Category: SBL Christian Apocrypha Section

The SBL Annual Meeting presents an ideal opportunity to check out new books on Christian apocrypha. As you make your way through the publishers’ exhibition, keep an eye out for these publications. If there is a book missing in the list, please pass along the details.

Baylor

Aageson, James. After Paul: The Apostle’s Legacy in Early Christianity. (CATALOG)

Brepols

Shoemaker, Stephen. The Dormition and Assumption of the Virgin Mary. (CATALOG)

Cambridge University Press

Jacobs, Andrew. Gospel Thrillers: Conspiracy, Fiction, and the Vulnerable Bible. (CATALOG)

Fortress Press

Heil, Uta, ed. The Apocryphal Sunday: History and Texts from Late Antiquity. (CATALOG)

InterVarsity Press

Laird, Benjamin P. Creating the Canon. (CATALOG)

Mohr Siebeck

Goldstein, Miriam. A Judeo-Arabic Parody of the Life of Jesus. The Toledot Yeshu Helene Narrative. (CATALOG)

Miroshnikov, Ivan (ed.). Parabiblica Coptica. (CATALOG)

Nagel, Peter. Codex apocryphus gnosticus Novi Testamenti. (CATALOG)

Lundhaug, Hugo, and Christian H. Bull (eds.). The Nag Hammadi Codices as Monastic Books. (CATALOG)

Eerdmans

Burke, Tony (ed.). New Testament Apocrypha: More Noncanonical Scriptures. Vol. 3. (CATALOG)

Wipf & Stock

Lollar, Jacob (trans.). The Doctrine of Addai and the Letters of Jesus and Abgar. (CATALOG)

Yale University Press

Smith, Geoffrey S., and Brent C. Landau. The Secret Gospel of Mark: A Controversial Scholar, a Scandalous Gospel of Jesus, and the Fierce Debate over Its Authenticity. (CATALOG)

The 2023 Annual Meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature runs from November 18 to 21 in San Antonio, Texas. The following is a list of all the sessions and individual presentations that focus on Christian Apocrypha

1. Christian Apocrypha Sessions

S19-114 Christian Apocrypha (9:00 AM to 11:30 AM)
Lily Vuong, Central Washington University, Presiding

Benjamin Lensink, Georg-August-Universität Göttingen: “Look at These Two Ugly Men, Whose Teeth Are like Milk and Their Lips Are like Soot: Demons in the Apocryphal Acts of Thomas.”

Benjamin M.J. De Vos, Ghent University: “A Disabled Saint and True Beauty: The Voice of Mattidia in the Pseudo-Clementine Homilies.”

Franz Gilbert Hetroza Biantan, University of Texas at Austin: “Acts of Thomas and Slavery in the Silk Road.”

Eric Cregheur, Université Laval: “The Acts of Thomas and of Peter? A Close Look at an Intriguing Text.”

Thomas Tops, Universität Regensburg: “Apostleship and Mission in the Acts of Andrew and the Acts of John.”

S19-311 Christian Apocrypha (4:00 PM to 6:00 PM)
Theme: Translating Christian Apocrypha

Tony Burke, York University: “What More Do You Need? The Next Wave in Christian Apocrypha Texts and Translations.”

David Calabro, Brigham Young University: “The Arabic History of Elijah in Deep Translation.”

Jacob A. Lollar, Alexander von Humboldt Foundation (Universität Regensburg): “Thekla in the Syriac Traditions: Critical Edition in Light of ‘New Philology.’”

