Top 17 iPhone Apps (according to me)

1. RedLaser ($1.99)- allows you to scan barcodes of products, including books, to find the best price anywhere on it

2. Logos (free) – While I’m not a huge fan of their desktop version, the iPhone version contains a copy of the Apocrypha (Charles)!

3. GasBuddy ($2.99) – Finds the cheapest gas nearest to you. Usually pays for itself in gas costs in one use.

4. JotNot ($4.99) – Let’s you make a pdf scans on anything, including journal articles. The quality is good, but not great. Perfect if you are in a pinch for time.

5. The Weather Channel (Free) – better than the normal weather app

6. SnapTell (Free) – Let’s you take a picture of the cover of a book, then it will find it online. Usually surpassed by RedLaser, but it’s amazing that it can find the book from a picture of the cover!

7. Shazam (Free) – Tell it to listen to a song (on the radio), and it tells you the name of the song and who is singing. Amazing.

8. DukeMobile (Free) – Everything Duke, including sports and course info

9. Oxford German Dictionary ($24.99) – The Oxford Duden Dictionary for the iphone (150,000 entries)

10. German-English Dictionary by Ultralingua ($19.99) – Derived from the Collins dictionary (250,000 entries)

11. Pandora (Free) – Streams music of any kind; tell it what you want (even song specific) and it delivers!

12. Yelp (Free) – Great restaurant finder (with ratings and filters for cost)

13. AP Mobile – Great news app that notifies you with pop up notifications of breaking news

14. Lexiphanes ($1.99) – Greek lexicon containing editions of LSJ and Autenrieth’s Homeric Lexicon

15. Lexidium ($1.99) – Latin lexicon using Lewis and Short

16. GNT and BHS for Biblereader ($46.99) – the NA27 and BHS (sans apparatus) for the iPhone

17. iBCP ($4.99) – Book of Common Prayer. Booyah.

There it is. My top 17 iPhone apps. I hope you enjoy some of these, particularly the biblical and research tools.

SBL Day 1 – Getting Started

It’s 4:15 AM CST, and I can’t sleep. I woke up fifteen minutes ago in the excitement of leaving for New Orleans in two hours. It’s going to be a full day of driving, ending with a late meeting with Prof. Loren Stuckenbruck of Princeton Theological Seminary.

In this, my first installment, I plan to blog SBL from start to finish. Get excited.

What are my goals?

1. to give one grad student’s perspective on things
2. to demystify this event for those of you who are not into biblical studies (or not nerdy enough to go)
3. to have a forum for discussion on the topics presented in the posts (duh! that’s sort of the main point of a blog to begin with)

What are my prospects for this year?

1. Last year, I was a newbie and went solo. As Pat has already pointed out, that can make for a rough and lonely time.
2. I made a lot of mistakes my first year. This year I’m hoping I have either learned from them or moved past the newbie pitfalls.
3. I have a lot of important meetings (about 5) regarding PhD programs. I’m hoping not to blow them! All kidding aside, I’m hoping to be “known” as well as get to know these fine faculty members. In the PhD application, one starts as a number and has to work one’s way out of obscurity.
4. I hope to really enjoy New Orleans and contribute to their economy.

This should be a fun time. Getting excited. Stay tuned.

New Historical Jesus book (Five Views!)

The other day I received the following gem in the mail from the good people at IVP Academic:

The Historical Jesus: Five Views (edited by James K. Beilby and Paul Rhodes Eddy) (312 pages)

About the Book

The scholarly quest for the historical Jesus has a distinguished pedigree in modern Western religious and historical scholarship, with names such as Strauss, Schweitzer and Bultmann highlighting the story. Since the early 1990s, when the Jesus quest was reawakened for a third run, numerous significant books have emerged. And the public’s attention has been regularly arrested by media coverage, with the Jesus Seminar or the James ossuary headlining the marquee.

The Historical Jesus: Five Views provides a venue for readers to sit in on a virtual seminar on the historical Jesus. Beginning with a scene-setting historical introduction by the editors, prominent figures in the Jesus quest set forth their views and respond to their fellow scholars.

On the one end Robert M. Price lucidly maintains that the probability of Jesus’ existence has reached the “vanishing point,” and on the other Darrell Bock ably argues that while critical method yields only a “gist” of Jesus, it takes us in the direction of the Gospel portraits. In between there are numerous avenues to explore, questions to be asked and “assured results” to be weighed. And John Dominic Crossan, Luke Timothy Johnson and James D. G. Dunn probe these issues with formidable knowledge and honed insight, filling out a further range of options.

