Henry Imler June 17th, 2008

Ugh, how true that is. Can’t tell you how many times I’ve gone through that. People want a 5 second diddy on what you do, not a 5 minute nuanced explanation of what your field is, followed up by a 3 minute description of where your work is positioned within that field.

Most people don’t get what religious studies is (hint: it’s not theology), let alone how you go about/can take a non-canonical religious text and analyze how it functioned to create and sustain a religious community two thousand years ago. Most people quickly assume that I am a cracked theologian who is trying to elevate the Acts of Thomas to the Bible. That’s understandable given the standard perceptions of what people do with texts, but just frustrating when I constantly have to take more time than the hearer wants to explain what I am doing.

The End.

• Humor , Personal , Religion
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Henry Imler June 16th, 2008

Picked this puppy up at Brendoman.com. The concept: a. Type your answer to each of the questions below into Flickr Search. b. Using only the first page, pick an image. c. Copy and paste each of the URLs for the images into fd’s mosaic maker. - The Questions:

1. What is your first name? Henry
2. What is your favorite food? Brisket
3. What high school did you go to? Versailles High School (Morgan County RII did not pickup anything)
4. What is your favorite color? Orange
5. Who is your celebrity crush? Jason Bateman
6. Favorite drink? Orange Crush
7. Dream vacation? Rome
8. Favorite dessert? Vanilla Ice Cream and Hot Coco Mix
9. What you want to be when you grow up? Professor of Religious Studies
10. What do you love most in life? Family , bio and otherwise
11. One Word to describe you. hhmmm
12. Your flickr name. hundiejo

Image Sources 1. HENRY’S GROCERY, 2. Brisket at Memphis Minnie’s, 3. Versailles High School Basketball, 4. Orange thrift, 5. Arrest me, Jason Bateman!, 6. Orange Crush Coffee Shop, 7. St. Peters - Rome, 8. Chocolate ice cream, 9. Mircea Eliade - Romanian Writer, 10. The Finger Family, 11. Hhmmm…….., 12. Honzo

• Humor , Personal
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Henry Imler June 10th, 2008

From Destin Trip (…

From Destin Trip (…

From Destin Trip (…

Meredith and I are down in Destin, Florida on vacation.  We came down here with 8 other good friends from our church.  We rented a 15 passenger van and drove hard through the night.  It was exhausting and it took a day and a half to recover from (I can’t sleep in a van) the sleep deprivation, but now that we are here and a hang’in it is pretty awesome and I am really enjoying the company.

Wanna give a shout-out to the organization the girls did behind the scenes which has allowed the trip to proceed smoothly and to the drivers that safely transported us the 700 miles down here.

Only bummer?  I have three more chapters of German and some thesis work to do this week - and I don’t really have the motivation to do it.

From Destin Trip (…

* I know the title is horrible, but that is what I am going for.

• Personal
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Henry Imler May 28th, 2008

As a religious studies master’s student at MU, I get two years of funding.  I teach two discussion sections per semester and in return, I get a tuition waiver and a very modest stipend.  For this, I am very grateful.  Due to a variety of factors, both personal and professional, I am taking three years to finish my degree.  Not only does it allow for a better marriage and home life, but it allows me to catch up on languages and background knowledge that I lacked because I came into my field late (middle of my second semester in grad school compared to first day of  class my sophomore year in undergrad).  While technically I could be done with my thesis early in the upcoming fall semester, extending into the spring and defending early in the spring would allow for a smoother defense and allow me to pick up reading French.

Give the above, I was faced with my last year without funding.  After talking with the administration, they were able to get me funding for second semester next year (when I did not really need it) but not for the fall when I really needed it.  I had a chance to get full funding because an opening popped up, but the program had to offer the spot to someone that had did not have funding their first year, a fair decision.  Still, I counted it as a blessing.

During all of this, I had been asking my family and church to pray that something would come up.  Yesterday, after having lunch with Meredith I checked my email.  Apparently, enrollment in religious studies classes has skyrocketed and the administration saw fit to fund more teaching assistant spots. They offered me four sections instead of two, which means double the work and therefore double the pay.

God came through, and actually doubled what I and others were asking for.  For this, I praise her!  Some people may chalk this up to circumstance, luck, and my track record at the school.  No doubt that some of that played a factor here, but I see a lot of these coincidences happening around my involvement in this program, coincidences that seem a little too uncanny for my taste.  I reckon that God was involved somehow.  There is no indisputable proof that He was, but there is proof (as in evidence) that He was.

