WWJHLL

What would Jesus have looked like? (WWJHLL) Here are some popular and past depictions:

Many popular depictions show Jesus with light-brown hair, sharp blue eyes, and a well trimmed beard with very European features. One of the pictures above even shows an Asian depiction of Jesus. In Popular Mechanics 2002, they think he looked more like this: I suppose that does more justice to his Palestinian roots, it was just very different than any other depictions of Jesus I've seen. WWJHLL?

The age of digital readers

It seems that the past few years has brought on a whole new age of reading: the age of digital readers. Some of the devices vying for your reading pleasure:

1. Sony PRS-900

2. Barnes & Noble Nook

3. Apple iPad

4. Amazon Kindle 2 and Kindle DX


I'm not really that serious in buying one, but I suppose it would be nice to have one instead of carrying all my books, not to mention the ability to access the hundreds of journal articles I have on my computer on one portable device. However, I have not really had a chance to actually mess around with any of these devices and from what I can tell there are some shortcomings of these devices. First, if they are quick, full-color with multi-touch capabilities (e.g., iPad), the battery life is very low, the price is very very steep, and for reading, they would be terrible for your eyes. Anyway, I think iPad is not really meant to act as an e-reader. Second, if they are basic and focused on reading (e.g., the other devices), the response times are slow and most of them lack any ability to mark up the books (though I might be wrong here). The only exception I think is the Sony PRS-900 with its stylus; unfortunately, this device only has a 7-inch display, the response times seem slow, and the book store is Sony's instead of an already well-established source like Amazon. Who reads books without marking them up?

I guess if I could have it my way, it would be something like the Kindle DX that is less than $200, with a stylus, with SD-memory support, and strong PDF support. Does anyone own one of these devices that want to weigh in?

Carnival

When I think of the word "carnival," I just think of something like the picture above, with some fun games and ferris wheels, but in literary terms, I learned that it has been used in a different way to understand a given text. I'm trying to read books that introduce different "criticisms" of the New Testament, and the book that I'm currently reading is James L. Resseguie's Narrative Criticism of the New Testament. I'm not sure if I can agree with all the tenets of narative-criticism that I've read so far, but it's still interesting. In a subsection titled, "Carnivalesque," Resseguie says something about carnival that I want to quote in full:

"Carnivalesque is a concept, popularized by Mikhail Bakhtin, that highlights the upside down, inside out, top to bottom, inverted world of carnival. Carnival predates Christianity and expresses "life drawn out of its usual rut" and "the reverse side of the world ('monde à l'envers') in which everyday social hierarchies are turned upside down and mocked by normally suppressed voices of the culture. Carnivaleque is prominent in the passion scenes of the Gospels, where symbols and actions mock a staid, authoritarian society and provide the transforming regenerative power for an alternative society. Opposites that underscore the relativity of all structure and order are paired in carnival: king with slave, crowning with de-crowning, exaltation with debasement, and sacred with profane. Similar opposites are paired at the crucifixion: an innocent man dies while an outlaw goes free (Barabbas); the sun fails at noon; the temple veil is torn from top to bottom; a carnival procession mocks the king, which, in turn, mocks the triumphal processions of conquering heroes; a cross serves as a throne; jeers (carnivalistic laughter) deride while ironically affirming truth. The images of carnival are linked to the paradox of death and rebirth. Carnivaleque is never simple negation but has a second, positive level of meaning. The downward, negative movement that characterizes the crucifixion world of abuse, curse, debasing, profanation, mockery, and death contains within it the regenerative power of an upward, positive movement of rejuvenation, renewal of life, and transformed symbols of power. In this sense, carnivalesque is like a U-shaped plot with a downward turn that moves upward to a new stable condition."

Pervasion

When I took a class on the history of rock and roll at UCLA specifically focused on The Beatles, I found out just how pervasive their lyrics/songs were, even decades after their time. I started seeing/hearing references and allusions to The Beatles and it became clear to me that they were even more influential than I had previously imagined. It seems to me that the culture of ancient Greece as well as the Roman adaptations of it in the Roman Empire had a similar impact on Western culture. In my class on the cultural context of 2 Corinthians, we talked briefly about the different gods being worshipped in the city of Corinth in the first century. One of them is Asclepius, the god of healing:



Also, here is Hermes:

Do you notice anything? One of the primary symbols for Asclepius is his rod, a rod with an intertwining serpent. And relatedly, Hermes also carries a caduceus, a serpent with serpents in double-helix formation with winged tips. Both of them look very similar to the modern symbol for medicine.

I visited the website for Yale School of Medicine and this is at the top banner:

Interesting, no?
Seems that long before The Beatles were taking us by storm, the Greeks have been influencing the centuries following.

Luke

I've been reading through C. Kavin Rowe's Early Narrative Christology: The Lord in the Gosepl of Luke lately. I had heard that he's been doing excellent work and as you can see from his Duke profile, it's pretty obvious that he's one of the young bright NT scholars in the world. I corresponded briefly with Dr. Richard Hays at Duke and he also pointed to Dr. Rowe's works for my own interest in the biblical studies department at Duke.

"Jesus is κύριος from the inception of his life. This is not simply an "anticipation" or foreshadowing of Acts 2:34-36, though it is that. More importantly, that Jesus' very existence and his identification as κύριος are coextensive means that κύριος is in a crucial way constitutive of his identity. The root idem in identity is proper here: for Luke there is no point at which Jesus is not κύριος. Lukan christology, therefore, does not allow for a separation between Jesus and his identity as ὁ κύριος."

I wish...

the entire Loeb Classical Library was on my computer in digital form! I really hope someone starts creating some kind of software that has them all... Anyway, does anyone know how I can get access to translations of Stobaeus? He seems to have collected a bunch of sayings from Greek authors, and I can find the Greek texts alright, but can't seem to find any English translations. If anyone knows anything, let me know!

Maundy Thursday

This year, it happens to fall on that odd day we call April Fool's. Well, today happens to be a much better day than that: Maundy Thursday, the day that Jesus enjoyed the Last Supper with his disciples.

I always wondered why they called it "Maundy", so I just did a little bit of digging regarding the origin of the name. There are various theories, but I think there was one that was particularly fitting: It is a derivation of a word from Old French, mandé from the Latin mandatum. This happens to be the first word from John 13:34 in Latin:

Mandatum novum do vobis, ut diligatis invicem; sicut dilexi vos, ut et vos diligatis invicem.

A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you are also to love one another.

There are two other important statements from the Gospel accounts that are titled after the first word that appears in Latin: (1)The Magnificat, the Song of Mary in Luke 1:46-55 and (2) The Benedictus, Song of Zechariah in Luke 1:68-79. So, in my opinion, the Latin verse origin of Maundy Thursday seems like a good guess. Also, if we follow the Gospel accounts of Jesus' activities, John 13-17 happens to fall on Thursday, so that seems to fit. Of course this is all in the realm of conjecture, but better than April Fool's.