Respondent: Janet Spittler, University of Virginia

S20-109 Christian Apocrypha (Joint Session with Syriac Studies) (9:00 AM to 11:30 AM)
Theme: Syriac Apocrypha
Kristian Heal, Brigham …

My third day in Denver began early with a pilgrimage (of sorts) to Red Rocks Amphitheatre. To people of my age and musical interests, Red Rocks is famous as the recording site of U2’s career-breaking Under a Blood Red Sky EP and video. Plenty of other bands have played the venue also, some even willing to bring a larger show to this smaller theatre (aprox. 9500) just for the joy of playing in this stunning, and storied, location. I convinced two friends (and fellow U2 fans), Phil Harland and Bob Derrenbacker, to join me for the trek and we hailed an Uber to take us there. Once we arrived, we hauled our creaky bones up and down the flights of stairs, stood on the stage (if only I had brought an instrument; I could then say I played at Red Rocks!), and just soaked in the atmosphere. Bob even played a couple of U2 songs on his phone to capture the spirit of that seminal event. I think I even saw tears welling in Bob’s eyes. Quoting Nigel Tuffnell of Spinal Tap, I said, “It really puts perspective on things, though, doesn’t it?” On cue, Bob responded, “Too much. There’s too much fucking perspective now.”

With some Red Rocks merch in hand, we headed back to the conference centre for afternoon sessions. Jacob Lollar (Universität Regensburg) started the Apocryphal Acts session with “Canonizing Thekla: The Acts of Thekla and Her Legacy in the Syriac Tradition.” Lollar remarked that much work …

Back in the pre-pandemic era, I would follow up my trip to the SBL Annual Meeting with a series of posts on the highlights of the sessions, receptions, and other activities (beginning in 2014 and including the last time SBL was at Denver in 2018). When the meeting went virtual and then hybrid, there wasn’t much to be said, though I did post my entire paper from last year’s online session (HERE). But it’s a new year and SBL was fully in-person this time (except for the occasional pre-recorded paper), so I stifled all of the anxiety that has been building in me over the past two years and headed off to Denver. Things did not start well. Reduced traveling seems to have had an effect on my trip-planning abilities and I inadvertently booked my flight under the name Tony instead of Anthony, the name on my passport. Thankfully I caught the error the day before my journey and a friendly guy at Expedia helped me fix the problem—though it did mean I had to cancel one flight and rebook (at an extra $300). Thanks Air Canada. Even the next day I was still uncertain that everything had been changed correctly. I knew I’d be able to get to Denver, I just didn’t know if I’d be able to get back.

Day 1 started by packing up my car with local SBLers and heading to the airport. Since I volunteered to drive, my wife advised me to …

The SBL Annual Meeting presents an ideal opportunity to check out new books on Christian apocrypha. As you make your way through the publishers’ exhibition, keep an eye out for these publications. If there is a book missing in the list, please pass along the details.

Bloomsbury

Robertson, David G. Gnosticism and the History of Religions.

Brepols

McCollum, Joey, and Brent Niedergall. Acts of John.

Brill

Lanzillotta, Lautaro Roig, and Jacques van der Vliet. The Apocalypse of Paul (Visio Pauli) in Sahidic Coptic.

Cambridge

Baker, Robin. Mary Magdalene: A Cultural History.

Dabiri, Ghazzal, and Flavia Ruani. Thecla and Medieval Sainthood: The Acts of Paul and Thecla in Eastern and Western Hagiography.

Norman, Dawn LaValle. Early Christian Women. (Includes discussion of Thecla).

Eerdmans

Burke, Tony, ed. New Testament Apocrypha: More Noncanonical Scriptures. Vol. 3. (Page proofs available for preview).

Fortress

Vanden Eykel, Eric. The Magi: Who They Were, How They’ve Been Remembered, and Why They Still Fascinate.

Mohr Siebeck

Reed, Annette Yoshiko. Jewish-Christianity and the History of Judaism: Collected Essays.

Oxford

Le Boulluec, Alain. The Notion of Heresy in Greek Literature in the Second and Third Centuries. (French original 1985; newly translated into English).

Litwa, M. David. The Evil Creator. Origins of an Early Christian Idea.

Mendez, Hugo. The Cult of Stephen in Jerusalem: Inventing a Patron Martyr.

