This is the house that I’m hoping to turn into a home. It needs a different shade of paint outside (and a whole lot of paint inside), but I think I’ve got myself a good deal! If it ends up being the place for me, I’ll take a bunch of before and after shots as I work.

Matt

You see, I’m stupid. Yes, stupid. After some time in college, I began grasping the thoughts and concepts to a degree that (in my stupid head) I thought, “oh here is a new, better relationship with God.” But it wasn’t. I gave up my prayer life, my one-on-one devotional reading of the Bible. In turn, I translated from Greek. I read systematic theology texts. I began research in textual criticism. Now, these things aren’t bad. They can really round out the context of the Bible, but these things are not the relationship I needed. I began to worship these things. They became my idols. They unrightfully took the spot in my life that belonged to God.

It took a tragic event (which I’ll talk about another time) to make me re-evaluate my life – to see what had happened, where I’d messed up. I had to set down my GNT, stop reading theology, end this blog for a while, and refocus my worship on God. Now, I’m finally comfortable to say that I can pick those things back up without them becoming idols once more, but it has not been a fun road. It’s taken time. A lot of time.

I wonder how many Bible college and seminary students are in a similar boat. If it weren’t for that event I spoke of, I might never have realized how far off I was. How many, then, are there who have no idea that they are placing something above God in their lives (even within these sorts of institutions)? I fear the number is high.

Matt

I intend to share rather briefly some of the thoughts/highlights that Wallace and Ehrman tossed around. Frankly though, if you are familiar with their works and textual criticism at large, what was discussed was nothing groundbreaking. It had a feel of a beginner’s introduction to the field, but (judging by some of the questions asked of the two by audience members) perhaps this is what was needed. What’s more, I found it exceptionally entertaining to see how these two scholars went about introducing textual criticism to us. They have vastly different takes (which most of you know), but there are similarities as well. I could only sit back and grin as they talked. I’m extremely glad I didn’t miss it!

Ok, so here is how the session was broken up. First, Ehrman had an opportunity to give opening remarks (about 30 min) followed by Wallace. Then there were two sets of responses (10 min each) followed by a Q&A session front the audience (I think about 30-40 min). We ended with closing remarks from the two of them (10 min each).

The opening remarks from each scholar were fairly straightforward introductions to the field as I mentioned before. Each of the scholars set out to establish an answer to the question in the title. Ultimately, Ehrman asked us, “Is the text of the New Testament reliable?” His answer: “There is no way to know.” Wallace however asked, “Is what we have now what they wrote then?” His response was that “it almost certainly is.”

Well, the response time was some of the most interesting. Both Ehrman and Wallace know how to talk to a crowd. They have such entertaining personalities, and it was here and the Q&A time that those personalities shown. Ehrman wanted to know how Wallace can know that our surviving manuscripts were copied from accurate copies of accurate copies (and so on). He also asked how many significant variants were created before our surviving manuscripts. Obviously, the answer to this is that we can’t know for certain. Wallace, however, stated that we have probability on our side. He returned a question to Ehrman asking how he knows that our earliest scribes are some of the worst (Ehrman had earlier stated that scribes reached a higher level of professionalism in the medieval world).

One more round of responses from the two were equally as fun to watch. Ehrman asked, “How do we know the earliest copies of Mark didn’t take out a verse or two that they didn’t like or added a verse or two that they wanted?” Wallace’s answer? We don’t have hard evidence, but we do have a great deal of soft evidence. For instance, the Alexandrian manuscripts do not greatly differ except in incidental errors.

After this they went into the Q&A time. It was mostly civil, but the questions being asked I didn’t bother to write down, nor their responses. Frankly, I don’t believe the great amount of questions would interest you (or perhaps they just didn’t interest me). In any case, Ehrman and Wallace treated each one with respect and answered at least what they thought was question that should’ve been asked.

