Matthew Ferguson, who has produced some of the best blog material I have read, has posted an explanation for why he is taking a break. I would love him to return when he feels the time is right.
He makes an interesting comparison about the tone of disagreements in biblical studies (so much bitter acrimony on both sides) and the atmosphere in Classics (a more enjoyable place to function). Amen. Over the years of this blog I have had the good fortune of “meeting” a number of classicists and scholars from other fields online and they actually sound cordial, friendly, positive, even the ones who say they believe their was a historical Jesus. Of course there are biblical scholars who are also quite pleasantly human, too, but if one wants to witness a serious blood sport of serious knifings and poisonings and bludgeonings one cannot go wrong by entering the arena of biblical scholarship. Or even the amateur arena where lay folk argue over the same topics that bring out the worst among scholars.
I was not very well prepared for it when I began blogging and it has taken me some time to figure out the best ways of handling it.
The good side of Matthew’s news is that I hope to be able to catch up with many of his past posts that I have only been able to skim so far — before he writes too much more. No doubt I am only one of many who will like to keep an eye on his future progress in studies and publications, and hope he will return to sharing his learning on the blog once again.
Neil Godfrey
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NT scholarship is the only field in academia that I don’t take so seriously. I’m not one to question the experts in academia but after seeing NT scholars either being dishonest or speaking about things that they really don’t know much about, I’ve become skeptical of them. They’re the ones who told me there’s no such thing as dying and resurrecting savior gods and no pagan influence on Christianity. I decided to look into it myself and sure enough, there are and they closely resemble Jesus. I noticed religious scholars outside of NT scholarship are more willing to point out similarities and influences from pagan religions. NT scholarship almost seems to be a club of certain scholars where there’s certain things you can’t say or question. It’s like they’re very protective over Jesus and Christianity. With all that being said, I don’t consider myself a mythicist because I don’t know enough about how historians determine historicity.
cf. TaborBlog newest post: Can a Christian be a historian? Some thoughts on heading for Denver. for another view.
The link: https://jamestabor.com/can-a-christian-be-a-historian-some-thoughts-on-heading-for-denver/
I’m sad his blog is apparently shutdown. I understand wanting a break or even wanting to just be done with counter-apologetics or biblical studies, but wish the blog could remain at least. Also even worse is having no idea how he is doing or how to contact him. Hope he’s okay during this difficult time.