Bart D. Ehrman's Blog, page 23

The New Testament Gospels in a Nutshell

Before I can talk about the Gospels individually, I need to say something about them as a group. How would YOU summarize the most important things to say about the Gospels in a single sentence?  Try it.  See how you do.   There are roughly 34 million ways to put it.  Here’s one of them. [...]

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What Is The New Testament? Can You Actually Say?

What exactly is the New Testament? If someone standing behind you in a long line in the grocery store should lean over and out of the blue ask:  “Hey, can you tell me what the New Testament is”, what would you say? (This happens to you every day, right?)  This person wants it in one [...]

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Seats Still Available! Blog Dinner in Tampa this Friday (January 17)

In case you didn't see the announcement the first time!  There are still some seats that can be filled for my blog dinner this week in Tampa, if you're interested.  Here is the original post:   I will be in Tampa next week and would like to do a Blog Dinner on Friday, January 17, [...]

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Do You Understand the Entire New Testament? Announcing My New Blog Thread

Most readers of the blog are interested – either passionately, intently, deeply, moderately, or somewhat – in, well, the New Testament.  But many do not actually know much about it as a whole.  You may well be the exception!  But hey, all of you are exceptional. My view is that anyone who claims to be [...]

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Other Critical Approaches to the New Testament (by Prof. Shaily Patel)

Most of my textbook approaches the New Testament from a historical and traditional literary point of view.  But there are many other approaches that one can take to the Bible or any other writing.  In recent decades other theoretical forms of analysis have developed and fruitfully employed by scholars. I decided to say something about [...]

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Getting the Bible Digitally (by Jeffrey Siker)

In my textbook, The New Testament: A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings (now in the 8th ed., co-authored with Hugo Mendez), another feature I rather like are several "excursuses" on key issues I chose not to deal with in the text itself.  A couple of these were written by other scholars in the field, [...]

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Blog Dinner in Tampa Fl. Friday January 17. You Interested?

I will be in Tampa next week and would like to do a Blog Dinner on Friday, January 17, with any blog members who happen to be around or can, well, get around.  Probably around 6:30 or so for drinks to start (for whoever is interested in quenching thirst before satisfying hunger), and location TBD. [...]

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Did Christians Invent the Idea of “Atonement” / “Vicarious Suffering”?

My textbook, The New Testament: A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings is now out in its 8th edition, co-authored with my colleague Hugo Mendez.  One of my favorite features of the book since I first wrote it in the mid 90s is the use of side-bar “boxes” that deal with issues that are [...]

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Was There No Room in the “Inn” or in the “Guestroom”? And Doesn’t Caesar Augustus Himself Describe His Census? More Questions from Readers

Here are some more particularly interesting and significant questions I've received from readers, with answers for all here to check out.   QUESTION: Dr. Ehrman: I find it interesting how the understanding of the Greek translation might affect such a crucial NT story. Also, it is in Luke’s narrative that we get the “no room [...]

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Was Jesus from “Israel”? Did Jesus “Pre-exist”? Answers to Readers Questions

I’ve received a number of interesting and important questions from readers over the past couple of weeks, and would like to devote a couple of posts to airing my answers to everyone.   QUESTION: I have a question for Bart. Every year right before Christmas we get numerous claims that Jesus was a Palestinian or [...]

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