The Ancient World Online (AWOL) recently posted a list of Durham University dissertations available for free. I combed through the list and here are some dissertations related to biblical studies and theology that readers might find of interest: BUSHUR,...
journal articles
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...
Ancient Chronology Critiques: Not Always PaleoBabble
I used to be really into ancient chronology (Near East, biblical). The chronology of the ancient Near East prior to 1000 BC and its basis has genuine uncertainties. Consequently, this is one area where alternative theorists have some real contributions to make. While...
Naked Bible Podcast Episode 024: The Bible’s Literary Context: Historical Annals
In the last podcast episode we continued our series on studying the Bible in a way that amounts to more than reading by taking a look at the legal genre in Old Testament books. This time I focus on another genre military annals. I think the best way of illustrating...
Transporting the Trilithon Stones of Baalbek: It’s About Applied Physics, Not Ancient Aliens
PaleoBabble readers know that ancient astronaut theorists suffer from a fixation on megalithic construction. The “impossibility” of moving stones of great size and tremendous weight appears to them as proof of alien assistance. This argument of course is simply...
Ancient Construction: No Aliens Needed
Yeah ... scholars are so overwhelmed by the building projects of the ancients that they just have no idea how it was done. They're so frightened by the clarity of the ancient alien visitation idea that they remain silent. There's just no way to explain the precise...
Recent Online Dissertation on the Sumerian Deity Enki
Today I came across this published (2010) doctoral dissertation on the god Enki by Peeter Espak. it is entitled, "The God Enki in Sumerian Royal Ideology and Mythology." I decided to blog the link in the name of offering something useful to all those who want to read...
Dissertations and Theses Available in PDF from Duke University’s Religion Department
Some good items (to my interests) here, so I thought others might want to have a look.
Ancient Egyptian Astronomers Recorded Eclipse of Binary Star Algol – 3000 Years Before Modern Astronomers
Here's a comprehensible summary of this recent academic paper that proposes Egyptian astronomers successfully recorded the eclipse period of a distant star. Here's an excerpt of the summary: Egyptian astronomers used what they learnt to make predictions about the...
Some Online Digital Resources of Interest
In recent days several valuable online resources have been posted on the web that will no doubt be of interest to readers. One is temporary (the month of April only) but the other two are permanent. Temporary Some time ago over at my Naked Bible blog I blogged on the...
Antikythera Mechanism Report
Thanks go to Charles Jones at Ancient World Online for posting this "pre-print" article, "The Cosmos in the Antikythera Mechanism" (due to the size, it is best to right-click and "Save File As"; you will also have to re-size the file in Adobe Reader, since the images...
The Law of Moses – Whatever That Means
Our first topic of the year is one that I have been asked about, directly or obliquely, a number of times in comments and correspondence: Did Moses write every word (or most of) the Pentateuch (Torah) or are the critics correct that the Pentateuch is essentially a...
Another Giant Human Skeleton That Isn't
I've blogged before about giant human skeletons that aren't giant human skeletons. The first two examples I blogged about were hoaxes, created with image editing software (see here and here). The Remnant of the Giants blog recently had an interesting post about a...
Ron Wyatt and Those Egyptian Chariot Wheels
I've complained before about the poor quality of Ron Wyatt's "research" (loosely defined) before. While he may have been well-intentioned (his aim was to defend the Bible's content), there is no excuse for the kind of paleobabble he has become notorious for. What...
Did the Religion of the Biblical Writers Evolve from Polytheism to Monotheism? A Paper and Response to Thom Stark
[Note: For other posts on Mike's work on the divine council, click here for the archive.] Here is my second ETS paper, entitled, "Does Divine Plurality in the Hebrew Bible Demonstrate an Evolution from Polytheism to Monotheism?" My answer is "no, and the question is...