Peeters

Calzolari, V.M. The Apocryphal Acts of the Apostles in Armenian. Studies on Early Christian Apocrypha 18.

SBL Press

Lehtipuu, Outi, and Silke Petersen, eds. Ancient Christian Apocrypha. Marginalized …

The 2022 Annual Meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature runs from November 19 to 22 in Denver, Colorado. The following is a list of all the sessions and individual presentations that focus on Christian Apocrypha.

1. Christian Apocrypha Section Sessions

S20-113 Christian Apocrypha (9:00 AM to 11:30 AM)
Lily Vuong, Central Washington University, Presiding

Thomas J. Kraus, Universität Zürich / Beyond Canon (Regensburg): “‘The Resurrection of the Flesh’ and What the Apocalypse of Paul Has to Say about It.”

Mari Mamyan, Regensburg University: “Shifts in Title: What Does the Evolution of Titles Imply about the Transmission of the Arm Inf Gsp?”

Rikki Wenxin Liu, Yale Divinity School: “The First and the Last: Scholarly and Popular Reception of The Thunder, Perfect Mind.”

Michael T. Zeddies, Chicago, IL: “More Misunderstandings about Mar Saba 65.”

Cristian Cardozo, Universidad Adventista del Plata: “What Is a Name? Author-Function in the 1 Apocryphal Apocalypse of John.”

S20-333 Nag Hammadi and Gnosticism / Christian Apocrypha (4:00 PM to 6:30 PM)
Theme: Coptic Apocryphal Literature in the Byzantine and Early Islamic Periods
This session showcases the ongoing work of the APOCRYPHA research project at the University of Oslo. This is a project that analyzes the production and circulation of apocryphal literature in Egypt throughout the entire period of Coptic literary production.
Janet Spittler, University of Virginia, Presiding

Hugo Lundhaug, Universitetet i Oslo: “Adapting the Storyworld: Coptic Apocrypha as Blueprints and Building-Blocks.”

Roxanne Bélanger Sarrazin, Universitetet i Oslo:“‘Eloi Eloi Lema Sabachtani’: Crucifixion Narratives in Coptic …

The 2021 Annual Meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature, which runs from November 20 to 23, is a combination of in-person (in sunny San Antonio) and virtual sessions. Apocryphicity continues its tradition of aiding readers plan their SBL schedules by compiling a list of all the sessions and individual presentations that focus on Christian Apocrypha.

1. Christian Apocrypha Section Sessions

S20-209 Christian Apocrypha (1:00 PM to 3:30 PM)
Theme: Apocalypses and Christian Apocrypha
Brent Landau, University of Texas at Austin, Presiding

John Ladouceur, Princeton University: “‘At What Time Was This Revelation Made?’ The Apocalypse of Paul and Theodosian Religious Politics”

The relationship between the preface and the visionary narrative of the Apocalypse of Paul has been a fraught one in the history of scholarship. Since R.P. Casey’s contention in 1933 that the preface, which recounts the miraculous discovery of the lost work during the reign of Theodosius I, likely postdated the text’s original edition by a century or more, scholars have vigorously debated the preface’s redactional nature and the implications of this question for dating and analyzing the apocalypse itself. While Casey’s view became the majority opinion for much of the 20th century, serious challenges to his thesis have been levied in the past thirty years, most notably by Piovanelli and Copeland. These debates over the integrity of the preface have coincided with a new wave of research on the social context that produced the narrative as a whole, with a wide base of scholarship situating it firmly in …

The 2020 Annual Meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature, which runs from November 29 to December 10, will take place online. The form of delivery may be entirely new but take comfort, because Apocryphicity continues its tradition of aiding readers plan their SBL schedules by compiling a list of all the sessions and individual presentations that focus on Christian Apocrypha. See you on Zoom.

