Bart D. Ehrman's Blog, page 110

Is There Anything “Religious” about “Ethics”?

It is true that ancient ethics did enjoin beneficent acts on family, friends, and acquaintances of one’s own status when they were in need.  But normally such benefices were expected to produce gratitude and respect (elevating one’s status and social capital) and to bring a return; just as important, they were expected to be reciprocated [...]

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Love. How I’ve Shifted the Focus of My Book on Charity.

As I've indicated, my plan is, or rather was, to write a book that argued that Christians radically changed the understandings of wealth and the practices of "giving" once they took over the empire.  They, in effect, invented what we think of as "charity." As I have talked it over with my literary agent and [...]

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Why Even Conservative Christians Should Accept Evolution: Blog Anniversary Guest Post by Michael Shermer (part 2)

For several months now I have been posting Guest Posts that were generoulsly provided by others in honor of the blog's tenth anniversary.  These posts have been wide-ranging in their content and the intriguing , each pbased on the posters' unique backgrounds and expertise.  This now is the final one in the series, the second [...]

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Do You Need the Holy Spirit to Interpret the Bible?

Every now and then I receive an email from a devout Christian who tells me that no one (including, well, me) is able to interpret the Bible correctly without guidance of the Holy Spirit.  I take this view seriously, but I've never found it convincing. Well, OK, I did when I was a student at [...]

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I’m Thinking about Starting a Podcast. Your Opinion?

I am thinking about starting a Podcast and would like your opinion.  This would be *different* from the Ehrman Blog podcast that we’ve had for years (and is now in hiatus as we redesign it) and, of course, from the audio versions of the blog already made available to gold and platinum members.  It would [...]

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Did the Apostles Use Secretaries to Write their Books?

Here is the third (and last) post on the use of secretaries in the ancient world, in which I discuss the issue of whether illiterate people (like Simon Peter, or John the son of Zebedee) could have had someone else write their books for them – so that 1 Peter *could* in some sense actually [...]

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Why Christians and Conservatives Should Accept Evolution: Blog Anniversary Guest Post by Michael Shermer (part 1)

I have been publishing guest posts in celebration of the blog's tenth anniversary, and am pleased to conclude the series now with two posts by Michael Shermer, whom many of you will know from his writings and media appearances discussing (especially) religion and science.  Michael was a one-time committed fundamentalist turned outspoken skeptic.   Here is [...]

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Vote on your favorite Platinum Post: The Next Round!

Dear Platinum members, It's time again again for you to vote on one of our Platinum guest posts, to see which one will be posted on the blog at large.  Take a look.  It's a wide range and all very interesting.   To vote, just send a quick note to Diane at ehrmanblog@gmail.com  Your deadline:  this [...]

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Did Ancient Writers Use Secretaries?

In my previous post I tried to show that the disciples of Jesus were almost certainly not literate.  Yet we have books allegedly written by them.  Is it possible that people like Peter, John, James, and Jude used a secretary to write their books for them?  So that the apostles in the ultimate sense were [...]

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How Many People Were Literate in Antiquity?

Over the past month I have received a number of questions on the blog about whether it was possible that some of the apostles used "secretaries" to write their books -- so that when 1 or 2 Peter, say, claims to be written by Peter, it actually was written by Peter in a sense.  Peter told [...]

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