Michael S. Heiser's Blog, page 26

Nanotechnology to Fight Cancer

Some good news related to nanotechnology (trying to balance out the previous post): Cancer Stem Cells Destroyed by Drug-Filled Nanoparticles. It’s not all about becoming gods.

Okay … had to add this. I couldn’t help myself: Scientists Train Bacteria to Build Unnatural Proteins. First sentence: “Scientists say they have created a partly man-made bacterium that can produce proteins not found in nature.”

Okay, back to normal.

I suppose you can tell I’m moving into novel mode.

 

Audio from the ETS Session on New Testament Textual Criticism

The Evangelical Textual Criticism blog has a link to the audio files of the presentations in the ETS session devoted to NT Textual criticism. As the ETC blog notes:

The session was titled “Growing Up in the Ehrman Era: Retrospect and Prospect on Our Text-Critical Apologetic.” The first part of the session was given to several presentations drawn from chapters that will be in a book we are editing; the second part was a panel discussion featuring Dan Wallace, Timothy Paul Jones, Michael Kruger, Charles Hill, Peter Head, and Pete Williams.

The audio files are $4 each. Here are the session titles:

Common Problems in Evangelical Defenses of the New Testament Text – Elijah Hixson and Peter Gurry
Dating Myths: Why Later Manuscripts Can Be Better Manuscripts – Greg Lanier
Math Myths: Why More Manuscripts Isn’t Necessarily Better – Jacob Peterson
Panel Discussion – Dan Wallace, Timothy Paul Jones, Michael Kruger, Charles Hill, Peter Head, and Pete Williams

MK-ULTRA Settlement in the News

The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) recently ran this headline (both the title and sub-title are noteworthy):

Federal government quietly compensates daughter of brainwashing experiments victim

Lawsuit filed after The Fifth Estate re-aired documentary about Dr. Ewen Cameron’s CIA-funded experiments

I’ve mentioned the film (not a documentary) called “The Sleep Room” before on this blog. It’s very good. You get a clear idea of what Cameron did, the CIA’s role, why the CIA was able to circumvent legal consequences, and the reality of MK-ULTRA. It’s story-telling that is based on historical events. The Fifth Estate documentary has the same goals. I recommend watching both.

Rice University Scholar Jeffrey Kripal: Meet Diego Cuoghi

Jason Colavito has a lengthy, but worthwhile (as usual) post on Rice University Prof. Jeffrey’s Kripal’s claim for UFOs in medieval art. Kripal shows his unfamiliarity with the work of art historian Diego Cuoghi on this matter. PaleoBabble readers should be familiar with Cuoghi’s site by now — it’s the major repository for showing what these objects in medieval and Renaissance paintings really are (via similar examples).

Kripal points gullible followers to the Madonna Col Bambino E San Giovannino (“Madonna and Child with the Infant Saint John”):

Cuoghi’s site of course discusses this painting. He draws on plenty of analogies to demonstrate that, contra Kripal, it’s not a UFO.

Dr. Kripal should just stick to what he does best — promoting Gnosticism.

 

Tom DeLonge: Stop the Madness

Robert Sheaffer has another funny-but-sad essay on the antics of Tom DeLonge, he of Blink182 fame (I confess to not knowing anything about the group, but it helps with Google search results so there it is). Sheaffer chronicles some fake photos and such that DeLonge has been posting (and removing) that are part of his effort to make money on disclosure. Here’s a choice paragraph:

Now that a few weeks have passed since that famous announcement, we are getting a clearer picture of DeLonge, and his venture (which has now raised almost $2 million from “investors”, who are perhaps better called “suckers.”) For one thing, he is a Serial Deleter on social media. Meaning, that he carelessly posts stupid stuff, that he soon has to delete after the embarrassment of having it quickly shot down.