The Historical Jesus: Five Views offers a unique entry into the Jesus quest. For both the classroom and personal study, this is a book that fascinates, probes and engages.

Contributors

• • Robert M. Price
  • John Dominic Crossan
  • Luke Timothy Johnson
  • James D. G. Dunn
  • Darrell L. Bock

Unlike some “five views” books, this volume has a great cast of scholars from all over the spectrum in historical Jesus studies (listed above in increasing confidence about the accuracy of the NT portrayals). Sure, not every view is represented, but one would need thousands of pages for that. As for none content features of the book, I am very pleased to see that IVP Academic has opted for footnotes over endnotes.Each chapter has responses from the other contributors — this my favorite feature of these books. Half the fun is simply reading the reaction of the others to each contribution… Take for example the opening sentence of James Dunn’s response to Robert Price:

Gosh! So there are still serious scholars who put forward the view that the whole account of Jesus’ doings and teachings are later myth foisted of an unknown, obscure historical figure. (page 94)

Classic. Stay tuned for my full review of this book, which will be posted here in due course.

 

SBL 2009 Papers Posted

Many thanks to Michael Halcomb for taking the time to gather over 700 pages worth of papers to be delivered in New Orleans next week! Check it out – it’s pretty awesome!

Also, check out Michael’s Theological German (Getting German) helps website. Good stuff!

Jesus, Memory, and Orality Once more

Check out the newest in The Bible and Interpretation by Anthony Le Donne. Enjoy!

HT: Jim West

Review Biblical Literature Newsletter (11 November 2009)

Enjoy!

The following new reviews have been added to the Review of Biblical Literature and listed on the RBL blog (http://rblnewsletter.blogspot.com/):

Jim W. Adams
The Performative Nature and Function of Isaiah 40-55

http://www.bookreviews.org/bookdetail.asp?TitleId=5877

Reviewed by Ulrich Berges

Joseph Azize and Noel Weeks, eds.
Gilgamesh and the World of Assyria: Proceedings of the Conference Held at the Mandelbaum House, The University of Sydney, 21-23 July 2004

http://www.bookreviews.org/bookdetail.asp?TitleId=6816

Reviewed by Michael Moore

John M. G. Barclay and Simon Gathercole, eds.
Divine and Human Agency in Paul and His Cultural Environment

http://www.bookreviews.org/bookdetail.asp?TitleId=6666

Reviewed by Thomas R. Blanton IV

Nina Burleigh
Unholy Business: A True Tale of Faith, Greed and Forgery in the Holy Land

http://www.bookreviews.org/bookdetail.asp?TitleId=6932

Reviewed by Aren Maeir

Philip Cary
Jonah

http://www.bookreviews.org/bookdetail.asp?TitleId=6906

Reviewed by Jacek Stefanski

Deborah L. Ellens
Women in the Sex Texts of Leviticus and Deuteronomy: A Comparative Conceptual Analysis

http://www.bookreviews.org/bookdetail.asp?TitleId=6434

Reviewed by Carolyn Pressler

J. Harold Ellens and Wayne G. Rollins, eds.
Psychology and the Bible: A New Way to Read the Scriptures (4 vols.)

http://www.bookreviews.org/bookdetail.asp?TitleId=6858

Reviewed by Ron Clark

Douglas Estes
The Temporal Mechanics of the Fourth Gospel: A Theory of Hermeneutical Relativity in the Gospel of John

http://www.bookreviews.org/bookdetail.asp?TitleId=7074

Reviewed by John C. Poirier

Eric Eve
The Healer from Nazareth: Jesus’ Miracles in Historical Context

http://www.bookreviews.org/bookdetail.asp?TitleId=7065

Reviewed by Tobias Hagerland

K. C. Hanson and Douglas E. Oakman
Palestine in the Time of Jesus: Social Structures and Social Conflicts

http://www.bookreviews.org/bookdetail.asp?TitleId=6720

Reviewed by Panayotis Coutsoumpos

Xavier Levieils
Contra Christianos: La critique sociale et religieuse du christianisme des origines au concile de Nicée (45-325)

http://www.bookreviews.org/bookdetail.asp?TitleId=6836

Reviewed by Stephan Witetschek

Tremper Longman III
Jeremiah, Lamentations

http://www.bookreviews.org/bookdetail.asp?TitleId=6497

Reviewed by Francis Dalrymple-Hamilton

James L. Resseguie
The Revelation of John: A Narrative Commentary

http://www.bookreviews.org/bookdetail.asp?TitleId=7169

Reviewed by Tobias Nicklas

Roman Vielhauer
Das Werden des Buches Hosea: Eine redaktionsgeschichtliche Untersuchung

http://www.bookreviews.org/bookdetail.asp?TitleId=6822

Reviewed by James Nogalski

Paul Wilkinson
Archaeology: What It Is, Where It Is, and How to Do It

http://www.bookreviews.org/bookdetail.asp?TitleId=6792

Reviewed by Aren Maeir

How’d they get here? (Make Believe Edition)