• Christianity , Personal
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Henry Imler March 31st, 2008

Meredith and I have recently made good friends with a few couples at our new church. They, like us, are board game freaks. God is good indeed (it is so good to find a welcoming Christian community! I could go on about this for hours, but this post is focused on board games). They have introduced us to several board games. The cool thing is that all of these people are very capable and very competitive!We introduced the group to some of our of our favorites: Sequence and Ticket to Ride (although I think some of them had either heard of or played TtR before, but I forget).

Bohnanza:

I can’t really begin to describe this one. A surprisingly fun and interactive card game about growing beans. I know, sounds absolutely boring, right? I was thinking the same thing. The only thing that got me to play this game was the fact that four of my friends insisted it was a blast. And indeed it was.

It is one of those quirky German games. I can’t quite explain it, but if you know anyone that has it, try it out and then drop $16 over at Amazon and spread the word.

Scotland Yard Detective Game

If Bohnanza was a relaxing and fun time with friends, Scotland Yard is a weekend trip down to your parents to help clear brush. Sure it is fun, rewarding, and at the end of the day you feel as through you have accomplished something worthwhile, but man of man does this game ever drain you emotionally and mentally.

The object of the game is to either hide from the cops as the mysterious Mr(s). X or catch the dirty rotten scoundrel! It is 1 against 3-5 as the players take turns moving about the city on taxies, tubes, or buses. Every 4-6 turns Mr. X surfaces and the chase begins anew. A lot of thought and deliberation goes into this game and if you are dead set on winning the stress piles onto you as it did me. They finally caught up with me after 19 out of 24 turns. You can grab this bad-boy used on Amazon, but I just snatched up the $12 copy.I wanna grab Ticket to Ride Europe, but I don’t want to drop 40 or so bucks on a new copy. Perhaps we’ll do that next month.

• Personal
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Henry Imler March 31st, 2008

I, like a lot of the Christian side of the blogosphere, have taken more than a fleeting interest in the Enns/Westminster controversy. Westminster Theological Seminary has suspended Professor Peter Enns effective at the end of this school year and will take steps to terminate his employment because of a book he wrote back in 2005 entitled Inspiration and Incarnation (review), which calls into question more conservative models of scripture while remaining wholly “[apologetic] and assum[ing] an evangelical faith in scripture from the outset.”

Christianity Today has a write up on the suspension :Westminster Theological Seminary Suspends Peter Enns.

To say on top of what people are saying about this situation, check out Google’s Blogsearch and Technorati’s watchlist.

For a run down of what the hub-ub is all about, check out Kingdom People :: The Peter Enns Controversy:

1. Enns has been criticized for emphasizing the human nature of Scripture over against the divine.
2. Enns has written that the first chapters of Genesis are firmly grounded in ancient myth, which he defines as “an ancient, premodern, prescientific way of addressing questions of ultimate origins in the form of stories.”
3. Enns claims that Scripture is inspired and inerrant, however the way he describes Scripture seems to counter that belief.
4. Enns does not seek to harmonize seemingly-contradictory parts of Scripture because he believes the diversity of Scripture is complementary.
5. Enns rejects the idea of objective unbiased historiography.

Here is an exchange between Paul Helm and Enns about Helm’s review of Enns’ book.

• Inspiration and Incarnation: Evangelicals and the Problem of the Old Testament by Peter Enns Review by Paul Helm
• A Response to Paul Helm’s Review of Inspiration and Incarnation
• Analysis Extra: ‘Inspiration and Incarnation’ one more time

Here is an interesting (and instructive) review of Helm’s review by Cdero’s Weblog entitled Bible Monopoly. Here are the central tenets of Bible Monopoly:

* An unwillingness to deal with the plural complexity of interpretation
* A failure to wrestle with the difficult matters of Biblical scholarship
* A failure to see the provisional nature of scripture
* An obsession with turning honest interaction with extra Biblical data into an evil foe of orthodoxy
* A tendency to use past theologians (the one’s they agree with) as the standard of Biblical interpretation

What do you think about the suspension? I know we have bloggers and readers that range from each end of the conservative to liberal spectrum when it comes to the verbal inspiration of scripture.

IMHO I don’t think that he should have been suspended at all, but then again, I tend to lean towards academic freedom and exploratory hypothetical theology which is left up to the students and readers to discern. I have not been in a position of power where Jesus’ words about causing one of these to stumble really apply as it would as being dean of a seminary. However, our view of scripture is not without its problems and it sounds like Enns has taken an honest and subtle look at the problem… and he is punished for it. Now, it is highly likely that this controversy will only boost his employability and sales of his book (my copy is on its way right now), but he now has to move his family, tear up his roots in a community, and evangelicals get a black eye from our own hand.

