MetaFilter posts tagged with Bible and history

Search the Bible with Google Maps

Effigy2000 — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 18:49:53 -0800

Biblemap.org is an interactive map system for the bible, which is great for visualising where certain biblical events are said to have occured. It's also great for people who don't subscribe to any kind of organised religion but do like looking at maps (like me!).

A Moment in Time

nola — Mon, 11 May 2009 17:53:18 -0800

AronRa has done some really nice YouTube vids on science (previously). In this latest vlog An Archaeological Moment in Time, he take(s) a look at how different societies are advancing at different rates on the same date in the distant past.

Religion scholars of Judas "feel, in a word, betrayed."

spock — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 07:48:39 -0800

Did a 'dream team' of biblical scholars mislead millions? [Chronicle of Higher Education] You may recall the curfuffle over the gnostic "Gospel of Judas" (previously). The National Geographic's documentary premiere "attracted four million viewers, making it the second-highest-rated program in the channel's history, behind only a documentary on September 11. . . . However, it's a perfect example, critics argue, of what can happen when commercial considerations are allowed to ride roughshod over careful research. What's more, the controversy has strained friendships in this small community of religion scholars — causing some on both sides of the argument to feel, in a word, betrayed."

Duuuuuuuude!

ozomatli — Fri, 14 Apr 2006 11:47:03 -0800

Bible Dudes. I'm a Bible Scholar, a Scriptural caller, I got a lot of books but not a lot of dollar. Things from antiquity you know they be ravin', I throw around words like sitz-im-leben, A bazillion languages are cloggin' my head, All of my heroes have been a long time dead. Come on along now, all the Bibledudes' buddies, Cuz Yo! We gonna rap BIBLICAL STUDIES!

Early Christian Writings

charmston — Sun, 09 Apr 2006 11:49:01 -0800

A comprehensive list of early Christian writings gives a list of, links to the online full text of, and articles detailing some of the alternative Christian writings that were and weren't canonized. Of note include the Infancy Gospel of Thomas, Justin Martyr, the Didache, the Acts of Thomas , the Gospel of Thomas (which many link with the "Q" from the two-source hypothesis, which attempts to answer the Synoptic problem), and some early apocalyptic writings. [mi]

On the Gnostic Gospel of Judas.

brownpau — Thu, 06 Apr 2006 15:08:40 -0800

Gnostic Gospel of Judas, they say! Hot on the heels of Christ On Ice and the, er, "newly discovered" Gospel fragment, the news outlets are currently drooling all over National Geographic's recent conclusive dating and translation of surviving fragments of the Apocryphal Gospel of Judas, now dated to about 300 CE. The text is classically Gnostic, emphasizing a duality splitting Christ's "spiritual" and "fleshly" natures, as opposed to Christian orthodoxy's belief in the Incarnation. Looking beyond the wide-eyed "OMG THIS WILL REVOLUTIONIZE CHRISTIANITY AS WE KNOW IT" sensationalism, Internet Monk asks if a 300 year-old apocryphal biography of George Washington would be regarded as authentic were it discovered in 1970. James F. Robinson, an expert on ancient Egyptian texts, regards the Judas Gospel as mostly a dud, produced by Cainite Gnostics who took it upon themselves to "rehabilitate" villians of Bible mythos. Even if you don't believe in the account of Judas, there's no denying his contributions to the Christian narrative. Truly a historical icon.

Textual Criticism and the Reliability of Scripture

brownpau — Mon, 23 Jan 2006 12:38:34 -0800

Reconstructing Aunt Sally's Secret Recipe. Addressing the Retranslations Fallacy, a common misconception about how the Bible we read has been handed down to us. [via]

Alexander the Corrector

matteo — Sun, 03 Apr 2005 10:03:27 -0800

The Man Who Unwrote the Bible. In the mid-1720s, Alexander Cruden took on a self-imposed task of Herculean proportions: he decided to compile the most thorough concordance of the King James Version of the Bible (777,746 words). The first edition of Cruden's Concordance was published in 1737. Every similar undertaking before or since has been the work of a vast team of people. Cruden worked alone in his lodgings, writing the whole thing out by hand. Cruden's day job was as a "Corrector of the Press" (proofreader). He would give hawk-eyed attention to prose all day long. Then he would come home at night to read the Bible—stopping at every single word to secure the right sheet from the tens of thousands of pieces of paper all around him and to record accurately the reference in its appropriate place. He had no patron, no publisher, no financial backers: his only commission was a divine one.
Cruden's Concordance has never been out of print. A new book tells the tale of Alexander the Corrector's bizarre, sad life (scroll down to about half page).

benjh — Mon, 22 Jul 2002 10:00:04 -0800

First there was the evolution in schools thing. Now, people are complaining about history books (in Texas no less), with such problems as "Margie Raborn said she wants all U.S. government books to describe the United States as a republic based on biblical beliefs."

willnot — Wed, 20 Feb 2002 17:51:19 -0800

Was the Gospel of Mark a rewrite of Homer's Iliad and Odyssey? The Homeric Epics and the Gospel of Mark is a book that sets out to show just that. Several scholars who reviewed or commented on it have said this book will revolutionize the field of Gospel studies and profoundly affect our understanding of the origins of Christianity. Will it?