 

PEERANORMAL Episode 13: Bible Codes

Back in mid-nineties a peer-reviewed article was published that sought to legitimize the idea that the Hebrew text of Genesis encrypted meaningful information about modern persons and events. Their method for detecting the presumed encrypted knowledge was known as equidistant letter sequencing (ELS).This article (Witztum, Rips, and Rosenberg) became a reference point for journalist Michael Drosnin, who wrote the bestselling book, The Bible Code, shortly thereafter. Subsequent to the success of Drosnin’s book, Bible-code research expanded to the full Torah and beyond, to the rest of the Hebrew Bible. In this episode we ask whether there is such a thing as ELS Bible codes. Have other statisticians and biblical scholars agreed with Witztum, Rips, and Rosenberg, or are there serious problems with the method and its assumptions?

The episode is now live.

First Look at the New 60-Second Scholar Series

Below are the covers of the new 60-Second Scholar series. They are now available on Amazon for pre-order, but will only be released May 1. You may recall that Zondervan acquired this series from me, explaining why the old books were retired on Amazon (and now have stupidly high prices attached to them). Each book has been trimmed from 100 short essays to 80.

 

Christmas a Pagan Celebration? What You Know May Not Be So

Hat tip to Stephen Huebscher for this one!

Here’s a link to an interesting short essay on this topic. The author argues (with some justification) that rather than Christians adapting a pagan holiday to their sacred calendar, pagans co-opted December 25 from Christians. Here’s a teaser paragraph:

It is true that the first evidence of Christians celebrating December 25th as the date of the Lord’s nativity comes from Rome some years after Aurelian, in A.D. 336, but there is evidence from both the Greek East and the Latin West that Christians attempted to figure out the date of Christ’s birth long before they began to celebrate it liturgically, even in the second and third centuries. The evidence indicates, in fact, that the attribution of the date of December 25th was a by-product of attempts to determine when to celebrate his death and resurrection.

I’m considering devoting an episode of the Naked Bible Podcast to this topic. I’m reading through the only two academic books on Christmas origins I know of. We’ll see if I get through the material in time.

Misquoted (Or Perhaps Misunderstood) in a Recent Book

This isn’t a big deal, but it’s sort of illustrative of how I can be misunderstood, and how Bible translations can be misleading.

I recently received an email that alerted me to the above this way:

The present globalist-versus-Christian war is taking place in both the seen and unseen (spiritual) realms, which are traceable to the beginning of mankind, according to theologian Michael Heiser, author of The Unseen Realm.  The original Edenic design outlined in Genesis failed due to man’s sin and was replaced by a new family from Abraham (Deuteronomy 32:8-9). That  resulted in the disinherited nations being put under the authority of lesser gods, divine sons of God who became corrupted, this resulting in the long spiritual war that continues today between Yahweh (the God of the Bible) and the fallen gods, demons.

Heiser speculates that these fallen gods (demons) wage war today as disembodied spirits of Nephilim mostly guided by the chief liar, Satan.  If we had spiritual eyes, Heiser wrote, we would see our world as mostly darkness peppered with lights of Yahweh’s (God’s) presence in the form of believers scattered across the globe, and we would see clearly that globalism and its followers are truly demonic….

Obviously, this isn’t a direct quotation of me. Rather the quotation comes from page 237 of Col. Bob Maginnis’ book, The Deeper State. The statement ends with a footnote to me — an interview I did with Bob for his book. Bob more or less summarizes things we talked about. But do you see the problem?

Bob refers to the lesser gods who were assigned to the nations (Deut 32:8-9; cp. Deut 4:19-20; 17:3; 29:24-26; Psalm 82, etc.). Those gods (at some point – we aren’t given the chronology in the Hebrew Bible) fell into rebellion against Yahweh. So far so good. But Bob’s statement suggests I think those fallen gods are demons. I don’t, because they aren’t. Demons are the disembodied spirits of dead nephilim (cf. Archie’ Wright’s scholarly work on this subject: The Origin of Evil Spirits: The Reception of Genesis 6:1-4 in Early Jewish Literature, Revised Edition[image error]). Neither the nephilim nor their spirits have anything to do with the bad guys of Deut 32:8 and Psalm 82. They are two separate groups of rebels. I read a lengthy statement on this on the Naked Bible Podcast in connection with the episode of how the work of Fern, Audrey, and Beth differs from traditional deliverance ministry.

