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How Can You Still Believe? Guest Post by Judy Siker

One of the questions I get asked the most frequently from blog members is how someone can possibly continue to be a believing Christian if they understand the enormous problems presented by the critical study of the New Testament.  I always tell them that in fact it’s not only possible – it happens all the time.  Sometimes they are incredulous, but it’s not only true, it’s so true that my friends who know everything I know about the Bible and are still believers often find the question / issue completely puzzling.  They have trouble understanding why anyone thinks it’s a problem.  As we learned from "Cool Hand Luke" (a great movie, btw, with tons of Christ-images), “What we have here is a failure to communicate.” I have asked my former student and long-time friend Rev. Dr. Judy Siker to write a couple of posts from a personal standpoint, indicating why/ how she continues to be a believer and faithful church person even though she is, at the same time, a critical scholar of the Bible. [...]

2025-09-10T12:46:31-04:00October 2nd, 2019|Public Forum, Reflections and Ruminations|

My Speaking Schedule for this Academic Year (so far)

I often get asked where I"m giving a talk next.  I do keep a listing on my website (www.bartdehrman.com), which has other information about my life and activities as well.   But, well, I haven't been good this year at getting it up to date, until now.  (It was lost in the triage of my life....)  With Steven's help, it's now up and up to date.   Here it is, for anyone who's interested.  And available, as well, even for anyone who is not. All of these are open to the public (except, well, the two I've already done; they're now closed to everybody).  Most of them require registration.  If you google the date and organization, for most of them, you'll find the information you need to sign up.  If you have any problems or just can't find it, just zap me an email at [email protected]. I'll probably be adding a few things here and there, at least in the spring.  If I do, I'll keep you posted.   DATE LOCATION SUBJECT ORGANIZATION Sept. 7 Washington, DC [...]

2025-09-10T12:46:30-04:00September 27th, 2019|Public Forum|

Hey! Wanna Go With Me To Rome ?

Here's an exciting announcement that I've been eager to make.  And now I can.   I'll be taking a group of interested (and interesting) folk on a ten-day trip to Rome and Southern Italy on April 14-24, 2020 (this coming April!); this is tour sponsored by Thalassa Journeys, the group that arranged my (with some other blog members)to Greece and Turkey last year.  It was spectacular. And this one will be as well.   It is an amazing itinerary, as good as they come.  The theme is "Pagans and Christians in the Roman World," and the places we see will be tied both to my most recent book The Triumph of Christianity, and the one about to come out in March,  Heaven and Hell: A History of the Afterlife. I've been to Rome a number of times, but this trip looks unusually good.  Some of the highlights:  Four nights in a hotel in Sorrento (one of the places I've never been; but google it and check it out: right on the Bay of Naples), with trips to [...]

2025-09-10T12:46:30-04:00September 25th, 2019|Public Forum|

An Opening for the Blog Dinner NYC August 27

We have had a cancellation for the blog dinner scheduled for 7:00 pm in NYC (Midtown), this coming Tuesday (August 27).  So we have one more seat at the table.  Anyone interested?   If so, email me at [email protected]    Only requirements for attendance: you be a member of the blog, you get there, you pay for your meal, you be interested in talking to us!

2025-09-10T12:46:12-04:00August 22nd, 2019|Public Forum|

Learning New Things

I am constantly awed by some fellow scholars,who have not just enormous range of knowledge about so many things but also an inordinate, almost insatiable curiosity.   There aren’t many people like that, but I know some.   At the same time I am regularly puzzled by people who simply have no curiosity about much of anything, who have strong opinions about lots and actual knowledge about little, who just don’t have any real curiosity or drive to find answers to anything. I’m not talking about the BIG questions of life (Why are we here? What is the purpose of it all?  What should I be doing with my life? Etc. etc.) – although I do find it odd that so many people just don’t think about them.  But here I’m talking about knowledge in general.  People simply prefer to sludge through life without looking into anything beyond the headlines, without reading books, without finding anything worth looking into. I suppose I too was raised that way and was that way for the early part of my [...]

2025-09-10T12:45:59-04:00August 18th, 2019|Public Forum, Reflections and Ruminations|

Blog Dinner for NYC Full!

I am pleased  to say that the table for the blog dinner in NYC for August 27 is now full.  At this point I will start a waiting list, in the event that someone backs out, as often happens.   So let me know if you want to be on it. And as other opportunities come up, I'll be sure to post them.

