Musings on biblical studies, politics, religion, ethics, human nature, tidbits from science
. Chapter 12 The Funeral: ‘Oral Tradition’ And Its World . Chapter 12 of Beyond the Quest for the Historical Jesus by Thomas Brodie addresses the problems Brodie came to see with oral tradition as an explanation for Gospel sources. I have covered Brodie’s arguments on oral tradition in depth here (see Two Core Problems … Continue reading “Making of a Mythicist, Act 4, Scene 1 (“We need a gentle funeral”)”
. Chapter 11 The Dominican Biblical Institute . This hurts. It becomes personal. From my outsider perspective I understand that the Dominican Biblical Institute (DBI) was founded by Thomas Brodie (though he has an oblique way of explaining this in Beyond the Quest), so when I turn now to the DBI’s website to see what … Continue reading “Making of a Mythicist, Act 3, Scene 4 (The Dominican Biblical Institute, and Its Research)”
Continuing Thomas Brodie’s Beyond the Quest for the Historical Jesus: Memoir of a Discovery This post follows on from my earlier one on Chapter 9 that began with a discussion of my own on parallelomania, introduced Brodie’s desire to understand why the gospels appeared to use the Elijah-Elisha narrative as the framework for the life … Continue reading “Making of a Mythicist, Act 3, Scene 3 (“It is original, but not off the wall”)”
Robert Alter opens his book, The Art of Biblical Narrative (winner of the National Jewish Book Award for Jewish Thought), with a fascinating analysis of a small vignette that for most of us appears to interrupt the larger story of Joseph. He takes the Hebrew texts of the Jewish bible and subjects them to the … Continue reading “The Literary Artistry of Genesis”
Continuing Thomas Brodie’s Beyond the Quest for the Historical Jesus: Memoir of a Discovery This post follows on from my earlier one on Chapter 8 where Brodie is beginning to appreciate the nature of the literary artistry of the biblical books. Chapter 9 The Third Revolution Deepens: 1992-1995 . Reminder: This series is skipping over … Continue reading “Making of a Mythicist, Act 3, Scene 2 (Discovering the Crucial Bridge) — With a Note on “Parallelomania””
Continuing Thomas Brodie’s Beyond the Quest for the Historical Jesus: Memoir of a Discovery Part III The Third Revolution: Literary Art, Including Form/Genre Becoming aware of how biblical writers redesigned their materials into a new work of art Chapter 8 . Dramatic happenings in the next room Old Testament studies were much more action-packed in … Continue reading “Making of a Mythicist, Act 3, Scene 1 (Too Strange!)”
The theme of Act 2 is how Brodie learned that the biblical writers found much of their material in literary sources. In 1980 Brodie met Joseph Fitzmyer in Washington, DC, and asked him to comment on an article he (Brodie) had had published in the Journal for the Study of the New Testament the previous … Continue reading “Making of a Mythicist, Act 2, Scene 3 (“That is an important thesis”)”
Updated about 90 minutes after original posting. Joel Watts, I am very happy to say, has for the first time ever addressed me in a civil tone. His first words to me were two years ago and are on record for posterity here. It was downhill from that point on. Until today when he left … Continue reading “Joel Watts Responds to Being Caught Out Liking a Mythicist’s Work”
Edited with additional notes on compatibility with other models of gospel origins 3 hours after the original posting. Previous posts in this series The Making of a Mythicist, Act 1, Scene 1 (Thomas Brodie’s Odyssey) Making of a Mythicist, Act 1, Scene 2 Making of a Mythicist, Act 2, Scene 1 (Brodie’s Odyssey) Continuing . … Continue reading “Making of a Mythicist, Act 2, Scene 2 (The Verdict Falls)”
Can’t we all just get along? In a recent post, Tom Verenna urged us all to stop using derogatory words to describe people whom we disagree with. He did that hipster thing where his sentence gets broken up into one-word, emphatic, staccato commands: This. Has. Got. To. Stop. That. Is. So. Cool. Wait a second. What, exactly, … Continue reading “What Do We Mean by “Incompetent”?”
Dr McGrath, after I demonstrated that he once again claimed a mythicist wrote the opposite of what he really did write, has quaintly responded with a post titled Why Do Mythicists Care So Little About Facts and Details? in which he writes a revisionist account of his original post. With a beautiful irony McGrath opens … Continue reading “Ongoing Disregard for Facts and Denials of Old Criticisms (yes, McGrath again, sorry)“
This is my response to James McGrath’s post, Mythicist Language is Designed to Make Lies Sound Truthful. Is McGrath really saying that a mythicist argument by Brodie is actually a set of “lies”? If so, that underscores the very point I have been making about how censorship works in academia — and McGrath is himself … Continue reading “McGrath: The Facts Are Such “Minor” Details. Impressions Rule!”
Chapter 3 While teaching a class in Trinidad during the late 1960s Thomas Brodie found himself repeating a line he had heard from an experienced Dominican teacher in Rome, Peter Dunker: the biblical account of Abraham was a story, a powerful meaningful story, but not historical. His students challenged him. What did he mean by … Continue reading “Making of a Mythicist, Act 1, Scene 2”
Whoever wrote the Gospel of John knew how to blend geographical and personal names with other-worldly theological symbolism. So suggests Thomas L. Brodie in an appendix to The Quest for the Origin of John’s Gospel. To address just a few. (I have in other posts addressed several of these already: otherwise unknown places like Capernaum … Continue reading “The Distinctive Uses of Names in the Gospel of John”