The above video, “Look Up,” might be a useful counter to the concern that keeps our eyes on our phones so often: FOMO or “Fear Of Missing Out.” See also the New York Times piece from 2016 on whether we are more or less connected as a result of being always connected through technology. Here’s another little short film on the same topic, called “I Forgot My Phone.” Read more
Reddit is exactly the kind of place where one would expect a discussion to take place about whether Wall-E (in the movie of the same name) represented the tempting serpent in the Garden of Eden, perhaps understood as Satan, rather than being a messianic savior figure. I am grateful to IO9 for drawing that discussion to my attention, and also to Steve Wiggins for offering further discussion of the suggestion under the punny title “Wall-E of Separation.” Apparently biblical allusions to the Genesis story... Read more
Call for Papers AI and Apocalypse Centre for the Critical Study of Apocalyptic and Millenarian Movements (CenSAMM) April 5 – 6, 2018. Inside the Big Top at the Panacea Charitable Trust gardens, Bedford, United Kingdom CenSAMM Symposia Series 2018 / www.censamm.org Abstracts are due by December 31, 2017. We invite papers from those working across disciplines to contribute to a two-day symposium on the subject of AI and Apocalypse. Recently ‘AlphaGo’, a Google/Deepmind programme, defeated the two most elite players... Read more
The Catholic Archdiocese of Indianapolis Refugee and Immigrant Services organization is hosting a World Refugee Day Dinner. Click through for more details. World Refugee Day is actually June 20th, and the Exodus website has a lot of other information and resources related to that event. Read more
Thanks to Jeff Carter for hosting the latest Biblical Studies Carnival – and apologies for not mentioning it here until today. As always, Phil Long has details about upcoming carnivals. The carnival includes this image of what happens when you ask an overworked grad student to do the index for your book: Read more
The Enoch Seminar website includes a subsection devoted to the figure of Salome – who was obviously part of my course on the Bible and music last semester. Here is the link: http://www.4enoch.org/wiki4/index.php?title=Category:Salome_(subject) It was in the process of looking for a musical snippet from among those mentioned on the Enoch Seminar site that I found this post-punk Japanese treatment… Read more
Ron Huggins shared the following on Facebook: The French scholar Charles Guignebert, Professor of Christian History at the Sorbonne in Paris, wrote a very critical book on Jesus in the 1950s. He was far more skeptical of the value of historical data on Jesus than most New Testament scholars liberal or conservative would be today. Compared to him, for example, people like Bart Ehrman, Marcus Borg, or John Dominic Crossan come across looking like sawdust-trail walkin’, Bible-thumpin’ Fundamentalists. (James McGrath... Read more
The episode begins with a commercial featuring the Doctor speaking of the monks’ benevolent role throughout history, asking for nothing in return except our obedience. We find out what the latter means when a family of three hears a knock on the door and the mother is arrested for having propaganda that defies the official story. Soon after we see Bill reunited with Nardole. She has managed to resist the brainwashing that has convinced most people that the monks... Read more
Via NASCAS I learned of the following web resource: I am pleased to inform you that [the] Digital humanities Center at the University of Balamand has publicly and successfully launched “PAVONe”, Platform of the Arabic Versions of the New Testament. The following is a general overview of the database : The “About” section: It includes a presentation of the project and the methodology used. The “Manuscripts” section: It allows the user to browse the Gospels manuscripts transcribed in the database. Two... Read more
The Society of Biblical Literature issued a statement on academic freedom. Here is an excerpt: The Society of Biblical Literature supports academic freedom for scholars in their research, publication, and the broader communication of that research in an international context. This includes the freedom to choose topics and methods and to arrive at controversial results. SBL’s institutional purpose to foster biblical studies is defined by scholarship devoted to the critical investigation of the Bible from a variety of academic disciplines.... Read more
Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In