2025-09-10T12:45:59-04:00August 16th, 2019|Public Forum|

Join Me In Egypt? Tour in October 2020!

  I am (very) happy to announce that I will be giving lectures on a tour to Egypt on October 16-29, 2020.  It's not too early to start planning!  On the contrary: the trip hasn't been seriously advertised yet, and already four people have signed up! The trip is sponsored by the University of North Carolina General Alumni Association, BUT -- big point here! -- you do not need to be an alumna/alumnus to come.   It's going to be a terrific trip.  The final brochure is not ready yet, but you can get the itinerary already from the company putting it on, Orbridge, at: https://orbridge.com/grp_departures/overview/partner_unc_egypt_2020  (Highlights below) It's spectacular.  I've done a number of these sites before (Cairo, Pyramids, Luxor, Valley of the Kingd, Karnak Temple, and on and on), BUT, this time we're doing something I've never done before and always wanted to:  a four-day cruise down the Nile.  How good can it get??? If you want to get more info, call the UNC Alumni office at 877.962.3980, and/or check out their travel website. [...]

2025-09-10T12:45:59-04:00August 16th, 2019|Public Forum|

Do You Need a Free Membership?

Thanks to the incredible ongoing generosity of members of the blog, I am happy to announce that there are still some free one-year memberships available.   These have been donated for a single purpose: to allow those who cannot afford the annual membership fee to participate on the blog for a year.   I will assign these memberships strictly on the honor system: if you truly cannot afford the membership fee, but very much want to have full access to the blog, then please contact me.   Do NOT reply here, on the blog, as a comment.   Send me a separate email, privately, at [email protected].   In your email, let me know your situation (why you would like to take advantage of this offer) and provide me with the following information: 1)      Your first and last name. 2)      Your preferred personal email. 3)      Your preferred user name (no spaces). 4)      Your preferred password (should be 8 or more characters, no spaces).   The donors will remain anonymous, but here let me publicly extend my heartfelt thanks for such [...]

2025-07-16T17:31:53-04:00August 16th, 2019|Public Forum|

Last Minute (well, sort of): Another Blog Dinner Option. NYC, August 27

OK, this is a bit unexpected.  But I'm going to be in New York (Midtown Manhattan) for a few days (that part was expected) and it turns out I'll have an evening free, August 27.  And so if anyone's interested I can do a blog dinner.  Given the location, it might be kind of pricey, but ... well, if you're interested, wanna come? As per my custom:  the table will be limited to eight, of which I will be one.  That means seven spots are available.  First come first served:  please do NOT response here on the blog, but send me a private email, at [email protected]. No agenda from my end, other than simply to have some of us to have a chance to meet and talk about matters of mutual interest. The only requirements for attendance to the dinner are that (a) you are a blog member; (b) you pay your own way – both getting to the event and your meal itself.  Otherwise, there is no expense and no requirement.   You don’t even [...]

2025-09-10T12:45:58-04:00August 12th, 2019|Public Forum|

Blog Dinner in D.C.: Full!

I am pleased and regret (at the same time) to say that the table for the blog dinner in D.C. in September is now full.  I have a waiting list that I have started, and have notified everyone who contacted me (both those at the table and those on the waiting list.) But I'll be doing others this coming year in a few other places!  Hopefully others can come to these

2025-09-10T12:45:58-04:00August 9th, 2019|Public Forum|

Blog Dinner, Washington DC. September 6, 2019

On Friday, September 6, 2019, at 7:00 pm, I will be hosting a Blog Dinner for blog members (members only, I'm afraid) at the Bistro Bis at the George Hotel in Washington D.C.   The table is limited to eight.  I'm one of them.  That means that seven spots are available.  First come first served:  please do NOT response here on the blog, but send me a private email, at [email protected]. The occasion is the Smithsonian Associates Seminar I'm doing the next day, four lectures on "More Controversies in Early Christianity":  Here's the website.  https://smithsonianassociates.org/ticketing/tickets/more-great-controversies-in-early-christianity-bart-ehrman-ponders-four-new-questions?utm_source=RAad&utm_medium=OAtsa&utm_content=mwX&utm_campaign=MayWe Please note: you do NOT need to be attending the seminar to attend the dinner.  The dinner is designed simply to allow us to have a chance to get to know each other and talk about matters of mutual interest. The only requirements for attendance to the dinner would be that (a) you be a blog member; (b) you pay your own way – both getting to the event and your meal itself.  Otherwise, there is no expense and no requirement. [...]

