Rick Perry cites Jesus' Profit-ic Libertarianism

Today I received (via FB) this word of wisdom from New Testament scholar and Fortress Press editor, Neil Elliott:

One man who would be president cites Mark 14 to dismiss concern for the poor (who "will always be with you"). That's not just insensitive and callous: it's bad Bible reading. Deuteronomy 15 was the likely background for Jesus' words: "SINCE there will never cease to be some poor and needy on the earth, I [GOD] therefore command you, 'Open your hand to the poor and needy neighbor in your land.'" Better Fortress Press resources make the point -- Emerson B. Powery, for example, in TRUE TO OUR NATIVE LAND: AN AFRICAN-AMERICAN NEW TESTAMENT COMMENTARY (2007); Raquel Lettsome in FORTRESS COMMENTARY ON THE NEW TESTAMENT (2014); etc.

Thank you, Neil.

-anthony

Of Seraphim and John 3

Maybe you memorized it when you were eight. Maybe it was painted on a decorative plate at grandma's house. Maybe you heard it a Keith Urban concert. Maybe you swoon when you hear it because of Tim Tebow's come-hither smile. But if you have any exposure to Christianity, you're probably familiar with John 3:16.

In the standard evangelical canon-within-canon, John 3:16 represents nothing short of the Gospel (emphasis on the definite article). In modern, minimalist, individualist incarnations of Christian theology, John 3:16 is the gateway drug to heavenly bliss.

It is curious then that many Christians have no idea what to do with the immediate context of this verse:

John 3:14 And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, 15 that whoever believes in him may have eternal life. 16 “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life....

So what is this business about the serpent in the wilderness? And how does said serpent relate to the Son of Man? Well, just as a refresher:

Numbers 21:6 Then the Lord sent poisonous serpents among the people, and they bit the people, so that many Israelites died. 7 The people came to Moses and said, ‘We have sinned by speaking against the Lord and against you; pray to the Lord to take away the serpents from us.’ So Moses prayed for the people. 8 And the Lord said to Moses, ‘Make a poisonous serpent, and set it on a pole; and everyone who is bitten shall look at it and live.’ 9 So Moses made a serpent of bronze, and put it upon a pole; and whenever a serpent bit someone, that person would look at the serpent of bronze and live.

As you can see this passage creates space for more questions (to put it mildly). So sometimes the Lord sends poisonous serpents? Or should this be translated "fiery seraphim" [הַנְּחָשִׁים הַשְּׂרָפִים] of angelic import? Sometimes zoomorphic images cast in bronze are salvation from sin and not the cause of sin? And has anyone ever had a worse middle-management job description than Moses?

Back to John's Gospel, what is to be gained by comparing Moses' bronze image to Jesus?

John 3:14 is a fascinating window into a much overlooked biblical topic: serpentine imagery. Once you start exploring the forms and functions of serpents in the Bible, it becomes clear that the image isn't nearly as negative as you might expect.

For a wonderfully comprehensive treatment of this topic, see Charlesworth's The Good and Evil Serpent. It is not for the timid. I once used it for an advanced exegesis class and it really functions well at that level (i.e. it's not going to challenge J. K. Rowling for sales). One of the payoffs is the realization that Christian, theological emphasis on Genesis 3 has negatively colored our understanding of serpents in the Bible. Indeed even a cursory reading of John 3 should suggest that our traditional readings of serpents in the Bible have been insufficient.

-anthony

Quarterly Quote of the Month about Jesus for this Week

"The last time that I remained silent in the face of this injustice: Tony and I were riding in the backseat of a car heading to one of Tony’s speaking engagements in a mid-western city. The two people in the front seat were evangelical Christians (I’m sure that this is what they would have called themselves). They wanted to talk to Tony about the “ills that plague our society and threaten the Church” and first on their list was the “homosexual problem.” As they started to describe these people, I started to feel physically ill. I sat in silent misery and anger, doing what I had always done: nothing. It used to be part of my religion never to upset anybody. Tony did his best to enlighten the couple, but my own silence was so loud in my ears that I can’t even remember what he said. That ride seemed interminable. But it ended too soon and I was left with my guilt. Those two people would go on with their made-up Jesus and their mixed-up thinking and they had every reason to think that I agreed with them. For me, that night, a cock crowed for the third time. I had not only failed to stand up for some dear friends, I had betrayed the Jesus who loved them. That night—miserable and ashamed of myself—I asked God to forgive me and to give me the courage to speak the truth next time. And God has given me many, many next times; and today is one of them."

