Manna Bible Maps/Bible History Online Maps

This is a site which does beautiful online maps which are not intended to be downloaded, but viewed online.

URL: http://www.biblemaps.com/onlinemaps/
Hmm...just checked out the site and they don't do free views anymore. You have to pay for the maps, but they are worth purchasing for their beauty.

But wait,here's a really nice site - Bible History Online. Check out especially the color maps which are closer to the bottom of the webpage.


URL:http://www.bible-history.com/biblehistoryonline_biblemaps.php

Bible Maps from StudyLight.Org

This site offers scanned pages of a complete Bible Atlas with colour maps. The headings in the table of contents will give you an idea of the scope of this online resource:

PART I: THE BIBLICAL SETTING

Chapter 1 The Face of the Ancient Near East
The Ancient Near East 001
Biblical Regions 001a
Modern States and the Ancient Near East 002
Mesopotamia: Homeland of Abraham 003
Egypt: Land of Bondage 004
Syria and Lebanon 005
International Routes, The King's Highway 006
Geography and Trade Routes of the Middle East 006a

Chapter 2 Natural Regions of Palestine
National Regions of Ancient Palestine 007
Physical Geography of Palestine 007a
Topography of Palestine 007b*
Cross Sectional Views of Longitudinal Zones 008
Northern Coastal Plains 009
Plain of Dor, Plain of Sharon, Samaria, et al. 010
Philistine Plain, Shephelah, Judah, and the Dead Sea 011
Arabah, Negeb, Wildernesses of Zin and Paran 012
The Old City of Jerusalem Today 012a
Modern Political Divisions of Ancient Palestine 013
Climate Patterns of Ancient Palestine 014
.
.
.
etc (there are 173 high quality maps available in this site - see below for examples)
Topographical Map of Northern Costal Plain, the Jezreel Valley, Galillee and Bashan
Expansion of Christianity in the 2nd to 3rd Century AD
URL: http://www.studylight.org/se/maps/browse.cgi?st=1&pn=1

Shifting our emphasis onto Bible maps/Smith Bible Atlas (1915, London)

I will be shifting our emphasis from visuals which tell the Bible story to Maps which help us develop better understanding of Biblical history and geography. You will be able to find beautiful collections which you can use for teaching purposes.

I tell the story of how I gave my precious Moody Bible Atlas transparency set to my Cambodian student. Years ago, I bought this set of transparencies for a lot of money. The reason why I gave it away? I can get all the maps resources I need online!

The first collection I will feature is a rather old collection - the Smith Bible Atlas

URL: http://www.creationism.org/images/SmithBibleAtlas/index.htm

The Brick Testament and the Rev Brendon Powell Smith

The Brick Testament is an interesting site which tells many of the narratives which are not found in the Sunday School Curriculum. The scope of stories found in this site reminds us that the package of stories offered to to our kids through the "canned curricula" offered by publishing houses often selectively edit out important narratives. That being the case, how do our children understand the full counsel of the Lord (Acts 20)?

On the other hand, the way the stories are told lend themselves to criticism. First of all the use of Lego Brick characters can be problematic. You see, Jesus is really ObiWan Kenobi in the Star Wars series and John the Baptist, Hagrid in the Harry Potter series. The narrative associations made by kids distract and thus add "noise" to the Biblical story.

Second, if you notice, this site provides ratings. N = nudity, S = sexuality, C = cursing and V = violence. While I would be the first to agree that Biblical narratives (esp from the Old Testament) have a certain degree of sex and violence, the specific portrayal in the Brick Testament often leaves nothing to the imagination. What? How nude, sexual, violent, curse filled can the site be? Well, you check it out for yourself and come to your own conclusion. For that reason, I find this site more useful for clarifying points in the Biblical narrative rather than for use as illustration.
Scene from Judges 9
URL: http://www.thebricktestament.org

Medieval Woodcuts

Here is a very small collection of Medieval woodcuts by various artists/craftsmen.


The one above depicts the beheading of John the Baptist at the request of Salome.

URL: http://www.godecookery.com/clipart/biblical/clbibl.htm"

Microsoft Clipart Online

If you wish Microsoft's online resource center and look under their Clipart section, you will be able to find some really nice Bible Cliparts for use.

If you do a search and type in "Biblical Scenes," you will find some nice Biblical Scenery.
Moses and the Israelites crossing the Red Sea (Exodus 14)
Samson and the Philistine woman, Delilah
URL: http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/clipart/

Flaming Fire Illustrated Bible

What if someone had a vision to illustrate all the verses of the Bible? Instead of trying to do it by him or herself, the person enlists the help of artists from all over the world and gets them to do the job. All the person needs to do is to provide the space and be the point person to organize and arrange the work sent to him.

Well, that's what The Flaming Fire Illustrated Bible project is all about.

Our goal is to illustrate the entire bible verse–by–verse— one illustration per verse. We plan to enlist artists and illustrators from all over the world— including you!— to help us bring each of the 36,665 verses in our database to life....

