The name of my talk on the Gospel of John for the Hidden God, Hidden Histories conference is: "What is hiding in the Gospel of John? Reconceptualizing Johannine Origins and the Roots of Gnosticism".
My "paper" has become so full and so detailed that it looks like it is going to become the basis of another book. I already have the title for it:
John Interrupted: What can the Gospel of John tell us about the origins of Christianity and Gnosticism?
The work I'm doing is from the ground up, straight back to the ancient sources. And all because one day, while preparing to deliver an undergraduate lecture on the Gospel of John, I stumbled upon a passage in Greek that is not translated accurately in any modern translation I have been able to find.
Friday, February 26, 2010
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
Self-perservation and the Gospel of John
I haven't been blogging too much lately because I have been up to my neck in research on the Gospel of John as I am preparing for the upcoming Hidden God, Hidden Histories conference. This research has been both enlightening and depressing, a sort of high and low of my academic journey.
I have known for a long time that traditions are conservative and self-interested, but what is coming home for me in a very real way is just how much the traditions are safe-guarded by the dominant group - be it the mainstream churches or the academy - and how far the dominant group will go to protect them. The interests and preservation of those interests often become the end-all, even at the expense of historical truth. The rationalizations, the apologies, the 'buts', the tortured exegesis, the negative labeling, the side-stepping, the illogical claims accumulate until they create an insurmountable wall that preserves both church and academy, which remain (uncomfortably so for me) symbiotic.
The entrenchment of the academy is particularly worrisome for me. Scholars' works are often spun by other scholars, not to really engage in authentic critical debate or review, but to cast the works in such a way that they can be dismissed (if they don't support the entrenchment) or engaged (if they do). In other words, fair reproduction of the author's position and engagement with it does not seem to me to be the top priority. The quest for historical knowledge does not appear to me to be the major concern. It usually plays back seat to other issues including the self-preservation of the ideas and traditions of the dominant parties - those who control the churches, and the academy with its long history of alliance with the churches.
I already know that what I have to say about the critical history of the Gospel of John and the origins of Christianity is going to be countered with the full force of the church and academic tradition that has built up around the fourth gospel a secure armor of 'correct' and 'permitted' interpretation, an exegetical tradition as old as the Johannine epistles that has worked to normalize, to deradicalize, to tame the beast. What I have to say is 'not allowed' speech, 'can't be' talk.
Even so I continue to study and write, to speak the unspeakable in my quest to remain fully engaged with the critical investigation of Christian history.
I have known for a long time that traditions are conservative and self-interested, but what is coming home for me in a very real way is just how much the traditions are safe-guarded by the dominant group - be it the mainstream churches or the academy - and how far the dominant group will go to protect them. The interests and preservation of those interests often become the end-all, even at the expense of historical truth. The rationalizations, the apologies, the 'buts', the tortured exegesis, the negative labeling, the side-stepping, the illogical claims accumulate until they create an insurmountable wall that preserves both church and academy, which remain (uncomfortably so for me) symbiotic.
The entrenchment of the academy is particularly worrisome for me. Scholars' works are often spun by other scholars, not to really engage in authentic critical debate or review, but to cast the works in such a way that they can be dismissed (if they don't support the entrenchment) or engaged (if they do). In other words, fair reproduction of the author's position and engagement with it does not seem to me to be the top priority. The quest for historical knowledge does not appear to me to be the major concern. It usually plays back seat to other issues including the self-preservation of the ideas and traditions of the dominant parties - those who control the churches, and the academy with its long history of alliance with the churches.
I already know that what I have to say about the critical history of the Gospel of John and the origins of Christianity is going to be countered with the full force of the church and academic tradition that has built up around the fourth gospel a secure armor of 'correct' and 'permitted' interpretation, an exegetical tradition as old as the Johannine epistles that has worked to normalize, to deradicalize, to tame the beast. What I have to say is 'not allowed' speech, 'can't be' talk.
Even so I continue to study and write, to speak the unspeakable in my quest to remain fully engaged with the critical investigation of Christian history.
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Horner's Coptic New Testament now available through LuLu.com
If you want to have Horner's long out-of-print critical edition of the Coptic New Testament (Sahidic and Boharic), it is now available for sale on LuLu.com. You can select paperback or hardback editions for VERY reasonable prices. Here are the links. I am so excited to finally own a copy!
