I'm once again feeling wearied by all the nonsense (pagan and fundamentalist Christian in equal doses) about how the date of Easter was the result of some sort of deliberate paganizing conspiracy. Personally, I don't like the modern trappings of Easter. A lot of the...
Biblical History
Josephus Code Follies
I've gotten a half dozen emails about the new (it's not really new) Joseph Atwill book and "Covert Christianity" PR launch (er . . . conference). The big media event is really about Atwill's rehashing of his material in a 2006 book called Caesar's Messiah. It was...
History, Archaeology, and Faith
The Bible Places Blog (BPB) draws our attention to a new book edited by James K. Hoffmeier and Dennis R. Magary entitled, Do Historical Matters Matter to Faith?: A Critical Appraisal of Modern and Postmodern Approaches to Scripture. It looks like a quality resource....
Israelite Kingship: Good or Bad in the Eyes of God?
When God tells Samuel, Israel's judge, to anoint a king for Israel according to their demands with the words "they have not rejected you, but they have rejected me from being king over them" (1 Sam 8:7), many Bible readers and students assume that the institution of...
For You Ancient Chronology Buffs …
If you're following the Naked Bible Podcast we've had several episodes where we get mired in the quagmire that is ancient chronology. Years ago I read the book Centuries of Darkness by Peter James. It's fundamental exposure to why the accepted chronologies of...
Larry Hurtado on Bart Ehrman’s Book, How Jesus Became God
Larry Hurtado has a thoughtful, even-handed review of Ehrman's book here. This subject area is one of Hurtado's areas of expertise, his criticisms, though irenic in tone, are telling. My only addition would be toward the end. Ehrman seems completely unaware of OT...
Review of Bart Ehrman’s Latest Book, How Jesus Became God
Dr. Andreas Kostenberger just posted his review of Ehrman's most recent work, How Jesus Became God: The Exaltation of a Jewish Preacher from Galilee. The review is more of an overview of problems he sees with Ehrman's thinking. He leaves analysis of those problems to...
The Dating of the Last Supper
Colin Humphreys' proposal to date the Last Supper on a Wednesday has been making the rounds on the internet this past week. Mark Goodacre has an informative post on it here on his New Testament Gateway blog. Certainly worth a read.
Wallace and Kruger Destroy NEWSWEEK Christmas Hit Piece on the Bible
[NOTE: this post was updated on 12/30/2014 to include Dr. Kruger's second installment.] I have to admit it's like shooting fish in a barrel, but we can't expect anything intellectually accurate or honest from those who write for these sorts of militant...
Reflections on Jesus for Liberal Theologians and Their Hermeneutic
A little more than a month ago I attended the Northwest regional meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society. The society had invited two guest speakers: Craig Blomberg, a professor at Denver Seminary and Marcus Borg, now professor emeritus at Oregon State. Both...
More Bart-Capades
Boy am I tired of getting questions on Bart Ehrman's stuff. Put simply, Bart is a fundamentalist, someone for whom his pet subjects only have two answers: his and the one he wants to caricature. Bart sees no gray areas; tolerates no nuancing of questions and responses...
The Location of Mount Sinai and the “Yahweh’s March from the South” Passages: An Addendum to the Naked Bible Podcast Episode
[Note: I added the material at the bottom about Rephidim. It relates to the "march from the South" and I forgot it the first time. - MSH] Those of you who follow the Naked Bible Podcast know that recently we covered Exodus 3:1 in three episodes. That verse says: “Now...
Review of Prof. Maurice Casey’s Scholarly Critique of the Work of Jesus Mythicists
I blogged a short time ago to alert readers about this book. Maurice Casey was a New Testament scholar and Aramaic specialist. He was also nowhere close to being a "Bible believer" - the sort of people that Jesus mythicists love to mock. It's Casey doing the mocking...
From Jesus Mythicism to Paul Mythicism
Robert Price is one of the few (very few) credentialed scholars who doesn't think Jesus existed. His work (and work put forth by others in the same vein) has been debunked by scholars ranging from the evangelical variety to atheists. I've blogged about that before....
Jesus as a Figure in History: Book Review
In today's RBL (Review of Biblical Literature) email I found a review on this worthwhile title by Mark Allan Powell: Jesus as a Figure in History, Second Edition: How Modern Historians View the Man from Galilee I have the older edition of this work and it's quite good...