This summer I had been planning to try to accomplish something I have long wanted to: creating an app-based version of Canon: The Card Game. I always thought it would be a nice and indeed a natural next step with the game. The pandemic made me sense the lack of a digital version painfully, as the pandemic meant it was impossible to use the game in class multiple players touching the same cards would undermine social distancing). I had a... Read more
I had Israel/Palestine on my mind even before the recent re-escalation of violence between Israel and Gaza. I have a sabbatical coming up the academic year after next and would seriously love to spend the full year devoted to writing my book on John the Baptist. One place I would love to spend at least some of that time is the Jordan river valley and other locations where John is said to have been active. Surprisingly few books have been... Read more
Call for Proposals: Edited volume on Star Trek and Star Wars deadline for submissions: August 2, 2021 full name / name of organization: Emily Strand and Amy H. Sturgis for Vernon Press contact email: [email protected] Call for Abstracts Edited volume on Star Trek and Star Wars Edited by Emily Strand, MA and Amy H. Sturgis, PhD Vernon Press The generations-spanning, multimedia franchises Star Trek and Star Wars will form the focus for this edited collection of scholarly essays. As venerable and evolving repositories of science fiction and... Read more
I am long overdue to blog about Chris Tilling’s important study, Paul’s Divine Christology, published first by Mohr-Siebeck in 2012 and then in paperback in 2015 by Eerdmans. A (slightly) revised version of Tilling’s doctoral thesis, it has many of the characteristics first monographs are prone to have, mine included. I am certain that I interacted with scholars whom I did not yet know personally in ways that I would temper significantly at least as far as my mode of expression... Read more
This is a reminder about the upcoming conversation about What Jesus Learned from Women. You can register for the webinar with Q&A via Facebook or Eventbrite. It will feature me together with three American Baptist ministers: the interim pastor of Crooked Creek Baptist Church (as well as long-time member of both the church and of my Sunday school class, Rev. Dr. Don Scott; another longtime member of both church and Sunday school class, Rev. Joy Amick; and our (retiring) area minister... Read more
Dear colleagues, We would like to invite you to an online workshop entitled: Jewish Authors and Power in the Graeco-Roman Period The workshop will take place via zoom on June 3rd- 4th 2021 14:00-18:00 CET The workshop is organized by the Institut für Judaistik, Universität Bern in collaboration with CoE Ancient Near Eastern Empires, University of Helsinki. Questions regarding power and power relations have been a prominent topic in the study of the Greco-Roman period and especially regarding the complicated... Read more
My church, Crooked Creek Baptist Church, has announced its plans to resume in-person worship next month. My reaction was one of wordy rather than jubilation. That could easily have been an instinctive reaction based on what has been in the news about various congregations who persisted in holding in-person services, but that wasn’t the reason. This move is appropriate given where we are in the process of vaccination, and appropriate social distancing measures will be observed. No, my reaction with... Read more
Call for Papers: Theology and the Riordanverse Editors: Nathan E. Fleeson and Carolyn M. Jones Medine 2020 marked the 15thAnniversary of the publication of the first book in the Percy Jackson series, Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief, as well as what Rick Riordan claims will be the last in the series, The Trials of Apollo: The Tower of Nero. In those fifteen years, Riordan has published an impressive twenty-one books, which have come to be known as the Riordanverse.... Read more
2021 University of St Andrews Biblical Studies Symposium July 7-9, 2021 – Online only The St Mary’s School of Divinity at the University of St Andrews is hosting this interdisciplinary conference dealing with questions of belief in the ancient world and in the biblical texts. The conference will consist of both plenary sessions and breakout sessions in which both postgraduate students and professional scholars will have the chance to present and discuss their research. Plenary speakers include: Dr. Brent Strawn... Read more
There is an incredibly detailed, thoughtful, and reflective review by Bob Cornwall on his blog. He writes: If we wish to fully understand who Jesus was and is, we need resources like this to flesh out the nature of Jesus’ person. McGrath’s What Jesus Learned from Women also helps us recognize the role of women in the biblical story, suggesting that Jesus took seriously the teachings and the examples of the women in his life. Now, McGrath’s proposals will challenge... Read more
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