Antiquitopia

Anthony LeDonne has compiled a hilarious stack of honest business cards, one including yours truly.  Check them out here .  Though, I think with mine Anthony was self-projecting a bit. ;)

Anthony LeDonne and Chris Keith are giving away a copy of my late advisor, Alan Segal's first book, Two Powers in Heaven here .  Three and a half decades after it was first published by Brill, it remains a foundational book that discusses intermediation, Christology, and the interrelationships between the emergent Rabbis and emergent Christians.  A seminal work, Baylor University Press has now republished it in a far more affordable form.  So now we can actually assign it in a graduate course!

Larry Hurtado asks an important question: What has happened to the Jesus' Wife Fragment ?  Perhaps as Anthony Le Donne's newest book, The Wife of Jesus , gets more circulation, scholars will continue to want to know (even if - or especially because - the popular hype has subsided). (I have just started reading this book, by the way.  Thought it would be some good, light reading.)

Christopher Skinner has a review of Anthony LeDonne's newest book, The Wife of Jesus , on his blog Peje Iesous.  Check it out here .

Anthony LeDonne seeks out the answer to this question that other scholars of the historical Jesus have seemingly shied away from (I wonder what Freud would think of this telling omission). As Anthony notes, the breast-feeding image of Madonna and Child becomes quite popular in medieval Europe.  What is even more interesting are the depictions of Christ offering his own breast milk among the writings of mystics, usually among women mystics but not exclusively so.

Anthony LeDonne, that ever-imaginative scholar embracing new ways of thinking and teaching, is offering a new online course on Jesus.  Here is his course description: In this course we will examine some of the different "Jesuses" who have emerged through the ages, including several interpretations of Jesus in historical studies, and several interpretations of Jesus from art and literature. This course will weave together three primary threads: 1) the Jesus of history; 2) ancient representations of Jesus; and 3) the various modern Jesuses who embody various symbols, ideologies, collective memories, and cultural identities. Through lecture and discussion, we will examine diverse portraits of Jesus in history, literature, art, song, and film throughout history. This is a summer course and has no prerequisites.  It actually sounds a lot like how I teach my Jesus course.  I've been wanting to include more artistic representations as well.

Let me state this baldly:  the portion of New Testament scholarship that I hate reading the most is historical Jesus scholarship.  I like most of the scholars themselves, but I came to the conclusion early on (as an undergraduate when I took a class on Jesus and the Gospels at Illinois Wesleyan University--a class I will teach next semester at the same institution) that much of the criteria used pulled themselves apart, cancelled each other out, and most scholars chose criteria based upon what Jesus they wanted to reconstruct (something noted more recently by Dale Allison that our methods bend to our predisposed wills).  I generally have operated with the view that historical Jesus research had run its course and we could focus on other things.  That's probably one reason why I like to stick to Hebrews.  Typically, I pick up a book on the historical Jesus with trepidation; I usually find that I put it down every few pages.  It is just an area of scholarship...

I just noticed that Chris Keith and Anthony LeDonne--both formerly of Lincoln Christian University--have started a blog dedicated to historical Jesus research, called " The Jesus Blog ."  Both are smart and engaging scholars--in person and in writing--and so their posts should make for interesting, thoughtful reading.

I just discovered the lamentable firing of Anthony LeDonne from Lincoln Christian University here .  I met Anthony my first year at Illinois Wesleyan University when his co-biblicist at LCU Chris Keith came to IWU to talk about the demise of the criteria of authenticity through research employing memory studies (see a recent discussion of one of Keith's books here ).  Anthony's firing appears to be due to pressure by donors and others because of his quite good popular book on the Historical Jesus .  Ironically, there is to be a conference concerning this research at LCU next fall, though it appears that the organizers are likely to move it in response to LeDonne's unexpected firing ( here ). I am quite angry about this.  LeDonne's research is good, responsible, and creative.  He should be rewarded for his work rather than endure mistreatment.  I join with others who offer their hopes that LeDonne will quickly find an institutional home that values his im...