Bart Ehrman On Coast to Coast AM Tomorrow Night
Posted By MSH on April 17, 2009
In case you like late-night talk radio, you might want to tune in. The C2C site has a list of affiliates by state to catch the show.
I’ve been on C2C many times. The host for this one will be Ian Punnett. Ian is a seminary grad (went to both Univ of Chicago Div school and Columbia in SC). He will make the material interesting. I’ve emailed him with some resources to (hopefully) present a balanced interview. But then there’s Bart. Bart is a very capable scholar, but he doesn’t have much time for things like logic and even-handedness in analyzing data. That’s unfortunate, since the result is that he often commits paleobabble-ological sins (hey, a new word!).
In case some of you have not bothered to keep up with Bart Ehrman’s less-than-charitable view of the text fo the NT, here are some resources:
http://www.forananswer.org/Top_General/Witherington_Misquoting%20Jesus%20Blog.pdf
http://benwitherington.blogspot.com/2009/04/bart-interrupted-detailed-analysis-of.html
This last link below is especially important, since it is produced by the most widely trafficked (and easily the most scholarly) textual criticism blog on the internet:
Enjoy!
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Michael, I appreciate this head’s up ! Though I’m an ‘early to bed; early to rise’ human, i’ve heard C2C from time to time and am glad that our fading republic still has room for such a program.
sure hope you start a Forum some day. many things I would like to comment on but don’t due to the format and multiple log-ins.
That last review is so great. I especially liked the comment section and one commenter, Martin, wrote: “… That does not mean that variants are irrelevant – the best text HAS to be ascertained – but neither does it mean that a certain (after all quite small) amount of variants (or, uncertain text) can delimit the power of the text. The greatest movements in church history were based on a rather bad text(Wycliffs Reformation – based on the Vulgate; the German Reformation – based on Erasmus’ text).” This seemed very insightful to me and I was surprised to learn this…Dr. Heiser can you comment on this (esp about “greatest movements based on rather bad texts) I think this sharpens the focus on God’s intentions for the text vs. our perception of what the text should be?
For those who haven’t read Ben Witherington’s blog yet-the 2nd link Dr. Heiser gives-, May I highlight his following quote:
“Indeed, I would argue that to actually understand an ancient author you must start by giving them the benefit of the doubt and hear them out, doing one’s best to enter creatively into their own world and thought processes before understanding can come to pass. To approach the text with a hermeneutic of suspicion is to poison the well of inquiry before one even samples the water in the old well.” A hearty “Amen” to that!
Just want to also say please read these blogs, I’m starting to see a parallel (not to be unkind to Mr. Ehrman) with when it is said Marcion indirectly inspired the production of the NT by way of defense tracts to counter his point. Reading these blogs it’s like I’m experiencing a modern take on this (not to say a new NT is being formed or some such non-sense, of course, but how important it is to have clear, well-rounded thinkers quickly intervene when a particular, unsound viewpoint starts gathering too much steam across the laity.)
@Jonnathan Molina: “bad texts” – the Erasmian is, of course, a key part of the Majority Text family/tradition of the NT text. MOST NT textual critics would say it is inferior to the Alexandrian or an eclectic text, but “inferior” is an overly harsh term. It isn’t like the Majority Text looks more like the phone book than the NT, or that it has a multitude of truly “bad” readings (as in doctrinal aberrance). “Bad” and “inferior” in the lingo of NT text critics really means “not as likely original” or “demonstrably secondary.” You should know that the (Byzantine) Majority tradition does have some scholarly defenders even today (e.g., Maurice Robinson).
@Cognus: describe what you mean (I’m not a techie).