1. Christian Apocrypha Section sessions:

S30-102 Christian Apocrypha (10:00 AM to 12:00 PM)
Theme: Christian Apocrypha
Janet Spittler, University of Virginia, Presiding

Chance Bonar, Harvard University: “The Place of the Dialogue between Jesus and the Devil in the History of the Antichrist”

The Dialogue between Jesus and the Devil (Dial. Devil; BHG 813f-g; CANT 84) is a narrative dialogue that expands upon the temptation account of Matthew 4:1-11 and Luke 4:1-13. In its Greek and Slavonic recensions, the dialogue portrays Jesus and the devil debating the reason for Jesus’s descent to earth, who the devil’s accomplices are, what happens to repentant and unrepentant sinners in the afterlife, the death of John the Baptist, and the devil’s ultimate fate. Dial. Devil participates in a long history of elucidating why the devil hates humanity and attempts to mislead them, and yet goes further than many narrations about the devil by portraying the Antichrist as the devil incarnate. While the idea that the Antichrist is the devil incarnate is a common topic on evangelical Christian blogs today, this late ancient apocryphal text depicts this exact scenario and has …

My final full day in San Diego began with a meeting of the NASSCAL board—or at least those of us who made it to SBL (Janet Spittler, Lily Vuong, Lorne Zelyck, and Jonathan Henry)—to discuss plans for the next NASSCAL conference. These events take place, ideally, every two years; the last one was at the University of Virginia in 2018. Next year’s gathering will be at the University of Texas at Austin under the guidance of Brent Landau. For a theme we want something that is focused enough to give the conference an identity but open enough to encourage contributions from a wide range of specialties. So far we are looking at the theme of transformation—how apocryphal texts change over time through translation, expansion, contraction, adaptation, etc. We also quickly discussed planned volumes in the Early Christian Apocrypha series and the success of the e-Clavis (as Janet remarked, “I can’t believe how much we have done in just four years”).

After the meeting I went back to the book display for a meeting with my editor at Yale University Press. I am working on a comprehensive overview of Christian apocrypha for the Anchor Bible series. The plan was to have it finished in two years—that was two years ago. Who would have thought a 600-page volume discussing over 300 texts would take longer? So, we negotiated a new deadline and I made promises to send some material along for review soon. Then I grabbed the last of my book purchases: …

My second day at the 2019 SBL Annual Meeting began with the Journal of Biblical Literature editorial board breakfast meeting. If you ever submit a paper to the journal on the subject of Christian apocrypha, there’s a good chance I’m Reviewer 2. The discussion at the meeting focused on reducing the backload of submissions to the journal. But the really interesting talk was happening at my table. One person (who will not be named) mentioned to me that a certain scholar (who will not be named) was working on a complete version of an otherwise fragmentary apocryphal text (which will be named): the Gospel of Mary. The text is presently extant in an incomplete Coptic manuscript (the Berlin Codex) and two small Greek fragments. A complete text certainly would be a major contribution to work on this text, but some things about the rumor did not sound right. It is not out of the question that someone is working on this new manuscript, but probably not the person who was mentioned to me. Let’s hope there is some truth to the rumor.

Filled up on tea and pastries, I headed off to the first session of the Christian Apocrypha Section. The open session featured four papers on a variety of topics. Up first was Adeline Harrington (University of Texas at Austin) with “Apocryphal Oxyrhynchus: The Literary Landscape of a Late Antique City.” Harrington began with the statement by a late antique writer on Oxyrhynchus (I wish I could remember …

Every year I sit down between grading papers to compile my thoughts and experiences from the SBL Annual Meeting. This process takes several days, so bear with me as I sift through my notes and memories and try to put together a useful and mildly entertaining overview of the event. The highlights include NASSCAL’s celebration of the debut of the Early Christian Apocrypha series, the night I was abandoned by a grad student on a boat, and the day another grad student stopped me on the street to give me edibles. One of those students can look forward to a lifetime of glowing reference letters and offers to collaborate, the other is dead to me.

