Jim Linville has a series of cartoons and pictures related to the theme of how the dinosaurs died. Here’s a sample: Jesus Needs New PR shared two gems – one asks for captions on what may indeed be the worst Jesus picture ever (I’ve added my own below): “No seriously, you’re gonna like her better than the tiger. Promise.” And a parody of the National Day of Prayer video: Finally, Brad Matthies shared Star Wars parodies of the Windows 7 commercials. Presumably... Read more

As promised, I’m sharing some thoughts I prepared for the review panel at the 2011 Stone Campbell Journal Conference. The book being reviewed was Jesus Among Friends and Enemies, forthcoming from Baker. Multi-author books are particularly hard to review, and so I will focus here, as I did at the conference, on the final chapter which seeks to point in new directions regarding historical methodology. And here, unlike at the conference, I won’t run out of time, and so some... Read more

Jim West beat me to the blogging button on this one, but only by a little. The Express in the UK draws attention to Peter Thonemann’s view that the lead books are fakes. They call them “scrolls” but that isn’t as bad as calling David Elkington a Biblical scholar. Probably the clearest evidence that he isn’t a scholar at all is found in his attempt at undermining Thonemann by saying “He’s not a biblical scholar, he’s a Greek classicist.” Since... Read more

I was particularly delighted to have the opportunity to go out to dinner yesterday evening with folks from the conference and sit with Anthony Le Donne, Chris Keith, and Rafael Rodriguez. We talked about all sorts of things, but a particular highlight was the subject of the criteria of authenticity, about which we disagree and nuance our views in different ways. In fact, there will be a conference at Lincoln Christian University next year challenging the traditional criteria, and a... Read more

A couple of posts related to religion and science fiction recently popped up on blogs I read. Nakedpastor reflects on the religious significance of TRON: Legacy, while Rod of Alexandria continues a series on Theology and Firefly. Read more

Because I was away and busy, I didn’t get a chance to mention Jim Linville’s LOLaCreationist Contest. (It is perhaps just as well, since he was busy being Pharyngulated). Since over the course of my recent trip I alas saw signs and advertisements for the Creation “Museum,” I’m all the more eager to highlight Jim’s contest and encourage participation in it. Here are a few of the entries so far, focused around the theme of food: Also related, Panda’s Thumb links to a... Read more

John Byron notes that bibliobloggers have driven the lead codices story into the realm of the most popular stories. Now if only there would be more attention not only to some of the misleading news stories, but to what scholars have been blogging about the subject, we’d be making real progress. Nevertheless, it is fitting that there has been so much blogging about the lead codices: Jazz appreciation month is obviously an appropriate time to be talking about fake books... Read more

Earlier today in a conversation with another New Testament person at the conference, we were talking about dinner plans. He said he’d probably look for a “BW3.” “Ben Witherington III?” I asked. No, he clarified, he meant “Buffalo Wild Wings.” I’m sure this is a useful illustration of the potential for misunderstanding when two contexts overlap or intersect (in this case, an academic conference and discussion of food). But I’m just sharing it because I expect that many readers will... Read more

I’m currently in Cincinnati attending the Stone Campbell Journal Conference at Cincinnati Christian University. This morning the conference opened with a presentation by Loren Stuckenbruck on demons and exorcisms in the Gospels and their possible background in Jewish literature, in particular 1 Enoch and the Book of Giants. A particularly intriguing idea is the suggestion that the notion of demons inhabiting human bodies may reflect the mythology of demonic origins which regards demons as the spirits of the giants who... Read more

Ben Witherington has been blogging about Bart Ehrman’s recent book Forged. While Ehrman’s book is by no means above criticism, Witherington’s suggestion that that Ehrman misrepresents the scholarly consensus about the Pastoral Epistles seems to me to be off target. But this is perhaps an excellent opportunity to ask that perennial question: How does one gauge the scholarly consensus on a particular matter? I found myself pondering this issue as I read Foster’s book on the The Gospel of Peter.... Read more