In this installment of “how’d they get here,” we’ll need our magic carpets. We’re going to a far away land where the NT has different, hybrid books. It is only in this faraway land that our inquisitive visitor comes to us. Here’s the search string:

“colithians 3.23″

Naturally, I would love to inform my dear reader of the crassis he or she has made. But alas, she or he has left no contact info…

James Crossley on BW3 (Quote of the Day)

Three cheers for James Crossley on dealing with BW3 in a manner both appropriate to his comments and incisive as far as diagnosing the lacunae in BW3′s logic and sweeping comments (see here, here, and here for the details). Here’s the quote of the day:

As it happens, and contrary to BW3, it would have been deeply unwise to hire on the basis of religious affiliation because hiring on the basis of religious affliation aint, erm, allowed. Like most places in the UK, and being a university and not a seminary/theological college, we have to hire on the basis of the best quaified person for the job in hand, irrespective of religious affiliation. But, as it also happens, the last hire was trained at the London School of Theology but, oddly enough, he was partly chosen because he was very strong on understanding the cultural context of the NT and a very good teacher of Greek. If fact, though I don’t know the precise personal details of faith, I am the only remaining full time member of staff with no religious affiliation.

Read here for more details.

University of Sheffield is an outstanding school with an stellar biblical studies department. That other schools were more concerned with hiring the very best!

The Deeply De-Christian Doctrine meme

Doug Chaplin has tagged me in a provocative meme that is simply too juicy to pass up. Here are the details:

List 5 doctrines that are taught within the Christian church that you believe to be deeply de-Christian.

Like Doug I think that the term “doctrine” as a certain flexibility in it. Of course, I’m no spokesperson for Christianity, but… Doug, ask and you shall receive. Here’s my list.

1. Justification by “Justification by Faith” – Doug also mentioned this one. The idea is that one is reconciled to God not by the death and resurrection of Jesus, but by intellectually assenting to a certain set of soteriological axioms. Such a view is deeply unChristian, as well as divergent from that which the Church has believed since the time of Paul. Take a gander at Romans 5. Jesus, not “justification by faith” is the one who reconciles people to God.

2. Oppression in the Name of Fidelity to the Scriptures –Oppression is never Christian, yet Christians are infamous for using the text to oppress different groups. This happened with the slavery issue and continues to happen with women and, I think, other minority groups. When doctrine excludes people from table fellowship, it contradicts the gospel.

3. Relegating the Eucharist to the sidelines of worship – In the early church, the Eucharist was the centerpiece of worship because Christ was the center of worship. In too many churches today, however, the Eucharist is only celebrated one a month or some such thing. The logic is, “We don’t want it to become dry ritual.” Funny, teaching the Scriptures doesn’t become dry ritual (or at least it shouldn’t).

4. Making “Christian” an adjective – It’s a great noun and a lousy adjective. It creates an us vs. them retreatism that results in “Christian” celebrations that are fenced or gated off from the rest of the world. Certainly, this is unChristian. The rest of the world won’t bite, I promise.

5. The Self-Help “Christian” Book Empire – I realize that not all books written by Christians are rubbish, but…really… how many books could possibly be needed on figuring out God’s will? The poor sheep are too blind to see they are being sold a bill of goods.

So there you have it. There’s my list. I’ll tag Rob Kashow (rise from the dead, Rob!), Scott Bailey, James McGrath, Mike Koke, and John Anderson.

Baylor’s Endowed Lectures Online

Many thanks to my blogging friend, John Anderson, who informs us:

See HERE.  You can hear a whole host of lectures from scholars such as Walter Brueggemann, Ben Witherington, Richard Hays, Dale Allison, John Barclay, Charles Talbert, Eugene Petersen, Bruce Longenecker, NT Wright, Gustavo Gutierrez, and Jurgen Moltmann.  These are a wonderful resource for students and scholars alike.  I am, as you may suspect, listening to my friend Brueggemann at present.

Fantastic! Thanks for the heads up, John!