John Litteral's Blog

Catena on Jonah almost done

2010-03-25T17:29:00.000-07:00

I am just about finished with the catena on Jonah, all I need to do is revise it with a commentary that I am getting in, which is the commentary by Haimo of Auxerre. The catena already has extracts from about 20 different Fathers of the Church. There are complete commentaries on Jonah that I made good use of, that is from St. Jerome, St. Cyril of Alexandria, Theodoret of Cyrus, and Theodore of Mopsuestia. I found 7 great extracts from St. John Chrysostom that contributed very well to the project. I can't say that I favored any one commentator, they all provided extracts of equal quality to form one really good commentary on Jonah. I have never read Haimo's commentary on Jonah so I am not sure how many extracts that will come from him, but I am holding out until I get it, which it should be in tomorrow.

After I finish I plan to start back on Acts, and Ishodad of Merv's commentary should be in so I can throw it into the mix of what I already have. The Acts catena is going well, I have found some helpful quotes from Oecumenius from his commentary on Acts, but unfortunately it has not been completely translated into English, and I am only relying on others who have quoted from him and translated what they quote. I would dearly love to have access to his commentary in English, as well as the commentary by Theophylact. I am astonished that the Ancient Christian Commentary did not even asknowledge Oecumenius, Theophylact, or Ishodad of Merv's commentaries on Acts. They did not make much use of Cramer's Catena on Acts. I translated a few extracts from it, but I don't have the time nor the skill to translate the Greek in a reasonable amount of time in order to get the Acts catena done this decade. In my opinion Oecumenius is an excellent Bible commentator. His commentary on Revelation is one of the best I have read, I like it even better than St. Andrew of Caesarea.

Bible Catena Project

2010-03-20T10:00:00.000-07:00

I have started a new project of putting together Bible commentaries. These are catenas, that is, Bible commentaries that are made up of citations from the Church Fathers and Doctors of the Church and woven together to form a verse by verse commentary on the books of the Bible. I've done similar projects in the past, but now I am focused on making them more of running commentaries and not so much as separate excerpts like I did in the past, but to be much like the way St. Thomas did in his Catena Aurea. I have begun working on Acts and have gotten to chapter 5, but I have put it on hold until I get another commentary from Ishodad of Merv to use, it is coming in the mail and should be in in a couple of weeks or so. I am now working on Jonah and hope to have it finished by the time the Ishodad's commentary comes in.

The project has just gotten underway a month ago, but I am providing everything that I do online. The site is found here

Daily Mass Readings with audio

2009-12-20T18:53:00.001-08:00

I am now providing the Mass Readings in audio as well as audio commentary and insights on the Readings. As far as I know the Litteral Christian Library is the only place to get the Daily Mass Readings with commentary, Christian Art, as well as audio clips of the Readings and commentary, and other things like study questions and additional resources, all in one place. Check it out! http://litteralchristianlibrary.wetpaint.com/page/Catholic+Scripture+Readings

Another blessed month for Litteral's Christian Library!

2009-12-01T03:16:00.000-08:00

I was very happy to see that Litteral's Christian Library has continued to reach higher numbers, breaking last month's record of 7,870 hits to this month of 8,905 hits! I am thankful for all the prayers for this site, and for the hard work and care that is put into it by my sister in Christ J9, as well as those very kind emails from people who show their appreciation for the site! I thank God for all the blessings that I have received from being a part of this ministry! God is so great!

New Catholic News Blog!

2009-11-25T09:57:00.000-08:00

Thanks to my priceless site administrator there is a new Catholic News blog on the Litteral Christian Library. http://litteralchristianlibrary.wetpaint.com/news

Check it out and feel free to express your thoughts and opinions on the latest issues of the day!

Free Complutensian Polyglot Bible downloads!

