Bart D. Ehrman's Blog, page 249

The Birth of Purgatory

I am interested in the question of where the idea of purgatory came from.   Roughly speaking purgatory is a kind of third place, between heaven and hell.   The abject sinners (or those who reject Christ, or whoever you think is destined for punishment) go to hell; the righteous saints go to heaven.  But what about those who will ultimately be saved but who have not lived a good (enough) life?  They go to purgatory.   This has been the standard teaching of the Catholic church since the 12th or...

The Martyr Perpetua and Her Estranged Family

Yesterday I began to talk about the Martyrdom of Perpetua, one of the most interesting and moving texts to come down to us from early Christianity.   It is an account of a 23-year old Roman matron who is willing to die a gruesome death for her Christian faith.   Among other things, the text shows that her faith is far more important to her than her family.  In particular, she is shown in conflict especially with her father (no husband is mentioned, which has led to considerable speculation: D...

The Martyrdom of Perpetua

A long time ago now I was pursuing a thread on the development of the Christian views of the afterlife but I got side tracked.  And then I got side tracked from my side track.  And then … well, it’s been a long time.  The thread died.  I need to bring it back to life.  So I’m hoping now to begin on the afterlife of the thread on the afterlife.

Over all these months I have continued to read, think, and sketch my thoughts on where the Christian ideas of the afterlife came from – especially the...

Forgery Lecture

I will be giving a lecture at Rice University in Houston on Thursday April 19.  I had originally thought that it was only for scholars connected with an antiquity seminar there, but I see now that it is open to the public.   Here is the description I gave them (aimed obviously at the academics), if anyone is in the area and wants to come:

4/19/18             Bart Ehrman         James A. Gray Distinguished Professor, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Literary Deceit in Its Various (D...

How Were Books Published in the Ancient World?

In this week’s Readers’ Mailbag I deal with a question about how books – including the early Christian Gospels – were “published” in the ancient world.  How were they “made public” and distributed in a world that didn’t have printing presses and publishers and book stores?  Here’s the question and my response.

 

QUESTION

Bart, this is a related but separate question–how would Mark’s gospel first have been distributed? I understand that most who read it would be reading copies made by believer...

Ehrman & Licona: Are the Gospels Historically Reliable? Part 2

Here is Part 2 of my debate with Mike Licona on whether the Gospels are historically reliable.  You won’t necessarily have to have seen Part 1 to make sense of this one; a lot of it involves penetrating questions from the audience (trying to trip us up!) which one or the other of us addressed.   Enjoy!

Part 2: Please adjust gear icon for 720p High-Definition:

 

REMEMBER: if you were a member of the blog, you would get interesting posts all related to the New Testament and the history of earl...

The Miracle of New Life

As most readers of the blog know, I do not believe in miracles.   At least in literal miracles as normally understood.  I suppose most people think of an actual or literal miracle as an event that cannot be explained through natural causes but requires some kind of supernatural intervention, an act of a divine being who is outside of this nexus of cause and effect, an act of God.

I should stress that this does not necessarily mean that we *do* know the natural causes of everything that we do...

The Marvels of Media Attention

My first trade book – that is, book written for a general audience, instead of for fellow scholars (academic monographs) or college students (textbooks) — was 19 years ago now, Jesus: Apocalyptic Prophet of the New Millennium.   I think it’s safe to say that when I wrote the book, I knew virtually *nothing* about writing a trade book.  My editor at Oxford University Press urged me to write it and I reluctantly agreed.

I was reluctant because I did not want to write for a general audience.  At...

Fresh Air Interview Tuesday March 20

I have just recorded an interview with Terry Gross for Fresh Air — scheduled to air tomorrow, Tuesday March 20.  It’s (mainly) on my book The Triumph of Christianity.  We recorded for an hour and a half, so hopefully they’ll figure out how to edit out the most boring bits!

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Jesus and My First Girlfriend: A Blast From The Past

Breezing through some old posts today from nearly six years ago, and came across this interesting little anecdote.  I’d forgotten I had written about it.  A funny personal story about something that actually became important for me.

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My first serious girlfriend was Lynn, whom I met when we were starting our sophomore year in high school.  She was funny, personable, attractive, intelligent, and Jewish.   I’m not s...