The mistake is illustrative of the confusion created by the way English Bibles translate Deut 32:17 (here, from the NLT):

17 They offered sacrifices to demons (shedim), which are not God (ʾelōah),

to gods (ʾelohim) they had not known before,

to new gods only recently arrived,

to gods their ancestors had never feared.

The word shedim occurs in that verse and is nearly always translated “demons.” This is an unfortunate translation that confuses OT theology about rebellious spirits. The shedim of Deut 32:17 are not the demons of the gospels (or 2nd temple Jewish literature). As I wrote in The Unseen Realm: Recovering the Supernatural Worldview of the Bible[image error], the term shedim refers in context to territorial spirits. It is from Akkadian, where the term has a variety of semantic nuances, including territoriality. That fits perfectly with Deut 32:8. Unfortunately, though, a translation like “demons” misses the point of the term and its connection to Deut 32:8. English Bible readers like Bob often naturally conflate Deut 32:8 with what we think of as demons (i.e., those evil spirits Jesus exorcises from people in the gospels) because of the translation (and Christian tradition, which basically conflates all terms for evil entities into “demons”).

To summarize the material at the items linked above, there are three divine rebellions in the Hebrew Bible:

The nachash (“serpent” or “shining one”) in Gen 3.
The sons of God in Gen 6:1-4 (also called “Watchers” in 2nd Temple Jewish terminology; in Daniel 4 “Watchers” are holy, unfallen members of the heavenly host). Their offspring are the nephilim giants. When one was killed, its disembodied spirit was called “Watcher” (because their immaterial part was supernatural like those who created them), “demon,” or “evil spirit” in Jewish literature and the New Testament. These are what the gospels refer to.
The lesser elohim of Deut 32 / Psalm 82 / Daniel 10 and other passages. These are called shedim in Deut 32:17 (“territorial entities / spirits”). They are not connected to the bad guys in number 2 above, or the nephilim.

There are other items I could pick at in the book’s excerpt. For example, the wording suggests the nephilim are somehow associated with Satan in the Bible (they work for him?). There is no such verse in Scripture that has the nephilim working for Satan. At best they have common enemies. Christian tradition tends to think of the supernatural evil world as monolithic and united in agenda. I don’t, as I’ve indicated in interviews. What does it mean that (human?) followers of darkness are “demonic”? Are lost people possessed? But the purpose of this isn’t critique — it’s to point out how Christian Bible readers can be misled by translation and tradition.

Reflections on ETS, SBL, and Other Stuff

Well, I’m home after three weeks on the road (PA, Providence RI, Boston, and you can throw in NY, Connecticut, and New Jersey in if you count the driving). To say I’m glad would be quite an understatement. Of course I had fun, saw friends and family, and met new people whose lives have been touched in some way by what I do, but I’m a homebody who thrives on routine. Before I jump into the work of reading 300 pages of editor’s comments (courtesy of Zondervan, who is republishing my Sixty Second Scholar series under slightly altered titles), I thought I’d share some thoughts produced by the last three weeks (in no particular order).

