#biblical criticism

[a-queer-seminarian]

Making a quick post with some of the texts I read during seminary on biblical criticism. These are very much academic texts; if you haven't been trained in reading academia they'll be very hard to get through.

If anyone knows of more accessible resources on the topic of biblical criticism, I'd love to know them!

Engaging Biblical Authority: Perspectives on the Bible as Scripture by William P. Brown, which offers 16 points of view on how to view the Bible (including one Jewish perspective and a variety of liberationist perspectives);

Biblical Interpretation: A Roadmap by Frederick C. Tiffany and Sharon H. Ringe, which introduces you to understanding the how your context impacts your reading, how various texual and historical contexts impact any given Bible passage, some stuff about critical analysis, etc.

Elements of Biblical Exegesis by Michael J. Gorman — this one gets really into biblical criticism and hermeneutics; it's dense but there are a lot of concrete examples that are nice

The Art of Theological Reflection by Patricia O'Connell Killen and John de Beer, for connecting our personal experiences to Christian tradition.

#log #summer 2023 #biblical criticism

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

"Those who are governed by reason desire nothing for themselves which they do not also desire for the rest of the humankind."

-- Baruch Spinoza

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baruch_Spinoza

Baruch (de) Spinoza (24 November 1632 – 21 February 1677) was a Dutch philosopher of Portuguese-Jewish origin, born in Amsterdam. One of the foremost exponents of 17th-century Rationalism and one of the early and seminal thinkers of the Enlightenment and modern biblical criticism including modern conceptions of the self and the universe, he came to be considered "one of the most important philosophers—and certainly the most radical—of the early modern period."

#Baruch Spinoza #reason #rationalism #philosophy #philosophers #Enlightenment #The Enlightenment #biblical criticism

[eli-kittim]

The Da Vinci Code Versus The Gospels

By Eli Kittim 🎓

Bart Ehrman was once quoted as saying: “If Jesus did not exist, you would think his brother would know it.” This is an amusing anecdote that I’d like to use as a springboard for this short essay to try to show that it’s impossible to separate literary characters from the literature in which they are found. For example, when Ehrman says, “If Jesus did not exist, you would think his brother would know it,” his comment presupposes that James is a real historical figure. But how can we affirm the historicity of a literary character offhand when the so-called “history” of this character is solely based on, and intimately intertwined with, the literary New Testament structures? And if these literary structures are not historical, what then? The fact that the gospels were written anonymously, and that there were no eyewitnesses and no firsthand accounts, and that the events in Jesus’ life were, for the most part, borrowed from the Old Testament, seems to suggest that they were written in the literary genre known as theological fiction. After all, the gospels read like Broadway plays!

Let me give you an analogy. Dan Brown writes novels. All his novels, just like the gospels, contain some historical places, figures, and events. But the stories, in and of themselves, are completely fictional. So, Ehrman’s strawman argument is tantamount to saying that if we want to examine the historicity of Professor Robert Langdon——who is supposedly a Harvard University professor of history of art and symbology——we’ll have to focus on his relationship with Sophie Neveu, a cryptologist with the French Judicial Police, and the female protagonist of the book. Ehrman’s earlier anecdote would be akin to saying: “if Robert Langdon did not exist, you would think Sophie would know it.”

But we wouldn’t know about Robert Langdon if it wasn’t for The Da Vinci Code. You can’t separate the character Robert Langdon from The Da Vinci Code and present him independently of it because he’s a character within that book. Therefore, his historicity or lack thereof depends entirely on how we view The Da Vinci Code. If The Da Vinci Code turns out to be a novel (which in fact it is), then how can we possibly ask historians to give us their professional opinions about him? It’s like asking historians to give us a historical assessment of bugs bunny? Was he real? So, as you can see, it’s all based on the literary structure of The Da Vinci Code, which turns out to be a novel!

