Back in March I posted a link to the video below, which was created and posted by Dr. Michael Brown. The video is about how Hebrew is not to be read / translated / interpreted according to the shapes of the original picture-script (“pictographic”) from...
Paleobabble (Misreading Texts)
Dr. Michael Brown on the Black Israelites Idea
I haven’t watched or listened to this yet, but I’m expecting Dr. Brown to have some sound insights on this paleobabble.
Excellent Article on the Sol Invictus Myth as the Basis for Birth Date of Jesus on December 25
Some readers will recall that last year around Christmas we devoted an episode of the Naked Bible Podcast (#195) to the myth that Christmas was a pagan holiday because of the December 25 (winter solstice) date. As the myth goes, the date was chosen by Constantine to...
Are the Hebrew Letters to be Interpreted from their Original Picture Signs?
I recommend the video below created by Dr. Michael Brown. It’s more than a debunking of the deeply flawed, nonsensical idea that the meaning of Hebrew letters is to be found in their original pictographic (picture) representations. Like myself, Dr. Brown is a...
Of Yehovah and Jehovah’s Witnesses
A week or so ago I saw something on Twitter that made me shake my head. An apparently well meaning Hebrew enthusiast gleefully reported that, after searching through hundreds of manuscripts, he’d found thousands of places where the divine name (YHWH) was...
David Meade and the Sept 23 Rapture: Living Testimony to Biblical Illiteracy
This is embarrassing. It shames Christ and tarnishes all those who sincerely try to understand Scripture and get people interested in it. There’s just no other way to put it. Lord willing after nothing happens on Sept 23 David Meade will just quietly disappear....
Catholic Skeptic Candida Moss at it Again
Someone just sent me this short article from the Daily Beast by church historian Candida Moss: “Nero, the Execution of Peter and Paul, and the Biggest Fake News in Early Christian History.” Basically, it’s about how Christians really weren’t...
Fake Exegesis: Return of the א-ת BS
You’ve heard of fake news? (Who hasn’t?) How about some fake exegesis? Some time ago I blogged about the nonsensical idea that the Hebrew particle את has an amazing hidden meaning in Gen 1:1 (that’s an aleph and taw, read right-to-left, for those who...
Five Differences Between Qur’anic (Sharia) Law and Old Testament Law
I’d recommend this interesting essay to readers. It was published by the Christian Research Institute. The essay has some deficiencies, in that there are other important differences (and nuances within the differences noted). For example, the OT law was also...
What Was the Hebrew Name of Jesus?
I get questions about the divine name periodically, or about how Jesus is a pagan name for Zeus (or similar nonsense). For those items, click here, here, and here, respectively. But more often than not, I get questions about how the Hebrew name of Jesus was...
There’s PaleoBabble in the Evangelical World, Too
What’s fair is fair. Sanctified paleobabble is still paleobabble. The excellent Evangelical Textual Criticism blog posted this back in February: “Debunking Silly Statements about the Bible.” Most of the items are examples of claims that over-extend...
Flat Earth Follow-Up
Just a quick note. While it’s depressing to see in real time that people who name the name of Christ believe in non-truth, thereby shaming the gospel, I’m going to keep the comments open on that post of a couple days ago (now at 118 comments), with the...
Christians Who Believe the Earth is Really Flat — Does It Get Any Dumber Than This?
I’m almost afraid to ask the question. It seems whenever I do, something comes along to produce an affirmative answer. Lately I’ve been seeing things on Facebook (or have had those who follow my work sending me items) that ask if I believe the earth is...
An Assyrian Origin for the Trinity?
Some readers may be aware of claims in this regard popularized on the internet. The idea is actually fairly old, but in recent years has gained steam via the work of a credentialed Assyriologist, Simo Parpola. A few years ago I had the role of soliciting papers for an...
The Mysterious Book of Jasher
That’s the title of this scholarly article by rabbi Arthur Chiel I recently found in an old issue of the journal Judaism: Chiel-The-Mysterious-Book-of-Jasher The article is a very good survey of the history of what some folks (even today) tout as a lost biblical...