It did this for hours! All down by the end of the day.

And did I mention these were first-year students?!? They've been real champs this semester with such interesting but difficult material beyond just reading the Hebrew Bible--Atrahasis, Ludlul bel Nemeqi, Homer, Hesiod, Plato's Republic, Laws, Timaeus, and, soon, The Secret Book according to John.

Next, we'll be reading @lianemfeldman.bsky.social translation of P's primeval history and exploring its relationship to J and to the Timaeus. I suspect students will see a much stronger relationship with Timaeus, but who knows!

One takeaway in the first of these two days of class on Gen 2-3 is that it sits very neatly in between Atrahasis and Timaeus. The students are seeing the longue durée of divine goodness/morality, which is the focus of our course.

Most think J's primeval history is closer in thought to Atrahasis, as do I, but my students arguing for a closer relationship to Timaeus are making really thoughtful arguments, especially connecting divine boundary crossing and 41c (contra 29e) and moral formation in 42b-d.

@maklelan.bsky.social coming in clutch once again with a video for me to add to my slides for the day we review 1 Enoch to explore the evolving attitude of the origins of evil in the biblical and post-biblical tradition.

The whole thread in one tweet!

I've printed it out and will reply as soon as I get it read!

So, um, www.nytimes.com/2025/09/11/o...

By his logic, the 1918-20 Great Influenza epidemic isn't over.

I reread Amusing Ourselves to Death because of this tweet, and then started thinking about a 21st century equivalent...Scrolling Ourselves to Death. I looked it up on Amazon and, sure enough, Evangelicals with the Gospel Coalition have coopted Postman's title to promote the gospel. 🤦‍♂️

I'm pretty sure this is a desk reject!

Very happy and willing to be said representative!

Love the story and how chance encounters can lead us down productive paths! BTW, let's plan to talk about those poisonous mushrooms in November! (Wink)

I teach an Ed Tech course as part of my day job. We mostly critique ed tech and learn media literacy pedagogies, but when we do cover teaching with technology, our book makes this same point about engagement and lists three concrete practices that count as engagement in her teaching framework.

This is really exciting! Just FYI, I'm not yet showing the free access to the PDF. I think @vox-magica.bsky.social element did the same thing a few weeks ago, was supposed to be available but the download link wasn't immediately available.

I'll keep my eyes peeled for this. Very happy to see this framed as a study of allusion!