By comparison, the historicity of Jesus depends entirely on how we view the literary structure of the gospel literature. Although modern critical scholars view the gospels as theological documents, they, nevertheless, believe that they contain a historic core or nucleus. They also think that we have evidence of an oral tradition. We do not! There are no eyewitnesses and no firsthand accounts. All we have about the life and times of Jesus are the gospel narratives, which were composed approximately 40 to 70 years after the purported events by anonymous Greek authors who never met Jesus. And they seem to be works of theological fiction. So where is the historical evidence that these events actually happened? We have to believe they happened because the gospel characters tell us so? It’s tantamount to saying that the events in The Da Vinci Code actually happened because Robert Langdon says so. But if the story is theological, so are its characters. Thus, the motto of the story is: don’t get caught up in the characters. The message is much more important! As for those who look to Josephus’ Antiquities for confirmation, unfortunately——due to the obvious interpolations——it cannot be considered authentic. Not to mention that Josephus presumably would have been acquainted with the gospel stories, most of which were disseminated decades earlier.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not trying to downplay the seriousness of the gospel message. I’m simply trying to clarify it. The gospels are inspired, but they were never meant to be taken literally. I’m also a believer and I have a high view of scripture. The message of Christ is real. But when will the Jesus-story play out is not something the gospels can address. Only the epistles give us the real Jesus!

#the da vinci code #ευαγγέλια #bart ehrman #the gospels #literarycharacters #literarystructures #literature #elikittim #novel #ΟΚώδικαςΝταΒίντσι #robert langdon #SophieNeveu #NewTestamentliterature #epistles #historical jesus #Genrecriticism #literarygenre #HistoricalJesusStudies #dan brown #the little book of revelation #ελικιτίμ #τομικροβιβλιοτηςαποκαλυψης #Bibleexegesis #historical fiction #ek #fictional characters #literary analysis #theologicalfiction #theJesusprophecy #biblical criticism

[martyschoenleber]

Four New Books on My Night Stand

Four new books I’m putting on the top of my nightstand. Loving each one. Historical Criticism of the Bible: Methodology or Ideology? Reflections of a Bultmannian turned Evangelical, by Dr. Eta Linemann. Dr. Linemann was a German scholar who was a personal student of Rudolph Bultmann. She taught for almost two decades in the German University system until two things happened. One, she started to…

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#Benjamin Wiker #Biblical Criticism #Book Reviews #Books #David the Good #Douglas Petrovich #Eta Linemann #Grocery Row Gardening #Permaculture #Ten Books that Screwed Up the World

[ronarends]

The naked Jesus -- exposed!

“My God, my God. Why have you abandoned me?” These final words spoken by Jesus as he hung naked and confused on the cross may be the most insightful we have into who he really was. He was not experiencing an existential breech within the godhead as Christians maintain. God was not “turning his back on his beloved son for the first time in eternity.” Here was a man who genuinely believed he had…

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#bible #biblical criticism #Christianity #evangelicalism #jesus

[the-ghost-rat]

Name a bigger downgrade, ill wait

#hazbin hotel critical #anti hazbin hotel #vivziepop critical #girlie only saw these biblically accraute angels memes n decided thats enough research and it shows #nothing about sera & emily even resemble seraphim aside from having multiple wings & eyes all pvef #their so clearly archangels they just have seraphim slapped on them cause seraphim & cheraubim are the only two angel names vivz knows #i mean girl made LUCIFER a seraphim WHEN HIS STORY DEPENTED ON HIM BEING AN ARCHANGEL

[ef-1]

Twitter is mad at Daniel again because they caught on to that CH interview about Daniel being offered the same contract as Max, icl I'm also bitter about it. I wish he wasn't so rash in 2018

It's easy to be bitter in hindsight but the reality is more nuanced, had it not been recorded and internationally broadcast, what happened to Daniel in 2018 would be flat out unbelievable by ANY standard lol. Daniel had mechanical issues in every. single. weekend in 2018 <- this is not a hyperbole or a joke (more on this later). He ran multiple races with a b spec engine -> 20 bhp down on Max. At no point in 2018 did Max run a lower engine power than Daniel. Daniel incurred 8 dnfs, 4 back of the grid starts for mechanical issues and 6 grid drops in total where as Max had *1*[one]. This isn't even accounting for failures in quali or free practice that would have compromised his set up or race prep. Daniel's car accounted for 92% of Red Bull failures in comparison to Max's 8%.

