New Blog

I’ve started a new blog dedicated specifically to explorations and comments on LDS scripture broadly following the annual Gospel Doctrine reading schedule.  It is located at:

http://mormonscriptureexplorations.wordpress.com/

1 Enoch Commentary

The second volume of the Nickelsburg and VanderKam commentary on 1 Enoch is now available.  I bought a copy at SBL, and it is a superb work.

Nickelsburg, G. and J. VanderKam, 1 Enoch 2: A Commentary on the Book of 1 Enoch, Chapters 37-82, Hermeneia (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2012), ISBN-13: 978-0800698379, $82, available for $65.70 on Amazon.

The first volume is:

Nickelsburg, George W. E., 1 Enoch 1: A Commentary on the Book of 1 Enoch, Chapters 1-36, 81-108, Hermeneia, (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2001), ISBN-13: 978-0800660741 is also at Amazon for $65.04.

Their translation only–based on their careful study of the Aramaic, Greek and Ethiopic fragments, quotations, and versions, is:

Nickelsburg, G. and J. VanderKam, 1 Enoch: A New Translation, (Fortress, 2004), ISBN-13: 978-0800636944, at Amazon for $11.52.

Dissertation on “Divine Multiplicity”

Spencer Allen,

The Splintered Divine: A Study of Ištar, Baal, and Yahweh Divine Names and Divine Multiplicity in the Ancient Near East

University of Pennsylvania Dissertation, 2011

Ehrman’s job description?

At SBL I attended a session in which Bart Ehrman mentioned that he felt his duty as a professor was to disabuse his Evangelical students of their beliefs about the Bible.  If I understood what he said correctly, I find this position rather shocking.  (And I’m confident that he’s not the only professor who believes this way.)

In my view Ehrman’s job–along with all professors at public universities–is to teach his students about the current state of biblical studies, not to indoctrinate them into a particular ideology of biblical studies.  I would likewise object if a Christian professor felt that his responsibility as a professor in a state school was to convert his students to Christianity.

In my view, all professors–from Christian to atheist–should introduce their students to the full range of biblical studies as an academic field.  They should present the wide range of interpretations that exist today.  While they can certainly explain what their personal interpretation is, and why they believe what they believe, but they should not proselytize.  If Ehrman does not present alternative views to his own in his class lectures and reading assignments, he is not serving his students well.

Both secular agnostic professors and Christian professors who work at a public taxpayer-funded universities need to realize that indoctrinating students into a particular ideology about the Bible is not their responsibility or even prerogative.

I’m not dead yet and they’ve already made a movie about me.

From a film major who was a student with the semester abroad in Jerusalem last year.

 

Best Rendition of “Happy Birthday” Ever!

From my grandson Will!