Last year, we reported on the First (2023) Global Virtual Meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature. And we have also discussed Biblical scholarship that has emerged from other SBL meetings (2017, 2020, and 2021). SBL, founded in 1880, is “the oldest and largest learned society devoted to the critical investigation of the Bible from […]
St. Paul
Uncovering Nympha: Scholarship and Female Leadership in the Early Jesus Movement
When one reads standard reference works about the New (Christian) Testament and the early Jesus movement one would almost never know that there is a woman mentioned in the letter to the Colossians. It has taken recent research by female scholars to uncover yet another woman who served the movement in the same ways that […]
A Little Levity from the Ancient World
The world is a serious place. When we examine the ancient world, especially as we look at the more serious (and even tragic) aspects of the history of the West, we are also confronted with images and concepts that normally do not make us smile, let alone laugh. Here we will lighten things up a […]
St. Paul on Individualism and Community: Guidance for Americans from I Corinthians 12
Several years ago, we examined the very American characteristic of hyperindividualism. We noted many examples of how extreme forms of a characteristic that generally has positive goals and outcomes often leads in our culture to putting the onus, stressfully, on individuals to improve our lives (in contrast to the fact that citizens of our peer […]
Apocryphal Women in the Early Jesus Movement: Eliciting Fact from Fiction
In past posts, we have examined women in the first couple of centuries of the Common Era (CE) who may well have been real: Evodia and Syntyche mentioned by Paul in his letter to the Philippians; Apphia, mentioned in Paul’s letter to Philemon; and women mentioned in Chapter 16 of Paul’s letter to the Romans: […]
Biblical Scholarship: A Report on the First Global Virtual Meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature
The Society of Biblical Literature (SBL) tried something new in March 2023: holding a virtual global meeting. SBL was founded in 1880 and is “the oldest and largest learned society devoted to the critical investigation of the Bible from a variety of academic disciplines.” SBL holds an Annual Meeting in North America (which now draws […]
Mary, Isis, and the Goddesses of the Via Egnatia
The Via Egnatia, which ran from Constantinople in the east to Dyrrachium, Albania, in the west, was one portion of the more than 50,000 miles of well-built roads of the Roman Empire. It was along the Via Egnatia, in part, that St. Paul and his companions spread the Christian message, visiting friends and family, preaching […]
Celebrating Women’s History Month: A Reading List
In celebration of Women’s History Month, we offer here an updated list of our blog posts about women, goddesses, goddess worship and female imagery. Enjoy! Posts since late March 2021: Rounding Out Women’s History Month: Current Women Leaders around the World Current Research on Pompeii, Part I: Archaeology Current Research on Pompeii, Part II: Paul’s […]
The Cult of the Thracian Horseman in the Early Christian Era
As we have seen in past posts, the early Jesus movement – which ultimately became Christianity – originated in a polytheistic environment: people of the Roman Empire worshiped multiple female and male deities. This means that Jesus himself, his earliest followers and those who later identified as Christians lived and worked among devotees of Aphrodite/Venus, […]
Index to the Seventh Year
Thank you for your interest in these blog posts! Here is a listing by topic for posts since October 2021. (Some topics overlap.) Social and Racial Justice, Diversity Honoring the Wampanoags Today and Moving Toward a More Perfect Union, November 26, 2021 Suggested Readings for Black History Month: The Self-Education of White Americans, February […]