Ehrman, death plagues, and some other things

Sorry about the long silences! I caught this death plague at church that threw me for a three week loop and I felt AWFUL. Add to the mix a rough pregnancy, a stye in my eye (yes, it's a cute rhyme, no, there's nothing cute about a stye) and taking care of the kids, stir in my hopeless disappointment that the doors to the US military have once again been slammed shut before us since we finally got word that they said no, and then add a dash of depression and anxiety over having to move (possibly) and you'll get a small, blurry picture of where I was at.

Bottom line? Been really, truly busy trying to recover. And I don't think I'm done yet-- I'm in one of those seasons where things just seem to be bumpy and rough. There have been good things too.... little graces and consolations here and there.

One of the things I've found to entertain myself has been looking into this guy Bart Ehrman, who everyone seems to think is some kind of spectacular scholar. Basically, the guy is a pseudo-intellectual hotshot who makes a living deconstructing everything you (the Christian reader) and I know about Christ. For God knows what reason, he seems to be uber popular with the soph college set-- you know the ones, the kids who never examined their own belief systems in their lives, take a Philosophy 101 course in their liberal arts college, and suddenly wind up "Experts" on the "real Jesus."

Anyways, I was so flipping sick of hearing about him I decided to look into some of his work myself (which I rarely do with people who annoy me this much.)

Anyways, here's a quote from one of his books.


“What I want to show is that because of the very nature of the historical disciplines, historians cannot show whether or not miracles every happened. Anyone who disagrees with me–who thinks historians can demonstrate that miracles happen–needs to be even-handed about it, across the board. IN Jesus’ day there were lots of people who allegedly performed miracles. There were Jewish holy men such as Hanina ben Dosa and Honi the circle drawer. There were pagan holy men such as Apollonius of Tyana, a philosopher who could allegedly heal the sick, cast out demons, and raise the dead. He was allegedly supernaturally born and at the end of his life he allegedly ascended to heaven. Sound familiar? There were pagan demigods, such as Hercules, who could also bring back the dead. Anyone willing to believe in the miracles of Jesus needs to concede the possibility of other people performing miracles, in Jesus’ day and in all eras down to the present day and in other religions such as Islam and indigenous religions of Africa and Asia,” Jesus Interrupted (HarperOne 2009), 172.

As many others have noted, the funniest thing about this is how impressed with his own argument he seems to be. What a dullard. Had he actually learned ANYTHING about Christianity, he would know that a) of course we know that other people besides Jesus performed miracles (hello? Moses? Elijah? Paul?? etc) and that b) Dude, ever heard of demons? Demons have always enabled people to perform miracles and imitate God's miracles. One need look no further than Pharaoh's magicians to discover a plethora of examples of demonic "magic" that appeared "miraculous."

Also, APPOLLONIUS??? SERIOUSLY??? Ehrman is no moron (I hear) so he knows that his biography was written after Jesus Christ and is obviously an imitation of Christ. he's just hoping we wont catch it, I guess.

Anyways, the guy is super slick, probably riddled with demons himself, and clearly abusing his right to call himself an "intellectual," and yet it would seem that hundreds of people are devoted to his writings and clinging to them as if they were God's Word. Hundreds of people who, incidentally, appear unwilling to let the ACTUAL Word of God change them.

Sometimes, I shudder at the darkness that surrounds us.