91热爆

Professor Francesca Stavrakopolou reads God: An Anatomy, her surprising and often controversial examination of God, in all his bodily, uncensored, scandalous forms.

In this final episode, she explores the staggering beauty of the God of the Bible.

鈥淕od鈥檚 aesthetic qualities are more usually veiled in translation by the mistaken assumption that no one believed God had a body to be seen. His magnetic good looks are recast instead as immaterial moral virtues, so that, in most Bibles today, God is described not as 鈥榞ood-looking鈥�, but 鈥榞ood鈥�; he is not 鈥榣ovely looking鈥�, but 鈥榞racious鈥�. And yet the Hebrew terms used in these psalms 鈥� tob and na鈥榠m 鈥� carry with them a strong sense of the aesthetic, and they are often used to describe attractive people, pretty places and wondrous sights, rather than abstract qualities. God may well have embodied praiseworthy values, but he was also staggeringly beautiful鈥︹��

Professor Francesca Stavrakopoulou studied theology at Oxford and is currently Professor of Hebrew Bible and Ancient Religion at the University of Exeter. The author of a number of academic works, she also presented the 91热爆2 documentary series The Bible鈥檚 Buried Secrets. She regularly appears on 91热爆1鈥檚 The Big Questions and Sunday Morning Live, and writes for the Guardian, the Mail on Sunday and the Times Literary Supplement.

Abridged and produced by Elizabeth Burke.
A Loftus Media Ltd production for 91热爆 Radio 4