Julia M. OBrien

the power of a good story . . .  literature that matters . . .

stories that help us think about our lives. . .

stories worth talking about

It’s no wonder most adults struggle to find biblical narratives relevant to their contemporary lives.  Those who learned biblical stories as children often are stuck with picture-book images: a little boy named David aiming his slingshot at a fee-fi-fo-fum giant and a guy named Jonah crouching in the belly of a whale, looking suspiciously like Gepetto from Disney’s Pinocchio.

Those who didn’t grow up with systematic religious education face other issues. They’d like to know something about the Bible but aren’t willing to go to a church or synagogue to do so. They want to approach the text on their own terms, without having to accept the doctrines of a particular religious body.

Getting Started

The project will make the most sense if you read everything in this "Gettting Started" section first. After that, the individual stories can be read in any order.

Jacob: (How) Do People Change?

In this session, we focus on the character of Jacob. We trace how the conflict that begins his story continues to shape his adult life. "Food for Thought" explains why Jacob and Esau compete for inheritance and invites participants to draw connections between the themes of Jacob's life and that of their own.

Jacob's Entourage: Whose Life Matters?

This session invites readers read Genesis 25-36--again, if they've already read "Jacob: (How) Do People Change?"-- focusing attention on the “minor” characters of the story. How does attention to Jacob’s mother, his wives, his slaves, and his children allow us to see this story, our own, and the Bible itself in different ways?

David: Really a Hero?

In this session, we consider the merits of reading a story closely, as well as of considering how it fits into a larger picture. We discuss how well the childhood version of David and Goliath matches with the way the biblical narrator depicts this most famous king of ancient Israel.

Bathsheba, Tamar, Absalom, Solomon:  No Escaping the Family Curse?

In this session, we read the accounts of David's later life and the accounts of his children:  David's rape (?) of Bathsheba, Amnon's rape of Tamar, and Absalom's rebellion against his father, while looking ahead to Solomon's rise and fall from divine favor. Comparing the David story with Junot Diaz's The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, we discuss whether (and how much) our families shape our lives.

Joseph:  Queering Categories

Joseph is best known for his flashy wardrobe--the garment that older translations call his "coat of many colors."  In this session, participants pay attention to how Joseph's clothes, as well as his speech and actions, complicate any attempt to fit him into rigid categories of gender, ethnicity, and class. Who is Joseph, and what do readers' reactions to his story reveal about their own understandings of gender identity and sexual orientation?