Biblical Studies Carnival XXXII Part Two

Controversies

Handling Commenters Who Overstep your Bounds

What is a blogger to do when a commenter hijacks a thread for the purposes of an agenda at cross-purposes with the blogger’s own? Doug Chaplin lays down a set of house rules, go here and here for more discussion. Notice how well Justin Anthony Knapp understands the rules in his comment thereto.

The David Walker Saga

It was bound to happen: legal action taken or threatened against a biblical blogger. Sam Norton is the honored one, may his blog be read by many! It all began as an act of solidarity for an ecclesio-blogger named David Walker. Go here for an intro (thank you, Matt Wardman), here for a lingapotamus cartoon; here for a recent roundup. J. Mark Brewer, whatever the merits of his position (I haven’t discovered any yet), made a big mistake in tangling with the big bad biblical blogging community. You are so outclassed, Mr. Brewer.

A New Beginning for Peter Enns

The saga of Peter Enns, with his departure today from Westminster Seminary (Philadelphia), reached a conclusion of sorts. Here is the relevant page from the WTS site. It is not yet clear, at least to the general public, where Gen 12:1 as it were will take Peter next. Blogging comment remains voluminous. Is Enns’ departure a sign that WTS is cutting itself off from the ongoing tendency of evangelical Christians to fully situate the biblical texts in their ancient Near Eastern and Mediterranean contexts without retreating one inch from an extremely high view of Scripture reformulated however in light of all the evidence? Is it a sign that the powers that be at WTS are acting in the best interests of the denominations they represent so as to reverse a trend whereby WTS lost its confessional (OPA and PCA) moorings precisely because its appeal began to extend far beyond those moorings?

Ros Clarke, a (now former) doctoral student in Old Testament at WTS, had this to say on the occasion of her withdrawal from the seminary:

This statement announcing Pete Enns’ departure from WTS has just been made public. I wonder what church historians will make of this in a hundred years time. Maybe it will be seen as nothing more than a blip in the progress of the kingdom. Perhaps it will be the beginning of the end for the seminary and all it represents. I hope it will prove to be the beginning of a new era of informed, intelligent, faithful biblical scholarship as Pete and many of his students scatter and pass on what they have learned.

Here are a few more posts this past month that caught my eye: Jonathan Bonomo; Jim Getz; Alan Lenzi; Green Baggins (see comments); and Art Aboulet (see comments).  

Fact Checking the Preachers

Chris Brady fisks Pastor Mark Driscoll of Mars Hill. Anyone who quotes from Targum Neofiti in a sermon is way cool, but watch out! A biblical blogger may bite you in the butt if you mess with the facts. That said, if you believe in the principle that love covers a multitude of sins, Mark is in no danger. Mars Hill adopted Zac Hubert’s fabulous and now renamed Resurgence Greek Project, where anyone can explore the Greek Bible, Old and New Testaments, in a fully tagged format. That’s got to be worth a pile of brownie points or plenary indulgences.

Suing Zondervan and Thomas Nelson over the Word “Homosexual” in Their Bibles

Kevin Wilson has the scoop, with excellent observations of his own. Who knows, a judge may think the suit has merit. It is considered an unassailable truth in some quarters that a victim’s point of view trumps all other considerations.

Inerrancy Remixed

Mike Heiser is doing a fascinating series on the topic. How is this series different from the others? Mike actually controls a ton of relevant details and discusses them with patience and care. Start here and work backwards, or the reverse. For a different approach by James McGrath, one which leaves him unsatisfied no less than some of his commenters, go here. An inerrantist, Jonathan Bartlett, states the obvious, the Bible is not scientifically true.

 Wrong about That

N. T. Wrong provides some caustic commentary on D. A. Carson's polemical review of Roland Boer's Rescuing the Bible (2007) in RBL, July 19, 2008 (here). I love polemical reviews myself. They keep me awake. So go ahead: read a polemical review of a polemical review.

Faith Healing, Lies, and Assorted Nasties in the Eyes of Believers and Unbelievers

Thoughts on Antiquity is one of the best blogs out there (take a look around). For a taste, see this post by Roger Pearse and check out the comments. The quality of the conversation on this blog is unusually high. Lieutenant Commander Spock told me he detected life forms of very high intelligence on this site.

My Bible is Better than your Bible

For a list of some of those who blog about English translations of the Bible with regularity, go here.

Telling It Like It Is

Pete reminds us what it’s like to be discriminated against by a heavy-handed majority: the case of Coptic Christians among Muslims in Egypt.

To be continued. Next Installment: posts on specific texts and other amazing stuff.

Comments

[Justin (koavf)]

John,

I also have c1alis and import watches. Do you want to fight?

-JAK

[JohnFH]

Bring it on.

[Peter Kirk]

I object to your description of Doug's house rules. Well, his rules might be useful in a case where someone has hijacked a thread. This is a case where Doug was himself actively involved in the comment thread and had given no indication in advance that he was not happy with what was being posted. It is a case of Doug having a personal objection to one thing I wrote (he hasn't said what!) I did not breach his house rules, unless perhaps "If in my judgement, your comment is libellous" which simply shows that his judgment is very poor and he does not have a clue about libel laws.

[Doug Chaplin]

Anybody want to buy a wounded amour propre from Peter Kirk?

[Chris Brady]

John, I appreciate the mention and I am glad to hear that Mars Hill is doing other good work to support scholarship. (I had always had good impressions of MH.)

I have to ask, however, if you intended to dismiss my critique as not being substantive. I had to look up the work "fisk" and found the Urban Dictionary had this (edited) definition:
"To copy an article to your blog, then after every paragraph insert your own oh-so-witty comments. You don't actually have to refute or analyze anything you don't agree with, because ad hominem attacks like "this douche {expl} is obviously a goat{expl}" is basically the same thing."

Was my post really without merit?

[JohnFH]

Hi Chris,

My goodness, I had no idea the Urban Dictionary contained such a misleading definition of what it means to "fisk." See the article entitled "Fisking" in Wikipedia for a very different, and positive definition, per Eric Raymond:

a really stylish fisking is witty, logical, . . . and ruthlessly factual

That, my friend, describes what you did very nicely.

[Chris Brady]

John, thank you very much. You are certainly too kind (and I probably too sensitive.)