It is now two weeks since we finally dived into the details of the Lord’s Prayer in my Sunday school class. Moving at our usual fast pace, we covered one word on that occasion: Father. I highlighted the evidence for Jesus have addressed God as abba in Aramaic, and the misconception that abba meant “daddy” was mentioned. And so I explained – as I also sought to do on the BLT blog recently – that abba simply is not an... Read more
I arrived in Baltimore yesterday and immediately started bumping into SBL people, and very soon people I knew or who knew me from my blogging. I had dinner with Judy Stack-Nelson and Brooke Lester, during which we talked about aspects of teaching both in the classroom and online. At the AAR reception I got to meet Brandon Withrow in person: Today I spent a little time in the book exhibits, and managed to see a few people I know from... Read more
Perhaps I could instead have called this “Bible snobs” – whether it is a question of wine or literature or pictures of Joe Biden as in the cartoon below, there is a positive and a negative angle on the “discerning palate.” Ian at Irreducible Complexity applied this to the Bible. Certainly there are things which you appreciate in literature, wine, music, or anything else by really familiarizing yourself with the range of phrases, sounds, tastes, etc. Surely this isn’t always... Read more
Via Doctor Who and the T.A.R.D.I.S. on Facebook. Read more
Wipf and Stock's Cascade imprints is distributing the book I co-edited on religion and Doctor Who in North America. They've reversed the title and subtitle for this edition, and have a really cool cover: For those attending AAR/SBL, you should be able to get copies in Baltimore…while they last! See also the article “Doctor Who: time travel through faith” on the BBC Religion and Ethics website. There is also a post on the blog Think Christian that may be of... Read more
That the term “Bible” means something very clear and specific with clearly-defined characteristics and attributes is a widespread assumption. And it is wrong. It would make more sense to speak of “Bibles” in the plural rather than “the Bible.” Between Jewish, Eastern Orthodox, Roman Catholic, Protestant, and Ethiopic Bibles there are significant differences. And the range of views regarding the Bible's nature and role is even larger. Recently Kevin Davis shared a list of some options regarding Biblical inspiration on... Read more
Today I will be joining more than 10,000 other religion and Biblical studies scholars in Baltimore, Maryland for the joint annual meeting of the American Academy of Religion and the Society of Biblical Literature. I will try to blog about the conference as possible. Read more
“Do we know what it means to be struck by grace? It does not mean that we suddenly believe that God exists, or that Jesus is the Saviour, or that the Bible contains the truth. To believe that something is, is almost contrary to the meaning of grace. Furthermore, grace does not mean simply that we are making progress in our moral self-control, in our fight against special faults, and in our relationships to men and to society. Moral progress may be a fruit... Read more
Thank you to Thom Stark for making me aware that the folks at HISHE (How It Should Have Ended) have tackled Doctor Who. In this video, the Doctor stops by to compare superhero status with Superman and Batman. Enjoy! Read more
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