"Moses Receives the Ten Commandments." Machsor mechol hashana. Germany, ca. 1290, leaves 59b, 50a. Vellum (2)
"Moses Receives the Ten Commandments." Machsor mechol hashana. Germany, ca. 1290, leaves 59b, 50a. Vellum (2)
Dr. Marc Herman applies Hayes' What's Divine About Divine Law to Islamic traditions.
Read MoreRemains of a Byzantine Church on Mount Gerizim | Image source
Remains of a Byzantine Church on Mount Gerizim | Image source
This Week: Religious deviants, Samaritans and Samaria, mosaic workshops, cuneiform, genetics, digitization everywhere – and more!
Read MoreDr. Sarit Kattan Gribetz describes using an unexpected classroom balcony as a pedagogical tool.
Read More"Jörg Rüpke, Vice-director for Religious Studies at the Max Weber Centre of the University of Erfurt, argues that an analysis of Roman conceptions of religious deviance such as the celebration of Bacchanalia can illuminate normative Roman religion and aid in identifying individual religious behavior in the Roman world."
Read MoreHarry Potter and the Deathly Hollows; image from Flickr.
"Griffith opens a window onto an earlier scholarly world, showing how the production of the earliest Arabic Bibles—and indeed the production of Arabic Christianity, Judaism, and Islam as a whole—has been from the beginning a thoroughly interreligious endeavor."
Read MoreCandle burning. License: CC0 Public Domain
Candle burning. License: CC0 Public Domain
Dr. Jill Hicks-Keeton on "eating" a candle as a teaching moment.
Read More"In a useful introduction, Shoemaker lays out the problem and the gap he wishes to solve and fill: scholars have tended to look at doctrinal texts on Mary and have all but ignored the presence of Marian piety in the first centuries. By charting a devotional rather than theological survey about the Virgin Mary, he aims to create a new narrative about her import in the early Church."
Read MoreMosaic of either St. Laurence or St. Vincent | Fifth-century lunette from the Mausoleum of Galla Placidia, Ravenna | Image source
Mosaic of either St. Laurence or St. Vincent | Fifth-century lunette from the Mausoleum of Galla Placidia, Ravenna | Image source
This Week: soundscapes in teaching, Pompeii, hidden manuscripts, Sasanian literature, cultural heritage, looting – and more!
Read MoreMamluk Manuscript Page depicting the Archangel Israfil, held at the British Museum and displayed at the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s “Medieval Jerusalem” exhibit in 2016
Mamluk Manuscript Page depicting the Archangel Israfil, held at the British Museum and displayed at the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s “Medieval Jerusalem” exhibit in 2016
Dr. Sarit Kattan Gribetz describes how to sensitize students to the sounds in ancient texts.
Read MoreCeramic Menas ampulla, for holding holy oil | Dated 610-50CE | Currently on display at the Met, New York Item No. 17.194.2291.
Ceramic Menas ampulla, for holding holy oil | Dated 610-50CE | Currently on display at the Met, New York Item No. 17.194.2291.
This Week: New journals, multi-million dollar antiquities smuggling, Huqoq, Sasanian Iran, Greek color, animality in Talmud – and more!
Read MoreSample webpage from Biblical Theology Spring 2017 semester.
Sample webpage from Biblical Theology Spring 2017 semester.
Dr. Rebecca Falcasantos with an alternative website-building term project.
Read MoreArmenian Illustrations of Pentecost (f.2r, left) and the Transfiguration (f.3v, right) | Four Gospels in Armenian, 1434/35 | No. 2010.108 on display at the Met, New York
Armenian Illustrations of Pentecost (f.2r, left) and the Transfiguration (f.3v, right) | Four Gospels in Armenian, 1434/35 | No. 2010.108 on display at the Met, New York
This Week: Paul and the dinosaurs, dog-headed saints, Armenian monks, scholarly bias, #openaccess hoards – and more!
Read MoreSt. Paul by Lippo Memmi. On view at The Met Fifth Avenue in Gallery 625 [public domain]
St. Paul by Lippo Memmi. On view at The Met Fifth Avenue in Gallery 625 [public domain]
"One criticism I have of Paul and the law scholarship (and Matthew and the law as well) is that extra-Jewish materials are only incorporated into a scholar’s research when such materials are believed to have influenced Paul’s thought. Put differently, extra-Jewish materials only count for Paul and the law scholars if we think Paul knew about them."
Read More"The oblique nature of Paul’s references to the Abraham Narrative suggests that his implied readers, in fact, do know the basic contours of that story. Paul’s allusions to Genesis, therefore, must represent his efforts to get them to read or hear the Abraham Narrative very differently than they currently do."
Read MoreSolomon Schechter at work, in Cambridge, on the Cairo Genizah fragments | Cambridge, 1898 | Original photograph image
Solomon Schechter at work, in Cambridge, on the Cairo Genizah fragments | Cambridge, 1898 | Original photograph image
This Week: Christians in Sasanian Iran, the Jewish Paul, the Talmudic Second Temple, firefighting, graffiti, digital humanities up the wazoo - and more!
Read MoreThe Apostle Paul from St. Sophia of Kyiv (Wikimedia Commons)
The Apostle Paul from St. Sophia of Kyiv (Wikimedia Commons)
"Description and Redescription – the classic interrelated activities that animate critical scholarship on religion. This roundtable affords the chance to examine two books that push the descriptive and redescriptive envelopes in their sectors of biblical studies."
Read More"With careful attention to detail and broad usage of a wealth of sources, Payne systematically deconstructs this idealistic bifurcation between Christianity and Sasanian culture. However, Payne dismantles this historiographical narrative, while simultaneously offering a completely new perspective on Persian Christianity by examining the various ways that Christians participated in, transformed, and even claimed Iranian culture as part of Christian identity."
Read MoreMenorah relief from the Arch of Titus, Rome | Image source
Menorah relief from the Arch of Titus, Rome | Image source
This Week: Zoroastrianism, A Handmaid's Tale, pre-modern anti-Semitism, menorahs, Hypatia, Vindolanda discoveries - and more!
Read More"The Conversion of St. Paul" Benozzo Gozzoli on view in The MET 5th Ave Gallery 603 [public domain].
"The Conversion of St. Paul" Benozzo Gozzoli on view in The MET 5th Ave Gallery 603 [public domain].
"Ultimately, I believe that a full understanding of Paul combines both of these interpretations, though with one additional element. It is perhaps a function of my age that I am more cynical than our two authors, but I am inclined to agree that Paul’s offer of cosmic rule for gentiles of faith has the ring of a marketing ploy."
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