Apocryphicity
A Blog Devoted to the Study of Christian Apocrypha
I was asked recently to take part in an on-line debate on the topic of Paul and the Resurrection. The two debaters were historian Richard Carrier and Jake O-Connell, a theology student at Assumption College in Worchester, Massachussets. I was among four scholars who were called on to assess the debate. Included also is Dennis R. MacDonald (whose assessment is quite witty). You can read the debate HERE and the assessments HERE.
I will be attending the 2009 SBL Annual Meeting in New Orleans in November. Francois Bovon has graciously agreed to respond to my paper. Here is the abstract:
Christian Apocrypha in Ancient Libraries
Several of the most prominent literary discoveries of the past century have been the contents of ancient libraries—i.e., collection of texts, rather than single texts or single codices. Many of these libraries include Christian apocryphal literature. The Oxyrhynchus site, for example, includes material that may have derived from a Christian scriptorum or that was borrowed/copied from the library of Alexandria. Among the texts found at the site are fragments of the Gospel of Thomas, the Gospel of Peter, the Gospel of Mary, the Acts of Paul, the Acts of Peter, the Acts of John, the Gospel of Mary, and two unidentified apocrypha. The Bodmer Papyri (aka the Dishna Papers), which may have belonged to a monastery library, include the Infancy Gospel of James and 3 Corinthians. And, the most well-known collection of Christian apocrypha, the Nag Hammadi Library, which may have originated at a nearby Pachomian monastery, features numerous apocryphal texts including the Gospel of Thomas and the Gospel of Philip. This paper reviews the manuscript evidence of the apocryphal texts from these libraries to get a sense of how the texts were regarded by those who collected them. Do they exhibit any of the features typically found in manuscripts that derive from ancient libraries? Are the apocryphal …
The International Meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature will soon be upon us (June 30 to July 4). I will be presenting a paper at the event (more on that to follow). Here is a list of papers/panels of interest to the study of the Christian Apocrypha.
Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha
July 2, 8:30-10:00 AM
Theme: Why Study Extra-Canonical Literature?
Kelley Coblentz Bautch, St. Edward's University, Presiding
Michael Segal, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Panelist
Ida Frohlich, Pazmany Peter Catholic University, Panelist
Pierluigi Piovanelli, University of Ottawa, Panelist
Joseph Sievers, Pontifical Biblical Institute and Pontifical Gregorian University, Panelist
Judith Newman, University of Toronto, Panelist
Jonathan Ben-Dov, University of Haifa, Panelist
Gabriele Boccaccini, University of Michigan, Panelist
Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha
July 3, 8:30-11:30 AM
Theme: New Approaches to the Study of the Pseudepigrapha and Apocrypha
Françoise Mirguet, Universite Catholique de Louvain, Presiding
Rebecca Raphael, Texas State University-San Marcos
Jesus the Disabler: Disability, Eschatology, and Identity in Sibylline Oracles 1.324-386 (25 min)
Timothy B. Sailors, University of Tubingen
The Baptism of Jesus and the Baptism of Adam in the Books of Adam and Eve (25 min)
Pieter M. Venter, University of Pretoria
Triadic Constructs in the Dinah Narrative: Genesis, Aramaic Levi and Jubilees (25 min)
Break (30 min)
Tony Burke, York University and Slavomír Céplö, Comenius University, Bratislava, Slovakia
The Syriac Tradition of the Legend of the Thirty Pieces of Silver (25 min)
Silviu N. Bunta, University of Dayton
The Shorter Recension of the Life of Adam and Eve: Revisiting the Romanian Version…