Public Forum Archives - Page 81 of 89 - The Bart Ehrman Blog

Letter from Urban Ministries of Durham
Gallery
Letter from Urban Ministries of Durham

Public Forum

Letter from Urban Ministries of Durham

As most of you know, there are four charities that the Bart Ehrman Blog supports. Two of them are international: CARE and Doctors Without Borders. Two of them are local to me: The Food Bank of North Carolina and the Urban Ministries of Durham. I very much wish we could support all of them more and more -- they are all superb organizations. Click to Enlarge and Expand Browser But I have a special soft spot for the Urban Ministries of Durham. Despite its name, it is not a religious organization. It is the principal organization that deals with hunger and homelessness in my community. It's a huge task. But what is really amazing about UMD is that they are not interested in simply putting a band-aid on the problem, for example by having a soup kitchen and an emergency shelter. They do have those, and a clothes pantry and a food pantry and much more. BUT what is really impressive is that they work very hard at *eliminating* homelessness (and hunger), [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:26:39-04:00September 19th, 2014|Public Forum|

A Day In the Life of a Research Professor

I sometimes get asked what it is that professors in universities actually do. The question is usually raised when someone realizes that at a major research university, most professors teach two classes a semester. Classes tend to involve three hours of class time per week. But that means a professor is in the classroom only six hours a week. Is this a full time job? Are you serious?? And on top of that you have tenure so that you can, for all practical purposes, never get fired? Hey how can *I* get a job like that??? It’s a really good question. First let me say something about what it is professors do, maybe in a couple of posts, and then say something about tenure. As it turns out, being a full-time professor is a boatload of work. I won’t say that it’s more than a lot of other busy and highly demanding occupations – a lot of you, I’m sure, work just as hard and long as I do. But it *is* a busy and [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:26:38-04:00September 16th, 2014|Public Forum, Teaching Christianity|

Yale Shaffer Lectures 2 of 3 – Christ The Divine Man

As I indicated in a post last week, on October 12-14, 2004 I gave the three Shaffer lectures at Yale University, on "Christ in the Early Christian Tradition: Texts Disputed and Apocryphal." This is the second of those lectures, dealing with Christ as a Divine man. (Again, the quality is not as high as we have come to expect over the past couple of years, because it was recorded originally on VHS. But it's been worked over to make it still pretty decent. Enjoy!) Please adjust gear icon for 720p High-Definition.

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:26:25-04:00September 8th, 2014|Christian Apocrypha, Public Forum, Video Media|

Upcoming Speaking Schedule and … Cruises!

I have finalized my speaking schedule for the Fall semester (I’m 58 and I still organize my life according to semesters… ) and more or less for the Spring as well. These are the events that are all open to the public; some charge for a ticket, others not. If any of these is near you, simply google the sponsor and my name, and normally that will take you to any information you may need should you want to attend. Two events in particular I want to highlight. The first is a cruise in the Caribbean this coming January 18-25. This event is sponsored by the Biblical Archaeology Society, and anyone who wants to purchase a place (and can do so) is absolutely welcome, whether you’ve ever been involved with or even have ever heard of the Biblical Archaeology Society or not. Now, you may wonder what the Caribbean has to do with Biblical archaeology. There is a clear and definite answer: Nothing At All. Well, except for the fact that the BAS is sponsoring [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:26:25-04:00September 2nd, 2014|Bart’s Biography, Public Forum|

Yale Shaffer Lectures 1 of 3 – Christ Come in the Flesh

Ten years ago now -- October 12-14, 2004 -- I delivered the Shaffer lectures at Yale University Divinity School. The central theme of the series was "Christ in the Early Christian Tradition: Texts Disputed and Apocryphal." Among other things, I tried to show how early Christian groups tried to restrict readings of their sacred texts to suit their own purposes. This first lecture is entitled on "Christ Come in the Flesh." (The video quality will not be up to what we all have come to expect, as it was recorded on VHS.) Please adjust gear icon for 720p High-Definition.

