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How Would We Know If We Found an “Original” Manuscript?
A reader recently asked a question I had dealt with on the blog many years ago. When originally asked it, I responded by saying I had never thought about it before. (!) Below is the question and my initial reflections. My views haven’t matured much during the past seven years (and they ain’t the only thing), so I give my initial response. If someone can improve on it, let me know. First here is this week’s way of asking the question: QUESTION: Suppose someone did claim to have found the original…. I get that you can show something isn’t original, such as by dating it to two hundred years later. But is there anything you can do to show it is likely original? Here now is the original post. ****************************** READER’S QUESTION: Were we to have any *original manuscript* of any NT document in our midst, would we be able to recognize and confirm it as such? If so, how? BART’S RESPONSE: Now that’s a question I’ve never been asked before! And in […]
February 26, 2022
Do We Have Any Reliable Sources for Pontius Pilate?
I recently was asked in a comment what kind of independent information do we have, outside the Gospels, for Pontius Pilate? Answer: not much. I told the commenter that I thought I had once written about the matter, and lo and behold, I was right. It was in my book Did Jesus Exist? The book was written to show why — contrary to what you sometimes hear these days — there doesn’t seem to be any reason to doubt that, whatever else you might think of him, there was a man Jesus of Nazareth (a Jewish teacher from Galilee who was crucified on orders of Pontius Pilate — and about whom we can say a good deal more. This is not an issue I want to re-address here again on the blog. But I do want to show why it’s not weird that Jesus isn’t talked about much in ancient sources. Here’s what I said about it in my book (slightly edited for the sake of the blog): ****************************** I have often pointed out that […]
February 5, 2022
What Was Paul’s Innovation?
I was recently recording the monthly Q&A that I do with Gold members of the blog (if you’re not a Gold member, this is one of the perks of moving to that level: every month Gold members ask me questions — in writing — and I record a 50-55 minute audio Q&A answering them; since the Gold members get audio versions of the posts, as well as written, this is an add-on they get every month. Think about joining!). In this Q&A I received a lot of really interesting questions, but one was very important for understanding the life and ministry of Paul. And now I see that it was closely related to a question I received on the blog years ago, which is exactly what I was going to post on today anyway! Here’s the original blog question and response. QUESTION What do you make of Paul’s statement that he didn’t get the good news (= the resurrection and thus the triumph over death) from other humans but from the ‘risen Christ’ himself? […]
February 2, 2022
How Did Paul Understand Salvation? The “Judicial” Model
I am currently in the middle of a thread discussing the significance of Paul to the history of early Christianity. So far I have been trying to argue that Paul is of utmost importance to the New Testament itself, but that it is very difficult to know how much of what we think of as Pauline theology (the doctrine of the atonement, for example) was *distinctive* of Paul (I doubt if he came up with the idea himself) and that there are some prominent features of Paul’s thought – e.g., the importance of Jesus’ resurrection – that he must have inherited from Christians before him. One of my ultimate points is going to be that whatever one thinks about Paul’s originality, it is clear that the gospel that he proclaimed looked very different from what Jesus himself taught. To get to that point, I have to deal a bit more with what it is that Paul proclaimed. Nowhere does Paul lay out his gospel message more clearly than in the book of Romans. The reason […]
February 3, 2022
Reminder! My Remote Book Event, This Thursday
Just a reminder in case you haven’t signed up yet: I’ll be doing a book event Thursday evening (Jan 27). Here’s the announcement from last week. I hope you can make it! ****************************** I am excited to announce a new and unusual fund raiser for the blog, to take place on Thursday January 27 at 7:30 pm EST. For anyone who is willing to make a donation, I will be holding a discussion on: “What Book Should I Write Next?” Those who come will be able to talk it over with me and give me their opinions. Here’s the deal. I have all but finished my book on Revelation: Expecting Armageddon: What Revelation Really Reveals. I have just a couple of mop-up exercises, then it’s off to the publisher. And now I have to decide what to do next. This is the first time in my adult life, since 1983, that I did not have the next writing project lined up, in my head, ready to be started, after finishing the current one. For some […]
January 24, 2022
Are the Gospels Too Early To Have Legends About Jesus? Platinum Guest Post by Bob Seidensticker
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Tags: Platinum
Paul’s “Participationist” Model of Salvation.