            ~Peggy Campolo

Congratulations to Professor Helen Bond!—Chris Keith

The Jesus Blog would like to congratulate Helen Bond on her promotion to Professor of Christian Origins at the University of Edinburgh!  Congratulations, Professor Bond!  This is a well-deserved honor for one of the leading New Testament scholars in the world (and a wonderful Doktormutter as well).  If you haven't read Professor Bond's contribution to the Jesus Blog, do so here.

Upcoming Changes (and Not) for Me and St Mary’s—Chris Keith

As something of an explanation for why I have not posted a lot on the Jesus Blog here lately, I wanted to update readers that here very soon my family and I will be moving from London back to the US.  Fortunately, I am not leaving St Mary's University, Twickenham.  I will keep my posts as Professor of New Testament and Early Christianity and Director of the Centre for the Social-Scientific Study of the Bible (CSSSB), and thus will continue working with my colleagues in the Centre, Prof Steve Walton and Prof James Crossley.  Our conferences and PhD supervision will roll on as normal, and I will frequently be in London.  I know that trading London for Kentucky isn't necessarily the most logical thing to do.  But this move to the US is due both to family matters and the desire of St Mary's to have a greater presence in the US.

Among many others, one upside to this move is that I will be able to visit US PhD students on site, in addition to meeting together in London at least once a year, at conferences, and over Skype.  If you're in the US and interested in doing a PhD in New Testament non-residentially at St Mary's, working with Prof Crossley and me (Prof Walton will take on new students in Fall 2016), please get in touch with either of us.  In addition to coming to see us, we will now be coming to see you!  Of course, if you're interested in doing a PhD residentially in London, get in touch also!

Typing Hebrew Unicode on a Mac

It has been years since I used a mac to write a biblical studies paper. But my new employer kindly issued me a very nice MacBook Air. So I needed to reacquaint myself with mac. Simply installing the SBL fonts was easy. But getting my word processor to recognize the Hebrew fonts and allow me to type from right to left was difficult (for me at least).

I am very grateful to Dr. Michael Burer for creating this youtube instructional:

It is a short instructional youtube. Watch it and you'll be typing Hebrew like a pro in no time.

-anthony

Klawans on First-Cent. Supersessionism

Today I am re-reading and appreciating anew Jonathan Klawans' masterful Purity, Sacrifice, and the Temple: Symbolism and Supersessionism in the Study of Ancient Judaism (Oxford: OUP, 2006).

He writes: "…both Paul’s metaphors and Jesus’ eucharistic words and deeds find a likely context in the multifarious and well-attested ancient Jewish efforts to channel the Temple’s sanctity in to various other rituals activities, such as prayer and eating" (244).

There is so much here to digest. (1) Is channeling the Temple's sanctity necessarily supersessionist? (2) Does the first-century Jewish critique of the appropriation of Jewish symbols create a world of possibilities leading to anti-Judaism? (3) What do we make of the proximity of such critique/re-appropriation immediately preceding the Temple's destruction?

If any of these questions interest you, Klawans' book should be on your list.

-anthony

Quarterly Quote of the Month about Northern California for this Week

"Christianity is borderline illegal in Northern California."

             

                               ~Erlich Bachman

              

My New Favorite Blogger: Rebecca Runesson

Get your daily dose of angry from Rebecca Runesson:

https://theangrytheologian.wordpress.com/

Don't let this shining countenance fool you, "nothing shall escape my wrath," says she.

Don't confuse her wrath with bitterness. She explains, "this rage is perhaps the truest expression of my near-palpable and sometimes all-consuming love for my subject."

