Aug 02
Bad project
There’s been a lot of reaction around the blogs to the announcement of the Jesus Project. In particular various people have been noting the number of scholars whose names have been taken in vain, it seems, as supposed fellows of the project. There are good posts from Chris Heard, Jim West and James McGrath among others that point to a layer of at best optimistic confusion about the project’s supporters, and at worst downright deception.
Among the listed fellows April DeConick is somewhat baffled but charitable about how she came to be listed, James Tabor professes himself mystified about the inclusion of his name, according to Chris Zeichman John Kloppenborg has expressed surprise at the inclusion of his name, and according to Mark Goodacre, quoted by Jim West in the above referenced post, Richard Bauckham denies having anything to do with it.
This is, to say the least, hardly an auspicious launch for the project, which claims to be the work of the rather self-importantly named Committee for the Scientific Examination of Religion. This in turn is a branch of the Center for Inquiry, which describes itself as ”A Global Federation Committed to Science, Reason, Free Inquiry, Secularism, and Planetary Ethics.” In fact, its raison d’être is “If the naturalistic outlook is to supplant the ancient mythological narratives of the past, it needs a new institution devoted to its articulation and dramatization to the public. The Center for Inquiry is that institution.”
All this suggests that far from a free (and honest!) enquiry into the historicity of Jesus, which in most academic history of the first century hardly needs arguing for, this project is actually an attempt at “dramatization for the public” (i.e. self-seeking publicity). Perhaps, if they want to be taken seriously as arbiters of history, they should learn how to tell the truth about the present first, and not create a myth of widespread support from eyewitnesses who are around to deny their involvement.
August 2nd, 2007 at 7:24 pm
Brilliant.
August 2nd, 2007 at 11:39 pm
This reminds me of the man who was trying to sell title deeds to plots of land on the Moon or something like that. One of his marketing ploys was that President Bush had acquired one of his plots. So he had - in that the guy marketing them had sent him, unsolicited, a title deed.
January 27th, 2008 at 8:30 pm
[...] informs the scholars associated with the Jesus seminar, and the Jesus Project (as proposed and scorned here and elsewhere last year). The desire to diesembody Jesus from his context and history seems to me [...]
August 27th, 2008 at 10:38 pm
[...] he is able to quote is Robert Price of the “Center for Inquiry Institute” which is overt about its anti-religious ideological bias. Readers may remember them from the dispute about their truthfulness last year over the launch of [...]