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:26:25-04:00September 1st, 2014|Christian Apocrypha, Public Forum, Video Media|

Suggested Donation for the Blog

With this post I would like to request that everyone on the blog consider making a donation, above and beyond your membership fee. I know that some of you simply cannot afford to do so, and that, of course, is absolutely fine. Others of you simply do not want to do so, and that also is absolutely fine. But if you have the means and the will, I would very much like you to consider my request. My proposed amount is $20. If everyone were to make a donation of that amount, we would stand a very good chance of reaching my desired fund raising goal of $100,000 for the year. As you know, every penny that comes into the blog goes out to charities supporting hunger and homelessness. I don’t keep a dime for myself, and I pay for all of the expenses of the blog out of my own pocket. For some of you, $20 will be more than you can afford, but you’d like to give something. So give $5. For others [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:26:24-04:00August 23rd, 2014|Public Forum|

Freedom From Religion Foundation Lecture

On May 3 of this year I gave a lecture at a meeting of the Freedom from Religion Foundation in Raleigh NC. The lecture is about what it is like to be an agnostic who writes about religion. That's an irony that I am constantly aware of and most of the lecture is about my experience as a non-religious person who is an expert in something he doesn't believe in. I also used the lecture to stress that being "free from religion" is not the same thing as "attacking religion." I absolutely agree with the founding principle of the FFRF that no religion (of any kind, Christian or otherwise) should be imposed on us by the state. But I do not at *all* think that this is the same thing as being opposed to religion. I am personally not opposed to religion or people who practice it (although I *am* quite definitely opposed to fundamenalist kinds of religion -- whether Christian, Muslim, Jewish, or whatever). And I think organized agnostic/atheist/secular/humanist attacks on religion per [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:26:24-04:00August 16th, 2014|Public Forum, Video Media|

Clarification!

I need to clarify something that I said in my earlier post today about my next project, since I have elicited several demurrals in response, and it was because I didn't express myself very clearly. What I said was this: Scholars have long held that Mark was the first of our Gospels to be written, and that it probably appeared sometime around the year 70 CE. Some scholars think it might have been a bit before that (I used to think that); more scholars think that it might have been a bit after. But almost everyone agrees that Mark dates to around the end of the Jewish War (66-70 CE). The only ones who consistently have argued otherwise are fundamentalists and very conservative evangelicals, who very much want Mark, our earliest Gospel, to be closer to the time of Jesus. When I said that the only scholars "who consistently" argued for an earlier date I didn't make myself clear. The reason I said "consistently" is because the only group of scholars that regularly [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:26:08-04:00August 13th, 2014|Canonical Gospels, Public Forum|

Suggestions for Improving the Blog (Its Content)

In my previous post I discussed some of the ideas that had been put forth for increasing the amount of money that the blog takes in – which is my ultimate goal, as I’ve repeatedly said. I realize that for most of you (all of you?), that’s *not* the ultimate goal. Most of you are interested in what the blog can provide by way of substance and content. So, on that topic…. I have tried to vary my posts since this endeavor started over two years ago now, and looking at the categories in which the posts appear, I think that has worked pretty well. And so far I have not run out of things to say and, to my knowledge, I have not yet repeated a post. Maybe I have and didn’t notice, and you were too kind to point it out! (Sometimes I have had ideas and searched only to see, yup, did that one already….) I have received a number of good suggestions about possible ways to change the blog to make [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:26:08-04:00August 11th, 2014|Public Forum|

National Cathedral Lecture – Misquoting Jesus

Here is a version of my lecture "Misquoting Jesus." Some of you have seen a different version of the lecture (I'm sure I've posted one!); I'm particularly fond of this particular one, both because of its setting in the Washington National Cathedral and because, well, I just think I was on better form than usual. The lecture was given on Feb. 6, 2007.

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:26:07-04:00August 10th, 2014|Public Forum, Video Media|

Ideas for Raising More Money on the Blog

Many thanks to everyone who responded to my request for comments about how to improve the blog. I am taking all of them under advisement! Here I’d like to flesh out a bit three specific suggestions and give my take on them (I will address a few others in my next post). Please consider each of these and respond if you feel so moved! These are themed: they are all about money and about how to raise more of it – one of my ongoing interests and concerns 1. The Price of the Blog. Several people suggested that if I want to achieve my fund-raising goals for the charities I support (i.e., make more money), I could raise the cost of the blog. Simply charge more. Some suggested $50 instead of $24.95. I was amused to see that no one suggested I charge *less* in order to make more money. It made me think that maybe there are more Democrats than Republicans on the blog. J The reason I don’t want to charge more is [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:26:08-04:00August 7th, 2014|Public Forum, Reflections and Ruminations|