Christian's cunty "he ran from a fight" comment stung particularly hard because it was Christian who made MULTIPLE public apologies to Daniel in 2018 on the ground that he wasn't given a chance to compete. Christian would apologise to Daniel again when Max won in Mexico, even though Daniel had an uncharacteristic outburst in the media pen during that famous "The car is cursed. I can't wait to give it to Pierre" This isn't even diving into the dubious & predatory RB contract practices. At 28 years old, to quote Christian "It's the first time he's effectively a free agent."

You look back at it now and lament it as a bad call but even by Christian's admission Red Bull were on the verge of selling the team for 4 years. Honda was coming in, I know it's easy to praise Honda now but Honda single handedly sent Alonso into early retirement. He found working with them untenable + said it cost him his love for the sport. Those were the lingering images of Honda as they re-entered the sport, the team who electrocuted Alonso then bled his love for racing dry.

If you weren't around in 2018 let me give you a run down so horrific it looks like a joke:

Australia - Race: 3 Place grid penalty

Bahrain - Race: DNF - Battery Failure

China - Free Practice 3: Gear box issue with complete engine turbo failure. Misses FP3 entirely, no quali set up prepared. He would go on to win that race from p6

Baku - Race: DNF - Collision with Max. Racing incident.

Monaco - Race: partial MGU-K failure. He would go on to win that race with drastic loss of power.

Canada - Free Practice 2 - Power unit issue, misses majority of the session.

France - Race: front wing failure. (it disintegrated)

Austria - Race: DNF - Retires from p3 with MGU-k Failure

Britain - Quali: DRS failure. No DRS activation, still qualifies p6 behind Max in p5

Germany - Race: Back of grid start + DNF - Takes new engine for the weekend, starts p19 + has lower power spec A ICE approximately 20 BHP down on B spec that Max was running. Daniel climbed upto p5 from p19 but incurs a MGU-k failure and retires.

Hungary - Race: Daniel is forced to run lower power spec A ICE again, 20 BHP down on B spec that Max was running

Spa - Free Practice 1 + DNF: Daniel misses entire session with engine injector issue + Daniel would go on to retire after being driven into on lap 1.

Monza - Race: Back of grid start + DNF. Daniel takes another new engine for weekend (spec C) and incurs another full grid penalty, starts p19. Daniel would go on to climb to p6 before having clutch failure and retiring.

Singapore - Race + Quali + Free practice: During every session in Singapore Daniel has an unresolved spec C engine clipping issue that Red Bull can't fix.

Russia - Race + Free Practice 1 - Daniel misses FP1 due to mechanical issues. Daniel takes another engine penalty, starts p18

Japan - Race + Quali: Daniel incurs throttle actuator failure, misses quali, another back of grid start.

USA - Race: DNF - Battery Failure

Mexico - Race: DNF - clutch Bearing failure + start software clutch issue. Daniel retires the race from P2

Brazil - Race: Daniel takes a 5 Place grid penalty due to new turbo charger replacement. Starts in p11.

Abu Dhabi - Free Practice 3: Misses majority of FP3 with water leak.

