The Secular Frontier

Religious dispositions are not so much viewed as one’s subjective set of beliefs for the faithful but rather the way they experience the world, like how the world might appear/present itself to a schizophrenic in a conspiracy saturated way.  The re ... Read Article

One of the great underreported sins of New Testament scholarship is the problem that, unless we're told by the writers, there is no way to tell whether specific interpretive units like the lord's supper or the empty tomb have their origins as historical m ... Read Article

Some things mythicists point to is the lack of detail about Jesus in Paul, and Mark as allegorical literature. This, though, needs to be qualified in a way that favors historicity, not mythicism. Paul says he resolved to know nothing among you but Chris ... Read Article

Keith gives an interesting example of how even if we consider something to be true of Jesus, there is so much that we still don't know. He writes: If I could indict atomistic approaches to the historical Jesus for one thing, it would be that their at ... Read Article

Bond stresses the difficulty in trying to distill historical information about Jesus from the gospels. She writes: Thus the many chreiai in the Gospels are not primarily repositories of oral tradition, but fundamentally literary creations, crafted to ... Read Article

One of the interesting things about this essay is some of the anti-Jewish overtones in the gospels may stem from literary need born out of the attempt to present universal saving by Jesus. Reinhartz writes: (1) Although the Four Gospels vary with res ... Read Article

Blogging my way through the anthology, Moxnes has the first essay. One tidbit I'd like to highlight is how Jesus challenges societal norms. Moxnes writes: Jesus is calling young men to follow him and leave the patriarchal household and their father ... Read Article

My new Philosophy for Kids book is out today. Please pick up a copy! ... Read Article

I just got my copy with a whopping 32 essays in it so I will be blogging about the volume for a while. (2) The Next Quest For The Historical Jesus: Reception History by Halvor Moxnes (3) The Next Quest For The Historical Jesus: Beyond The Jewish ... Read Article

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0qTwBn4vh1o If you're intellectually impatient like me, just start watching at 47:00 when they start to stretch out their hands to cast a magic spell. That the faith community is backing Trump is wonderful. If Trump ... Read Article

"In Leibniz's sense, a ratio sufficiens, a sufficient reason, isn't at all a ground capable of supporting a being so that it doesn't straightaway fall into nothing. A sufficient reason is one that reaches and offers to beings that which puts them in the ... Read Article

Previous Posts in this Series: (1/4) Christianity, A Question of Reasoning: The Continental/Analytic Philosophy Divide (Part 2 of 4) Christianity, A Question of Reasoning: The Continental/Analytic Philosophy Divide (Part 3/4, AFTERWORD) Christian ... Read Article

It's now more mainstream to acknowledge that the NT writers were rewriting OT scripture to flesh out the biography of Jesus, and so we have Mark create his crucifixion narrative out of Psalms and Isaiah since Paul doesn't record any details. Matthew prese ... Read Article

Trump is polling well with conservative Christians but is really trying to overcome the problem that conservative Christians often stay at home on election day. ... Read Article

FOR THE SHORT INDEX OF MY PHILOSOPHY POSTS, SEE: The Joy of Philosophy (Postscript and Poetry) Heraclius: “physis kryptesthai philei” (Being/The Nature of things loves to hide) Hegel, in his inaugural address, Heidelberg, 1816, says “The ... Read Article

I've been talking about how Paul introduced the Lord's Supper into the Jesus movement tradition as miming Jesus did alone in prison that represented a ritual meal for future Christians. The importance of Paul having this vision is it solidifies the idea ... Read Article

For the first post in this series, see HERE For the second post in this series, see HERE (Appendix) Christianity, A Question of Reasoning: The Christ Myth Theory and the Lord’s Supper (1/2) Does Literary Imitation Suggest Christ Never Existed? ... Read Article

For my previous post see HERE! For the Afterword in this series CLICK HERE (Appendix) Christianity, A Question of Reasoning: The Christ Myth Theory and the Lord’s Supper (1/2) Does Literary Imitation Suggest Christ Never Existed? Does Litera ... Read Article

As someone who focuses on the history of Philosophy in the Continental tradition, perhaps the main style of reasoning you see is phenomenology/phenomenalizing.  Hegel gives the example that a torn sock phenomenalizes the previously hidden ... Read Article

I've been thinking with Keith Augustine on supposed survival after death that some claim for mediums, Out of Body Experiences, and Near-Death experiences. Gregory Shushan  ("Diversity and Similarity of Near-Death Experiences across Cultures and History: ... Read Article

Last time, I thought a bit about mediumship, and how the observational evidence doesn't lead us to a supernatural spirit-world medium hypothesis rather than a "mundane" supernatural psychic mind reading that does not involve undead spirits communicating w ... Read Article

(Theatrical poster for a mind reading performance, 1900 wiki) In this essay Sudduth covers a lot of ground, but mainly considers Keith Augustine’s critique of recent attempts to use the example of a well-known medium Mrs. Piper to argue the soul ... Read Article

Previously, I've talked about how Trump is positioning himself that a vote against him is a vote against God. What better way to spend a political rally than as Christian Worship time, lol? https://www.youtube.com/shorts/RJ86JGoX05o For anyone no ... Read Article

Check out the trailer for our new Kids chapter book: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3GLemL5pm3g ... Read Article

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QxiaZEhS3g8 There is a really interesting thing happening in politics right now. Politicians have adopted a lawyer schema where they defend their side at the expense of the truth. And, the people have responded accor ... Read Article