Loading...Several readers have suggested that this kind of post should be available on the blog for everyone, not just members. I think they’re right!
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The next two weeks are going to be highly intense for me, and I’m a bit worried about how I will be able to fit in my “blog time.” The reason: I will be throwing myself day and night into writing my next book.
Background Part One: As I think I’ve mentioned on the blog before, I try to write three different kinds of books for three different audiences. This keeps life interesting and varied for me. First, I write books for scholars, in which I try to advance serious scholarship, speaking the language that works with my colleagues who have PhD’s in the field and who are deeply conversant with all the ancient and modern languages and with all the major critical and historical issues. My most recent work of this kind is due out in October: Forgery and Counterforgery: The Use of Literary Deceit in the Early Christian Tradition. It will be a long and complex treatment of the subject – over 600 pages; a real contrast to my popular book Forged, written on the same subject but to a different audience.
Second, I write popular books (called “trade books” for some reason) for general audiences. These are ones in which I attempt to communicate what scholars have uncovered for popular audiences, for the “Barnes and Noble Crowd” (among whom I proudly number myself, for books outside my area of expertise). These are the books that I am best known for, since they reach the widest audience. I try to space these out, so that I write one every two years. My next one will be on How Jesus Became God, which I hope to write this coming Spring, so it will be published, if all goes well, in Spring 2014.
Third, I write textbooks for college-level courses, mainly in New Testament and early Christianity. I have two separate textbooks on the New Testament that get used widely throughout the country, and several anthologies of readers – collections of ancient texts in translation which get used in a variety of courses in the field.
The book I am going to start writing tomorrow (tomorrow!) is the third type of book, a college textbook, not, however, on the New Testament alone, but on the entire Bible, from Genesis to Revelation, for colleges that offer a one semester course that covers the whole shooting match. I am not in favor of this kind of course, but about half the colleges in the country teach it, if they teach Bible at all. And I think there needs to be a better textbook for it.
Background Part Two: When I write – that is, when I no longer am doing the research for a project but am sitting down to write the actual words/pages/chapters/book – life gets very intense for me. One of the things that I happen to be able to do very well, thank the gods, is focus. And my writing is very focused. It is hard to express or explain, but it feels like I have a large amount of energy walled up inside of me, and when I write, I let it go.
Normally I will write (that is, type out the words/pages/chapters) for six or seven intense hours a day, starting in the early morning until I finish. For my trade books (and a bit less so for my college textbooks; this doesn’t apply to my scholarship which is much harder to put into writing) I can normally write 14,000 to 16,000 words a day, with this kind of schedule. It is exhilarating. I don’t answer my phone, I shut the door to my study, I put on my headphones, and I write intensely, pounding away at the key board as fast as my fingers will fly, for hours. I will usually take a 20 minute lunch break, and then get back to it, and keep going either until I finish the chapter I’m working on, or until I’m brain dead and can’t do it anymore.
Then I go to my basement exercise room, work out for a couple of hours, take a steam bath (I had an old, small bathroom in my basement converted into a steam room!), eat a nice dinner, have some nice wine, vegetate in the evening, and get a solid night’s sleep, and the next day, do it again.
With this kind of system, I can normally write a trade book in two weeks. I then need to edit it, polish it, mop up loose ends, and so forth. But the writing is the hard part, and I do it with bursts of intensity.
So, my next book, starting tomorrow, is my Bible textbook. I have two weeks, and I won’t have it all written by then, as it will be much longer than one of my tradebooks. My goal is to have the entire Old Testament section written before I go to England to join up with my beloved Sarah, who is already there for a program she’s teaching for Duke students. (We have a flat in London – Sarah’s a Brit – and spend a good chunk of the summer there every year.) That means I will have the house to myself, with almost no distractions, and I can work like a wild man.
Which I plan to do. My goal is to have all eight of the chapters on the Old Testament written before I fly the friendly skies. If I don’t meet the goal – it’s highly ambitious – that will be OK. In London I’ll have a month while Sarah is still teaching her class (it’s on theater; they discuss a play in class in the morning, and go see it performed that night! A great program.) and will be able to work every day there. It won’t be as intense, as it won’t be my home study. But it’ll be enough to finish the OT section of the book and to make serious inroads into the NT.