I still don’t like traveling, despite the fact that I no longer have to wait in line to rent cars. I’ve traveled so much in the last 18 months that I’m now at the glorified status of just walking past the line to the stall the company texts to me on my phone. I love that, but it’s not making me want to leave home.
Bad postal service sometimes pays off. At SBL this year the elite publisher E. J. Brill didn’t get their books due to a shipping fiasco. They improvised by offering 50% off their catalog with free shipping. Hey. they had to stimulate sales somehow. Getting a 50% discount is the second sign of the Lord’s return (the first was a Cubs World Series championship). In other words, that will likely never happen again. And yes, I spent some money there with a smile.
Just as really smart biblical scholars can think poorly about science, really smart scientists can sometimes not think well about the Bible. As much as I appreciate Hugh Ross and want to promote his apologetics effort (Reasons to Believe), I was really struck by how simplistic some of his thinking about the Bible is. You can listen to Part 1 of the ETS interviews for what I mean. I interviewed Hugh this year. I’m sorry, but the book of Job really wasn’t inspired to tell us about water management and meteorology, nor can we say with any security that Job is the earliest book of the Bible. It’s hard to believe with how thorough Hugh is that he can presume ideas like this that represent Sunday School level thinking. It really startled me to be honest. There is no way to determine with certainty when the book of Job was written, nor by whom it was written, so any position or idea that depends on that is reliable. (Here’s on the Hebrew linguistic issues in the book — the conclusion is indeterminate: it could have been written before or after the exile). Ross’ concordism in general is problematic, For example, his approach to Genesis notably presumes the author was encrypting science into the text for later generations, or that parts of Genesis teach us science (in which case the meaning of those texts was unknowable to second or first millennium BC audience — the very people the material was written for). The approach has serious theological and coherence issues. But I still think Reasons to Believe does important work. My advice is to note Hugh’s science and take it seriously, but be wary with how he makes Scripture say scientific things. Science is his wheelhouse, not exegesis in context. He doesn’t need the latter to capably defend theism and faith. That makes his ministry a blessing.
I really missed my pug (in case you’re wondering, my wife and kids joined me, so I’m not elevating Mori too much).
I miss the east coast. All that history and real seasons. And of course my own history mixed in there.
Fenway Park is a terrific ballpark (and in better shape than Wrigley Field). I got to see both this past year (a game at Wrigley, a tour of Fenway this past week). Love them both. There’s a reason watching a game in an old ballparks is a completely different experience.
The Naked Bible Podcast has an amazing reach. I ran into people in different countries who listen … who are in seminary and grad school who listen … who teach at places like Harvard who listen … who represent a spectrum of denominations who listen. It’s really something. I’m so glad it’s useful to so many.
Scrapple is not only real food, it’s really good. Those of you from PA will understand.
Any airline that doesn’t offer outlets on seats should be shut down.
Uber and Lyft are really useful. I’ve been under-appreciating these services since their inception. I’m over that now.
It’s okay to cheat on your diet if cheating doesn’t mean you’re quitting. I’ve been trying to lose weight for two months (down 16 lbs) but had my share of pie last week. No matter. I gained only one pound while I was away.
I can’t wait to jump into novel # 3. I’ve been thinking about it and preparing for months, but the ETS trip made it even worse (or better). For those of you who have read The Facade and its sequel, The Portent, in the latter there’s a crucial scene in a restaurant in Rhode Island (George’s of Galilee). I chose it for the scene because of the name and the geography. Trey, Fern, Audrey and I had dinner there one night (Fern and Audrey decided to go to the conference to see what one was like). The food was great and, thankfully, the colonel didn’t show up. If you subscribe to my newsletter you can see pictures.
Conferences are great places for generating opportunities. ETS and SBL was a great place for connecting with people who want to help with what we’re doing. I can’t provide many specifics yet, but some interesting things developed as Trey and I spent time at these events. I can only assign them to providence. One I can reveal here: I’ll be on the Eric Metaxas show to talk about The Unseen Realm. I’ll be interviewed Nov 28 from 8-9 am Pacific, but I presume (?) that it’s recorded, not live.
There are more Christian scholars alive today who care about the normal person in church and want to get content to them than any other time I can remember. In other words, there’s reason for optimism. What we’re doing online in its various forms will continue to grow — because God has lots of other people involved. We’ll just produce all we can and let him connect those dots.