I started explaining that Paul has different ways that he conceptualizes the act of salvation – how the death and resurrection of Christ restores a person to a right relationship with God. The judicial model that I laid out can be found in several of Paul’s letters, especially Romans and Galatians. But he has other ways of understanding how salvation works, other models involving Jesus’ death and resurrection. The other BIG one can be called the Participationist model. Here is what I say about it in my textbook on the New Testament: ****************************** The Participationist Model. Most of us today have no trouble understanding how a judicial process can be seen as analogous to the act of salvation. The participationist model, however, is much harder to get our minds around. This is partly because it involves a way of thinking that is no longer prevalent in our culture. Under this second model the human problem is still called “sin,” “sin” is still thought to lead to “death,” and Christ’s death and resurrection still work to […]
February 6, 2022
Paul’s Models of Salvation: Contradictory or Complementary?
I’ve been discussing how Paul understands the significance of Jesus’ death and resurrection for salvation, and have done so by laying out as concisely as I could his two principal “models” of how salvation worked, the judicial and the participationist model. In this post I’ll make some brief concluding comments about the two models, in particular in relation to one another, again from my textbook on the New Testament. ****************************** Comparison and Contrast of the Two Models Let me emphasize that the two models of salvation we have been looking at are ways of understanding something. They are not the thing itself. Paul’s gospel is not “justification by faith” or “union with Christ.” These are ways of reflecting on or thinking about his gospel. His gospel is God’s act of salvation in Christ; the models are ways of conceptualizing how it worked. The way it worked differed according to which model Paul had in mind. In both of them, the problem is “sin.” But in one, sin is an act of disobedience that a person […]
February 8, 2022
Still Other Models of Salvation in Paul
I have been discussing various ways that Paul understands the importance of the death and resurrection of Jesus for salvation, and have focused on the judicial and participationist models – mainly because these are the two that Paul most frequently appeals to (without calling them the judicial and participationist models!). I need to clarify a few points before moving on to speak of yet other models that Paul appears to use. First, over the years when I’ve discussed these models in a public forum, people have asked me about my personal views of these models. Several have asked how I could possibly believe such a thing. And one has asked what right I have to talk about “sin” if I’m not a Christian and so do not believe in sin. So let me clear: I’m not affirming or denying anything Paul says in any of his writings. I’m simply describing what it is he says. Some people have trouble understanding the difference between description and prescription, but there’s a big difference. I remember back when […]
February 9, 2022
My Response to A Book That Responded To My Book: How Jesus Became God
I was browsing through some blog posts from many years ago and came upon this one, which I had completely forgotten about. It gets a bit feisty at the end, and that’s because it was written back when I was … feistier. Even so, it makes an overarching point I still agree with. It’s about my book that tries to explain how the early Christians came to see Jesus as God. ****************************** My publisher, HarperOne, asked me to write a 1000-word response to the book that was written in response to How Jesus Became God. As you probably know, the book is called, somewhat expectedly, How God Became Jesus. I have toyed with the idea of giving a chapter-by-chapter response here on the blog. I’ve grown a bit cold to the idea, though, since I’m not sure every chapter of their book really needs a response. I may respond to a couple of the chapters. In the meantime, here’s one response you can read that is, interestingly, written by Daniel Kirk, a professor of NT at the […]
February 13, 2022
