The first thing to be said is…. please do your civic duty. Saddle up your camel today and go to the polls and vote. In some ways, this is the most important election in the 21rst century for Americans, as it is likely to determine the direction of our country for years to come. The second thing to say is you should vote not on the basis of party affiliation but on the basis of where candidates stand on issues.... Read more

“This is historical fiction at its best.” (World Magazine, October 27, 2012) “Ben Witherington III, a good creative writer and accomplished NT scholar, has given us a treat in his short novel A Week in the Life of Corinth. Rather than providing a list of facts about life and culture in NT times, Witherington has composed an interesting story in which we can see and learn this information along the way. This will be a fun way to enhance our... Read more

I remember 1969 all too well. I once hitchhiked my way back to High Point from the Blueridge Parkway only a month after Neil Armstrong walked on the moon. The first ride we got was by two flat landers— people who didn’t believe the world was round (because the book of Revelations [as they wrongly called it] said the angels would stand on the four corners of the earth) and thought the whole moonwalk thing was a Hollywood stunt that... Read more

First of all, kudos to Carey Newman and Baylor Press for producing this third edition of Richard Burridge’s now classic study entitled What Are the Gospels? which first appeared as an SNTS monograph in the early 90s and helped produce a sea change in the field’s assessment of whether the Gospels are like ancient biographies or not. The answer is— most now think they are. The reason for grabbing a copy of this edition are several: 1) there is now... Read more

Maybe you’ve not noticed it, but there has been a decline in religious language in public life over the course of the last 30 or so years. To give one small example, when TV newscasters want to say something sympathetic when a tragic illness has befallen someone in the news they simply say ‘our thoughts will be with you’. They rarely say ‘our thoughts and prayers will be with you’ any more. It’s gotten even worse elsewhere. A major British... Read more

There are two rather new exhibits at the Museum of the Bible, and I was able to review them both while I was there for the consultants meeting. The first of these exhibits is the Jerusalem and Rome exhibit— which has some fine murals about early Jewish history during and after the Jewish war. Here are a few of the shots of the murals. This depicts members of the Qumran community hiding scrolls in jars in caves near the Qumran... Read more

The last two briefer chapters of the book deal with special topics, and then erroneous ideas about angels that Michael has encountered along the way. Some of this material is helpful as well. One interesting point is that Heiser pp. 147-52 urges us to realize that reconciliation of all things in heaven and on earth, as indicated in Colossians 1.19-20 is not about the redemption of fallen angels. I agree. The reconciliation language doesn’t have to do with the forgiveness... Read more

Because the NT has less to say about angels than the OT and intertestamental Jewish literature, Heiser’s treatment of the subject is briefer (pp. 116-62), and if I were to have a general criticism of these two chapters, it would be that the NT resources, specifically commentaries, he refers to are in various cases dated. Still, there is much interesting and good discussion here as elsewhere in this book. One of the initial points Michael makes on p. 116 is... Read more

Picture courtesy of Mr. Weiss and the Red Sox Even God must be for the Red Sox today— look at that rainbow over Fenway! Best Sox team maybe ever. 119 wins, including 7 and 1 on the road in the playoffs against the Yankees, Houston the world champs, and the Dodgers… Read more

One of the major differences between angels and humans, as Heiser rightly points out, is that the former are deathless, and therefore they have no need to propagate their species by marriage. (p. 88). This is doubtless why Jesus says that in the Kingdom we will neither marry nor be given in marriage for we will be like the angels. This is not about become neuters or sexless beings, it’s about becoming deathless ones instead of mortals, and by implication... Read more