Daniel's insanely vulnerable "if racing was the only thing making me happy this year, I would have been miserable" during the last on the sofa with Max was a v apt summary of 2018. To suggest that Daniel fucked up based on the information he had in 2018, namely Daniel undergoing all those problems + knowing RB was flirting with selling the team + Helmut's fuckery + having an out from the RB umbrella for the first time in his career? Your problem isn't with his decision making process, you just wish he was clairvoyant which is an unfair thing to be bitter about

#I think Daniel EARNED criticism for the way he left Renault NOT Redbull even if it went biblically bad #I think he deserves shit for Renault I really do. #I need you to understand that Im glad he's back with RB now but he also had no reason to stay in 2018 #His faith in the RB project was not rewarded. he spent his whole career at RB umbrella- #and in the last year of his contract his car collapsed. #anyway #one day I'll make that Renault post #f1 #daniel ricciardo

[ultrainfinitepit]

I dropped a bunch of pins off at Gamelandia today! Including some old favorites like Heart Seraphim; Percy de Rolo who is out of stock in my Etsy shop; and Wolf Knight which is unreleased.

Gamelandia is a game and hobby store located in Palo Alto, California. They have a wide array of board games, minis, and accessories like pins. I highly recommend checking them out if you're in the area.

#enamel pin #enamel pins #dnd #dungeons and dragons #angel #angels #eldritch angel #eldritch angels #biblically accurate angels #biblically accurate angel #cr #critical role #tlovm #percy de rolo

[puddleofpins]

I’m not exactly a huge fan of Hazbin Hotel, because I don’t really like the creator, though there are some aspects to the show that I like.

I’ve seen the whole show along with most of Helluva Boss, but now a question has been tugging at my mind like crazy:

If Vivziepop uses biblical/traditional Ars Goetia names for demons (Ozmodeus, Mammon, Belphegor, Beelzebub, including Lucifer, a fallen Angel), why is she using nontraditional/non-biblical names for the angels?

Like why is a high-level angel given such a commonly used human name(Emily)? Ooh sure Sera being a Seraphim is sooooo clever /sarcasm

I can’t tell if this is implying that the highest-ranking/or Biblical angels are missing/absent like god is or if the show is just that uninspired? Like is this intentional that none of the angels have actual angel names???

#hazbin hotel #helluva boss #hazbin critical #helluva critical #the other ambiguity is if this is a theory or critique cause im gonna tag it as both #hazbin theory #helluva theory #im just so confused because like Where Are They #how are you gonna have the Seven Deadly Sin demons and then not have actual biblical angels like Uriel Barachiel etc #how are you gonna have such uninspired and boring names like Sera Emily and LUTE for the angels??? Shit is so dumb #anti vivziepop #this is not gonna make the hh/hb stans happy and im gonna be around for that ride #also I was confused why no one else is talking about this or mentioning it #also also also #Lute is a stupid fucking name and it just makes me hate her even more

[ibeewashere]

Normalize drawing old man Caleb with streaks of blonde in his hair!!! Ginger bitches do not go fucking grey they go blonde!!! LET HIM BE BLONDE!!!

#I hate seeing old man Caleb art because it makes me sad and also aware of the passage of time #BUT. #I needed to share this knowledge #the world needs to know #critical role #give him blonde streaks #do it you won’t #coward. loser. #draw him old and blonde. #I bet u won’t #biblically accurate old Ginger bisexual #caleb widogast #critrole

[fefflerone]

Listen, I know everyone has beef with The Many Saints of Newark, but can we just appreciate for a moment how damn babygirl Paulie was?

#the little stomp he does after getting blood on his jacket come onnn #dick he literally just got this jacket why would you do this to him #babygirl paulie is biblically accurate paulie #i will not take criticism on this thank you #yes the car scene is just there because i think about it day and night why do you ask #(so normal about this guy i swear) #the many saints of newark #the sopranos #sopranos #paulie gualtieri #paulie walnuts #my gifs

[eli-kittim]

