The Formations of Canons

I gave a full-on lecture, by my classes' request, to my freshmen today that began with Moses' writing down the law in Deuteronomy 32 and finished with the publication of the Harper-Collins Study Bible. They wanted to know how the Bible became the Bible, so I gave them the full treatment. Thirty-five hundred years of history in forty minutes? No problem!

I did get to emphasize to them the organic side of canon formation, how Christians and Jews were using these texts in synagogues and churches well before the dudes with beards wrote down the lists. I also got to cover the differences between the Rabbinic, Orthodox, Catholic, and Protestant canons and the historical events surrounding those differences.

In other words, I got to play church historian/biblical scholar today in my English class, and it was quite a bit of fun.

The papers are now all outlined, and I've written significant chunks of two of the three. Barring disaster, I should have the two due on May 7 in with little problem and dust off the last one's revisions by the 9th or so. I'm going to make it.

In computer matters, I've been reading up on Linux and am considering switching my laptop over to Debian once the semester ends. I've gotten proficient enough with Open Office that I don't necessarily need Word any more, and other than that, there's really not any proprietary Microsoft programs that I use that much; the rest of what I actually use ought to work. If what I've read is true (and I've read it in several places), I'll be a Linux man for life once I make the switch.