(6 votes, average: 4.17 out of 5)
Loading...I have just finalized the deal. I will be giving lectures on an amazing trip to Greece and Turkey this coming June, 2019, with a company called Thalassa Journeys. The theme is centered around the journeys of the apostle Paul, and is called “St. Paul in the World of Late Antiquity: Civilizations and Faiths in Transition.”
For the trip we go to some of the key places in Paul’s missionary work: Thessaloniki, Philippi, Ephesus (staying on the Isle of Samos!), Patmos (connected of course with John the author of Revelation, rather than Paul: but it’s in the area and is an important site!), Athens, and Corinth. On the trip I’ll be lecturing on various aspects of Paul’s travels and teachings, and will be hanging out, of course, with other travellers the whole time. The itinerary and planning all look truly great. You interested?
If so, CLICK HERE to download the brochure. I think you’ll agree, it looks terrific. Anyone connected with the blog (or anyone else who sees this who can claim to be a “friend or follower of Prof Ehrman” (!) can receive a discount of $300 per person for reservations made by January 15.
I hope some of you can come. It looks like a first-rate trip, to important and interesting places in a great part of the world.
Any plans to lead a tour to Israel again in the future? I’d jump on that one!
Nothing in the works just now, I’m afraid.
Would love to go on another trip with you, but unfortunately we have a planned trip to Norway and Sweden in June. But to anyone reading this who is trying to decide whether to go or not – do it! We just did an Israel trip with Bart and it was absolutely fantastic!
I Would love to go to Greece. The brochure says the cost of flights within Greece is not included. How much will those flights cost?
It depends on a large number of factors. Simply check online from your point of departure.
This looks like a wonderful trip, and the brochure is fantastic. For those of us as poor as Corinthian church mice, who would like to enjoy the trip vicariously, will anyone video-record the lectures/sight-seeing?
I’m afraid not! Bummer!
I could see myself becoming really annoying on the same boat with you for 11 days. Just sayin’.
Alas not – I have a policy of not flying because of its impact on climate change. Also it’s somewhat out of my price range!
Double whammy.
Are you thinking it could be even close to how awesomely wonderful your October Israel trip was?
Yes, that was special, an unusually amazing trip….
That trip looks amazing. What a fantastic idea. If I wasn’t already going to Europe this year, I would so go. Please keep us posted on any future trips.
I wish I could join you Dr. Ehrman! That does look like an amazing trip.
I did have a question, one that would’ve fit perfectly a few posts ago when you addressed Jesus’ identifying himself as God. Regarding something that has always intrigued me. In John 10:33-34 When the authorities want to stone Jesus for claiming to be God, he refers I think to psalm 82:6 in his defense. “Is it not written in your law that ‘ye are gods, ,and all of you are children of the most high” which apparently was convincing enough.
What do you make of this? It seems like something a Gnostic would affirm; a divine nature in each individual.
Yes, it seems that Jesus is trying to trap them more than anything else. But his point is that all people are “children of God,” and so for him to declare himself divine isn’t any different (or much different). It’s always seemed like a clever and not altogether ingenuous line of arguing to me, since he is indeed claiming for himself something different than for all others.
Bart, in your book you say the common assumption that first Christians were hiding in the catacombs and were persecuted and thrown to lions all the time is false. But there obviously were even official persecutions. Could you perhaps write a blog to put this in context (give a bigger more objective and accurate picture)?
Good idea. I’m surprised I haven’t done that yet!
Any suggestions for how to get from the US to Thessaloniki? I checked for Texas, and the options seem to be dauntingly expensive or agonizingly long.
Yes, it’s probably expensive. The only way to know is to check out options online.
if the name “jesus” was a name jewish mothers gave their infant children, then these woman would be careful not to identify “jesus” as “yhwh” right ?
Isaiah is also a name which has yhwh doing something, but there is no evidence that isaiah was identified as yhwh, right ?