Follow-up Apologies for the Post on Dinesh D’Souza

I was completely taken aback when I got up this morning (I’m in London – five hours ahead of Eastern Standard Time) to check my blog and Facebook pages to find that I caused a bit of a firestorm by my comments on Dinesh D’Souza when in yesterday’s post I introduced the video of the debate that I had had with him a couple of years ago. That was not my intention at *all* and I’m non-plussed, surprised, and embarassed. All sides of the political spectrum have reacted strongly – rabid liberals hee-hawing and rabid conservatives fuming and others weighing in one way or the other. Woops. Not what I had in mind. Now that I re-read my opening comments, I see how they are being read, and they are not being read in the way that I meant them. But I need to apologize to Dinesh and to anyone else I have offended. My intention was *not* to badmouth Dinesh, whom I like on a personal level even if absolutely not on the political. [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:26:07-04:00August 3rd, 2014|Bart's Debates, Public Forum|

My Debate with Dinesh D’Souza on the Problem of Suffering

A prominent figure in the news lately has been Dinesh D'Souza. Dinesh is best known as a hyper-conservative political commentator. His most recent book is America, and this week it is #1 on the New York Times bestseller list for non-fiction. It has a companion documentary film. If you're politically very-right-wing conservative and despise Barack Obama and everything he stands for -- this is the book for you! Dinesh was a policy analyst in the Reagan White House as a 20-something Wunderkind; he has served as John M. Olin Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. The New York Times Magazine named him as one of America's most influential conservative thinkers. Newsweek listed him as one of the country's most prominent Asian Americans. Dinesh has also been in the news for several other things in the past two years, in connection with his (former) presidency of Kings college -- a conservative evangelical institutions that trains conservative Christians in business and finance so that they can get high level places at Goldman Sachs-- and more recently because [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:24:46-04:00August 2nd, 2014|Bart's Debates, Public Forum, Video Media|

About the Blog

I have now finished with my extensive comments on Jesus’ burial. Some of you may be relieved to hear that. I know I am! That was the most intense thread that I’ve done on the blog since its inception over two years ago. It was really more like producing scholarship than anything else I’ve done. And I know that’s not everyone’s cup of tea. So now I can move on to other things on the blog. If you weren’t really into that more hard-core kind of thing, then I hope that the sorts of things that I’ll be doing now for a while will strike your fancy. I thought this would be a good time to pause and think a bit about the blog, and to hear your ideas and suggestions for it. As probably everyone on the blog knows, I have two major objectives in doing it, one far more major than the other. The one that is *less* major for me is the one that is *more* major for virtually everyone else. I [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:26:07-04:00August 1st, 2014|Public Forum|

The Skeletal Remains of Yehohanan and Their Significance

I plan to make this the last post responding to Craig Evans’s article, “Getting the Burial Traditions and Evidences Right,” in which he attempts to refute my argument in How Jesus Became God, that Jesus was probably not given a decent burial on the day of his crucifixion. Several readers have asked me interesting questions about this or that thing that I’ve said, and I may try to answer these questions in a few days or, well, eventually; but for now, this will be my last post on it. It think maybe this thread has been more than enough! I have dealt with a wide range of Craig’s arguments, and have saved his two strongest arguments for last. In my last post I dealt with the claim of Josephus that Jews (always? usually? sometimes?) buried crucifixion victims before sunset, and I showed that as a general statement it simply isn’t true, and argued that in any event it would not have applied to a case such as that of Jesus, one who was crucified as [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:26:07-04:00July 31st, 2014|Bart's Critics, Historical Jesus, Public Forum|

