“I, brethren, when I came to you, came not with excellency of speech or of wisdom.” When I first read those words from St. Paul, they inoculated me against certain kinds of inquiry. St. Paul must not have been an orator the way we think of orators, because he didn’t rely on eloquence when he spoke. His education, therefore, must have been irrelevant to his epistles. And certainly we won’t learn anything by attending to the rhetorical form when we take on his writings. But here’s some good news for you, listeners: Ben Witherington and Jason Myers are here to get those ideas off the table. The second edition of their book New Testament Rhetoric demonstrates that not only Paul but all sorts of New Testament writers exhibit familiarity with and formation through ancient canons of rhetoric, and Christian Humanist Profiles is glad to welcome them to the show.
Charles Hackney interviews Mark McMinn about his recent book "The Science of Virtue."
Michial Farmer interviews Stephen J. Lind about his recent book "A Charlie Brown Religion."
Nathan Gilmour interviews Walter Brueggemann about his 2014 book "Ice Axes for Frozen Seas."