I would be surprised if the name Stephen Fowl was unfamiliar to you. He is a highly esteemed New Testament scholar, a pioneer in the area of theological interpretation of Scripture, and an all-around nice guy. A few years ago, when I was working on some research on Philippians, I sat down to have lunch with Fowl at SBL and he struck me as such a humble, warm person. Also, his Philippians commentary (Two Horizons) is one of the best... Read more

My buddy Chris Skinner has written a book introducing the study of the Gospel of Thomas and CBD has discounted copies for a limited quantity. Now, I kind of think it is funny CBD had it listed as “What Are They Saying About the Gospel of Thomas? – Slightly Imperfect” Ha ha ha ha! Yes, the Gospel of Thomas is “slightly” imperfect… Read more

I couple of weeks ago I mentioned a lecture by John Collins about his views on the Dead Sea Scrolls and Qumran. Today I saw a short piece in the Huffington Post Religion section by Collins on the DSS. He voices, every so briefly, his particular view (that the scrolls themselves were not the exclusive library of Qumran). This article is well timed, as Collins is just about the release a book on the Dead Sea Scrolls with Princeton Univ... Read more

N.T. Wright and Walter Moberly (both Biblical scholars) have major articles in the Nov 2012 issue of Scottish Journal of Theology. Wright’s is called “Imagining the Kingdom: Mission and Theology in Early Christianity.” If I am to understand the (very lengthy and complex!) abstract, Wright takes the Gospels and argues that a misreading of the Gospels and their intent has led to a wider misunderstanding of Christian theology. Wright offers a reading of the Gospels that is political (in the good sense of... Read more

The latest Currents in Biblical Research is out (Oct 2012) and includes articles on the Septuagint and the Gospel of Thomas. Read more

Currently I am reading Don Thorsen and Keith Reeves’ new book What Christians Believe about the Bible (Baker, 2012). So far, it has been a very good guide to biblical hermeneutics (so far at page 51), but I wanted to note one hilariously apt illustration used in the book. Thorsen and Reeves bemoan the abuse of Biblical genres, especially when texts are taken literally when they are metaphorical (as in apocalyptic literature). They offer an example from a magazine called The Wittenburg... Read more

If you are like me, you are excited to see the release of Donald Hagner’s New Testament: A Historical and Theological Introduction (Baker, 2012, coming in November). While it is not officially “out” yet, I found the snippets on Amazon “Look Inside” tantalizing. I was particularly interested in how Hagner places Colossians under his chapter on Paul (“Paul and His Epistles”), but Ephesians is put in a separate chapter with the deuotero-pauline material and considered a form of “incipient early catholicism.”... Read more

I am currently researching Paul’s language of wakefulness and sobriety in view of the return of Christ. What a fascinating subject and I am sorry to say that there is only one serious work on this theme and it is quite old (Spiritual Wakefulness in the NT, Loevestam, 1963)! In any case, I was interested in a comment made by A.W. Steffler regarding the use of the crane in early Christian symbolism. “The crane became a symbol of renewal and... Read more

A few days ago I mentioned my trip to see the DSS in Philly which also included listening to a special lecture by Profs. John Collins and Lawrence Schiffman. I made a few notes about their respective viewpoints (see here). Prof. Shiffman saw my post and has kindly responded to it on his own site with additional information, some corrections to my (mis)understanding of his points (and that of Prof. Collins), and a few clarifications. I cannot stress how impressive... Read more

If you got your program for SBL yesterday, then, like me, you immediately turned to the advertising section to check out new book releases for the conference from the plethora of publishers. Here is my top 10 list of book releases (keep in mind I am not putting down books that have already been released and that I own) [In no particular order] 1. Invitation to the New Testament, by Ben Witherington III (Oxford Press). I am interested in seeing what... Read more