[BibChr]

Lüdemann considers himself a "non-theist," which he defines as one who "lives as if God does not exist and has no personal relationship to God.

Oh. Around here we call that a "Democrat"

Dan

[JohnGalt]

"Meaning no disrespect to the religious convictions of others, I still can't help wondering how we can explain away what to me is the greatest miracle of all and which is recorded in history. No one denies there was such a man, that he lived and that he was put to death by crucifixion. Where...is the miracle I spoke of? Well consider this and let your imagination translate the story into our own time -- possibly to your own home town. A young man whose father is a carpenter grows up working in his father's shop. One day he puts down his tools and walks out of his father's shop. He starts preaching on street corners and in the nearby countryside, walking from place to place, preaching all the while, even though he is not an ordained minister. He does this for three years. Then he is arrested, tried and convicted. There is no court of appeal, so he is executed at age 33 along with two common thieves. Those in charge of his execution roll dice to see who gets his clothing -- the only possessions he has. His family cannot afford a burial place for him so he is interred in a borrowed tomb. End of story? No, this uneducated, propertyless young man who ... left no written word has, for 2000 years, had a greater effect on the world than all the rulers, kings, emperors; all the conquerors, generals and admirals, all the scholars, scientists and philosophers who have ever lived -- all of them put together. How do we explain that? ...unless he really was what he said he was."

--Ronald Reagan

[BibChr]

Anyway, as I thought. The usual Happy Easter ceremony of sticking one's head 'way deep in the barrel, using a really long stick, scraping hard at the bottom, and then doing a glossy, adoring article about what scrapes off. Which is usually some self-impressed academe who hasn't heard a word from the last hundred years of NT archaeology and scholarship.

Like this pinhead.

Dan
How to Make Your Very Own Jesus

[elephantlips]

Typical liberal; he "agonized" over it. It's all in the feelings don't you know.

[Rightwing Canuck]

as Lüdemann did at a meeting of the Jesus Seminar

Big surprise. The Jesus Seminar represents probably the worst in Biblical scholarship. No wonder this guy hangs with them.

[VOA]

bump

[stands2reason]

Would you see a white-supremacist professor teaching in a black studies department? Yet the libs will whine about "academic freedom" when it comes to undermining religion all day long.

[Icthus]

That's why it's called FAITH!

[Logophile]

Lüdemann is now teaching classes students have no reason to take-the area in which he teaches doesn't offer a major.

If Lüdemann is right, there is no reason for students to major in Christian theology (except as a historical curiosity). Indeed, there seems to be no reason for him to continue his "battle to teach as a non-theist in a Christian setting". The honorable thing would be to resign his position and go elsewhere.

[Jerry_M]

Oh my gosh! You mean that I have been wrong all this time, and Jesus didn't rise from the dead?

Just because some muddle headed unregenerate academic says so? I don't think so. Besides, when I spoke with Him this morning, Jesus re-confirmed for me that He is still alive.

[ArGee]

It would be interesting to hear ol' Gerd explaining about his academic freedom and the supremacy of historical scholarship to Jesus at his judgement.

Not nice. Not funny. Not ironic. But interesting.

Shalom.

[lideric]

I read a book years ago written by a retired prosecuting attorney (sorry, can't remember his name). To make a long story short he was an agnostic that originally intended to write a book disproving the resurrection based on all his investigative experience as a prosecutor. He went to Israel and did all kinds of investigating but in the end he converted to Christianity and wrote a book called "Who Moved the Stone" that listed all the proofs he had found that Jesus had risen from the dead.

[Stefan Stackhouse]

"The body of Jesus," he has said many times, "rotted in the tomb, if it was not eaten before then by vultures and jackals."

Then why didn't the Pharisees and/or the Romans find it and parade it through the streets when Peter and the disciples started preaching the resurrection? They would have had ABUNDANT motive for doing so. Yet the gospel accounts report that they had to resort to a lame lie, because they KNEW that the body was not in the tomb.

This guy's problem isn't that he is incapable of believing, just that he doesn't WANT to believe, because it would be too challenging and uncomfortable.

[watchin]

"If there are conclusions that you are institutionally forbidden from adopting at the cost of your career," ... "then you don't enjoy academic freedom, and the field you are studying doesn't belong in the academy."

I'm not sure I understand. Does this precept mean that a creationist is now welcome in the academy, or that evolution doesn't belong there?

"The problem is that, damn it, it's a state university,"

Any Church that accepts pastors from an institution full of self-congratulating professional agitators is already dead. What would motivate someone to "teach" students in this manner? Is there really any other motive than the undermining of the very discipline he teaches?

