Website Visitation Summary

The start of a new year is always a good time to look back and review what’s happened in the recent past. So today I thought I would add a summary of the number of visitors that arrive at this website every month. The bar-chart below shows the visitation count from July 2010 to the present month — a little over two year’s time. Over that time more than 3000 folks have visited. Our most active day attracted a total of 24 individuals. Most folks come to find lists of parables. Others come to copy the free parable materials offered for study group use.

If you are one of the truly curious visitors – Thank you for taking the time to come and learn about the 1100 parable books listed on our “BooksOnParables” site.  If you like this site and find it useful, spread the word about the information you find here.

This site also attracts an unusual amount of SPAM. We have other blogs which attract 1/50 th the amount of spam this blog does. Presently, we get about 1-5 visitors a day who leave useless SPAM messages in our contact box. For what reason, it’s not clear. I guess they just don’t have worth-while things to do.

Bible Parable Lists

Today we take up the topic of Bible Parable Lists.

You can find dozens and dozens of websites with Parable Lists. One of my favorite LIST OF PARABLES is provided on my STUDY materials page (See TAB at top of website). You can download the  PDF file form of the list by CLICKING HERE. Below I show a table of ten (10) sites that contain Parable Lists. You can get to each site by simply CLICKING on the web address displayed in the tabulation.

The ten (10) sites tabulation also shows the number of Parables each of these sites has found in the Bible. As you can see there is a wide discrepancy in the Number of Parables each site choses to display. Why is this?

A similar variation in what folks consider a Parable – also holds in many of the 1100 Parable Books found on our site. Every author has a reason for including more (or fewer) Parables in each of the PARABLE LISTS contained in their book. How many Parables are found in any given book really boils down to how the author himself personally defines – What a Parable is.

What we consider a “Book On Parables” to be is covered in a past blog entry – (See, Is It Really a Book On Jesus’ Parables?) but to-date we haven’t provided any definition of a Parable. Once you define what a Parable is – you have reasons to either include (or exclude) certain Biblical Parables in your own personal Parables list. Let us just say – depending upon the author the assumed list of Parables contained in the New Testament Bible varys from around 35 to numbers that occasionally exceed 50.

Websites with Lists of Bible Parables ……….  # In List
=======================================

http://www.amazingchange.org/Parables_of_Jesus.htm ……………………….40

http://www.bcbsr.com/survey/jpbl.html ……………………………………………41

http://www.ccel.org/contrib/exec_outlines/pa.htm …………………………….34

http://www.comportone.com/cpo/religion/christian/parables/list.htm …44

http://www.crossmarks.com/parable/parablelist.htm ………………………….41

http://www.egarcell.com/Bible/Jesus_Parables.htm …………………………….35

http://www.keyway.ca/htm2002/parables.htm …………………………………..44

http://www.lifeofchrist.com/teachings/parables/…………………………………57

http://www.studylight.org/con/ttt/view.cgi?number=T414 …………………..52

http://www.wogim.org/lordpara.htm …………………………………………………38

MORE FREE STUDY MATERIALS

FREE STUDY MATERIALS

Today I have added another set of study materials in the STUDY TAB which can be accessed by clicking on the word “STUDY” at the top of this website.  The added Free Study Lesson is on the Parable of the Weeds. As time goes by – I hope to provide many RE-PRINTABLE study materials like the on added today for use in church related gatherings.

The 4 pages of available material are shown in thumbnail form for your quick review – But the same 4 pages are also included in a high resolution PDF file ready for download. You may reprint them and distribute as you desire. I hope you find them of use.

If you have PARABLE study materials you think are useful to others and would like to distribute them in this venue – Please “Contact Me”.

BELOW – SEE THUMBNAIL VIEWS
FROM THESE RE-PRINTABLE FILES.

…………………………………..

BIBLE PARABLES STUDY

……………………………………

A Parables Study for a Small Group Bible Class
( 4 Pages / Week 1 )

CLICK  PDF  FILE  on Next Line to Download Printable File
Parables Bible Study Lesson 1 –
Freely Reprintable – 4 Pages

Bible Study Parable of the Weeds pgs 1-2

Parable of the Weeds Study Lesson Pgs 3-4

Free Study Materials

Today I have added a new PAGE TAB to the top of this website. You can find Free Study Materials on that page. As time goes by – I hope to provide many RE-PRINTABLE study materials for use in Sunday School Classes or other church related programs.

The available materials are shown in thumbnail form for your quick review – But are also included in PDF form so you can download and distribute them by reprinting if you so desire. I hope you find them of use. If you have PARABLE study materials you think are useful to others and would like to distribute them in this venue – Contact Me.