The Heart of Jesus’ Message
To this point in the thread I have been talking about Paul’s “religion” – specifically, what he thought was important in a person’s relationship with God. He expressed his views in a variety of ways – I have talked about his judicial and his participationist understandings of salvation, and have made brief comments on yet other “models” that he used to express his view about the act of salvation that God had achieved through Christ. In all of these models, it was the death and resurrection of Jesus that was of paramount importance. It was that, nothing else, that brought about salvation. And what did Jesus himself think? This is arguably the most important point to consider about early Christianity. Did the best known apostle of Christ proclaim the same, or very similar message, to Jesus himself? Or not? In my New Testament class every semester I have my students debate, in class, a resolution dealing with the issue: “Resolved: Paul and Jesus represented fundamentally different religions.” Students are surprised by the topic. Until they […]
February 12, 2022
Reminder! Live Lectures Tomorrow (Sunday 1/30/2022)
In case you’re interested: here is the post I made a while back about the course I’ll be starting tomorrow. *********************** I am pleased to announce that I will be doing a six-lecture online (recorded) course called: “In the Beginning: History, Legend and Myth in the Pentateuch. Part 1. The Book of Genesis.” This will not be in connection with the blog per se, but there is an important connection worth noting for blog members (see below). The plan is to make this course the first installment of a rather long series of courses that I am calling, “How Scholars Read the Bible.” (The next six-lecture course – no surprise! – will be the rest of the Pentateuch after Genesis). Each lecture in this course, and the ones that follow, will be thirty minutes of length. We will later be announcing the release date of the course (it will probably in February). But I want to let you know about it now, so that it can be on your radar screen. And because there is […]
January 29, 2022
Preface to My Book on Revelation: Expecting Armageddon
I have sent my book manuscript off to my editor. She will work it over, ask for edits, and we’ll go from there. The preface to the book, as it now stands, explains what the book is about and what I try to argue for in it. I thought I’d pass it by you to see what you think. ****************************** Preface Many of the early Christians had serious doubts about the book of Revelation and did not think it should be included in the New Testament. The author, they argued, was not an apostle and the book presented views that were clearly unacceptable. In the end, of course, they lost the argument. But once the book came to be widely accepted as Scripture, the followers of Jesus had to figure out how to make sense of it. Over the long course of Christian history, many readers of the Bible have widely opted not to delve into its mysteries at all. Even today, most find it bizarre and unapproachable. Those who do read it fall into […]
February 10, 2022
Are the Teachings of Jesus Realistic? Platinum guest post by Douglas Wadeson
Now *here’s* a challenging post, by Platinum member Doug Wadeson. Read it and see! Doug will be happy to reply to responses. Many thanks Doug. Others of you who want to do a post — go for it. ********************** Jesus is generally thought of as a great moral teacher, but I have heard that questioned on occasion. For example, Jesus said, “Do not show opposition against an evil person; but whoever slaps you on your right cheek, turn the other toward him also” (Matthew 5:39). Really?! Does Jesus want us to be target practice for bullies? Won’t that just enable and embolden them? And on a society scale, if America is attacked are we not supposed to defend ourselves? Otherwise evil will win. A real sore point for some people is that Jesus never condemned slavery, which was a common institution in his day (e.g., Matthew 10:24, 24:46, etc.). Apologists sometimes rationalize this by explaining that slavery was not that bad in the Roman empire; it was more like indentured servitude. Yet a truly wise […]
February 4, 2022
Would Anyone *Invent* the Story of the Women at the Tomb?
