Musings on biblical studies, politics, religion, ethics, human nature, tidbits from science
Over a week ago I posted Where did the Bible’s Jews come from? Part 1 — a discussion drawn principally from Thomas L. Thompson’s The Mythic Past: Biblical archaeology and the myth of Israel. That first post covered the evidence that “Jewishness” originated as a religious rather than an ethnic label: the origin myth of … Continue reading “Where did the Bible’s Jews come from? — Part 2”
Dr McGrath’s “reviews” (sic) of Earl Doherty’s book are what you get when a reviewer has made up his mind beforehand that he is going to read nothing but nonsense — except for any tidbits that happen to be repeats of mainstream scholarly views anyway — written by an ignorant charlatan whom he (the reviewer) … Continue reading “Concluding my response to Dr McGrath’s “review” (sic) of chapter 10 part 2″
This post is based primarily on a few pages in The Mythic Past by Thomas L. Thompson. It is slightly supplemented by fewer notes from a different but complementary discussion on the biblical meanings of “the people of God” in The Israelites in History and Tradition by Niels Peter Lemche. (All bold fonts for emphasis … Continue reading “Where did the Bible’s Jews come from? Part 1”
Patristic scholar Markus Vinzent has posted a few clear-headed pointers in relation to Dan Wallace’s apparent claims concerning the discovery of a piece of papyri containing some of the Gospel of Mark “reliably dated” — through paleography — to the first century. Does confessional bias enter this scholarly debate? Markus thinks so: While ideological disagreements, … Continue reading “Confessional Bias & Tendentious Dating of Manuscripts”
Well this is really quite embarrassing. I have never read more than snippets by a notorious right-wing Australian historian, Keith Windschuttle, and those I have read have been mostly quotations found in the works of his critics, but I know I have been strongly opposed to whatever Windschuttle has written about the history of the … Continue reading “Ouch! My own beliefs undermined by my own historical principles!”
Cameron seemed so polite when making first contact with my blog that I thought, Hey, this is gonna be a nice reasonable guy. How can David Fitzgerald, author of Nailed: Ten Christian Myths That Show Jesus Never Existed At All, be reasonable and still have issues with such a polite Cameron? Well, Cameron responded to … Continue reading “Neil Godfrey’s lousy defense of Christ-myth hypocrisy”
Continuing the series of Couchoud’s The Crucified Christ — archived here. In this chapter Couchoud attempts first of all to account for the origin of the concept of Christ crucified and then to address what this meant for Paul and his churches, in particular its mystical and timeless character. The greatest gift of Paul to … Continue reading “Crucified God: origin and original meaning of the concept (Couchoud continued)”
Continuing from the previous post, “The Struggles of Paul” . . . . (The full series is archived here.) Troubles in Ephesus Having sent his “terrible letter” to the Corinthian ekklesia Paul was beset by mounting troubles where he was staying in Ephesus. He had been banned from the synagogue so assembled his church in … Continue reading “The sufferings of Paul (Couchoud continued)”
Couchoud follows the main outline of Acts in his account of the missionary career of Paul. Where and why he occasionally deviates from Acts is explained in context below. (All posts in this series, along with a few extras, are archived here.) At first glance it appears that C is merely repeating a well-known set … Continue reading “The struggles of Paul (Couchoud continued)”
Unfortunately this is not my favourite chapter in Couchoud’s book The Creation Of Christ. But I’ve set myself a target and I have to get through this one to finish the book, so here goes. (The series is archived here.) (I personally suspect the stories in Acts are inspired more by Old Testament and Classical … Continue reading “Earliest divisions in the Christian movement (Couchoud continued)”
Couchoud thought that John the Baptist epitomized and popularized the Jewish hopes for a coming Judge from Heaven — as shown in my previous post in this series (the entire series is archived here). Christianity was born of the travail of the days of John. The Baptist gave it two talismans with which to bind … Continue reading “The First Signs of Christianity: Couchoud continued”
Continuing the series archived at Couchoud: The Creation of Christ – – – (Couchoud argues that our “editor” – Clement? – compiled 28 books, one more than our current 27 that make up our New Testament and this post concludes the section where Couchoud discusses the origin of our New Testament books.) The perfect balance … Continue reading “2 Peters, 1 Jude and 2 Revelations: the first New Testament (Couchoud)”
The following post by David Fitzgerald is posted here with DF’s permission; the original is at freethoughtblogs.com. Will the Real Jesus Please Stand Up? Is the “Jesus of History” any more real than the “Jesus of Faith”? (From the upcoming book, Jesus: Mything in Action, by David Fitzgerald) Christianity had a good, long run. But … Continue reading “Dave Fitzgerald sequel: Is the “Jesus of History” any more real than the “Jesus of Faith”?”
David Fitzgerald‘s essay, Ten Beautiful Lies About Jesus, that received an Honorable Mention in the 2010 Mythicist Prize contest has been expanded into a book, Nailed: Ten Christian Myths That Showed Jesus Never Existed At All. The book is clearly a hit: Nailed continues to garner more fans and accolades, and generate cranky hate mail. … Continue reading “David Fitzgerald responds to Tim O’Neill’s review of Nailed”