{"id":90048,"date":"2021-01-27T15:29:15","date_gmt":"2021-01-27T22:29:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/?p=90048"},"modified":"2021-01-28T19:39:41","modified_gmt":"2021-01-29T02:39:41","slug":"martin-harris-the-historical-jesus-and-sundry-other-topics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2021\/01\/martin-harris-the-historical-jesus-and-sundry-other-topics.html","title":{"rendered":"Martin Harris, the historical Jesus, and sundry other topics"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"James<\/a>
Lincoln Hoppe as Martin Harris, in the forthcoming Interpreter Foundation theatrical film, \u201cWitnesses\u201d\u00a0 (Still photograph by James Jordan)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Several new items have appeared on the website of the Interpreter Foundation.\u00a0 It can sometimes be a bit hard to keep up:<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Interpreter Radio Show \u2014 January 10, 2021<\/a><\/p>\n

The 10 January 2021 broadcast of the Interpreter Radio Show featured\u00a0Martin Tanner, John Gee, and Kevin Christensen. In this episode, they discussed some difficulties that the Church and its members could face as they move into the 21st century. The second portion of the show was a roundtable discussing the upcoming Come Follow Me Doctrine and Covenants lesson #8 (D&C 14-17). The Interpreter Radio Show can be heard Sunday evenings from 7 to 9 PM (MDT), on K-TALK, AM 1640, or you can listen live on the Internet at\u00a0ktalkmedia.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Audio Roundtable:\u00a0Come, Follow Me<\/em>\u00a0Doctrine and Covenants Lesson 6\u00a0\u201cThat You May Come Off Conqueror\u201d:\u00a0<\/em>D&C Sections 10-11<\/a><\/p>\n

The panelists for the Interpreter Radio Roundtable on\u00a0Come, Follow Me<\/em>\u00a0Doctrine and Covenants Lesson 6,\u00a0\u201cThat You May Come Off Conqueror,\u201d<\/em>\u00a0on D&C 10-11,\u00a0 were Steve Densley, Matthew Bowen, and Mark J. Johnson. The roundtable was extracted from the 27 December 2020 broadcast of the Interpreter Radio Show. The complete show may be heard at\u00a0https:\/\/interpreterfoundation.org\/interpreter-radio-show-december-27-2020\/<\/a>. The Interpreter Radio Show can be heard Sunday evenings from 7 to 9 PM (MDT), on K-TALK, AM 1640, or you can listen live on the Internet at\u00a0ktalkmedia.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

And Jonn Claybaugh has generously provided this<\/em>:<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cCome, Follow Me<\/em>\u00a0\u2014 D&C Study and Teaching Helps: Lesson 6, February 1-7: Doctrine and Covenants 10-11 \u2014\u00a0\u201cThat You May Come Off Conqueror\u201d<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

And there is also this item, courtesy of Latter-day Saint Perspectives<\/em>:<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat Is the Restoration?\u201d with Patrick Q. Mason<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

***<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Please have a look at this little piece, from Book of Mormon Central:<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWhy Did Martin Want a View of the Plates in March 1829?\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

***<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

And this piece, from the Interpreter Foundation\u2019s own Jeff Lindsay, will interest some:<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cMore on the Book of Abraham Manuscripts: What Spelling Errors Teach Us\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

***<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Significant remarks from Elder D. Todd Christofferson, of the Council of the Twelve:<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cReligious Freedom\u2014A Cherished Heritage to Defend\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

***<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Many of you will enjoy this interview with one of the most remarkable, unique, and colorful people I\u2019ve ever known, a man that I consider a close friend and an invaluable colleague:<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201c10 Questions with Louis Midgley\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

***<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve been remiss, of late, in sharing links from the sadly necessary Neville-Neville Land<\/em> blog.\u00a0 Here are a few recent ones:<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThose who live in glass houses, pt. 9\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cOliver Cowdery and Lehi\u2019s landing site\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Heartland theory: a barren, shallow philosophy\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cRian Nelson, the Heartland hoax, and conspiracy theories\u201d<\/a>\u00a0 (This one, to me, is really stunning.)<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThose who live in glass houses, pt. 10\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cHeartlanders can\u02bct meme\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThose who live in glass houses, pt. 11\u201d<\/a>\u00a0 (This one takes brief notice of a recent attack by Mr. Neville, by no means his first, against the Interpreter Foundation.)<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

***<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s an item from the Christopher Hitchens Memorial \u201cHow Religion Poisons Everything\u201d Fund<\/em>:<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cLatter-day Saints in Beirut Rebuild and Serve Others After Explosion\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