2025-09-10T12:45:58-04:00August 5th, 2019|Public Forum|

My Current Research Projects, 7/2019

I often get asked what I’m doing in my personal research – both long term and, well, what is it I actually do during the day?   It’s all related to the blog, so I thought I’d devote a single post to it, just a kind of overview of the kinds of things I’m working on.  Right now, as it turns out, it’s a wide range. Tomorrow I’m off to Marburg Germany (I’ve been in London for most of the summer, so it’s a short flight) for an international conference of New Testament scholars, called the Studiorum Novi Testamenti Societas – i.e., Society for New Testament Studies.   It’s an annual affair, mainly of Europeans and Americans, that takes place over four days, with major lectures, less major lectures, and seminar papers.  The latter involves small groups of anywhere, I suppose, from five to twenty scholars discussing papers written in advance for an hour and a half each. I’m presenting a paper I’ve been working on for about a month now on and off, on the Katabasis [...]

2025-09-10T12:45:40-04:00July 29th, 2019|Public Forum, Reflections and Ruminations|

Sad News From Larry Hurtado

Many readers on the blog will know of Larry Hurtado, a prominent New Testament scholar who has been influential as one of the most regular and reliable bloggers on issues of relevance to the study of early Christianity.   Larry has announced that he is very ill and will no longer be able to participate in either scholarship or the promotion of early Christians studies to a broader reading audience.  This is very sad, especially for us who know him.  (I will give his announcement about his illness and the prospects at the end of this post.) I have known Larry for over thirty years.  He started out as a New Testament textual critic, with his first book a published version of his dissertation: Hurtado, Larry W. (1981). Text-Critical Methodology and the Pre-Caesarean Text: Codex W in the Gospel of Mark. Studies and Documents. 43. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans.  It's not something you will want to try to reading, unless you're an expert on Greek and the Greek manuscript tradition of the NT.  Trust me.  But I used [...]

2025-09-10T12:45:38-04:00July 10th, 2019|History of Biblical Scholarship, Public Forum|

Would You Be Willing To Donate a Membership?

Twice a year on the blog, around mid-year and Christmas, I open up a possibility to help out people who really want to be on the blog but cannot afford the membership fees.  We are at that point!  So here is the semi-annual appeal for you to pitch in, as you feel moved. We've been doing this for nearly six years.  It  all started off when two anonymous donors proposed that they provide some funds to pay for memberships for a few people who wanted to be on the blog but because of personal circumstances, could not afford the membership fees.   I put out the offer on my Facebook page, asking if anyone was in that boat, and within twenty minutes I had thirty requests –all from people who were eager to join but simply did not have the means to do so.  I had to shut down the offer nearly as soon as I made it.   This made me suspect that there were a lot more people out there like that. And so [...]

2025-09-10T12:45:20-04:00June 30th, 2019|Public Forum|

Do You Need a Free Membership?

Thanks to the incredible ongoing generosity of members of the blog! I am happy to announce that there are a limited number of free one-year memberships available.   These have been donated for a single purpose: to allow those who cannot afford the annual membership fee to participate on the blog for a year.   I will assign these memberships strictly on the honor system: if you truly cannot afford the membership fee, but very much want to have full access to the blog, then please contact me. Do NOT reply here, on the blog, as a comment.   Please send me a separate email, privately, at [email protected].   In your email, let me know your situation (why you would like to take advantage of this offer) and provide me with the following information: Your first and last name. Your preferred personal email. Your preferred user name (no spaces). Your preferred password (should be 8 or more characters, no spaces). Country located The donors will remain anonymous, but here let me publicly extend my heartfelt thanks for such kind [...]

2025-07-16T17:31:35-04:00June 30th, 2019|Public Forum|

Finally! Now We Know. The “First-Century Copy” of Mark

I have posted on and off over the past six or seven years about an allegedly first-century copy of the Gospel of Mark that some scholars claimed we had now in our possession.  This would be by far the earliest manuscript we have of any part of the New Testament, a matter of real importance and interest.  But it turns out NOT to be that, and it has involved a real academic farce. Those of you who have followed this charade know most of the important facts, but for those of you who don’t, and just to remind those of you who do, let me set them out, before explaining the new development: In 2012 I was holding a public debate on whether we can know what the authors of the New Testament “originally” wrote, given the fact that we don’t have their original writings but only later copies of them, all of them different in many, many small ways and sometimes in more important ways.  Virtually all of these copies are many centuries removed [...]

