There are two opposite tendencies in how the Last Supper is viewed. Some dismiss it as purely the invention of the church. Others insist Jesus must have said, done, and meant exactly what the New Testament authors tell us he did. As you might guess from things I have written about Jesus and history recently, I think there is a path between the extremes that is preferable, recognizing the likelihood of both a basis in history and reinterpretation and elaboration... Read more
We are all well aware by now of the dangers and detrimental effects of social media. People can get themselves into an information bubble that shields them from information and perspectives that might challenge their thinking. They can be so poorly informed that they will stage an insurrection seeking to overturn democracy while believing sincerely that they are defending it. All of that, to be clear, was possible in the era before the Internet. The only difference now is that... Read more
In a recent blog post, Ian Paul pushes back on some points John Barton makes in one of his influential books. I find myself between the two, agreeing with Ian that there is a tendency to treat a widespread academic surmise about the dates of works and other matters as though they were known with a high degree of certainty, almost gospel truth. Yet I also tend to find that Ian prefers conservative dates and views because of his own... Read more
Yesterday was the day in my Bible and music class when we focus on metrical Psalms. That means it was the day I bring a guitar with me. This time I had a digital piano as well, which wasn’t too hard to accomplish since I was in my office and they were on Zoom. It was a very different way of doing things than anything I had tried previously. I turned my computer monitors around and made various other adjustments... Read more
I was delighted to have the opportunity to speak yesterday via Zoom with composer Bruce Adolphe about his violin concerto “I Will Not Remain Silent” which is being released on a new album tomorrow. You can read more about the work on the composer’s website and also on the site of the Milken Archive, the organization which put the two of us into contact with one another for this conversation. I mentioned Adolphe’s new album briefly as something “of related... Read more
One of the ideas I am exploring in connection with my research on the historical John the Baptist, and which I already make some reference to in my book What Jesus Learned from Women, is the persistence of Israelite traditions of a variety of sorts in a range of places including Galilee as well as Egypt and Mesopotamia. Suggesting that Jesus had a heritage that was different than it might have been if he had grown up in Judaea is an... Read more
We have all been warned about YouTube comments, right? But I did come across one that was genuinely useful and insightful, although my perception of it that way may be because it expressed something that I had been thinking. Here is what the comment said (with slight fixes of capitalization, punctuation, and the like): Here is a way to test Haik-Vantoura’s claims: Psalms 57, 58, and 59 and possibly 75 share a melody: אל תשחת Psalm 69 and 45 also... Read more
I saw on the news a report about how quickly and efficiently Israel has been able to get the majority of its citizens vaccinated. You just know that there will be conservative Christian Zionists who will say “see, Israel is blessed by God, as we will be if we stand with them.” I cannot stop everyone from going that route, but I have to at least attempt to draw attention to some facts that complicate this conservative Christian narrative. First,... Read more
In recent years Bob MacDonald has played a particularly active role in drawing attention to the work of Suzanne Haik-Vantoura on the “accents” (more accurately called cantillation marks) found in Hebrew Bible manuscripts going back a millennium or so. He has also mentioned that there is a particularly important test case for any deciphering key: a traditional melody used to chant Psalm 114. He talks about this towards the end of his video here: Here is the melody that results... Read more
I have felt puzzled and surprised by some of the things said in a response on the Biblical Scholarship Blog to my recent blog post about the longest an embryo has been frozen before being implanted in a woman’s womb and carried to term, which I highlighted in connection with a discussion of some of the views that supporters of a “pro-life” stance claim to hold. The response starts with a lengthy quotation from another source, which assumes that abortion... Read more
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