My goal is to have the entire thing finished by the end of September. I want to get onto the next project, doing my research for How Jesus Became God. More than anything else this is what drives me to write fast – wanting to get to the next project, which always sounds even more interesting than the current one![/mepr-show]
GOOD LUCK!!! BTW, did you know a Jewish journalist wrote a very good book some years back called WHEN JESUS BECAME GOD?
Yup, Rubenstein. Great book, but not at all on what mine will be.
So, while Sarah is away, how does your dog fit into your ‘frenetic’ life. Your blogs are more than efficient in number and quality, so don’t worry about that. As for Jesus Becoming God, I have just been revisiting Larry Hurtado’s work on this fascinating issue…perhaps as you write it, some of it might be shared on your blog.
Yup, Hurtado — who is a friend of mine — has written some very important work on the subject!
Would sharing pieces of drafts as you write your new textbook help solve the blogging time problem? I know sharing drafts can be sensitive–like sending a unprepared child into the world–but I personally am fascinated with how ideas evolve.
I may do!
I’m glad to hear you work out. It would be a shame to lose you too soon…
Re:Keeping the blog going. Have you thought about having an editor or editors from your publishers provide excerpts from your various books to fill in when you can’t devote the time? They could do an edited version, run it past you for approval and then post it. They could certainly justify the expense as a marketing function—simply provide links to purchase the book being excerpted, either using the page you already have on this blog, or to a distribution channel of their choosing. Perhaps even excerpts from your DVD courses through the Teaching Company. They could certainly use more marketing…
Good idea! I’ll think about it.
Bart,
When will the textbook be published?
Jerry
Possibly in time for the Fall 2013 semester. We’ll see!
Would you consider “Forgery and Counterforgery” a “scholarly” book? If so, why? I have a couple of books you have described as “scholarly”, (including your “Text of the New Testament” with Bruce Metzger) but I personally don’t find them all that difficult to grasp. (With the exception of the Greek, but I am working on that part) I do spend a fair bit of time googling names and terms you use, but it’s unclear what makes these “scholarly”.
I’m going through Forged a third time now and keep running into things where I ask “just how do we know that?”, so I am excited about “Forgery and Counterforgery”, hoping that it will answer these questions.
Yes, it is definitely a scholarly book. It presupposes a ton of knowledge, not available to people not trained in the field. I’m not sure which of my books you have. The TExt of the NT is not actually a scholarly book; it is written for students. A good idea of the difference between scholarly and non:scholarly would be comparing my Orthodox Corruption of Scripture (scholarly) with Misquoting Jesus (popular).
It is okay to take a break from the blog. You have done more than enough work on it. Other similar blogs (say that of John Spong or Peter Enns) have far fewer and much shorter entries. During the two weeks, I can work my way through the rest of your New Testament textbook since you write faster than I can read. You sound like Handel composing the “Messiah.”
Take a break from your blog! I think no one should complain given the amount of posts you have been doing thus far! As a subscriber, I won’t complain!!
Hey Bart, while in London, will you be appearing on the Unbelievable? radio program by any chance? It’s always fun hearing you debate Christian apologists.
I’ve been asked, and am thinking about it.
Bart is the most thorough new testament scholar I’ve come acrossed.
Why is Jesus been deemed a deity and why has that view been so enduring
That’s my next book. Stay tuned!
Greetings Dr. Ehrman,
I look forward to How Jesus Became God, but I am curious as to where you will take the topic compared to Richard Rubenstein’s When Jesus Became God: The Epic Fight Over Christ’s Divinity in the Last Days of Rome (Harcourt Brace, 1999). You are aiming for the same wider, more popular audience. Perhaps you won’t care to tip your hand now, and that’s O.K.. I make a point to read anything you write, so godspeed to you (ahem…).
Suggestion for another post: could you some day write something about the mechanics of how you conduct your research? I am a UNC alumnus, and I fondly recall the hours (even days) I haunted the stacks at Davis and Wilson Libraries. I imagine you mine the libraries at UNC and Duke for all you can, but how do you acquire access to primary documentation that has not been published in facsimile editions? Does you reputation as a major scholar open doors that would more likely be closed to others? If you appear at the Vatican Library, do they bring out Codex Vaticanus for you? Maybe send it over on Interlibrary Loan? :-).