Feedback on the Blog?

I’m back from Greece and Turkey now, with two weeks with nothing to do but work like a  wild-person day and night on my book project on Christian tours of heaven and hell in relation to their Greek and Roman predecessors.   I’m madly into Virgil’s Aeneid just now.  Great stuff.  I’ll say more about it anon. But it seems like a good time for me to pause for a day and take assessment of developments on the blog and get your reactions.  I do this a couple of times a year, as old-timers will know.  My basic questions:  How is the blog going, from your point of view?  And is there anything we should change/do differently?  Any feedback at all is welcome – just let me hear it. The goal, of course, is to keep the customers satisfied and to draw more in.  I’d like to use the blog to disseminate scholarly knowledge of the New Testament and the early Christian movement more broadly, for three interrelated reasons.  First, of course, is that I think [...]

2025-09-10T12:45:19-04:00June 19th, 2019|Public Forum, Reflections and Ruminations|

How Do We know When Manuscripts Were Written? Guest Post by Brent Nongbri

Here is the second post by Brent Nongbri on his recent book God's Library.    I mentioned in the first of his posts that the book is "ground-breaking."  In part that's because he challenges the widely accepted dates of a number of our earliest surviving manuscripts of the New Testament.   Here he talks about his further explorations of this problem.   The basic question: When scholars say "This manuscript dates from the fourth century" (or the second, etc.): how do they *know* that?  Or do they??  A lot of scholars will not be happy with Brent's conclusions!  But no one can simply write him off -- he gives some very convincing analyses.... - Brent Nongbri’s most popular books are Before Religion: A History of a Modern Concept and God's Library: The Archaeology of the Earliest Christian Manuscripts.   *********************************************************** In my last post (HERE), I talked a little bit about some of the interesting stories of discoveries of ancient Christian manuscripts I uncovered while researching my recent book, God’s Library. What I would like to do [...]

2025-09-10T12:45:01-04:00June 4th, 2019|New Testament Manuscripts, Public Forum|

The Blog Podcast: A Milestone!

As you may know, there is a weekly Podcast connected with the blog, called, cleverly enough, The Bart Ehrman Blog Podcast.  The idea was hatched two years ago by blog member John Mueller, who has put a tremendous amount of effort into the whole affair every week since, producing and managing the podcast all himself, simply out of the goodness of his heart.  The podcasts appear in a variety of venues, most anywhere you typically go for such things (e.g., Itunes, Stitcher, iHeartRadio, Spotify).  You can find it simply enough: just search for “Bart Ehrman” or look on the episode webpage:  http://ehrmanpodcast.libsyn.com/  John releases a new episode every Sunday and now, I am happy to say, we have reached a milestone.  Episode 100 is to be released this weekend. The goal of the podcast is to help raise blog awareness.  The theory was and is that this in turn would increase membership in the blog, which would then  raise more money for charity.  The best part of John’s offer to start the project is that [...]

2025-09-10T12:45:01-04:00May 31st, 2019|Public Forum|

God’s Library Part 1: Finding Ancient Christian Manuscripts in Egypt. Guest Post by Brent Nongbri

Here is a post by Brent Nongbri, from whom we have heard before on the blog.  His recent book on early Christian manuscripts, especially those of the New Testament, is ground-breaking and insightful.  He will give us a couple of posts devoted to it.  Here's the first. - Brent Nongbri’s most popular books are Before Religion: A History of a Modern Concept and God's Library: The Archaeology of the Earliest Christian Manuscripts.   *********************************************************** Bart suggested that a book I recently wrote might be of interest to readers of this blog, and he invited me to write a couple posts about it. The book is called God’s Library: The Archaeology of the Earliest Christian Manuscripts. It’s an introduction to early Christian manuscripts as archaeological artifacts. What exactly does that mean? Well, lots of excellent scholars have been studying our earliest Christian manuscripts for decades (in the case of some manuscripts, for centuries!), but they have mainly been interested in the texts that these manuscripts carry and not so much in the books themselves as physical [...]

2025-09-10T12:45:01-04:00May 28th, 2019|New Testament Manuscripts, Public Forum|
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