“Welcome back, my friends, to the show that never ends!” — Karn Evil 9

Yes, once again the carnival is in town. This time, however, the town in question is Klaipeda, Lithuania. Let’s head down to the midway and see what delights came our way in the biblioblogosphere during the month of April.

Our first act brings us the best entry of the month,1 Tyler F. Williams’s post on the King David Seal uncovered in the excavations of Jerusalem. A master work of humor and Photoshop legerdemain, the post apparently even fooled some people. P.T. Barnum was right . . .

In a sideshow, we have some archaeology and Ugaritica to entertain you. Several different people have blogged about Larry Stager’s statement on unprovenanced artifacts, including PaleoJudaica’s Jim Davila and Duane Smith at Abnormal Interests. And for those of you who can’t get enough historical toponyms (you know who you are), Duane also has an entry on Ashdod in the Ugaritic texts.

In the center ring, we have some Old Testament bloggings. Jim West has an interview with Giovanni Garbini. It is in Italian, but he promises to have a translation soon. 2 On Abnormal Interest, guest blogger Loren Fisher has an interesting piece on the conquests of David and Sinuhe.3 And while we are talking about David and Goliath, Chris Heard at Higgaion gives us a review of Azzan Yadin’s understanding of that story.

Next up, please direct your attention to the New Testament. Clifford Kvidahl at Theological Musings has a piece on NT textual criticism, while Prove All Things regales us with a discussion of Greek pronunciation systems. If you are interested in the gospels, the Busybody4 tries to get out of paying his taxes with a series that examines Jesus’ teachings on rendering to Caesar. On Christian Origins, Peter Kirby asks whether the gospels had any historical intent. And to round out our three ring circus, Andras Kostenberger at Biblical Foundations examines the phrase “saved by childbearing” in 1 Timothy 2:15, with a response from Ben Witherington.

In the area of early Christian literature, Rick Brannan of Ricoblog fame has a piece on the Didache. And if we place the quotation marks around the word “Christian,” we can include in this category Phil Harland’s take on the Gospel of Judas.5

As a final bit of entertainment, we have some blogs that are uncategorical — or at least I couldn’t figure out where to place them. Lingamish brings us a post on when and if “they” is grammatically correct, Aman Yala blogs about homosexuality and the Bible, and Stingray discusses God’s love for us. And if centrist Canadian politics is your fetish, be sure to wander over to Centrerion for a post about the Bible and freedom.

As for me, my contribution to this carnival is a proposal I submitted to the biblioblogging community about the need for a good on-line Bible dictionary. I would love to get some feedback on this. I think it could be a useful teaching tool for all of us. Also, please let me know if you would like to contribute to this project.

Well, the cotton candy is sold out, the elephants have been put to bed, and the barkers have ripped off their last mark. And so we bid farewell to the carnival. But don’t worry, it will be back next month, when your host will be Benjamin Myers on Faith and Theology. Keep a look out for his call for submission.


  1. As chosen by me, your friendly master of ceremonies. [back]
  2. Jim, let me know if you have that translation up. [back]
  3. For those unfamiliar with Sinuhe, it is an Egyptian text from the Middle Kingdom that tells the story of a man who flees from Egypt and lives in Canaan for a while. [back]
  4. A.k.a., Loren Rosson III. [back]
  5. Please note that “Christian” is placed in quotes to indicate that the Gospel of Judas is not quite Christian literature. It is not intended to question the faith of Phil Harland, whom I have never met but I assume is a wonderful guy. [back]
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