4.5 hour long video of the tour!!

"The authors wisely advise scholars to ignore historical photographs of professors hunched over the Dead Sea Scrolls and Nag Hammadi Codices with cigarettes dangling from their lips or fingers" lol great review, @ctschroeder.bsky.social!

Chance Bonar reports on the 2026 NASSCAL meeting at the University of Virginia. www.nasscal.com/meetings/con...

New release 📚 Afropean Biblical Studies, by Olabisi Obamakin 🌍 In this book, Obamakin constructs a Nigerian/British women’s hermeneutic that reshapes how we read the New Testament, blending feminist, postcolonial, and decolonial approaches. Read more here 🔗 brill.com/display/ti...

This book was my very first acquisition when I started with @fortresspress.bsky.social and, even more importantly, it's an incredible book! Can't wait to see it in the real world. Congratulations @chancebonar.bsky.social!

Agree hard w/ all of this but hasten to add: Publish on your own timeline! And publish only what you want to publish! There are very few perks to being off a tenure clock, but two of them are the privilege to let projects take the time they take and the privilege to “write for the drawer.”

Also, it is scary how teaching is like parenting, in that you have no control over what students will remember!! I asked students to tell me about their most memorable class periods and I totally forgot that we did half this stuff....

Amid grading, I am so grateful to my students for reflecting back to me the power of the classroom. This term felt difficult/chaotic for me/them for lots of diff. reasons. And despite all that, these students are out here asking all these great questions about religion, canon building, and history!

Why read The Pearlsong? •new Eng. tr. of 1 Syriac & 2 Greek texts •at least 13 scripts & 20 languages •a dragon-dosed narcotic magic spell •more about snakes/dragons/serpents •commentary light on allegory and heavy on story •the Guardian of Forever (Star Trek TOS) 1/2

HMML is hiring a "Cataloger, West African Manuscripts," a full-time, benefits-eligible, remote position. Details: https://bit.ly/4njwcgW The Cataloger will participate in HMML's effort to catalog Islamic manuscripts recently digitized in Mali. This is a one-year, grant-funded position. #LibraryJobs

So far oral exams have been a super success! Had a fantastic conversation with a student about what justice for Bathsheba might look like (their own question based on our class!).

Congratulations to @iannelsonmills.bsky.social for receiving the De Gruyter Prize for Biblical Studies and Reception History 2025! His article is now published in #openaccess in our "Journal of the Bible and its Reception". 🔗 www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi...

A student providing one word about ancient Christianity in reflection of our course: Absurd. My work is done.

including @isaactsoon.bsky.social on the Satanic Partridge! muse.jhu.edu/pub/1/articl...

hagiography friends: are saints often referred to as the mother or father of a martyrium?

As the SBL program starts firming up, I'd like to encourage unit chairs to keep track of committee members and accepted presenters who are unable to attend the meeting due to the increased cost. Please consider submitting those numbers to SBL.

Why do we even bother with endnotes--this is my personal pet peeve as a historian, I need to read the spicy, sassy, whiny footnotes immediately

A must read!

Arabic words of the day: jiḏr جذر (pl. ʾajḏār اجذار) '(square) root' murabbaʿ 'square' ḍilʿ ضلع (pl. ʾaḍlāʿ أضلاع) 'side (of a square)' zāwiyah زاوية (pl. zawāyā زوايا) 'angle' saṭḥ سطح 'surface' wa-ḏālika mā ʾaradnā nubayyina وذلك ما اردنا ان نبين 'and this is what we want to demonstrate'

Today in Teaching: I had students find examples of Islamophobia in the news and write about how they see mis-information and racism at work in public discourses. One example is the recent reporting on the recent politicization of the Islamic Academy of Alabama (www.nytimes.com/2026/03/16/u...)

We are excited to share the CFP for the two-day AHRC/BRAID-funded conference, 'Natures in Translation: AI, Ethics and Environmental Conservation', at Lancaster University on October 1-2nd 2026! 🌊🤖🌎🐋 Do share! wp.lancs.ac.uk/animalsintra...

Check out this newly published volume on Ancient Egypt and video games, edited by Jennifer Cromwell. This volume is the first to focus solely on the portrayal of Ancient Egypt in video games. More info at: www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi...

Arabic #WOTD: دمع ج دموع damʕ, pl. dumūʕ "tears" as in anon. Ar. Enc. for Mt Sinai (Sin. ar. 508, f. 6r) ولنا تجديد اخر منجل المسيح صار لنا برحمته الذي هي الدموع والبكا والتوبه "We have another renewal for Christ's sake, which is granted to us through His grace: tears, weeping, and repentance."

Arabic word of the day ناسك /nāsik/ "ascetic, recluse, hermit, devotee" as in PO 16 230.6-7 هذه الناسكة كانت من بلاد الصعيد ابنة ابوين عابدين للمسيح "This ascetic was from Upper Egypt, the daughter of Christ-worshipping parents" ("Upper Egypt" is /ṣaʕīd/, the etymon of "Sahidic")

Arabic #WOTD: لحية liḥya "beard" as in anonym. Ar. Encomium for the Summit of Mt Sinai, quoting Psalm 133:2 (Sin. ar. 513, f. 127r:16): شبه ذلك العطن السايل من الراس وعلى اللحيه لحيه هرون "this is like the oil (?) running down from the head and onto the beard, the beard of Aaron"

This morning I scheduled a meeting for the wrong version of daylight savings. Total face palm moment.

