Bart D. Ehrman's Blog, page 115

Did Christians Invent Hospitals?

This will be the last of my posts on this thread, connected with what I hope is my next book, that I’m calling tentatively, The Creation of Charity: How Christianity Transformed our World.  Here I talk about one of the lesser-known aspects of early Christianity – a surprising one to most people. Arguably the most important [...]

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Were Early Christians Really Charitable? Or Was It All Talk?

In this thread on “charity” in early Christianity I’ve been discussing what the Christian writers said about the importance of giving money to those in need.  But did all this preaching have any real-life effect on anything? In his classical discussion of wealth in antiquity, Paul Veyne pointed out that it is important to “distinguish [...]

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Did Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John Write Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John? Free video.

As you may know, I have started producing a series of online courses that consider in a systematic way how historical scholars understanding the Bible.  These are not connected with the blog, but are a separate activity I have for the Bart Ehrman Professional Services (BEPS; website: www.bartehrman.com)   In June I did a freebie as [...]

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Announcing a New Live Course on the Gospels! Interested?

I am pleased to announce that I will be doing another online course, the second in the series: How Scholars Read the Bible.  The first, if you recall, was a six-lecture course on Genesis.  This one will be an eight-lecture course called:  The Unknown Gospels:  Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. As with all the courses [...]

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Our Platinum Webinar! Tuesday July 19.

I'm looking forward to our re-rescheduled Platinum-Onlies Webinar on Tuesday! Topic:  Peter and Paul: The Dueling Apostles Time:  7:30 - 9:00 pm. Link:  https://us02web.zoom.us/j/83457463872... Meeting ID: 834 5746 3872 Passcode: 334283         Hope to see you there! = Bart

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How Could Jesus Be BOTH Divine and Human at Once? An Intriguing Ancient View

This now is my tenth and final April 18 anniversary post.  The blog started on April 18, 2012, and with this post I will finish all the previous posts from April 18.   This one, from 2021, is especially interesting for anyone intrigued by early Christian attempts to figure out who Christ was.  God?  Human?  Half [...]

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Christians Who Reversed Jesus’ Teachings: Wealth is GOOD!

In this thread I’ve been giving a short history of ancient Christian views of giving to charity – a matter of real interest for the blog itself, but of bigger interest for the world at large.  Surprisingly, before Christianity started to take over the Roman world, no one apart from Jews appeared to think that [...]

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“Redemptive Gifts”: Can Giving to Charity Save Your Soul?

In my previous post I began to show that after Jesus’ death, his followers started to soften his message that it was necessary for his followers to give up all their material goods.  In fact, Christian leaders started seeing the virtue of wealth in their communities and began to claim that wealthy people who gave [...]

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Rescheduled (and RE-scheduled!) Platinum Webinar July 19

It's past time for another Platinum webinar; as you know, this is a four-time a year event, for Platinum Members only.  Apologies for having had to reschedule this one twice--I'll have a few words to say about that during the Zoom. Our topic is TBA. The date:  Tuesday July 19; 7:30-9:00 (EST)  No need to [...]

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July Gold Q&A

Dear Gold Members, These monthly Gold Q&A's have been a lot of fun to do.  Time for another one!  Have a question?  Ask it!  Anything related to the blog! To enter your question on to the list: send it to Diane at ehrmanblog@gmail.com DEADLINE for your question. Saturday July 16, midnight (whenever midnight is where [...]

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