I received a question in the comments recently that I’ve gotten a lot before. Wouldn’t the Gospel story about women being the first to realize Jesus had been raised be contrary to what Christians would have *wanted* to say, possibly even embarrassing? If so, isn’t it likely that no one made it up but that it’s actually what probably happened? It’s been a few years since I posted on the question, so it seems like a good chance to post on it again. Here’s what I’ve said before: ****************************** Who in the ancient world would ever try to *prove* the resurrection by making up a story that women, in particular, discovered Jesus’ empty tomb? Weren’t women seen as complete unreliable witnesses? Their testimony never even accepted in a court of law? If someone want to prove that Jesus had been raised — and that therefore the tomb was empty — they would have invented *men* at the tomb (reliable witnesses) rather than *women* (untrustworthy). Right? The reason anyone ever has this question is because it […]
February 16, 2022
The “Common Era”: Invented to Stop Speculations About the End of the World. Platinum Guest Post by Daniel Kohanski
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Tags: Platinum
February 7, 2022
(Re)Thinking Everything. Guest Post by Glenn Siepert
As you probably know, a number of volunteers work for the blog, graciously giving their time and talents to promote the work we’re doing. As one of the perks, volunteers who have published a book of relevance to what we do here on the blog can write a post on it for us. I did an interview this past August with Glenn Siepert that I enjoyed very much; he is a very good interviewer (you can see it here: Interview on Lost Christianities: “What If Project” Podcast | The Bart Ehrman Blog ). Afterward he volunteered to design graphics for some of the blog posts, and we’ve all benefited from it. Glenn has just published a book about how he left a fundamentalist form of Christianity and the new world he then entered into. Here is his description of his experience and the book. ****************************** Hello friends. My name is Glenn Siepert and Bart invited me onto the blog today to share with you a bit about my new book that I recently self-published via […]
February 14, 2022
Jesus and Paul: Are They on the Same Page?
I spent several posts explicating Paul’s understanding of his gospel, that by Christ’s death and resurrection a person is put into a restored relationship with God. He had several ways of explaining how it worked (the “judicial” model; the “participationist” model; and the other models I described). But in all of these ways, it was Jesus’ death and resurrection that mattered. It was not keeping the Jewish law. It was not knowing or following Jesus’ teaching. It was not Jesus’ miracles. It was not … anything else. It was Jesus’ death and resurrection. I then summarized in my previous post, the teaching of Jesus himself, about the coming Son of Man and the need to prepare by keeping the Law of God, as revealed in the Torah, as summarized in the commandments to love God above all else and to love one’s neighbor as oneself. Do these represent the same religion? I see this as one of the most fundamental and important questions in all of early Christianity. I’m not asking if Paul invented Christianity, […]
February 17, 2022
The Messages of Jesus and Paul: Basically the Same or Fundamentally Different?
I have been talking about the relationship of Jesus’ proclamation of the coming Kingdom of God to Paul’s preaching about the importance of the death and resurrection of Jesus. In the previous post I argued that the fundamental concerns, interests, perspectives, and theologies of these two were different. In this post I’d like to give, in summary fashion, what strikes me as very similar and very different about their two messages. Again, in my view it is way too much to say that Paul is the “Founder of Christianity”: that assumes that he is the one who personally came up with the idea of the importance of the death and resurrection of Jesus for salvation, whereas almost certainly this view had been around for a couple of years before he came onto the scene. And it is probably too much even to say that he was the “Co-founder of Christianity,” for much the same reason. But it is safe to say that of all the early Christian thinkers and missionaries, Paul is the one we […]
February 19, 2022
Heaven and Hell at the Popular Level
I often get asked about the difference between my trade books for general audiences and my academic monographs for scholars. Three times in my career I have written on the same topic for a popular and a scholarly audience. The first was one on the manuscripts of the NT. The popular book was Misquoting Jesus: The Story behind Who Changed the Bible and Why; the academic one was The Orthodox Corruption of Scripture: The Effect of Early Christological Controversies on the Text of the New Testament. Just from the title it should not be too hard to tell which one is trying to cater to a wider audience and which one is directed to fellow academic nerds. So too with the next set, dealing with the issue of pseudonymity in the New Testament and other early Christian Writings. The popular account: Forged: Writing in the Name of God — Why the Bible’s Authors are Not Who We Think They Are; the academic one: Forgery and Counter-forgery: The Use of Literary Deceit in the Early Christian […]
February 20, 2022