I just came across a site that offers a number of Mandaean, Manicaean, other Iranian, Early Church and Jewish Pseudepigraphal texts in English translation. I’ve also added a link to my sidebar. Here’s the address: http://fam-faerch.dk/pseudigrapher/ Last week was our Spring Break, and I still can’t believe that I managed to finish off most of the projects I was hoping to during that period! Read more

“Sethian or Classic Gnosticism developed as a result of the efforts of educated Jews interested in making sense of their traditions. They did this, not by rejecting their traditions wholesale, but by applying to them a new hermeneutic, whereby their ancestral traditions were given a radically new meaning. The result was, in effect, the creation of a new religion” (Birger Pearson, Ancient Gnosticism: Traditions And Literature (Minneapolis: Fortress. 2007) p.132). Read more

Tonight’s episode had some “wow” moments, mostly in the flashback/flashforward (it was a clever idea to have the two running in parallel simultaneously) and in the events on the ship. Finally, Michael’s presence on board is revealed to Sayid and Desmond. Where Walt is, we do not yet know. The discussion with Capt. Gault was fascinating, particularly given that Sayid and Desmond had been warned not to trust the captain, presumably by Michael, and yet the captain seemed far more... Read more

“Unless we are actively looking or listening for something, there is a real and distinct possibility it will simply fail to reach our conscious awareness, at least not at the levels that are desired” (Richard G. Colling, Random Designer: Created from Chaos to Connect with the Creator (Bourbonnais, IL: Browning, 2004). Read more

Carmen Andres draws attention to the Biblical imagery in a Johnny Cash song used in the season finale of Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles. This is part of an ongoing series of blog entries about the show. The same Johnny Cash song will also be discussed in a paper at SBL. Mystical Seeker discusses intercessory prayer and alternatives to it. Doug Chaplin points to a recent discussion of the Good Friday prayer by Jacob Neusner. Iyov updates us on Free... Read more

The latest news from my state is that we elected the second ever Muslim to a seat in Congress. Andre Carson, grandson of the late Julia Carson. The first state to elect a Muslim to congress was Minnesota. There go some stereotypes about the Midwest. What is more astonishing is when a “red state” like Indiana elects a Democrat! On another subject, I have self-identified as a Christian and more specifically a Baptist on this blog on many occasions, because... Read more

Over at Uncommon Descent, DaveScot has given what must be an overwhelmingly satisfactory reply to the point I made about “Intelligent Design Criminology“, since all of the comments have been favorable and none critical. Oh that’s right, they just ban their critics. That must be the sort of stifling of opposing viewpoints this new movie Expelled will be about… [If your sarcasm detector was not activated while reading this post, please activate it now and begin again at the top.... Read more

As I had this awful stomach flu that’s been going around, I wasn’t able to check out the YouTube clips that many bloggers have shared over the past few days. It is just as well. I was already nauseous. The above clip of Oklahoma representative Sally Kern speaking about homosexuality is disturbing for a number of reasons, and I will try to point them out in a calm, level-headed fashion. Perhaps the most important point is that she is wrong.... Read more

No, I don’t mean a tutorial to teach students how to plagiarize. They clearly seem to know that instinctively. I mean a tutorial to help students grasp, through specific examples and questions they have to answer, what plagiarism is. Butler University’s library has made just such a tutorial available online. I share it here in the hope that other professors and teachers may find it useful and perhaps direct their own students to it. It won’t stop plagiarism, but at... Read more

“I learned that God reveals himself through Scripture and in general through his creation, and when we destroy God’s creation, it’s similar to ripping pages from the Bible” (Jonathan Merritt, spokesman for the Southern Baptist Environment and Climate Initiative, quoted in today’s New York Times). Read more