\nThe big news is that I\u2019ve been asked by the Society of Biblical Literature (the largest academic society representing the field, of which I am a member) to present and defend the thesis of On the Historicity of Jesus at their Western Regional Conference at Azusa Pacific University next Monday (program here). Notably, Dennis McDonald\u2019s fascinating Homeric emulation thesis will get the same treatment the morning of Monday March 9, and then mine that afternoon.<\/p>\n
Probably only members of the SBL can attend (only door registration is possible now anyway). And I doubt it will be recorded. But it will be an important milestone in the saga of mythicism. Even though I expect a hostile reception (they elected a Baptist minister to rebut\u2013although someone thoroughly qualified, so it could be a measured response, or it could be not), the exposure will do good. More experts in the field will be confronted with the debate and made aware of the new stages in its development, and hear things they hadn\u2019t heard before.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
I have no objection to Carrier's proposal getting academic discussion \u2013 it should. But when I see him doing precisely what I have seen proponents of Intelligent Design do, I am not surprised. Carrier has received an invitation from whoever oversees one particular section of a particular regional meeting, and is presenting it as though the entire organization has somehow done this, and seems moreover to be trying to spin this as though it were somehow acknowledging that his ideas are valid. Once again, that is not how scholarship works. We present ideas at conferences to try to persuade our peers, not in order to use that as publicity for ideas that we hope to persuade the public to accept even if our peers do not.<\/p>\n
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Richard Carrier posted the following on his blog: The big news is that I\u2019ve been asked by the Society of Biblical Literature (the largest academic society representing the field, of which I am a member) to present and defend the thesis of On the Historicity of Jesus at their Western Regional Conference at Azusa Pacific […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":136,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[64,88],"tags":[2116,7848,7853,7854,7856,10359,10835,11511],"class_list":["post-28968","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-mythicism","category-society-of-biblical-literature","tag-conference","tag-mytherism","tag-mythicism","tag-mythicist","tag-mythicists","tag-richard-carrier","tag-sbl","tag-society-of-biblical-literature"],"yoast_head":"\n
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