The names “jesus” and “isaiah” were not names jews used to identify their invisible GOd.
i dont think even author of acts identify “jesus” as yhwh.
It seems it is the gentile christians who start identifying jesus with invisivle yhwh.
Can you imagine jewish mums in first century saying “in the name of jesus….”
todays gentile christians have no issue with this, but surely jewish people in first century would have said,
“What the hell are you saying” ?
I’m not sure what you mean. Jesus and YHWH were different names. So is Isaiah.
i am asking , does it make sense that mary would name her son “jesus” and then identify “jesus” as yhwh?
On the other hand, christians identify “jesus” as yhwh.
Jesus and YHWH are normally understood as distince (son and father)
Your question is bringing up something interesting…
I never liked the mentioning of the ‘in the name of Jesus’ as the way to save in the gospels as Jesus himself did not point to himself but to ‘the father’ *why do you say I’m good, there is only one that is good’…
but your question pointed me to “in the name” .. not “in the person”… and the name Jesus is a greek adaptation of the name Yehoshua wish means: God Saves!
and that is important as it points to the first ‘Commandement’… “I am the Lord thy God, who brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.”
and that is very important because there is so much to say about the fact that the first ‘Commandement’ is not about the fact that G.od is the Creator (He could have boasted about that right from the start of the Big Speach) but that He is the one that saves!
In the Name of …(the name explains alot about someone or something) … God Saves
Bart:
I would have loved to have joined you (not least to have spent some time in your company) but unfortunately the cost of the trip is way beyond my means. I wish you, and those able to join you, a superb experience.
I lived in Paphos, Cyprus, for five years and walked every day along the coast to the ‘agora’ ruins and mosaics which were around in Paul’s times and feature in the stories/legends/myths of Paul’s visit to Cyprus. Fascinating, but not half as fascinating as it would have been with a historian such as yourself to put things in context – and to help one half-close your eyes and squint a bit to try to ignore the modern developments which threaten to destroy antiquarian evidence.
Best wishes and good luck with your trip.
Oh man that sounds incredible! I took a two week tour of Turkey 4 years ago and have been itching to go back. As it happens though, I am expecting a kid at the end of June so I won’t be able to join you.
Bart, it sounds like a great trip with a great historian. Having said that, I was wondering for the sake of those people who find themselves “financially challenged”, have you ever thought of conducting similar but really low budget trips? I am sure many will jump on it. What do you think?
I simply do the trips I”m asked to do; unfortunately I have no say over the budgets!
You could always organize a trip yourself and invite blog members. Maybe a blog member would volunteer to organize it for you. I’ve been looking at other tours, and they’re half the cost of this one. I really feel like this company is price gouging. It’s geared toward wealthy people—and only wealthy people. So was the last trip. The average person will *never* get to go on one of these trips.
I’m not really looking for work! But I do make time to attend tours (sometimes) that others have organized.
Looks like a great trip Dr. Ehrman. My father is a Greek immigrant, came here in 1969 at age 17! Needless to say, we’ve been back many many times.
Be sure to visit the souvlaki shop right next to the Corinth Canal it looks like you’re going to, we stop by every time on our way from Athens to his “part of Greece” where we usually stay.
Darn the luck. We just did this trip with Collette in October. The experience would have been 10 times better with your commentary.
Rats!
How many formal lectures do you plan to deliver on this tour? Will you be accompanying the tour participants to the sites for informal comments on the historical/ religious meaning of what we are seeing? Finally, will there be opportunities for extended discussion at supper or in the evening regarding other aspects of your writings and academic work? As a psychiatrist I was quite interested in your book on memory though I thought you did not address aspects of this domain of human life which might prove germane to understand the disciples’s experience of Jesus’s death and events subsequent to that
Cliffschilke
The plan is for four lectures. I will be with tour participants the entire time, at all the sites, and with tons of opportunities for extended discussions. So far, it looks like a very small tour, so there will be lots of interactions.