There Was No Pre-Pauline Oral Tradition

By Eli Kittim 🎓

When asked why Paul didn’t give us more details about Jesus’ existence, some scholars often use a common strawman argument that everyone already knew the story and so Paul didn’t have to write anything about it. But after thinking about this explanation for some time, I didn’t find it convincing. A key problem besetting the assumed pre-Pauline tradition is that it is a) based entirely on the gospel literature, which came much later, and b) it hasn’t been verified because there were no eyewitnesses and no firsthand accounts. Plus, the stories that we’re all familiar with (from the gospels) were not written until a few decades after Paul’s writings. So the life of Jesus was not written before, but after, Paul. Given that Paul’s knowledge of the story of Jesus is based entirely on “a revelation,” and that Paul himself admits that he didn’t receive it from man, nor was he taught it (Gal 1:11-12), it’s reasonable to assume that no one else knew the story prior to Paul’s writings, at least from a literary standpoint. After all, Paul was the first to write about it!

There are a lot of presuppositions that are implied by the oral Pre-Pauline-tradition hypothesis that most people aren’t aware of. Many people also presuppose that the gospels are historical, even though that has not been verified either. On the contrary, the fact that they were anonymously written, and that there were no eyewitnesses and no firsthand accounts, and that the events in Jesus’ life were, for the most part, borrowed from the Old Testament, seems to suggest that they were written in the literary genre known as “theological fiction.”

What is more, because the gospel texts are found at the beginning of the New Testament, people often presuppose that the gospels were the first Christian writings, and so they completely misunderstand the New Testament literary chronology. This presupposition leads to many other false assumptions that are very misleading and totally unrelated to the actual chronological development of the New Testament writings.

They have it all backwards❗️

What is more, because of the hypothetical Q source (for which there’s no evidence), even scholars often talk as if the gospels preceded the epistles, and so given that everyone already knew about the story, Paul didn’t have to mention all the details…

But wait just a second… ⛔️

The full-fledged story we usually refer to actually starts around 70 AD with Mark, and ends at the end of the first century with John. But surprise surprise, Paul is writing much much earlier than that. Paul’s letters are the FIRST Christian writings, which are written over two decades earlier (49-50 AD)! Paul’s writings are actually the EARLIEST Christian writings. So, presumably, no one knew the story yet, at least from a literary perspective. It was Paul’s task to tell the reader all about it.

But Paul failed to mention the pertinent information regarding the details of Jesus’ life, even though it is assumed that he was in a position to know this information. If Paul was expected to have all the pertinent information regarding the Jesus-story, and intending to write a complete account of these events, and if the details of the Jesus-story were important enough to deserve to be mentioned, then why didn’t Paul talk about any of them? Astoundingly, Paul didn’t mention any of the legendary elements that we find in the later embellishments of the 70s, 80s, and 90s. In Paul’s letters, there’s no nativity, no virgin birth, no shepherds, no star of Bethlehem, no magi, no census, no Elizabeth, no Zechariah, no John the Baptist, no flight to Egypt, no slaughter of the innocents, nothing about

“Jesus healing anyone,

casting out a demon, doing any other

miracle, arguing with Pharisees or

other leaders, teaching the multitudes, even

speaking a parable, being baptized, being

transfigured, going to Jerusalem, being

arrested, put on trial, found guilty of

blasphemy, appearing before Pontius Pilate

on charges of calling himself the King of the

Jews, being flogged, etc. etc. etc. It’s a very,

very long list of what he doesn’t tell us

about.” —Source credit: Bart D. Ehrman

This doesn’t mean that Paul is writing letters to people who already knew about the story.

It means that such a story didn’t exist. It was added later!

Conclusion

How is a supposed Aramaic story suddenly taken over, less than 2 decades after the purported events, by highly articulate Greeks and written about in other countries, such as Greece and Rome? None of the New Testament books were ever written in Palestine by Jews! That doesn’t make any sense and it certainly casts much doubt about the idea of a supposed Aramaic oral tradition.

In fact, most of the New Testament Books were written in Greece: Romans, 1 & 2 Corinthians, Galatians, 1 & 2 Thessalonians, 1 Timothy, Titus, the Book of Revelation, and possibly others as well! To sum up, most of the New Testament Books were composed in Greece. Most of the epistles were penned in Greece and addressed to Greek communities. The New Testament was written exclusively in Greek, outside of Palestine, by “Greek” authors who copied the Greek Septuagint rather than the Hebrew Bible when quoting from the Old Testament. So where is the Aramaic tradition?

