Biblical Studies Carnival IX is Up at Hypotyposeis

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The latest Biblical Studies Carnival is up, with many interesting blog posts highlighted (including one by yours truly). Check it out.

Thanks for all of the effort Stephen.

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Was Paul a Liar when He quotes Jesus in Acts 20:35?

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Pixie said: "The early Christians believed Jesus was adopted as God's son, not born that way (though Paul believed that happened at the resurrection). His childhood was relatively normal, born to two Jewish parents, the oldest of four brothers and some sisters too." [1] There is no historical basis for that belief.There is no document that says  this.  Adiptionism arises in the second century there is no recognized bastion of that view in the first century. [2] The only basis anyone has is gained by interpreting passages in Mark and written by Paul to seem to take an adoptionist view. [3] Of course they have to ignore the testimony of the church in all it's many facets. It is not hard to imagine that before the creeds and the controversies that shaped Trinitarian doctrine the average Christian probably did understand something like an adotionist view. That does not mean that the Gospel of Mark  or Paul taught this view. There is no passage in Mar...
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I first made this post in 2012, and since then I've made a sort of mini-career out of tracking down bogus quotes like this one (including a video version below). It's a sort of fun microcosm of the way information is mishandled in the Information Age. ** I like your Christ. I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ. – Mahatma Gandhi A Christian can probably expect to get this quote thrown at them at least once in their lifetime, and waved in their face many more. I had it put to me recently, but my experience with this sort of thing immediately led me to wonder -- is it real? The evidence at this point seems to be no. The first signal of a problem was that anywhere I found it, no source was given. That's often a sign that something is being passed around uncritically. Whether online sources or books, no one seemed to have a source for this quote. A second warning was that the quote has been given more than one context. As ...
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More evidence for the Historical Truth of David and Goliath

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Even people unschooled in the Bible know the basics of the story of David and Goliath – if for no other reason then the analogy is used whenever something small takes on something large and powerful. Just to prepare to write this blog, I searched for “David and Goliath” on Google News and found stories about residents in a small town in Ireland fighting a large developer , a battle between McDonald’s and a small Irish food chain over the trademark to Big Mac , and the violent stoush resulting when a large galaxy and a small galaxy get too close to each other among other stories. Yes, the story of the future King David, while still too young to join his brothers in a fight for the new kingdom of Israel, against the biggest, baddest Philistine of the time is well-known even to those who have a stunted education of the Bible. Of course, many will say, the story is nonsense. A 9 foot-tall giant being defeated by a young boy and his sling? There couldn’t be anything to it, right? ...
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  As with many pieces on my sight it's written to be more like debate briefs than an essay. But don't let that get in the way,  It's a series of quotations with explains about why I'm using them. Jews self censored the Talmud to remove mentions of Jesus, thus modern Jews deny that it is talking about him, while ancient rabbis used examples supposedly speaking of him for centuries. But what cannot be denied is that the Talmud gives evidence of Christians believing in Jesus as a flesh and blood rabbi from the late first century, which contradicts the Jesus myth theory. There is a history of the Talmud The Babylonian Talmud translated by MICHAEL L. RODKINSON Book 10 (Vols. I and II) [1918] The History of the Talmud from Vol I chapter II Thus the study of the Talmud flourished after the destruction of the Temple, although beset with great difficulties and desperate struggles. All his days, R. Johanan b. Zakkai was obliged to dispute with Sadducee and Bathu...
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The Banana: Proof of Atheism!

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I'm kind of busy this week, so I asked our recurring fundy atheist punching bag, I. M. Skeptical, to write me a post about the best argument for atheism he could come up with. Here's what he gave me. ** There was once a slimy, snotty Christian apologist who made the argument that the banana is an “atheist’s worst nightmare” because it has so many great design features. I used to love that argument when I was a stupid, blind fundy, and now as an intellectually fulfilled atheist I think it is really stupid ! In fact, I want to argue now that if anything, the banana proves that God does not exist, or that if he does, he is evil, malevolent, and really snotty! Here’s why: The banana has a slippery peel which can be thrown on the ground, causing innocent people to slip and fall. The banana has been used for endless, cruel practical jokes (especially on me, and I have the bruises on my butt to prove it!) and this would only be a feature designed by a m...
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