Mythicism, Creationism, Certainty and Innkeepers around the Blogosphere

Matt Flannagan links to a series of posts on mythicism at James Hannam’s blog Quodlibet. The articles themselves appeared on Patheos.

John Byron also mentions the question of Jesus’ existence, and has a book giveaway as well.

Also of interest, Unreasonable Faith links to a humorous interview with the Bethlehem innkeeper and in the process raises the issue of whether there is an “inn” in Luke’s story at all. But such cultural and historical considerations aside, it is problematic to have Galileans participate in a census of Judaea that didn’t cover Galilee, unless they had some property that they wanted to maintain a claim to, in which case why are they relying on hospitality, even if they weren’t staying at an inn?

The interview with the innkeeper, by the way, is definitely worth a read. My favorite part is this:

…Do you know what a manger is?

As far as I know, it’s the place you put infant messiahs.

It’s a food trough for animals.

Oh. Interesting.

“Oh, interesting” is right. Let me ask you. So your baby is born, and the first thing you do is put him in an open container filled with grain and covered in oxen drool? Does this seem reasonable to you?

You did have them out with the animals. Their options were limited.

I rented cribs. I asked Joseph, do you want a crib. And he said, no, we’re fine, and then sets the kid in the food box. And I say to him, you’re new at this, aren’t you.

In his defense, he was.

And then someone says, look, the animals, they are adoring the baby. And I say, adoring, hell. They’re wondering why there’s a baby in their food.

In relation to creationism and related matters, John Pieret is the latest to mention Albert Mohler’s problematic view of science.

Pete Enns discusses traditions of interpretation in Genesis 2:15. Of course, the language of “guarding” paradise made me think about protecting the island on LOST…

SansBlogue debunks once again the myth that prior to Columbus, people thought the Earth was flat (although some who were trying to be Biblical literalists did think that, and some still do).

Finally, relevant to all of the above is the discussion of the feeling of certainty at De-Conversion. Here’s a sample:

Moreover, certainty has been claimed by many religious and ideological adherents, as well as every conspiracy theorist on the planet. Logically, they can’t all be right. Logically, in fact, it must be the case that the majority of people who claim perfect certainty in their conclusions, are in fact wrong, and their feeling of being certain must be just that – a feeling. A feeling, that does not feel like a feeling; that feels, rather, like an accurate assessment of the world.