My SBL experience began with travel, which can be fraught—flight delays, cancellations, encounters with customs and security. This year, travel went without much trouble. I chose a six am flight out of Hamilton, Ontario—closer to me and easier to navigate than Toronto’s Pearson airport. The early flight time was chosen for cost (it included a stop-over in Calgary) and because I wanted to arrive in plenty of time to set up for a NASSCAL reception celebrating the release of our premier volumes in the Early Christian Apocrypha series. As it happens, the executive later decided to move the reception to Saturday night. Ah well, it can’t hurt to get there early.

The plane touched down around 1 pm. I managed to find the bus to downtown (I swear they hide the affordable transit option so …

One of the highlights of the SBL Annual Meeting is the publishers exhibition. As you make your way from one booth to another, keep an eye out for these new books dealing with apocryphal texts and contexts. If there is a book missing in the lists, please pass along the details.

Additions to the list:

Bloomsbury

Chris Keith, Helen K. Bond, and Jens Schröter, eds. The Reception of Jesus in the First Three Centuries. 3 vols.

SBL Press

Janet E. Spittler, ed. The Narrative Self in Early Christianity: Essays in Honor of Judith Perkins. WGRWSup 15.

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Baylor

Philip Esler. Ethiopian Christianity: History, Theology, Practice.

Bloomsbury

Matthew Crawford and Nicola J. Zola, eds. The Gospel of Tatian: Exploring the Nature and Text of the Diatessaron. Bloomsbury, 2019.

Ingvild Saelid Gilhus, Alexandros Tsakos, and Marta Camilla Wright. The Archangel Michael in Africa: History, Cult and Persona.

Brepols

E. Créghur, J. C. Dias Chaves, and S. Johnston, eds. Christianisme des Origines: Mélanges en l’honneur du Professeur Paul-Hubert Poirier.

Brill

David Bertaina, ed. Heirs of the Apostles: Studies on Arabic Christianity. Studies on Arabic Christianity in Honor of Sidney H. Griffith.

David Hamidovic, Claire Clivaz, and Sarah Bowen Savant, eds. Ancient Manuscripts in Digital Culture: Visualisation, Data Mining, Communication.

Edmondo F. Lupieri, ed. Mary Magdalene from the New Testament to the New Age and Beyond.

Einar Thomassen and Christoph Markschies, eds. Valentinianism: New Studies.

Lorne Zelyck. The Egerton Gospel (Egerton Papyrus 2 + Papyrus Köln VI 255): Introduction, Critical Edition, …

The 2019 Annual Meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature takes place November 23–26 in sunny San Diego, California. To help prepare for the event, I have compiled all of the presentations focusing on Christian Apocrypha, this time with abstracts (since they tend to vanish from the SBL site soon after the conclusion of the meeting). See you in San Diego.

1. Christian Apocrypha Section sessions:

S24-119 Christian Apocrypha (9:00 AM to 11:30 AM)
Theme: The Christian Apocrypha in Material Culture and Art
Brent Landau, University of Texas at Austin, Presiding

Adeline Harrington, University of Texas at Austin: “Apocryphal Oxyrhynchus: The Literary Landscape of a Late Antique City”

Recent scholarship on Christian apocrypha has made a decisive turn away from dichotomous models that present a stark discontinuity between the diverse, often ‘heretical’, literary practices of the early church and the canonical, authoritarian late antique church. As we have seen, apocryphal writings continued to be widely produced, copied, and distributed across the Mediterranean throughout antiquity. It is significant, however, that a large number of our earliest apocryphal (and canonical) Christian texts come from a single city: Oxyrhynchus. Our manuscript evidence from this city is often isolated from its original Oxyrhynchite context, as has been long noted by scholars like Eldon Epp. This paper sits within a larger dissertation project on the Christian literary culture in Oxyrhynchus. Focusing on the apocryphal material within the city, I trace the local trends in apocryphal production diachronically, paying special attention to manuscripts dated from the …