Sahidic New Testament Paperback:
The Coptic Version of the New Testament in the Southern Dialect, Volume I
The Coptic Version of the New Testament in the Southern Dialect, Volume II
The Coptic Version of the New Testament in the Southern Dialect, Volume III
The Coptic Version of the New Testament in the Southern Dialect, Volume IV
The Coptic Version of the New Testament in the Southern Dialect, Volume V
The Coptic Version of the New Testament in the Southern Dialect, Volume VI
The Coptic Version of the New Testament in the Southern Dialect, Volume VII
Sahidic New Testament Hardcover:
The Coptic Version of the New Testament in the Southern Dialect, Volume I
The Coptic Version of the New Testament in the Southern Dialect, Volume II
The Coptic Version of the New Testament in the Southern Dialect, Volume III
The Coptic Version of the New Testament in the Southern Dialect, Volume IV
The Coptic Version of the New Testament in the Southern Dialect, Volume V
The Coptic Version of the New Testament in the Southern Dialect, Volume VI
The Coptic Version of the New Testament in the Southern Dialect, Volume VII
Boharic New Testament Paperback:
The Coptic Version of the New Testament in the Northern Dialect, Volume I
The Coptic Version of the New Testament in the Northern Dialect, Volume II
The Coptic Version of the New Testament in the Northern Dialect, Volume III
The Coptic Version of the New Testament in the Northern Dialect, Volume IV
Boharic New Testament Hardcover:
The Coptic Version of the New Testament in the Northern Dialect, Volume I
The Coptic Version of the New Testament in the Northern Dialect, Volume II
The Coptic Version of the New Testament in the Northern Dialect, Volume III
The Coptic Version of the New Testament in the Northern Dialect, Volume IV
Sahidic New Testament Paperback:
The Coptic Version of the New Testament in the Southern Dialect, Volume I
Sahidic New Testament Hardcover:
The Coptic Version of the New Testament in the Southern Dialect, Volume I
Boharic New Testament Paperback:
The Coptic Version of the New Testament in the Northern Dialect, Volume I
Boharic New Testament Hardcover:
The Coptic Version of the New Testament in the Northern Dialect, Volume I
Monday, February 15, 2010
Blogger has added static pages!
Thanks to LucValentine who brought my attention to the fact that Blogger has listened to us and added static pages! We can add up to ten static pages to our blogs now. Just go to dashboard and click 'edit pages'.
So I will be working on this blog and getting the static pages put up instead of relocating to another host.
So I will be working on this blog and getting the static pages put up instead of relocating to another host.
Friday, February 12, 2010
Tuesday, February 2, 2010
Main Speakers for Hidden God, Hidden Histories Symposium
I have now the list of main speakers for the Rockwell Religious Studies 2010 Symposium: Hidden God, Hidden Histories. There will be graduate student speakers involved in each session as well.
In Western religious traditions, God is conventionally conceived to be humanlike creator, king, or ruler enthroned in heaven. But what about the God of the unconventional Western traditions, the God of the mystics, gnostics, and sages? Like almost everything else in these esoteric traditions, God is hidden, secreted away. Sometimes God shows up in another universe beyond our world. Other times God is cloaked behind veils in celestial palaces or within a body of blinding light. Often God is understood to be utterly transcendent, utterly beyond us, while also immediately immanent, immediately within us. This symposium, the inaugural event of the Department of Religious Studies’ new Program on Gnosticism, Esotericism, and Mysticism (or GEM) offers academic reflections on these secreted traditions about God, from the ancient world to the modern period.
ROCKWELL SYMPOSIUM, April 15-18
April 15, 3-5 p.m.
April D. DeConick, Rice University
“The Gospel of John as a Transtheistic Early Christian Gospel: Reconceptualizing Johannine Origins and the Roots of Gnosticism”
John Turner, University of Nebraska
“From Hidden to Revealed in Sethian Revelation, Ritual and Protology”
BURKITT PUBLIC LECTURE, April 15, 7:30-9 p.m.
Kocku van Struckard, University of Groningen
“The Esoteric Quest and Western Culture”
April 16, 8:30 a.m.-5 p.m.
Kelley Coblentz-Bautch, University of St. Edwards
“The Hidden God in the Pseudo-Clementines”
Andrei Orlov, Marquette University
“Adoil Outside the Cosmos: God Before and After Creation in Enochic Traditions”
Bernard McGinn, University of Chicago
“The Hidden God and the Hidden Self in Christian Mysticism”
Claire Fanger, Rice University
"God's Occulted Body: Divine Involucra in Alan of Lille and Bernard Silvestris"
David Porreca, University of Waterloo
"How Hidden is God? Revelation and Pedagogy in Ancient and Medieval Hermetic Writings"
David Cook, Rice University
“The Vision of God in Muslim Dreams”
Jeff Kripal, Rice University
"On the Mothman, UFOs, and Other Monsters: John A. Keel and the Superspectrum of the Occult"
John Stroup, Rice University
"The Multidimensional Physics of History and the Problem of Transtheistic God-Language as Cultural Critique in the Popular and Learned Works of Joseph P. Farrell"
April 17, 8:30 a.m.-3:00 p.m.
