside literature....

In this episode, Jeanne and Jennifer share a poem from Rainer Maria Rilke's poetry collection Love Poems to God. Rilke's poem invites readers to think about the problem of representation as it pertains to the representation of God.  To think about the "problem of representation" is to think about the gap that exists between the reality of God--whatever that might be--and the portrayal of God in la...

Jeanne Petrolle and Jennifer Bird discuss the rampant violence that characterizes so many Bible stories. Using Sherman Alexie's poem "Crow Testament" and American independent film as lenses through which to reconsider the Bible's violence, Jeanne and Jennifer reflect on some of the real-life consequences connected with the location of a collection of violent stories at the center of Christian cult...

Jeanne and Jennifer discuss gender, power, and sexuality in Genesis 3 and in "Loving You," a poem by Vievee Francis. Help support Wild Olive, Donate Here!   Follow us here! Blog Instagram Facebook   Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Jennifer and Jeanne share observations about rhythm, rhyme, parallelism, and imagery in the first three chapters of Genesis. After exploring how the Hebrew poetry in these Genesis chapters work poetically, the conversation goes on to consider the thematic richness of the story, the myriad ways of understanding the woman in Genesis, and two ways of thinking about genre in connection with the Genesi...

Sometimes, readers of the Bible underestimate the effects of translation on the meanings that arise from particular Bible stories. In this episode, Jeanne and Jennifer discuss the complexities of translation, exploring a number of specific examples in which changes made in the process of translation from Hebrew to English--or Hebrew to Greek to English--introduce meanings that do not exist in the...

While some understand the term "myth" to mean "something that's not true," that isn't what biblical or literary scholars mean when they use the term.  For scholars, "myth" is the literary term for certains kinds of storytelling. Jeanne and Jennifer explore a range of meanings for the term "myth," and discuss how reading the Bible as myth opens up a range of rich, valuable interpretations. Help sup...

Hosts Jeanne Petrolle and Jennifer Bird talk about their backgrounds and how these backgrounds shape the reading lenses that each brings to biblical texts. Conversation goes on to explore the nature of reading "lenses," and how one's "lenses" shape interpretation of any work of literature, and will certainly shape interpretation of the Bible.  Help support Wild Olive, Donate Here!   Follow us...

The Wild Olive Podcast brings listeners game-changing conversation about literature, culture, and the Bible. Literature Professor Jeanne Petrolle and Biblical Studies Professor Jennifer Bird talk about the Protestant Bible from a literary perspective, connecting biblical texts with other kinds of texts, and with American culture. In this inaugural episode of Wild Olive, Jeanne and Jennifer introdu...