BELOW IS A THUMBNAIL VIEW OF MY FIRST RE-PRINTABLE ENTRY UNDER THE NEW “STUDY” TAB AT THE TOP OF THIS SITE.

LIST OF BIBLE PARABLES

List of Bible PARABLES

 

We Added Some New Books on Parables Today

Today Books on Parables are coming out at a rate of ONE a MONTH.

To see the most recent books on parables — Click the TAB “NEWEST” that’s printed along the very top edge of our site. About 75 Parable Books are listed on the “NEWEST” page. That page covers a span of about 5 years of publication(s). At the present time over 1100 English titles on the topic of Jesus’ Parables are listed here. At this rate –  We’ll soon have 10-20 new titles and our listings will be even longer!

Looking for a Parable Book?
Want to review its content?
This website is for YOU !

Today we’ve also added new links to “Additional Book Review Sources” allowing you to easily read and learn more about “Books On Parables“. If you’re trying to review Parable Books – Many of our listings are “LINKED BY ONE CLICK” to sites that allow you to quickly scan a book’s content in further detail. When you see an UNDER SCORE LINE on any of our listings — Click on the listed title — and you’ll be taken directly to further resources about that book.

Do you have a favorite that’s recently been published? Should we add it to our “Newest” page listings? — Then, Leave us a note and we will. Chances are – however – we already have it listed for you.

What’s Your Favorite Parable Book?

It’s Maundy Thursday — the Holy Thursday before Easter — a  commemoration of Jesus’ Last Supper. It’s a good day to discuss the question: What’s Your Favorite PARABLE BOOK?

On this site we list over 1000 books on Jesus’ Parables. Anyone should be able to find at least one favorite among our listings. I must confess I have not read nearly half of the titles listed here. However, my library does contain a copy of over half of them. It’s taken 10 years to accumulate the sources. Two of my particular favorites include:

• “Kingdom, Grace, Judgment: Paradox, Outrage, and Vindication in the PARABLES of Jesus“, by Robert Farrar Capon (2002)
• “Speaking PARABLES: A Homiletic Guide“, by David Buttrick (2000)

Readers comments on the Capon book(s):
The referenced Capon book is actually a composite printing of 3 separate Parable Books by the same author. I believe the publisher found these three books so popular – they decided to print them as a unit. A great idea!

Recorded Reader Reviews include the following comments: Anne Lee / This is an amazing book: Josh / Pure brilliance: A reader / My favorite author… I would recommend him to anyone: A reader / I read Capon to keep me off balance: A reader / Amazing book, repetitive but life impacting: S. Tracy / This book provides an excellent discussion of the meaning of Jesus’ parables: R. McFarland / We loved it. Boy the discussions it fostered!!

Readers comments on the Buttrick book:
Isaac D. Kreutzer says this about the Buttrick book on PARABLES … “Arguably David Buttrick is the finest homilitician in the United States. His latest book, Speaking Parables, is a marvelous, no-nonsense map for this preacher.” Amen.

Dave Barhart when talking about “Speaking with PARABLES: A Homiletic Guide” says … “This book presents a rethinking of the way we approach the parables of Jesus. This book is in two parts. The first, shorter one explains the parables in general. The second part, the larger section of the book, is a parable-by-parable analysis. Buttrick’s exegesis is not only good, it’s a fun read. With some parables he provides sample sermons and critiques which are enjoyable lessons in sermon construction themselves.” I agree.

Buttrick’s book is also very well documented with 5 separate pages of “notes” which follow the material he is discussing, chapter by chapter.

What’s Your Favorite Parable Book?

Leave us a comment – We’ll include it in a future posting – if you’d like.

“Parables of Jesus” – Web Searches (2004-2009)

If you like this discussion, you can find more details by going to the “Google’s Insight” search pages. You too, can create the plots shown below with the tools found HERE.

Searches for the “Parables of Jesus” words have remained nearly constant over the years from 2004 to 2009. Evidence for this is displayed in trend plot shown below. This data is from the reference search site already mentioned.

Searches for the Words "Parables of Jesus" - 2004 to 2009

However, these same word searches are non-uniform when displayed by state over the United States. The search range for the relative Number of Searches by State is available by inspecting the multi-color graphic drawn below. The darker color – the greater the relative number of searches.

"Parables of Jesus" Searches by State for Period 2004-2009

I obtained the Bar Chart plotted below, which displays the relative Percentage of Searches by State from the same website source. Judging from the display, I would say the people of Tennessee are more interested in the contents of this website than folks from the western states.

Bar Chart of "Parables of Jesus" web Searches by State

You can do your own investigation of the terms and information of this review by going to the “Google Insight” website found HERE.