thinktoomuch.net

You may have noticed I’ve started looking into podcasts. One of the podcasts I’ve been most eager to listen to, for a while already, was Philip Harland’s. He has a blog titled Religions of the Ancient Mediterranean. He teaches in both the Religious Studies and Ancient History programs at York University in Toronto (Canada), and specialised in early Christianity for his Ph.D.

I discovered his blog when I was searching for some more info on what I’d heard at the “Ron Martoia seminar”: the early Christians were accused of atheism. And then I discovered his podcasts. He started podcasting last year, with his first series dealing with “Paul and his communities”. It contains twelve episodes. He started his second series in February, titled “Early Christian Portraits of Jesus”.

Being a proud new owner of a Cowon D2, I listened to his first episode while going up and down Blackcomb Mountain — during the times that I was alone. (No worries, I’m not too geeky: once I was done with that episode, I did the last few aggressive runs of the day with Fort Minor, rather than climbing into episode 2.)

Philip takes a historical approach, not a theological one. See Podcast 1.1: Paul in his own words for the first episode, as well as a link to the feed. While I cannot vouch for the series yet, having only listened to the first episode (and by now, a part of the second), I do find Philip’s stuff very informative. After all, he’s an expert in the field. I just have a couple of minor niggles, and a skeptical, critical thinking attitude that I carry into just about everything. I have a couple of niggles that I hope won’t show up too often in the rest of his podcasts, and a couple of questions and uncertainties that I’ll just have to live with or accept on his authority, because I’m not going to make a study of this.

The first episode sketched out some biographical details of who Paul was, based on his letters, and pointed out how little contact Paul had with the main leaders of the Jesus movement in Jerusalem. Only after three years, did he go visit Peter in Jerusalem, and only for fifteen days. He claimed the authority of his teachings based on his Damascus vision. I wonder how much he learned about the teachings of the Jesus movement during the years prior, when he was still persecuting the movement.

I love how Philip pronounces “about”. Is that unique, or is it common to a particular group of people?