Gregory Kaplan, Rice University
"How (Not) to 'Immanentize the Eschaton' and Other Problems for Hans Jonas and Eric Voegelin"
Steven Finley, Louisiana State University
"Hidden Away: Esotericism and Gnosticism in Elijah Muhammad's Nation of Islam"
Anne Klein, Rice University
“The Transcendent, the Mysterious, and the Hidden in Tibet: A Buddhist Logos”
Shira Lander, Rice University
“Scholarship on Ancient Palestinian Helios Mosaics: Hiding the Revealed God”
Marcia Brennan, Rice University
“The Modern Museum and Mystical Houston”
April 18, 8:30-11 a.m.
Jonathan Garb, Hebrew University
"Shamanism and Modern Kabbalah"
Bill Parsons, Rice University
“Contours of an Emerging Psychoanalytic Spirituality: Prospects and Problems”
In Western religious traditions, God is conventionally conceived to be humanlike creator, king, or ruler enthroned in heaven. But what about the God of the unconventional Western traditions, the God of the mystics, gnostics, and sages? Like almost everything else in these esoteric traditions, God is hidden, secreted away. Sometimes God shows up in another universe beyond our world. Other times God is cloaked behind veils in celestial palaces or within a body of blinding light. Often God is understood to be utterly transcendent, utterly beyond us, while also immediately immanent, immediately within us. This symposium, the inaugural event of the Department of Religious Studies’ new Program on Gnosticism, Esotericism, and Mysticism (or GEM) offers academic reflections on these secreted traditions about God, from the ancient world to the modern period.
ROCKWELL SYMPOSIUM, April 15-18
April 15, 3-5 p.m.
April D. DeConick, Rice University
“The Gospel of John as a Transtheistic Early Christian Gospel: Reconceptualizing Johannine Origins and the Roots of Gnosticism”
John Turner, University of Nebraska
“From Hidden to Revealed in Sethian Revelation, Ritual and Protology”
BURKITT PUBLIC LECTURE, April 15, 7:30-9 p.m.
Kocku van Struckard, University of Groningen
“The Esoteric Quest and Western Culture”
April 16, 8:30 a.m.-5 p.m.
Kelley Coblentz-Bautch, University of St. Edwards
“The Hidden God in the Pseudo-Clementines”
Andrei Orlov, Marquette University
“Adoil Outside the Cosmos: God Before and After Creation in Enochic Traditions”
Bernard McGinn, University of Chicago
“The Hidden God and the Hidden Self in Christian Mysticism”
Claire Fanger, Rice University
"God's Occulted Body: Divine Involucra in Alan of Lille and Bernard Silvestris"
David Porreca, University of Waterloo
"How Hidden is God? Revelation and Pedagogy in Ancient and Medieval Hermetic Writings"
David Cook, Rice University
“The Vision of God in Muslim Dreams”
Jeff Kripal, Rice University
"On the Mothman, UFOs, and Other Monsters: John A. Keel and the Superspectrum of the Occult"
John Stroup, Rice University
"The Multidimensional Physics of History and the Problem of Transtheistic God-Language as Cultural Critique in the Popular and Learned Works of Joseph P. Farrell"
April 17, 8:30 a.m.-3:00 p.m.
Gregory Kaplan, Rice University
"How (Not) to 'Immanentize the Eschaton' and Other Problems for Hans Jonas and Eric Voegelin"
Steven Finley, Louisiana State University
"Hidden Away: Esotericism and Gnosticism in Elijah Muhammad's Nation of Islam"
Anne Klein, Rice University
“The Transcendent, the Mysterious, and the Hidden in Tibet: A Buddhist Logos”
Shira Lander, Rice University
“Scholarship on Ancient Palestinian Helios Mosaics: Hiding the Revealed God”
Marcia Brennan, Rice University
“The Modern Museum and Mystical Houston”
April 18, 8:30-11 a.m.
Jonathan Garb, Hebrew University
"Shamanism and Modern Kabbalah"
Bill Parsons, Rice University
“Contours of an Emerging Psychoanalytic Spirituality: Prospects and Problems”
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