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Professing Themselves to be Wise…They Failed to Notice the Context of Paul’s...
I recently mentioned the words from Romans, “professing themselves to be wise, they became fools,” because I did actually have someone quote those words at me on Facebook.There are a lot of ironies in...
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Young-Earth Creationists are Without Excuse
Joel Watts drew my attention to the fact that an individual named Tony Breeden, with whom I had been interacting on his blog, mentioned me on Facebook:My response was to ask whether, if I gave a simple...
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Not Just a Pot
There is a comparison between God and a potter on the one hand, and humanity and pottery on the other, in both testaments of the Christian Bible.The analogy is not apt. Pots do not feel pain. And as...
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Jesus Mythbusting
Several people on Facebook drew my attention to a misleading press release about Joseph Atwill, who is listed there as a “Biblical scholar,” even though there is no evidence that he has relevant...
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“Simply pretending to hold a watermelon does not validate your argument”
“Simply pretending to hold a watermelon does not validate your argument.” – Steve CarusoVia Robert Cargill. See also the posts by Nathan Campbell, Tom Verenna, and Joel Watts about Joseph Atwill’s...
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“Biblical Scholarship”
Chris Tilling shared the above image on Twitter. If you don’t get it, it relates to the claims of Joseph Atwill, which have begun circulating again even though he doesn’t seem to be saying anything...
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Romans Paraphrases Galore
I need to get back to my project of paraphrasing Romans to give modern Christian readers a sense of the impact Paul’s words would have had in his time, before there was a label “Christian” and when...
View ArticleScholars Discussing Paul
Click here to view the embedded video.Fortress Press featured the above video on its website, which has N. T. Wright, Richard B. Hays, and Michael Gorman talking about Paul’s letters. The website also...
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Jesus the Exception?
While I was traveling recently, lots more appeared in the blogosphere related to the historical Jesus in general, and Bart Ehrman’s book on Christology in particular. Larry Hurtado had a review of the...
View ArticleJesus: Not God in New Testament Christologies
Here are links to three interesting posts related to New Testament Christology. In each case, the evidence suggests that the New Testament authors in question did not identify Jesus as identical to,...
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Romans and a Miracle-Worker
The question raised in this People in White Coats cartoon is an interesting one. There are stories of martyrdoms of miracle-workers, and not just from early Christian sources. But do those stories make...
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Critic of the Domination System
I haven’t tracked down the exact source of the quotation, but Borg discusses the domination system of Jesus’ time, and his relation to it, in The Heart of Christianity: Rediscovering a Life of Faith.
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Mapping Romans 1-8
Matthew Malcolm shared this map of Romans 1-8, using the rhetorical questions as signposts to the structure. What do you think of it?
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Punctuating Romans 1
I have blogged numerous times before about Romans 1, and the problems with reading it in isolation from the chapter which follows it, and which followed it without any break in the original letter. I...
View ArticleRomans 1:27: Patriarchy, Penetration, and Penalty
Daniel Kirk has been offering a fantastic survey of what the Bible says about homosexuality, contextualizing it in the context of ancient patriarchy, which considered it shameful for a man to take on...
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Gets The Last Word, The Dark Side Does Not
As I was preparing the PowerPoint for my conference paper which I read yesterday, I looked for one that featured the famous quote from Yoda on the left. I didn’t expect to find it paired with a quote...
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Josephus and the Burial of the Crucified
I had a wonderful conversation recently, which lasted for hours and only ended because of concern about severe weather. It was with Matt Kovacs and Arick Mittler, formerly of Miami Valley Skeptics, now...
View ArticleScholars Discussing Paul
Fortress Press featured the above video on its website, which has N. T. Wright, Richard B. Hays, and Michael Gorman talking about Paul’s letters. The website also has a discussion guide as well as a...
View ArticleJesus the Exception?
While I was traveling recently, lots more appeared in the blogosphere related to the historical Jesus in general, and Bart Ehrman’s book on Christology in particular. Larry Hurtado had a review of the...
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