Addressing a difficult cultural issue in Ezra

Moses Rivera

Hi Logos family!

I need help in creating a collection in LOGOS to write a 10-12 page paper. I chose to write about the difficult cultural issue pertaining to the condemnation of intermarriage in Ezra. The difficult part of writing this paper is that I have to citing at least one critic who concludes that the Bible is flawed in some way due to the condemnation of intermarriage in Ezra. After this I have to clearly list and summarize the various evangelical viewpoints on the difficulty.

I am assuming I have to build a collection on apologetics and Ezra. Can anyone help or guide me in building a collection on the difficult cultural issue pertaining to the condemnation of intermarriage in Ezra?

Blessings,

Moises

Dave Hooton

First thing is to create a Basic Search on Intermarriage (All Text in Entire Library). The Topic section can be very useful + the other results. You might want to build a collection but you will see that useful resources include commentaries (NAC Ex 34.16) and monographs/encyclopaedias (What Does the Bible Say About). Also many raise the issue of interracial marriage vs. interreligious marriage (perhaps for modern day consumption of the issue).

To narrow the Search further I used intermarriage NEAR bible.

David Ames

At [below] there is a comment that maybe Nehemiah is written in flashback mode and that Nehemiah was Governor when Esra arrived instead of 13 years latter so that the families broke up within days instead of years later – don’t know if it is something you might want to check out
http://community.logos.com/forums/p/19225/149316.aspx#149316

Mark Barnes

Moises Rivera said:

I am assuming I have to build a collection on apologetics and Ezra. Can anyone help or guide me in building a collection on the difficult cultural issue pertaining to the condemnation of intermarriage in Ezra?

Personally, I wouldn't bother with a collection. A search of all your resources (apart from Bibles) for the following will prove useful:

(intermarriage, "mixed marriage", marriage NEAR foreigner) NEAR Ezra

That said, I don't own a resource which concludes the Bible is flawed as a consequence. So I would try Google if this happens to you. Here's the equivalent search:

(intermarriage|"mixed marriage"|marriage foreigner) Ezra

You could add derogatory search terms like 'racist' to that, which would help. You could limit your search to Google Books or Google Scholar to get only authoritative work.

Incidentally, adding the requirement of 'racist' to the Logos search returned an article entitled "The Problem of Mixed Marriages in Ezra 9–10" in Bibliotheca Sacra 162:648 (pg 438), which I'm sure you'll find extremely helpful, as it lists several different viewpoints within the one article. If you don't have the resource in Logos, be sure to get the article from your school library.

Fred Chapman

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/309648#Comment_309648

In addition to what has already been said, if you have the Anchor Yale Bible Dictionary http://www.logos.com/product/1660/anchor-yale-bible-dictionary there are several good articles that discuss this topic as they relate to Ezra.

DMB

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/309648#Comment_309648

Oddly enough, I've recently read several pot-shots on the intermarriage sequence in Logos.

They usually occur in dating the OT books. But how I'd search for them, who knows!