Problems at the biblical criticism subreddits again — OT festivals, Bart Ehrman, Luke-Acts

At the two where I'm banned.

At Ask Biblical Scholars, someone asking "How can you debunk Unitarianism?" Violates sub rules on invoking theological belief, but had been up there for 3 days when I saw it. Poster is a thrown-off Jesuitical heretic hunter.

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Also there, somebody talking about "Fulfillment of Leviticus 23." (That's about, per the P author, Yahweh designating various festivals.) Claims parts of it have been fulfilled in light of a Rapture. Poster is a premillennialist of some sort, possibly a Messianic Christian to boot. (The "Feast of Trumpets" is today's Rosh Hashanah, and that's proof of being a Messianic Christian.) Post had been removed from other subs, but up at ABC for 3 days. See his video at another sub. Dude, you ARE nuts.

And, I can be banned there and mods don't do shit about stuff like this.

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At r/AcademicBiblical?

A question about the status of women in antiquity in general, based on Augustine's Confessions. Breaks the rules.

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Here, some general nutter claims that Bart Ehrman does NOT do critical source analysis, then doubles and triples down on that in comments.

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Here's someone confused. They claim Luke and Acts must have different authors because Acts contradicts Paul's letters. Totally irrelevant. Just as irrelevant is a commenter claiming that Luke never indicates in Luke that he intended to write a sequel, quoting a JVM Sturdy:

Nothing in Luke’s Gospel suggests the author intended to write a sequel. The prologue (1:1-4) certainly does not advocate this view. Acts does, however, suggest at an early point – in its prologue, no less – that it is the work of the author of Luke. I regard this as a fictitious attempt to claim a literary relationship with Luke through deliberate stylistic imitation.

And? Hundreds, if not thousand of authors have written books not intending to write sequels, but eventually doing so.

And, there's the introit to Acts, despite what the author says. JVM Sturdy, you're wrong. The book is actually called "Redrawing the Boundaries: The Dating of Early Christian Literature," and appears Not.Even.Wrong.

Per this link, I think that the Luke-Acts differences on relationship to the Jews is some issue, but not insurmountable. I disagree on Acts using the Pastorals. The piece cited for that uses the Westar Institute as point of takeoff, making it a bit dubious IMO right there. (I mean, I know how Westar sucks.) And, it claims all the letters inspired Acts. Erm, how do you explain the contradictions between Acts and the genuine Paulines? And, the idea that a post-Trajan final version of Revelation circulated enough to be used by the author of Acts (and occurring before it)? Laughable.

It's more examples of what I've said before: Some hot young bucks with "out there" ideas attract too many r/AB commenters like moths to the flame.

A few updates

Mainly blogroll, links list, etc.

On the blogroll, I got rid of Gary the ex-Lutheran. Had enough of him. It wasn't quite Gnu Atheism, but most of his stuff lacked that much depth. And, he overrates Bart Ehrman. And, a couple of his fanboi commenters got to be quasi-Reddit chud types.

I added Aeon when I discovered it had a feed.

And, I just added Thoughts on Papyrus, the site of someone who follows my Goodreads reviews. They read mainly fiction, but they also write about classical music.

Top blogging, third quarter

 Since I don't post here as often as my main blog, I don't do a monthly update of the most-read items.

But, I do post a quarterly roundup, and here we go.

With all of them, I'll have a bit of explainer, but more with ones more than a few months old, as well as nothing their original time provenance, etc.

No. 10? Aeon, in a piece puffing John Rawls and puffing the author's new book about Rawls, ignored that, at the time, Walter Kaufmann crushed Rawls. I helped Aeon out.

No. 9? From not quite a year ago, with the help of Paul Davidson of "Is That in the Bible?", I riffed on Idan Dershowitz about the development of the book of Deuteronomy and other things.

No. 8? From more than a year ago, but timely for upcoming US elections, I talked about fascism in the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod.

No. 7? A recent book review. Tim Alberta's "The Kingdom, The Power, and The Glory" was sadly lacking in several areas, above all, a failure to discuss eschatology, millennialism and US support for Israel.

No. 6 was another recent book review. "Catastrophe Ethics" was wrong from the start.

No. 5? Back to biblical criticism, and again, bank-shotting off Davidson. My "Paul, Passover, Jesus, Gnosticism" piece from back in 2009 takes a critical look at 1 Corinthians 11 and the institution of the Eucharist by Paul.

No. 4 is my takedown of Chris(sy) Hanson, someone who isn't totally what they claim, but with whom the AcademicBiblical subreddit is infatuated.

No. 3 looks at some other r/AB stupidities, like the burial of Jesus.

No. 2? Another extended book review! Joseph Horowitz butchers what could have been a great concept about 20th-century musicians exiled to the US.

And ... No. 1

Inspired by my summer vacation this year?

Per the old philosophical bon mot, indeed, de gustibus non disputandum on natural beauty.

Non-wingnut conservative-to-moderate evangelical Christianity ain't dead

The Texas Tribune recently offered a pointed comparison-contrast to Tim Dunn's political-religious quasi theocratic compound just down the road, by profiling Connection Christian Church in Odessa. Here's pastor Dawn Weaks: 

"Christian Nationalism is an example of this kind of arrogance parading as Christianity,” she said. “There is nothing Jesus-like about that."

That's the bottom line.

The church, a member of the Disciples of Christ, has a history far beyond the Dunns' independent church. And, that itself is important. That said, the Trib perpetuates some stereotypes. I lived in Hobbs for a little less than two years, and nobody asked me my religion at H-E-B. That said, I didn't introduce myself to others. (I still think it's a stereotype or cliché; I'm sure that even when two strangers introduce themselves, it comes up far less than 100 percent and probably less than 75 percent. Maybe less than 50 percent, which definitely makes it stereotype, not generalization.

This is something Tim Dunn, other than brief speculative thought about the future of the Southern Baptist Convention, simply missed in "The Kingdom, The Power and the Glory," per my review. Denominations, even one as loosely congregational as Southern Baptists, ride at least a bit of herd over individual churches and their pastors.

That said, the story is nowhere near perfect. It's got clichés, such as claims that people in Odessa ask strangers in the supermarket what their religion is. From personal experience, I can say this never happened to me.

There's also a BIG contextual failure on this:

This year, Pew Research reported that 80% of Americans believe religion is losing influence in American life. And nearly half of those who say religion is losing influence said it is bad for society.

In fairness, it later cites this from the same survey:

In the same survey, less than a third, 27%, of white Evangelical Protestants wanted Christianity declared the official national religion.

While that's not the same as "losing influence," it does offer some framing. But, it's a further one-third the story down. In addition? NO URL for the Pew story. THAT's not acceptable.

And, reporter Nic Garcia's not a newbie. These things aren't excusable.