As the end of a semester draws near, and having been reading student papers, let me offer a word of advice to any students who happen to be reading this. Thesauruses give words which overlap in meaning, and that is useful. But two words are not always interchangeable even if they are essentially synonymous. And attempts to sound more eloquent than you are, or as though you have a broader vocabulary than you do, are rarely successful, and will typically... Read more
I’ve mentioned here before the class activity  I use when teaching my course on the historical Jesus. I get students to bring M&Ms, and we re-enact the voting on sayings of Jesus undertaken by the Jesus Seminar. And we call ourselves the Jesus SeM&Minar. Keith Reich recently tried the activity in his class. Click through to see what sorts of results he got – and chime in there, here, or both with your thoughts about this activity as a teaching... Read more
This is another video of me playing Christmas music – it is my own jazz arrangement of “Silent Night.” It is as rusty as “Christmas Time Is Here” is, not having been worked on since last year. So this is another “before” video – hopefully the “after” video will not only be more polished, but will include a bit of soling over the chord changes!   Read more
I shared this last year and then forgot about it for a year, as we do with most things Christmasy. Whether it is your first time or your hundredth time seeing this, I think you’ll enjoy this Star Wars/Dr. Seuss mash-up. And I feel like I had better get started sharing some of these classics from years past, since any day now I expected to be inundated with lots of new holiday videos, images, and music! Read more
The religions of the world are becoming increasingly aware that what unites them in ethics is greater than what divides them in theology. — Damien Keown and John Keown, “Killing, karma and caring: euthanasia in Buddhism and Christianity” in the Journal of Medical Ethics 21 (1995) 265. Read more
I just recently started meeting with some colleagues and a student in a Greek reading group. I suggested to a colleague in Classics that it might be interesting to read Philo of Alexandria together, and she got very excited about the idea, and some other colleagues in Religion also expressed an interest. And so lately, I have felt disconcertingly like I am back in Greek class, wondering why the verses that I end up with when it is my turn... Read more
Mandaean texts like the Book of John make reference to Jerusalem quite often – more often than one would expect if this religion had its origins in Mesopotamia, and so the very attention given to Jerusalem provides important hints about the history and geographical movements of the Mandaeans. Here are links to the passages which make reference to Jerusalem in the Mandaean Book of John: Chapter 20: obscure references in passing to John and the sun having “halos” or “wreaths”... Read more
Anthony Le Donne asked me to share this announcement about an upcoming speaking event of his: The Gospel of Jesus' Wife: A Discussion of a Recent Biblical Controversy Nov 12, 2012 Dan Brown's 2008 novel “The Da Vinci Code” had a controversial premise – that Christian savior Jesus married and had children. The fictional book sold more than 80 million copies and was turned into a hit movie. It also was widely condemned by many religious institutions.Two months ago the... Read more
Via my wife   Read more
The title will probably attract grammar nazis in large numbers. But the wording is intention, indicating that what I play in the video below is almost “Christmas Time Is Here,” the classic jazz piece by Vince Guaraldi from the Charlie Brown Christmas Special. Alas, it is a bit rusty (I don’t play it that often apart from around Christmas time, for obvious reasons), but I’m posting it here in the hopes that I will later post an “after” to correspond to... Read more
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