Steve Caruso shared the above, in which he combined two images he found online, each trying to suggest that their worldview is affirming of human beings and gives meaning, while the other supposedly does the opposite. I think he is right that the very act of pretending that only one’s own worldview is meaningful, and that any opposing view by definition dehumanizes, engages in the very damaging of others that each side claims the other’s worldview causes. In other words,... Read more
Via Bart Ehrman Read more
Although most of the images in the series The Minimum Bible didn’t really speak to me in connection with the texts that they were supposed to represent, this one on the Book of Job seemed worth sharing: Read more
The cartoon above hopefully clarifies why some of us think that the expression of gratitude for one's own experience is problematic, when it posits God's direct and deliberate involvement in arranging circumstances for one's own benefit, while ignoring the contrasting experience of others and failing to offer a theological account of what befalls them in the same way one does for oneself. Is it not better to simply express gratitude, rather than voicing the view that God is showing favoritism... Read more
T&T Clark kindly sent me a review copy of Maurice Casey’s monumental opus Jesus of Nazareth: An Independent Historian’s Account of his Life and Teaching.Since Casey’s more recent book focused on mythicism builds heavily on the treatment of the details of the life of Jesus in this earlie volume from 2010, i thought I had better finish reading it and start blogging about it (even if not in that order). The reason for taking so long is that Casey’s book... Read more
The short answer to the question in the title of this post is almost certainly “no.” But it still seemed worth sharing the news article that came to my attention, claiming that an archaeologist has found the tomb of Judas, and in it, a pipe with traces of cannabis resin. I suspect that this may be an article someone was saving for April 1st but accidentally published too soon… Read more
Via God of Evolution Read more
I suppose one could call it the lord’s prayer…but the “lord” in “Lord of the Rings” is usually considered to be a different “lord” than the one in “Lord’s Prayer.” Read more
I came across several variations on the image below. It is certainly an apocryphal story, but one that may perhaps be worth commenting on. First, the sheer number of these kinds of stories and the variations on them suggest that this is an example of an urban legend. Whether it is based on any actual real-life experience will be impossible to tell. But I suspect that these stories may perhaps be circulated by those who are hoping to get into... Read more
The day before yesterday, I learned that a friend of mine had previously interviewed Tony Banks and chatted with other members of the band Genesis, of which he is a huge fan. Yesterday, the Genesis album The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway was the focus of an article that came to my attention in The New Yorker. One of the things mentioned in the latter article is the appropriation of Biblical and classical literature in Genesis songs. As I was... Read more
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