The first volley in Ron Sider's battle against right-wing evangelicalism Read more
The first volley in Ron Sider's battle against right-wing evangelicalism Read more
Full title for this post (after an enlightening conversation with Hannah Anderson @sometimesalight)–Because the Experiences of Some Women Do Not Reflect the Experiences of All: An Open Plea to Reconsider the Impact of Complementarian Theology. I almost didn’t post this today. I wanted to change course and write on Al Mohler’s “discipleship of the vote” and “unfaithful” Christians who vote “wrongly.” But then I realized that, even if I wasn’t writing about Al Mohler, I was writing toward Al Mohler—or,... Read more
I have been thinking a lot about Jair Bolsonaro, the “Trump of the Tropics,” president of Brazil, my home country. I spent considerable time in Brazil in the last couple of years, traveling in the Northeastern part of the country, visiting family and researching for a forthcoming book. Bolsonaro lost in the 2018 elections in the Brazilian Northeast and will likely lose again this year. Nevertheless, even in that region, most evangelical pastors (read: Protestant) find themselves in one of... Read more
Our new regular contributor, Dr. João Chaves, releases his first post tomorrow. Having had a sneak peek of this forthcoming post, “The God of Evangélicos and the Brazilian Presidency: A Presentist Musing,” I can vouch that we will have much to glean from the historical insights Dr. Chaves brings to the Bench in future posts. As an incoming regular contributor to our team, I thought I would take a moment to introduce you to Dr. Chaves today. Dr. João Chaves... Read more
Last night, Mexico’s president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO), stepped out onto the balcony of the Presidential Palace in Mexico City to face a throng of people gathered in the zócalo – the first such gathering since 2019. At 11pm, the popular norteño band, Los Tigres del Norte, paused their outdoor concert and the voices in the square hushed as the president, holding aloft a Mexican flag, shouted various phrases, including: “¡Viva la independencia! ¡Vivan los héroes anónimos! ¡Muera el... Read more
Christians who delve into the Quran will be surprised how many old friends they find there, including Jesus and Mary, and a lengthy roster of prophets and patriarchs. Exploring the Quran can be an excellent way of understanding the Christian and Jewish worlds of Late Antiquity, particularly the sixth and seventh centuries AD. It also tells us about some lost and forgotten byways of the semi-sort-of-canonical Bible. Most of the Quranic characters can be identified easily enough. Allowing for legendary... Read more
Every morning, grasping for dear life that first crucial cup of coffee of the day (possibly in the mug that truthfully admits that I am “Tired as a Mother”), I open my work email. Sometimes there is a sense of dread – chances are, my inbox is filled with requests, reminders, and questions from students and colleagues, near and far. Responding to all these emails can take hours. Some get “triaged” for another day, if they are less urgent. A... Read more
Today we welcome Dr. Thomas Carlson to the Anxious Bench. Dr. Carlson is Associate Professor of History at Oklahoma State University. His field of research interests include: Medieval Middle East; Muslim-Christian Relations; Byzantine, Islamic, and Syriac Studies. He is the author of Christianity in Fifteenth-Century Iraq (Cambridge, 2018). You may follow Dr. Carlson at @MedievalMidEast. Christianity is a global religion. The canonical Acts of the Apostles narrates one trajectory from Jerusalem to the imperial capital at Rome, while hinting at other trajectories in... Read more
The Old Testament commands the Israelites not just to fight and defeat other peoples such as the Canaanites and Amalekites, but to exterminate them, to commit what any modern reader would define as genocide. Today, such commands are extremely troubling, and Jews and Christians alike have agonized over them through the centuries. But such concerns are anything but new. From the earliest Christian ages, we find readings and responses that sound very modern in tone, and in a few cases,... Read more
It keeps cropping up in my classes. Perhaps we’re studying about reported Aztec visions of the arrival of “white men” in the Western Hemisphere. “Do you think this really happened, Professor Diller?” someone is bound to ask. And then we stop to have the conversation about miracles—a conversation it seems I have almost every semester in all my courses. Just this week, in my class on the Mediterranean world 600-1600, a student wanted to know if I thought Muhammad was... Read more
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