Bart D. Ehrman's Blog, page 21

Now that I’ve devoted two posts to the major sine qua non of Matthew’s Gospel – one that lays out its major themes and emphases, the other that deals with who wrote it, when, and why, I can provide a bibliography  of important works, written by scholars for non-scholars.  You may find one or more [...]

The post Matthew: For Further Reading appeared first on The Bart Ehrman Blog.

In my previous post we took the first step in understanding the Gospel of Matthew, grasping its major themes and emphases.  It is also important to situate the book in its own historical context.  For that we need to know something about the author, the approximate time he was writing it, and why he appears [...]

The post The Gospel of Matthew: Who, When, and Why? appeared first on The Bart Ehrman Blog.

Are you familiar with the Gospel of Matthew?  If not, read on! If so, try to summarize its distinctive portrayal of Jesus in one sentence. (of say, 50 words or so max).  If you really can’t, then again, read on!  If you give it a try, check to see that you have both described it [...]

The post The Gospel of Matthew in a Nutshell appeared first on The Bart Ehrman Blog.

I sometimes feel like a pestiferous terrier who goes after someone’s ankles and just won’t stop. There are some issues (among the “Big Questions”) that I repeatedly come back to and just can’t let drop.  I suppose that’s because they seem both really important and completely incapable of being figured out.  Hence my occasional return [...]

The post Rambling Meditations on What It Means to Exist…. What Do You Think? appeared first on The Bart Ehrman Blog.

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. [...]

The post The New Testament Gospels in a Nutshell appeared first on The Bart Ehrman Blog.

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 [...]

The post What Is The New Testament? Can You Actually Say? appeared first on The Bart Ehrman Blog.

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, [...]

The post Seats Still Available! Blog Dinner in Tampa this Friday (January 17) appeared first on The Bart Ehrman Blog.

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 [...]

The post Do You Understand the Entire New Testament? Announcing My New Blog Thread appeared first on The Bart Ehrman Blog.

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 [...]

The post Other Critical Approaches to the New Testament (by Prof. Shaily Patel) appeared first on The Bart Ehrman Blog.

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, [...]

The post Getting the Bible Digitally (by Jeffrey Siker) appeared first on The Bart Ehrman Blog.