2009-11-21T08:52:00.001-08:00

I have wanted to get this for years, and now it is for free to download!

http://litteralchristianlibrary.wetpaint.com/page/Complutensian+Polyglot+page+index

Looking for someone to do a Catholic News Page on site

2009-11-19T18:02:00.000-08:00

I have been wanting to provide a Catholic news page that keeps up with the news of the Church and world news. I don't have time to do it myself, but would love to have someone who is a news junkie who would have the zeal to do it on a daily basis, just to provide links to the latest articles and news. If anyone is interested in volunteering for it then please contact me at jlitteral5@roadrunner.com

Commentaries by Ambrosiaster now on Litteral's Christian Library!

2009-11-17T16:11:00.000-08:00

I was thrilled to find that I can now provide some Bible commentaries on Paul's Epistles by an ancient Christian writer Ambrosiaster! Ambrosiaster is one of my favorite Bible commentators, and now I get to share some of his great insights with everyone! Here is the link to access them http://litteralchristianlibrary.wetpaint.com/page/Letters+of+St.+Paul

Still looking for translators

2009-11-05T17:16:00.000-08:00

I started a webpage some time ago looking for volunteers to help me in a project to translate commentaries of the Church Fathers from Greek and Latin into English. Thanks to Peter Papoutsis it has taken a start. I would love more to join in, no matter how much or how little they can devote to it. I translated a few fragments, while Peter translated a fragment and is working on another one. If anyone feels that they might like to do one then let me know, I can fix you right up! My email is jlitteral5@roadrunner.com

Great day for Litteral's Christian Library

2009-10-29T19:24:00.000-07:00

Today was a very active day for the site, reaching 631 hits by 10:30pm! It has been a very fruitful month for the site, reaching numbers that the site has not seen before! The Daily Mass Readings page always gets lots of hits, and lately the addition of the Holy Orthodox Bible has attracted many people, and my project of the Hebrew version of Matthew has been getting lots of hits even though I have just started the project, I can't wait to have it finished!

I beg everyone for their prayers for the site to be fruitful and to reach as many people as possible, all for the glory of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ!

UFC 104

2009-10-25T11:26:00.001-07:00

It was a good UFC lastnight. The fight between Machida and Shogun was very close, and proved that Lyoto was actually human! Many people thought that Shogun should have won the fight, but I think that the commentators seemed bias and actually influenced many peoples perception. It probably would not hurt to watch the fight with the volume off just to watch it without the influence of the commentators. But either way both fighters looked great!

Cain looked awesome out there. Ben showed alot of heart but he was in there with the new bad boy of MMA. Brock and the rest of the heavyweights have to notice Cain!

Litteral's Christian Library

2009-10-23T18:55:00.000-07:00

The website has been very fruitful this year, reaching nearly 60 thousand hits so far this year! I owe so much credit to Janine who has put so much time into the Daily Mass Readings page, which happens to be the most viewed part of the site. I am also thankful for Peter Papoutsis who has allowed me to put his translation, the Holy Orthodox Bible, on my site, and he has also offered to translate some Greek ancient Bible commentaries, in which he has already translated one already.

I am so excited about the future of the site, God has done so much with it so far, and I know that he has great plans for it still. It usually gets over 200 hits a day and has even passed 600 some days. I would love to see it get up to 1000 a day or more!

While I am working on a project right now to provide the ancient Hebrew version of the Gospel of Matthew with a fresh translation and linked lexicon, I am still listening to God for His guidance in order to provide the best Christian resources on the web!

Here is the link to the homepage http://litteralchristianlibrary.wetpaint.com/

Going to crack down

2009-10-23T18:45:00.000-07:00

Going to crack back down on my fitness routine. Cold weather coming on and the crummy weather is depressing enough without letting my waist get bigger. Diet is my struggle. Tomorrow will be a fresh start. I plan to get back to my perferred weight of 175-180, I'm about 190 right now. I will continue my martial arts training and weight training, but I plan to throw in some extra cardio.

Working on the Hebrew version of Matthew

2009-10-23T18:36:00.000-07:00

I have been working on an Hebrew text of the Gospel of Matthew. I'm not sure how long it will take me on this project, but I am very excited about it! I am linking each Hebrew word to the lexical words, and I am also translating the Hebrew text as I go. It can be found here http://litteralchristianlibrary.wetpaint.com/page/Hebrew+Matthew