All of this reminds me about the unnecessary perils of venturing into the academic realm of evangelicalism. I want to be an evangelical scholar. We, as a community, are in desperate need of good scholarship if we are to both remain relevant and respected (listened to). But, if I teach or even consider that which is out of line, I am out of a job and perhaps blacklisted amongst the communities I wish/am called to serve. All of a sudden teaching at a small liberal arts college does not seem all that bad.

• Personal , Philosophy , Religion
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Henry Imler March 30th, 2008

I needs some help something fierce. My meager music collection has gotten stale - any recommendations?

• Media , Personal , X of the Day
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Henry Imler March 18th, 2008

A comment by Hank on The Way I need Jesus got me thinking. Is there such a thing as a “biblical notion of husband and wife?” What notion are we talking about? Pre-Israel marriage? We gonna pattern it after the marriages in Genesis? Ancient Israel? 2nd Kings? Isn’t that what got us good US citizens up in arms against the Mormons a hundred or so years ago (poly-what?)? Are we gonna talk about the Jewish ideas of what marriage is in the time of Jesus? Are we gonna talk about marriage as it was practiced by the Romans (i.e. baby factories = wives)? Are we going to talk about those writing in the name of Paul when they are giving advice on how to be a couple of equality under the yoke of the empire?

The more I look at actual marriages in the Bible the less I am enamored with the monolithic notion of the so-called “biblical notion of husband and wife.” We need to realize that marriages in our Holy Scriptures are described (not prescribed) in different structures with different power realationships between the parties involved.

We see in the myth of Genesis 3 the consequences of the fall in marriages - women and men will try to dominate each other. This arragement (both women looking to dominate their husbands and husband dominating their wives) is unnatural; God teaches us this in Genesis and He confirms it in the writings of Paul.

It gives me great pleasure to see people attempt to justify our culture’s (or rather the 1950’s) version of marriage where one party dominates the other.

With the coming of the Kingdom of God, we must work to restore the equality inherent in the “two becoming one flesh” by means of our practice and our teachings. What we need to do is rediscover the the pre-fall power relations between husband and wife and make those relations real in our lives. It is up to us to enact the Kingdom of God on Earth - now.

• Personal , Religion
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Henry Imler March 14th, 2008

Scored another desk today.

There is one guy left to prank and I know what I would like to do to his desk. He is an American with Irish heritage - the kind that never lets you forget that he has Irish heritage and freaks out if you conflate Ireland and Scotland… so I am thinking of putting a lot of Scottish themed things labeled as Irish things on his desk However, he won’t shut up about how he is going to get be back soooo bad that it will take most of the day to put everything back together. Two things I wanna say here. First, everything I have done would take a person about 10 minutes to fix (or I waited around and helped them get the stuff back together quickly), so I don’t think he gets this manner of etiquette and that is frustrating. Secondly, while I have something in the initial stages, I might just not do anything. That would be funny because he could never have his revenge that he keeps talking about.

• Humor , Personal
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Henry Imler March 12th, 2008

You can tell I am intelectually (and mentally, and physically) exausted when I only post quizzes and memes:

1. What translation of the Bible do you like best?
Depends on what I am doing. For personal use, I like the NLT because I am a vernacularist. When it comes to indepth academic study, I go with the NRSV and the NASB.

2. Old or New Testament?
While the correct answer is both, in reality, I go with the New Testament. I am a Christian and not a pre-rabbinic Jew, so the NT gets the nod when I am asked.

3. Favorite Book of the Bible?
Romans, hands down… and Genesis and John.

4. Favorite Chapter?
John 3

5. Favorite Verse?
Romans 8:1

6. Bible character you think you’re most like?
Depends on who you ask - I am sure some ’round here and other parts would liken me to those pesky prophets of Baal. But, self identification? Lamech, because when I have lived 182 years I want to become the father of a tike named Noah. That, or I am skirting the question because I don’t like throwing myself onto those people.

7. One thing from the Bible that confuses you?
Paul and the Law - What gives?

8. Moses or Paul?
Paul, all the way.

9. A teaching from the Bible that you struggle with or don’t get?
The stuff that the people writing in Paul’s name tell women to do.

10. Coolest name in the Bible?
Not in the Bible, but the coolest renaming of anyone in the Bible is God himself, when certain Gnostics equate the OT God with the demiurge and name him Yaldabaoth. I know he becomes the evil creator of matter and is holding all of us back and that we need to gets that knowledge, but I still want to name one of my children after him.

• Personal , Religion
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