By the time we got to closing remarks I’d forgotten to start taking more notes, so you’ll have to forgive me. They mainly restated their beliefs in the level of trust we can place in the text (as was stated above).

All in all, it was worth the time to go and was exceedingly fun. Drs. Ehrman and Wallace, thank you for taking the time to do this. I look forward to the next chance I have to see you speak!

Matt

There’s going to be a more well-rounded feel to what I put here from now on. Previously, it was almost entirely academic. I posted book reviews, my translation work, interviews, and the like. I hope to continue to do those things, but I will also attempt (and prayerfully succeed) in sharing where I am in my walk with Christ in the hope that it might encourage those who visit here in their own walk. In the past year I’ve discovered that focusing solely on the academic study of Christianity can be idolatrous when you place that study higher in your life than the One who created what it is I love to study. Needless to say, I’ve taken time to put things in order.

All that being said, I don’t yet know the frequency of my posts, but I know what my next one will be. You can look forward to it tonight tomorrow. It will contain my thoughts on a certain debate here in Dallas that I will be attending shortly.

Matt

MSE

In my opinion, it would be preferable to order the cases as nominative, accusative, dative, and genitive. It seems smoother to move from subject to object to indirect object. In the neuter the nominative and accusative are the same, and this arrangement would keep them together. But I gave in to conventional usage and listed the cases in the standard format. (p. 45)

That “standard format” is nominative, genitive, dative, then accusative. Now, I believe that if Mounce thinks that the order he suggests is the better way to learn it, then he should’ve put them in that order. Otherwise it doesn’t make it any simpler.

However, I am not so sure I agree that it is the better way to learn it. I think that perhaps the way the paradigm falls regularly is the easier way to learn it. Of course this is only opinion and the only reason I can come up with for learning it the conventional way is that it is the way I originally learned it a couple years ago and believe it would be difficult for me to adjust.

What are your thought? Does Mounce have a point? If he does, should he or shouldn’t he follow through with it in his grammar?

MSE

I’ve not really kept up with biblio-blogdom as I would’ve liked, so I’m counting on you all to fill me in on anything critical that I should know about. I did notice, however, that Larry Hurtado is blogging now!!! I’m very excited to see him enter this arena and have enjoyed what I’ve seen at his blog so far.

I have to admit that I have not glanced at my Greek NT, grammar, vocabulary, etc during my time away. I started to remedy this last week and am currently working through Mounce’s latest update to his intro grammar. Now, I know most of this already, but hope to cement the material in my head and catch anything I missed before moving on to Wallace’s massive volume (to be followed by BDF and/or Robertson).

Needless to say, these next few months will be heavy on Greek related postings. Maybe one day I might get to the level of blogging on the subject that Mike Aubrey has achieved. That’s going to take a long while though!

I’m going to steer away from my old style of pointing out other posts that I found beneficial. That became more of a way to attract views than anything else. That’s not to say that I won’t dialogue with material on others’ blogs, but I will not simply regurgitate what’s already been said. I think ending this practice will not give me the viewership I had before, but that’s not what I care about any more. I want substance in my posts, not subsistence for my blog!

So, what do you say? Shall we have another go at this?

MSE

I’ll be back…soon.

MSE

I’m a bit sad to say this, but this blog needs to be put on hiatus for now. I’m not gone, but I’ve got other things I need to take care of in my life right now instead of updating this thing. I don’t know how long I’ll be away, but it’s got to be.

MSE

They had all 700 of us sit in a room where they played a cheesy video about serving on a jury. Then those with exemptions/disqualifications were asked to come up to plead their case to get out. That took about half an hour. Then they started assigning people to courts. Since it’s Friday there were only two courts looking for jurors today, so only 80 people were taken.

I on the other hand (along with 59 others) was given a questionnaire and assigned to a court for Monday at 10:30.

It’s nice to be out for the day and to be able to go in a little later on Monday, but I’m still worried about the length of this thing. I guess I’ll know more come Monday.

MSE