What would we think of a art history professor who sued over his right to teach that the great masters never existed? A English literature professor who taught that English is not really a language at all, but simply a random assortment of symbols that seems like a language? A math professor who proclaims that numbers don't really exist, and objects can't be reliably counted?

Would we consider the possibility that these theories could be correct? Would there be controversy over the lack of academic freedom when he was laughed off campus?

[DallasDeb]

Just what I thought. He's a "Fellow" in the Jesus Seminar (www.jesusseminar.org), a group of "theologians" with representation from virtually every Christian denomination. This group gets together every year and votes on the veracity of passages of Jesus in the Bible. They are the ones who have decided (without evidence) that Mary was raped by a Roman soldier. They are charlatans; however, they are viewed as "THE" source for Christian faith. Our friend Peter Jennings used them extensively in his program, "Search for Jesus." What utterly fails me is how can people like this devote so much of their life to debunking a religion they don't believe in. I think they are led by Satan. He'll do anything to deny the diety of Jesus and he has lots of tools to promote his work. Wonder how the Jesus Seminar, full of extremely well-educated and intelligent people, like being used. Their due is coming.

Here's his bio:

Gerd Lüdemann
Professor of New Testament at Georg-August-University, University of Göttingen, Germany

Gerd Lü demann is Professor of New Testament at the University of Göttingen, Germany, Director of the Institute of Early Christian Studies, and Founder and Director of the Archive "Religionsgeschichtliche Schule" at the University of Göttingen. He has also served as Visiting Scholar at Vanderbilt Divinity School in Nashville, Tennessee, and as co-chair of the Society of Biblical Literature Seminar on Jewish Christianity. His many books include The Resurrection of Jesus, The Great Deception, The Unholy in Holy Scripture, and Heretics: The Other Side of Early Christianity.

Books

• The Great Deception: What Jesus Really Said and Did, 1999
• Suppressed Prayers: Gnostic Spirituality in Early Christianity, 1998
• Virgin Birth? The Real History of Mary and Her Son Jesus, 1998
• The Unholy in Holy Scripture: The Dark Side of the Bible, 1997
• Heretics: The Other Side of Early Christianity, 1996
• What Really Happened to Jesus, 1995
• The Resurrection of Jesus: History, Experience, and Theology, 1994

Academic Credentials

• D.Theol., University of Göttingen
• D. Habil., University of Göttingen

Special Study

• Visiting Scholar, Vanderbilt Divinity School, 1992–1998
• Duke University, 1974–1975

Academic Appointments

• Professor of New Testament, Georg-August-University, Göttingen, Germany, 1983–
• Associate Professor of New Testament, Vanderbilt Divinity School, Nashville, 1980–1983
• Assistant Professor of New Testament, Vanderbilt Divinity School, Nashville, 1979–1980
• Visiting Assistant Professor of Jewish Christianity and Gnosticism, McMaster University, Dept. of Religion, 1977–1979
• Academic Assistant of New Testament, Georg-August-University Göttingen, Germany, 1975–1977

Professional Service

• Founder and Director, Archive "Religionsgeschichtliche Schule," Göttingen, Germany, 1987–
• Member of the editorial board: The Second Century. A Journal of Early Christian Studies, 1981–1992
• Co-chair: SBL Seminar about Jewish Christianity, 1979–1984

Membership in Professional Societies

• Canadian Society of Biblical Studies
• Ernst-Troeltsch-Gesellschaft
• Society of Biblical Literature
• Studiorum Novi Testamenti Societas
• The Jesus Seminar
• Verband der Judaisten in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland
• Wissenschaftliche Gesellschaft für Theologie

Awards and Honors

• Heisenberg-Scholarship of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, 1980–1983

Website: http://www.gwdg.de/~gluedem/

[Sci Fi Guy]

If there are conclusions that you are institutionally forbidden from adopting at the cost of your career," says Jack Neusner (who put together the symposium), research professor of religion and theology at Bard College, "then you don't enjoy academic freedom, and the field you are studying doesn't belong in the academy.",

Academic Freedom is a myth. You don't have a right to teach anything you want. The people who pay the bills should determine what gets taught. I'm sure that Jack Neusner would object to a professor teaching something outrageous (like holocaust denial, or white racial superority). If someone cannot teach that the holocaust never happened would Neusner think that it means history shouldn't be taught??

[concerned about politics]

...And this guy is the kind of academic liberal who thinks the english word 'scholorship' means a boatload of students.