Helen K. Bond, The First Biography of Jesus: Genre and Meaning in Mark's Gospel (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2020), 92.
Helen Bond: The “Social and Cultural Ramifications” of a Writing a Bios of Jesus
Helen Bond: Hazardous Reading of Ancient Texts
Helen K. Bond, The First Biography of Jesus: Genre and Meaning in Mark's Gospel (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2020), 8.
Matthew Thiessen: The Jesus of the Gospels Argues on the Basis of Torah
Matthew Thiessen, Jesus and the Forces of Death: The Gospels Portrayal of Ritual Impurity within First-Century Judaism (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2020), 173.
Matthew Thiessen: Jesus is Divinely Equipped to Deal with Ritual Impurity
Matthew Thiessen, Jesus and the Forces of Death: The Gospels Portrayal of Ritual Impurity within First-Century Judaism (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2020), 20.
Joel Marcus: No External Evidence for the Barabbas Incident
Joel Marcus, Mark 8-16: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2009), 930. While it is probable...that some members of the Jewish hierarchy pressed Pilate to put Jesus to death (Mark 15:1, 3, 11), and while a revolutionary ringleader may have been released at about the same time that... Continue Reading →
Wayne Pitard: Garbled Facts in Oral Tradition and the Book of Genesis
Wayne T. Pitard, "Before Israel: Syria-Palestine in the Bronze Age," in The Oxford History of the Biblical World, Michael D. Coogan, editor (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998), 27. There are many reasons to be skeptical of [the Patriarchal] narratives as historically accurate accounts of the lives of Israel's progenitors. Indications within the narratives suggest that... Continue Reading →
Bart Ehrman on What It Would Mean If We Had the “Original” Gospels
Over on his blog, NT scholar Bart Ehrman addresses the question, “What if we had the ‘original’ Gospels?” Apologists seemingly believe that if we had an original copy of Mark or Matthew that it would give what they wrote some degree of credibility. In essence, they do think we have the original reading of these texts, albeit... Continue Reading →
Jesus is the Prodigal Son: καταπέτασμα’s Interpretation
There are many ways of reading the story of the Wayward Son (Luke 15:11-32). In the context of the other two parables Jesus offers, it is fundamentally a story about the joyous response to one who repents and turns to God: “[T]here is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner... Continue Reading →
Musings on Mark: Reign of the Demons
Jesus’ first public miracle in the Gospel of Mark is an exorcism (Mark 1:23-26) This is no coincidence; neither is the fact that it is contained within a pericope portraying Jesus as a teacher (vv. 21-28). On a narrative level, the Markan author desires to show how Jesus is the one with unique authority: he... Continue Reading →
Recent Comments