Here's the Genesis 2:3 illustration.

My favourite artist? Brian Dewan

Dewan illustrating Leviticus 4:3 If the priest that is anointed do sin according to the sin of the people; then let him bring for his sin, which he hath sinned, a young bullock without blemish unto the LORD for a sin offering.

Note: Not all illustrations are of equal quality. I really don't like many of the illustrations at all. In a sense, the very pluralistic vision of this site makes it interesting, yet it is the very diversity which makes me appreciate some of the collections where you can see a style and a coherence repeated throughout.
URL: http://www.flamingfire.com/bible.html

Matt Stone's Blog

Here is a really interesting blog site which if you were attentive enough earlier, you would have visited already (there was an innocuous link in the Dec 14 '06 entry). Matt Stone has a blog exploring religious pluralism, secular spirituality, and emerging expressions of Christianity. The "non traditional visual expressions of Christian faith" make for fascinating discussion.

If you scroll down the blog, you will find toward the right hand side of the page, links to several image collections including Aboriginal images Jesus, African images Jesus, ancient images of Jesus, Anglo images of Jesus, Asian images of Jesus, Esoteric images of Jesus, and Native American images of Jesus.
Life in Nazareth (from the Asian Jesus Images Collection)
Interesting question raised through viewing all the images: When does contextualization of Christian faith end and syncretism or even blasphemy begin?

URL: http://mattstone.blogs.com/

HolyBible Sketchpad by Deborah A. Reed

There is a really nice site which hosts a really creative collection of sketches inspired by the Bible. The artist is Deborah Reeder. There is no additional information about her in the website, but you do want to visit the site to view her great sketches. Some of them have very contemporary interpretation and special cultural applications embedded in the sketches. All in all, this is a great collection of 152 sketches.
Abasalom's Hair (2 Sam 18:9)
King Joash - he started off a good king, go read about the rest of his life (2 Chron 24)
URL: http://www.holybiblesketchpad.com

Shlomo Katz (1937 - 1992)

There is another very stylized collection of biblical lithographs found in the Shlomo Katz Gallery. This is a commercial artist who portrays his characters with slender, angular forms. Let's put it this way, it's not quite Botero!

The 10 commandments Exodus 20
Here's a mnemonic: Exodus comprises 40 chapters. Divide that by 2 gives you 20. That's the chapter where you will find the (20 divided by 2) 10 commandments
URL: http://strictlylimited.com/katz_gallery.html

John August Swanson (1938-)

A contemporary collection which you can view is at the gallery of John August Swanson. I just love this collection. Its beautiful! The information below is from his website:

JOHN AUGUST SWANSON makes his home in Los Angeles, California, where he was born in 1938. He paints in oil, watercolor, acrylic and mixed media, and is an independent printmaker of limited edition serigraphs, lithographs and etchings.

His art reflects the strong heritage of storytelling he inherited from his Mexican mother and Swedish father. John Swanson’s narrative is direct and easily understood. He addresses himself to human values, cultural roots, and his quest for self-discovery through visual images. These include Bible stories and social celebrations such as attending the circus, the concert, and the opera. He also tells of everyday existence, of city and country walks, of visits to the library, the train station or the schoolroom. All his parables optimistically embrace life and one’s spiritual transformation.
(...read more on his website)

URL: http://www.johnaugustswanson.com/

Sadao Watanabe (1913-1996)

Another interesting Asian collection is by the Japanese artist Sadao Watanabe. Watanabe's work is very stylized, but he uses very strong and vibrant images. This picture has its reference, the encounter between Abraham, Sarah and the three angels, and is found in the book of Genesis in the Old Testament. The picture is entitled Sarah, Abraham, and the 3 visitors. You can visit the rest of his collection at The Scriptum, a gallery which specializes in 19th and 20th century contemporary Japanese prints in woodblock, etchings, engraving, stencil and mixed media. More information about him can be accessed here.
URL: http://www.japaneseprintart.com

Asian Christian Art Association (ii)

While you are at the Asian Christian Art Association site, visit the galleries of two other Asian artists:

Hanna Varghese, a Malaysian artist who began painting religious/biblical themes after she was inspired by artworks of Asian Christians in the early issues of IMAGE magazine. The spritual images made by other Asian Christian artists prompted her to explore the possibilities of making tangible her own understanding of her Christian sprituality and faith - for the first time.Who will roll away the stone...? (in Batik) Mark 16:3

Li Wei San, a Christian artist from China, was an engineer. After retiring, he painted nearly 1000 Christian art works for calendars, cards, slides, book covers, and illustrations. Published works include a 300 picture "Pictorial of Jesus' story", 70 picture "Pictorial of Salvation", 110 picture "Pictorial of Revelation". Some of his Chinese traditional painting was included in several joint exhibitions in Beijing, Nanjing, Singapore, Vienna, Toronto and New York. Nail marks (John 20:24-30)
URL: http://www.asianchristianart.org/profile/profile.htm