Rubenstein’s books is very good indeed! But it’s on a completely different topic from mine. His is about the Arian controversy in the fourth century. Mine will be about how we got to that point. How is it that a jewish apocalyptic prophet became a member of the trinity. (All sides in the Arian controversy agreed that Jesus was in some sense God. The question then was, “in *what* sense. My book will be about how we got there.)
About the trinity and Arian topic. I am discussing with christians about the lack of trinity for months with high eager and I was wondering what do you Dr. Ehrman think about the john 1:1 verse? I read sources about the following phrase “and God was the word” but also “the word was divine” or “the word was a god”. Also whats your opinion about the view of Jehovah’s Witness? ( which have similarities with the arianism)
I don’t have an informed view of the Jehovah’s Witnesses, although it’s true that Arians believed that Jesus was God but not that he was equal with God the Father or co-eternal with him. John 1:1 — I think the proper translation is “The Word was God.” (In this Gospel Jesus appears to be equal with God — here I disagree with the Arian view — but he is not *identical* with God, a major point I think.)
Ah, my mechanics. I may need to devote a post to that!
The solution to the problem seems obvious enough to me.
Just collect everything you write for the book over the next couple of weeks as blog posts.
(Two birds, one stone, etc)
That way, everyone will be happy (well, except maybe OUP…)
P.S.
Just got to ask:
– I shut the door to my study, I put on my headphones …
What do you typically listen to?
Classical, just instrumental. Helps me block everything out. Including the music itself.
Best wishes on your next project(s)! I’m looking forward to your next trade book, though I would be very curious to read the textbook as well (without having to enroll at university again mind you).
It sounds like you will also be working like a mad man during the highly distracting Summer Olympics. No mean feat!
Dr Ehrman,
Do you mind if I ask you about how the financial incentives for you compare between these types of projects? I assume that your books for scholars are not expected to make much money directly, although they are important for your career in other ways. Textbooks are very expensive compared to popular books; for example the list price for your textbook “The New Testament” (paperback) is $65. That’s actually not particularly high as textbooks go, but still at least three times as expensive as your popular books. Its also longer of course at 600 pages vs e.g. about 250 pages for “Misquoting Jesus” so they must take you longer to write. How does the compensation on your end compare?
I don’t mean this as disparaging; I’m sure you work very hard to earn what you make. Just wondering.
It’s a great question, but a bit complicated. I think I’ll answer it by making a separate post on it for the blog.
“How Jesus Became God” is a fascinating subject. In “Did Jesus Exist?” you express confidence in human reason. The varieties of early and current Christianities suggest, however, that reason and the examination of historical evidence may be far less important than psychological wishes and needs with different people, at least, in part, formulating different doctrines to fulfill different wishes and needs. What do you think about the power of these psychological factors? Are these psychological factors so strong that they cannot be changed by historical evidence which will always be “spun” to fit with the doctrines that satisfy these psychological factors? In other words, the wish to have eternal life, or the wish to have an inerrant Bible, is far stronger than any evidence about the matter. In a similar way, Pitts in his column today in the Durham Herald-Sun, describes the politics of Palin and Beck as not being about “facts,” or historical evidence, but about psychological issues.
Yup, I agree. It’s why the most reasonable of arguments — no matter how persuasive — cannot sometimes convince otherwise reasonable people!
Bart,
In How Jesus Became God I am looking forward to your treatment of the Logos Doctrine. I have read a ton of varied material out there including the Fathers, but I have not seen it explained completely and well in any one place. You have a great gift for synthesizing material and presenting it in a way that is complete and understandable to the non-scholar. I’m excited.
Dallas
In your How Jesus Became God, I suppose you would take note of James Dunn’s various past writings on it? And recently Dunn wrote the trade book “Did the first Christians worship Jesus?” Your friend Larry Hurtado of course would debate against it.
Yup!
i know you believe that the koran is the product of man, but when the koran said that jesus was nothing but a human being, would you agree that the koran was right on that issue?
I do not think Jesus was anything other than a man. I think that is true of all men. I do not believe there is a God, so I do not think Jesus could be God’s son.