Al-Hallaj and the Johannine Jesus

Last updated on: March 14, 2014 at 7:23 am By James F. McGrath

Dustin Smith has continued posting a transcript from when he recently interviewed me. Unfortunately, one of the points looks like it lost something in the recording or summarization process. And since it relates to a potential thesis topic, I thought I’d say more about it here. There was a Sufi mystic, Abu al-Mughith al-Husayn ibn Mansur al-Hallaj, who reportedly was crucified by Islamic authorities for saying ana al Haqq, “I am the truth.” The account of him – and/or Al-Hallaj’s self... Read more

The Sequel to Noah

Last updated on: March 13, 2014 at 8:10 pm By James F. McGrath

Richard Carrier on Acts as Historical Fiction

Last updated on: March 13, 2014 at 7:31 pm By James F. McGrath

John Loftus drew attention to the lecture above. Here are some comments on it. The presentation starts with best books, mentioning Richard Purvo, Dennis MacDonald, and John Dominic Crossan. This was misleading, because these scholars do not draw the distinctive conclusions that Carrier does. Luke-Acts is said to have been written by the same guy, and as a response to Matthew, which in turn was a response to Mark. Brief and oversimplified summaries of the aims of each Gospel. Carrier mentions... Read more

Neil deGrasse Tyson Sermon

Last updated on: March 13, 2014 at 2:02 pm By James F. McGrath

If you saw the first episode of Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey, you’ll probably have been impressed with Neil deGrasse Tyson’s testimony about the impact of Carl Sagan on his life. This reminded me of a powerful “sermon” he “preached” at the Beyond Belief 2006 conference, which is the video embedded above. His account of being a physics major at a Liberal Arts school is powerful and very timely in our era when some students think the point of a university... Read more

An Unexamined Faith is a Flat Faith

Last updated on: March 13, 2014 at 1:26 pm By James F. McGrath

Theodicy and Thanksgiving

Last updated on: March 13, 2014 at 8:31 am By James F. McGrath

Last Sunday in my sunday school class, we talked about prayer. Perennial questions came up, the most pressing of which was how to avoid having prayers asking for help, and giving thanks for good fortune, become things that cause harm to those around you. It is ultimately the same issue that got Job’s friends into trouble, only the flip side of it. They tried to interpret Job’s suffering in relation to God’s will and activity. Today more often people ignore... Read more

Jesus in the Wilderness

Last updated on: March 12, 2014 at 3:08 pm By James F. McGrath

HT Roger Wolsey on Facebook Read more

If God Needs Money

Last updated on: March 12, 2014 at 1:17 pm By James F. McGrath

I’ve seen this quote from Homer Simpson pop up in a few places recently: If God needs money, why doesn’t he just write another Bible? The first one sold pretty well. Bruce Gerencser also included the image, and so I thought I ought to combine the two. Read more

My Bacon Number is 3

Last updated on: March 12, 2014 at 12:14 pm By James F. McGrath

Someone shared the “Oracle of Bacon” on Facebook. Through it, I learned that I have a Bacon Number of 3, assuming that one is calculating connections of all genuine friends and acquaintances, and not only people who were in movies together. Krystina Ptasinski, an actress who majored in religion as well as theater at Butler University, has a Bacon Number of 2. And since I know Krystina, that makes my Bacon Number 3. And if you are acquainted with me,... Read more

Cosmos for Creationists

Last updated on: March 12, 2014 at 11:18 am By James F. McGrath

HT Hemant Mehta I found this funny. But there is a serious side to it. The truth is that young-earth creationists really do redact and selectively quote scientists to try to support their own bogus claims. And the substitution of “God” in the place of a lengthy summary of scientific evidence, in addition to being comical, illustrates the more serious problems with those who treat the two as competing. Why not do the same to everything? When the weather report... Read more