Runesson is my new favorite blogger. Consider yourself demoted, Larry Behrendt.

-anthony

Gronking Jesus: A Review of 'The Lost Gospel' by Jacobovici and Wilson

An excerpt from my LARB review of The Lost Gospel by Simcha Jacobovici and Barrie Wilson:

THE LOST GOSPEL is not the worst book ever written. I once attended a party where I was subjected to an excerpt of dinosaur erotica. It was a lovely gathering otherwise, but my ears were assaulted by pages from Taken by the T-Rex. I will say no more for fear that I will corrupt you, gentle reader. The silver lining of my turpid tale is that I now have a new barometer for beastly books. While The Lost Gospel is no match for dinosaur erotica, it is equally daring.

Here are some of the claims that Simcha Jacobovici and Barrie Wilson make: (1) a 6th-century text that never once refers to Jesus or Mary Magdalene is secretly about Jesus, Mary, and their children; (2) the character “Joseph” named in this text represents Jesus, Apollo, Helios, Mithras, and a Roman emperor simultaneously; (3) Mary Magdalene was not Jewish and was, moreover, a priestess of Artemis; (4) when Jesus refers to the Queen of Sheba (Matt 12:42), he is speaking of Mary in code; (5) Jesus — not a peasant, but a powerful figure in the world of Roman politics — was the victim of not one but two assassination attempts, both of which he survived; (6) the Roman general Germanicus was the second threat to Jesus, but a Roman prefect named Sejanus saved him, Mary, and their children; and (7) the wine of the Last Supper symbolized Mary’s menstrual blood. As you will see below, this is only a small sampling of this book’s originality.

What, you might wonder, warrants such derring-do? They take a 2nd-century fiction written about two characters from Genesis — Joseph and Aseneth (here referring to the son of Israel; compare to Genesis chs. 41, 46) — and decode this story’s “true” meaning. The story of Joseph and Aseneth, according to Jacobovici and Wilson, is really the secret history of Mary Magdalene and her husband, Jesus. To keep the secret of their marriage and family, various Gnostic authors from the 2nd to the 6th centuries wrote “Joseph” when they really meant Jesus, and “Aseneth” when they meant Mary. This allows Jacobovici and Wilson to rewrite the history of Jesus. They conclude: “Joseph and Aseneth gives us a glimpse into a story untainted by later Roman theology. We finally have a document that was slated for the fire, but is now seeing the light of the day.”

In order to arrive at such a conclusion, the authors must employ conspiracy theories and find hidden meanings behind the story’s plot, characters, and symbols....

To read the full review, see here.

-anthony

Steve Walton on 'Cities of God?'

I was fortunate enough to attend the St Mary's conference titled 'Cities of God?' last month. This conference was organized and facilitated by Steve Walton. Steve reflects on the experience here:

http://stevewalton.info/cities-of-god-conference-a-resounding-success/

I agree. It was a great success! I learned so very much and rethought several previously held assumptions about urban life in antiquity. Well done, Steve!

-anthony

Jesus Inside and Outside the New Testament

David Capes alerts us to a panel discussion titled "Jesus in the Canonical and Gnostic Gospels." The video is here (scroll to the bottom) alongside several other interesting lectures and panels. The panel includes:

Simon Gathercole (Professor and Fellow at Cambridge University)
David Chapman (Associate Professor of New Testament and Archaeology, Scripture and Interpretation, Covenant Theological Seminary)
David Capes (Thomas Nelson Professor at Houston Baptist University)
Peter Davids (Visiting Professor at Houston Baptist University)

I'm grateful for this resource and I'm considering using it for an up-coming online class. It presents several theologically conservative perspectives on Jesus inside and outside the New Testament. If I use this resource, it will be balanced with other resources that offer a wider range of perspectives.

-anthony

DeConick Rug Studio: Jesus of Nazareth

You already knew that April DeConick was talented. But did you know that she was 1677 squares of awesome?

Check it out.

-anthony