Thanks to Jim West for scheduling the Biblical Studies Carnivals for 2011 and listing them on his web site. Anyone who wishes to get a head start on things can write and schedule their posts for next August over Christmas break, and send me the links… Read more

David Stark pointed out that the free SBL Greek New Testament is now available in pdf format. The Talmud Blog draws attention to the new issue of Oral Tradition which includes a substantial number of articles related to Biblical studies. Matt Montonini points out that Mariam Kamell’s PhD dissertation on the Letter of James, earlier Jewish Wisdom  literature, and the Gospel of Matthew, is available online. Also related, the latest issue of First Monday includes an article on open-access publishing and the inefficiency... Read more

A topic that has come up in a comment thread on another post seemed worth bringing out in a post of its own. It is a common misconception that evolution is a matter of complex organisms coming about through a random process. That is ancient Epicureanism, not modern biology. There certainly is an element of randomness to evolution, but the same could be said or pretty much any natural process. But the objection that “Complex organisms could not come to... Read more

Jim West shared a request from Joseph Kelly for submissions for this month’s Biblical Studies Carnival. The latter has apparently set up a Google Spreadsheet to expediate the process. Read more

Some (especially those who skipped accents altogether when they first learned Greek) are boung to find them puzzling and wonder what they are useful for. For one answer, visit Suzanne’s Bookshelf, which has a post on the accenting of the name Junia in Romans 16:7 and how it provides indication that, in the period when accents were being added to Greek manuscripts when they were copied, Junia was understood to be a woman. Read more

Here are videos of my son and his teacher playing two Christmas carols as violin duets. The first is “Silent Night” followed by “We Three Kings.” Apologies to those who object to the song’s reference to “3 Kings” because they consider only “1 Kings” and “2 Kings” canonical. 🙂 Read more

Continuing to reflect on the reference to books recording deeds and a book of life in Revelation 20 (and elsewhere), I wonder if this isn’t simply an expression of the dual emphases in some strands of Judaism and Christianity, maintaining both divine election and human freedom. And so human beings are said to be judged according to their works, and yet their lives and choices are connected with whether their names were written in the book of life, perhaps (depending... Read more

On his blog Davar Akher, Simon Holloway has posted a wonderfully detailed yet focused and succinct introduction and overview to the development of Rabbinic halakha and the literature that preserves and transmits it. Read more

I love the synchronicities of the blogosphere. While I was discussing Behe and mentioning evolutionary developmental biology here, a post was going up at BioLogos about the same, as the series “The Skeptical Biochemist” continues with a sixth post entitled “The Cathedral of Life.” Read more

I tried to make a pun in the title of my post about the NASA-funded discovery of a bacterium that adapted to not merely survive in an arsenic-abundant environment, but incorporate arsenic in its own chemical composition. But the blog The Deeps Of Time came up with a better one: “Arsenic and Old Lakes.” Well done! On behalf of pun-lovers everywhere, I salute you! Read more