#formcriticism #oraltradition #biblical criticism #elikittim #NewTestamentoraltradition #epistles #τομικροβιβλιοτηςαποκαλυψης #Qsource #Christianorigins #προφορικήπαράδοση #Paulsletters #oraltransmission #earlyChristianhistory #NewTestamentletters #thelittlebookofrevelation #Paulinecommunities #gospels #επιστολέςΠαύλου #Paulinetraditions #prepaulineoraltradition #ελικιτίμ #prePaulinetradition #Jesusstory #PaulsvisionofChrist #biblical studies #epistolarytradition #epistolaryform #literarydevelopment #literary analysis #early christianity

[roxo-moxo]

I just wanna say this.

Good omens lore >>>>>> Hazbin/helluva boss lore

#good omens #hazbin hotel #helluva boss #vivziepop #look i “like” hazbin and Helluva but one is just clearly better at portraying biblical lore #critical #good omens 2

[tixythepixy]

I drew an OC of mine: Maxwell!

Maxwell is someone who grew up in a cult of an evil god, who grew up to run away, stealing his power, being corrupted by a curse from that very god. A curse that turns their body and soul into an divine eldritch abomination. But he uses the power he stole to further his goals towards destroying that evil god, and helping many escape horrible situations. While his body is being turned into a divine Lovecraftian nightmare, he fights tooth and nail for the one thing he can defend, his mind.

#art #digital art #dnd oc #oc artwork #angel aesthetic #angelcore #biblically accurate angel #angelic #angel core #eldritch divinity #eldritch #edgy art #dnd character #dnd art #artwork #my art #young artist #illustration #drawings #small artist #original character #character art #character design #criticism welcome

[aelstudies]

Tuesday September 26th

More library photos, as that is where I’m studying this afternoon. I still can’t get over how pretty my college library is. There are several other libraries on campus, but I haven’t yet explored any other than my own because this one is so lovely.

Had New Testament class this morning. I spent almost an hour afterwards talking with the professor about New Testament textual criticism. It was really fun.

I have class again this evening, so I will stay around the college. There’s not really much point in going home; especially since I get more done and less distracted when I’m on campus.

#aelstudies #studyblr #university #dark academia #university studyblr #dark acadamia aesthetic #academia aesthetic #study motivation #books #library #new testament #textual criticism #religious studies #biblical studies

[ef-1]

Sending this to you specifically because I feel like you understand it best and you never shy away from calling Daniel out. Not an apologist for rich men, every single one of them is fucked up and has done fucked up shit. Would never defend Daniel from things he deserves to be criticized for, but so much of the uhhh 'dialogue' right now is just hate wanking lol. There is this blog who genuinely made a post celebrating that she would have never been able to tag Daniel hate in the past because he was too popular and she willingly (?!) admitted she regularly searches him up to look for hate and 'smile' LMAO? We're not even doing the ole' moralising our hatred thing now? Allow it 😭

1. where are you fucking finding these people I just screamed.

2. That one derek pope lyric

#!?!?!?!?!? BATMAN COULD NOT!!! BEAT THAT INFORMATION OUT OF ME! EVER!!!!! #+ yeah I wont ever defend him from criticism which he has earned but you will NOT police my fandom experience. #be soooo liberal with filtering and blocking. #need to make that derek pope edit #sorry but the nobodies are not getting crucified. only daniel lol #not as a joke but stay away from these people? I believe energy is contagious. #loser admissions of biblical; astronomical proportions indicate energy that says im irl repellent and have no prospects or plan in life #+ I definitely failed PE; english and maths and now I tell people I was a gifted child #you lot are too ugly to pull off the mean girls get up. give me something to work with at least. it cant be Ls across the board lol