The latest email from Ben Witherington III has been added to beliefnet's Scholarly Smackdown on Jesus and Paul conducted between Elaine Pagels and Ben Witherington III. This time the order is reversed and Ben Witherington contributes first:
Scholarly Smackdown Round 3: Ben Witherington III
His topic is Gnosticism and the canon. Was there any fully-fledged Gnosticism in the first century? Witherington says no. There's one useful bit of bibliography, something I had missed: Craig Evans, "Thomas, Gospel of" in R. P. Martin and P. H. Davids (eds.), Dictionary of the Later New Testament and its Development (Downers Grove: Inter Varsity Press, 1997): 1176.
I'm still not sure if this format is conducive to really decent critical engagement. The problem I mentioned before is exacerbated by reversing the order of engagement in this round so that here Witherington if effectively starting afresh. There's not enough actual conversation here.
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