***<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

I was really pleased to see this, and to see who is backing it.\u00a0 I may even contribute a bit myself:<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cTolkien fans hope to turn his house into a \u2018Rivendell\u2019 for writers and filmmakers: Fantasy enthusiasts want to turn the house of the Catholic author in Oxford, England, into a meeting place.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

***<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Some especially contemptuous critics of the Church like to portray my adopted state as something of a hell on earth, chock full of brain-dead \u201cMORmONS,\u201d \u201cMorgbots,\u201d and \u201cUtards.\u201d\u00a0 The reality, however, may not be quite so completely horrible, at least not in all respects:<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cUtah has \u2018strategic competence,\u2019 and the U.S. should take note: The former national security adviser and Miles Hansen, CEO of World Trade Center Utah, say Utah\u2019s founding principles could lift the rest of the nation.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

***<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t know much \u2014 truth be told, I know absolutely nothing \u2014 about this writing contest.\u00a0 But the competing schools are reputable ones, and a clean sweep of the competition is not unimpressive:<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cBYU students sweep writing contest, win new short story dispenser for campus\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

***<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Perhaps thanks most of all to the internet (which has also aided the spread of QAnon and other conspiracy theories and anti-scientific fads), it has become fashionable of late in certain circles \u2014 very few of them, it should be noted, formally trained in ancient history or any of the relevant academic disciplines, and very few of them professionally engaged in such fields \u2014 to deny the literal historical existence of a real Jesus of Nazareth in the first century.\u00a0 Just to be clear, they\u2019re merely not denying his deity.\u00a0 They\u2019re denying that he ever lived at all.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

I will frankly confess that, to me, this is flat madness.\u00a0 I\u2019ve even written a little bit on the subject.\u00a0 For now, though, I just want to call attention to a couple of relevant quotations:<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

When we survey both the biblical sources and the non-biblical ones, according to Michael Licona and Gary Habermas,<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

what we have concerning Jesus actually is impressive. . . .\u00a0 In all, at least forty-two authors, nine of them secular, mention Jesus within 150 years of his death.\u00a0<\/strong> (Gary R. Habermas and Michael R. Licona, The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus<\/em>\u00a0[Grand Rapids, MI: Kregel, 2004], 127.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

And here\u2019s a comment from the historian Edwin Yamauchi:<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Even if we did not have the New Testament or Christian writings, we would be able to conclude from such non-Christian writings as Josephus, the Talmud, Tacitus, and Pliny the Younger that: (1) Jesus was a Jewish teacher; (2) many people believed that he performed healings and exorcisms; (3) he was rejected by the Jewish leaders; (4) he was crucified under Pontius Pilate in the reign of Tiberius; (5) despite this shameful death, his followers, who believed that he was still alive, spread beyond Palestine so that there were multitudes of them in Rome by A.D. 64; (6) all kinds of people from the cities and countryside \u2014 men and women, slave and free \u2014 worshipped him as God by the beginning of the second century.\u00a0<\/strong> (Edwin Yamauchi, \u201cJesus Outside the New Testament: What Is the Evidence?\u201d in Michael J. Wilkins and J. P. Moreland, eds., Jesus Under Fire: Modern Scholarship Reinvents the Historical Jesus<\/em> [Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1995,] 221-222).<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0 \u00a0 Several new items have appeared on the website of the Interpreter Foundation.\u00a0 It can sometimes be a bit hard to keep up: \u00a0 Interpreter Radio Show \u2014 January 10, 2021 The 10 January 2021 broadcast of the Interpreter Radio Show featured\u00a0Martin Tanner, John Gee, and Kevin Christensen. In this episode, they discussed some […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1019,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[56,259,1356,1809,9257,3841,1369,4663,2905,1812,1815,1570,788,55,1667,2589,21223,5688,4003,921,6384],"class_list":["post-90048","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-book-of-mormon","tag-book-of-mormon-witnesses","tag-christ","tag-church-of-jesus-christ-of-latter-day-saints","tag-historical","tag-historicity","tag-jesus","tag-jesus-christ","tag-latter-day-saint","tag-latter-day-saints","tag-lds","tag-martin-harris","tag-mormon","tag-mormonism","tag-mormons","tag-nazareth","tag-reaity","tag-three-witnesses","tag-witness","tag-witnesses","tag-witnesses-film"],"yoast_head":"\nMartin Harris, the historical Jesus, and sundry other topics<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"    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