Hiatus: A New Teaching Company Course

Another brief hiatus as we near the end of my thread on the burial traditions of Jesus, occasioned by the inquiries of several members of the blog, and others not on the blog, about my new course for the Teaching Company (the company is also called The Great Courses). A couple of days ago my new course on “How Jesus Became God” came out. It is obviously based (roughly) on the book of the same title. The Course consists of twenty-four lectures, each thirty minutes in length, and as with all the Great Courses, it is available in numerous formats: on CD for audio only, or DVD for video, or as a download, and so on. For a quick link: http://www.thegreatcourses.com/tgc/courses/course_detail.aspx?cid=6522 You’ll see that it is right now being offered at a serious discount. One hint about the Teaching Company courses: ALWAYS buy them at discount! (They all get discounted on and off.) These are the titles of each of the lectures: 1 Jesus—The Man Who Became God 2 Greco-Roman Gods Who Became Human 3 [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:26:06-04:00July 26th, 2014|Historical Jesus, Public Forum, Teaching Christianity|

Pilate the Intransigent

To make the best sense of this post it is important to keep in mind what I said in the previous one. In his response to my views of in How Jesus Became God – that Jesus most likely was not given a decent burial on the day of his crucifixion by Joseph of Arimathea – Craig Evans has maintained, among other things, that Pilate was not the kind of governor who would ignore Jewish sensitivities. For Craig, Pilate started his rule by making a big mistake of bringing into Jerusalem the Roman standards that bore on them the image of the emperor. But once he realized that the Jewish populace was offended, he backed down and from then on he showed that he had learned his lesson. For that reason, Craig finds it “hard to believe” that at a later time Pilate would do something so opposed to Jewish custom as allow a body unburied on the day of a person’s death. This view strikes me as extremely problematic, for several reasons. To start [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:25:49-04:00July 19th, 2014|Bart's Critics, Early Judaism, Historical Jesus, Public Forum|

Violent Opposition to the Romans in the Days of Jesus (or Brian)?

This will be my last post on the conference dealing with the Life of Brian and the historical Jesus. Here I would like to summarize one paper that I thought was unusually insightful, to give you an idea of the kind of thing that could be done on a topic like this. As it turns out, it was the opening paper of the conference, and it was delivered by Martin Goodman, professor of Jewish Studies at Oxford. I should begin by saying that scholars have their own internal ranking systems for who the really good scholars are, who the pretty good ones are, who the OK ones are, and who the rather miserable ones are. It’s like most fields: outsiders have trouble knowing which is which. (I couldn’t tell a mediocre physicist from a top-flight one if my life depended on it.) With that said, Professor Goodman is at the top of the heap, a world-class scholar who is unusually gifted and knowledgeable about both Jewish and Roman antiquity. He is the real item – [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:25:47-04:00June 30th, 2014|Historical Jesus, Jesus and Film, Public Forum|

Brian and the Apocalyptic Jesus Part 3

Here is the third and final section of the paper that I read at the Life of Brian conference. The entire paper tried to argue that parody can be an effective historical method. By providing a caricature of a narrative or an alleged historical event, the film was able to highlight some very important historical realia that otherwise are too easy to miss, or that have not been given enough prominence by biblical scholars and historians. This third part of my paper is the really controversial one (although part 2 raised some concerns as well!). Here is where I argue that Jesus was not given a decent burial, and I use the film to explain why. I should say that in a few days I am going to be devoting a sustained thread to just this issue, of why I think the story of Joseph of Arimathea in the NT is legendary, that Jesus was almost certainly not given a decent burial on the day of his crucifixion. My thread will be a response [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:25:47-04:00June 29th, 2014|Historical Jesus, Jesus and Film, Public Forum, Video Media|

Brian and the Apocalyptic Jesus Part 2

Here I give the second of three installments of the paper I read at the Life of Brian and the Historical Jesus conference. In this portion I deal with an issue that I have been spending a lot of time reading and thinking about over the past couple of months: the value of eyewitness testimony for establishing what really happened in the past. The reflections here are inspired by the first episode of Brian's adulthood in the film, where he is present, at a distance, at Jesus' famous Sermon on the Mount, and the people around Brian cannot make out exactly what Jesus is saying since they are so far away from him. Rather than "Blessed are the Peacemakers," Jesus is thought to have said "Blessed are the Cheesemakers"; and it was the Greek, not the meek, who will inherit the earth. And so it goes. It's the sort of scene that is both funny and insightful -- what *was* it like to hear a public speaker back in the days before there [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:25:31-04:00June 28th, 2014|Jesus and Film, Public Forum|

Previous 1···808182···89 Next