Preparing for a convo on modern retellings of Exodus in my HB class. We are comparing the versions of Zora Neale Hurston, Cecil B. DeMille, Ridley Scott, and Nina Paley. I, for one, am *really* enjoying re-reading Moses Man of the Mountain. Highly recommend to re-visit in this moment in time!!

The Call for Papers for the 2026 Annual Meeting in Denver, CO, has been extended to 11:59PM ET on March 9. Don't miss this chance to engage the global community of biblical scholarship. buff.ly/4hRL28M

CALL FOR PAPERS Friendly reminder that the abstract deadline for this year's York Magic and Witchcraft conference is 14th March 📜 the theme is NATURE AND THE SUPERNATURAL, broadly defined 🌦️🌛🌍 Please send your abstracts to [email protected] ! @drdebsmoretti.bsky.social

*Language Summer School* #ASPIRANTUM is offering intensive #Persian summer courses in #Yerevan from June to August 2026, with flexible 6–10 week options for beginner to upper‑intermediate learners. Applications are now open: aspirantum.com/courses/pers...

Thinking with Ashon Crawley in my intro to religion course today: "Noise ain’t nothin’ but vibration and it is there, all around and in and through us...unending pulse...[I]t is an ethical demand, an ethical statement, about how we might be and think otherwise." lareviewofbooks.org/article/nois...

A new podcast episode with Anna Bonnell Freidin. "Birthing Romans sheds critical light on the diverse ways pregnancy and childbirth were understood, experienced, and managed in ancient Rome during the first three centuries"

I will be giving a lecture titled "Meeting Thekla in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Silk Road" later this month as part of The Silk Roads Lecture Series: People, Objects, and Stories on the Move at SLU's AMES Center. | February 26, 2026 at 3:30-5:00pm CST | Zoom: slu.zoom.us/meeting/regi...

I purchased an Oxford paperback and Every. Single. Entry. of the bibliography is missing ALL or a portion of the last name. Some of the footnote citations are also missing whole chunks of text.

📕 New Release - 'Coptic Studies from Egypt to Los Angeles' This volume, a Festschrift in honor of Hany N. Takla, presents a collection of essays–many of which contain unpublished archival material–showcasing historical and liturgical aspects of Coptic Christianity. 🔗 brill.com/display/ti...

Next Tuesday, at Harvard and on Zoom, is the book launch for the second installment in our 4T series. Fabien Muller and Aaron Johnson will discuss Fabien's new book on Porphyry's /Letter to Anebo/ and /Philosophy from Oracles/. Please join us in-person or online!

I will be giving a lecture titled "Meeting Thekla in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Silk Road" later this month as part of The Silk Roads Lecture Series: People, Objects, and Stories on the Move at SLU's AMES Center. | February 26, 2026 at 3:30-5:00pm CST | Zoom: slu.zoom.us/meeting/regi...

“…universities are becoming more reliant on wealthy benefactors. But the networks that fund research and programs can also entangle top universities with morally compromised figures… complicity and compromised institutional integrity.” www.chronicle.com/article/a-mo...

All welcome to our next research seminar. Elaine Treharne (Stanford) on handwriting, women scribes, digital tools and manuscripts. 10 February 5.30 pm GMT, Laidlaw Library (hybrid). To register: forms.office.com/e/iP5qRb5GSk #medieval #manuscripts #palaeography #digitalhumanities

AJR's forum, "Secondary Scholarship," closes today with a reflection from Religious Studies scholar Elena Dugan, who shares how her journey to and through a private secondary boarding school has made her a "braver, more curious scholar." www.ancientjewreview.com/read/2026/1/...

Saints Outside Hagiography starts next month! A new workshop-style series, discussing work in progress on saints in unusual sources. Come and join us ❤️‍🔥 drive.google.com/file/d/1-BPc...

A student just wrote to follow up about textual criticism after a mini-lecture I gave in my survey of xtianity course. I can. barely. contain. my enthusiasm!! I'm going to take some deep breaths and try my best not to freak them out with my unfiltered joy.

I assigned handwritten reflections as one de-tech my teaching strategies. I provided cheap notebooks and ask students to write a weekly entry. Already so much better than I imagined! I love seeing their handwriting + the quality across the board is far better than my usual digital discussion posts.

Teaching eco-criticism my intro to the bible course today. Excited to talk about one of my all time favorite things: Eduardo Kac's trans-genic installation, "Genesis" (c. 1999-2001). Gen. 1:26-28 translated as genetic code and bacteria writing back! | www.ekac.org/genesis.html

Very pleased to be able to finally announce "The Critical Edition in the Infrastructure of Philology," a special issue of Philological Encounters edited by me and @danielpicus.bsky.social out this Spring.

Beginning my Coptic lecture today with a bit of MLKjr: ⲧ-ⲁⲧ-ⲙⲛⲧ-ϩⲱⲛ ⲉ-ⲡ-ⲉⲧ-ϩⲟⲟⲩ ⲡⲉ ⲟⲩ-ⲙⲟⲩⲣ ⲉϩⲟⲩⲛ ⲉϥ-ⲛⲁⲛⲟⲩϥ ⲉϥ-ϣⲏϣ ⲉ-ⲧ-ⲙⲛⲧ-ϩⲱⲛ ⲉ-ⲡ-ⲉⲧ-ⲛⲁⲛⲟⲩϥ. Martin Luther King Jr., “Love, Law, and Civil Disobedience” (1961) tinyurl.com/5d2sxe8r

coming March 2026! @monikaamsler.bsky.social @universitypress.cambridge.org www.cambridge.org/core/element...

docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F... For anyone interested in learning Austronesian languages spoken in Taiwan, all courses are offered online :)