Rated 5 out of
5
by
DC1234 from
Great Course
I looked forward everyday to a different lecture and learning more about the New Testament. The professor was very engaging, knowledgeable and presented the material in a very clear,concise way. The material was very rich and increased my understanding of the Bible.
Date published: 2020-02-12
Rated 4 out of
5
by
jsb1918 from
I found this course very interesting. Most important is the fact that I learned a great deal. I happy I took the course.
Date published: 2020-01-11
Rated 1 out of
5
by
Mark A from
Horrible intructor ! Seems unsure of material he put together. I don't like his approach to the subject matter from beginning to end. I'm looking to send it back.
Date published: 2020-01-04
Rated 5 out of
5
by
Palm367 from
A great course for understanding the New Testament
I found this course informative and certainly NOT preachy. I wanted to understand the New Testament from a historical perspective, and this course was perfect for that. I appreciated that Professor Ehrman approached this from a scholarly perspective rather than one of a course in religion.
Date published: 2019-12-29
Rated 5 out of
5
by
Karl W from
Excellent Treatment of a Hot-Button Subject
Lecture series on aspects of Christianity seem to remain very popular -- and controversial. Between the Scylla of modern skepticism and the Charybdis of those insisting on Biblical literalism and inerrancy, it must be hard to negotiate a scholarly course. I was skeptical, when I purchased this, whether I would actually find it meaningful to me or not. It turned out that I did. Parts of it were repetition for me (though if you've never taken any scholarly course on Christianity, it's all apt to be new material to you). Other parts I found novel and informative, even though I've read the Bible and taken several other courses on the New Testment and Christianity over the years. In fact, parts of this course are probably the most illuminating discussions I've listened to on the "New Testament". I found his analysis of Paul's ethics and theology particularly insightful. Without discussing his own personal beliefs, I think Professor Ehrman does an excellent job here of presenting what the authors of the books of the New Testament themselves believed, the cultural background to which they addressed their accounts, as well as how modern scholars have worked to trace out the dates and authorship of the various books. I haven't quite finished this whole series, but the 80% I have completed was already well worth the effort for me.
Date published: 2019-08-19
Rated 5 out of
5
by
MarleneZ from
The New Testament
I bought this course to study along with the Education for Ministry course that I mentor and it has helped me add to the information I get from the EfM course. This is the second course I used from The Great Courses. The other was the Old Testament. Both are helpful in my studies.
Date published: 2019-08-07
Rated 4 out of
5
by
DocS9788 from
Well Done Video Lectures - Great SALE Price!!!
I enjoyed the thoroughness of the professor in the presentations. I binge watched all 24 lectures.
Date published: 2019-08-06
Rated 4 out of
5
by
Chino from
Excellent professor but miss closed captions
Even though I have not finished it yet, I think it is a great course, very well explained. Proffesor is excellent making you to understand the context and explaining very well everything related. It could be improved adding closed captions or subtitles to the course.
Date published: 2019-07-05
Rated 1 out of
5
by
Greg55 from
Total waste of money!
I have over fifty Great Courses videos and this is I believe my first review. If I could give this course less than one star I would. You can learn more from a Chick Publications cartoon tract than from this course. Don't waste your money.
Date published: 2019-05-13
Rated 3 out of
5
by
157650564161 from
New Testament
I need close caption on and this does not have CC. I have returned the course back for my credit.
Date published: 2019-05-06
Rated 5 out of
5
by
Anita Loos from
Love Bart Ehrman! Getting a whole new historical perspective on the New Testament.
Date published: 2019-03-24
Rated 3 out of
5
by
Heinie from
Ok
I bought this to better understand the overall development of the New Testament. It did that, but in considerably more time and effort than was necessary
Date published: 2019-03-22
Rated 5 out of
5
by
Wantonoit from
Compelling and engaging
I found the lecturer to be knowledgeable, objective, and engaging. He held my interest thoughout the lectures.
Date published: 2019-03-19
Rated 5 out of
5
by
MHarland from
New Testament
I just got started on the course over the recent weekend. I am very happy up to this point and haven't really gotten that far into it. The instructor is laying a good background.
Date published: 2019-02-20
Rated 5 out of
5
by
Threese from
Awesome Course
I am finding the New Testament course fascinating. The instructor is an excellent teacher. Glad I decided to try the course.
Date published: 2019-02-17
Rated 1 out of
5
by
Patsy1 from
It’s a course that is suitable for someone who has no knowledge of the Bible but not good enough for those of us who are wanting a more in-depth course. Very disappointed
Date published: 2019-02-16
Rated 1 out of
5
by
NevSong from
Disappointed & misled
As a Bible college graduate many years ago and a person in full time ministry, I was excited for a refresher overview of the New Testament from a historical, contextual and maybe fresh viewpoint. I am open to new ideas and love learning. But I did not expect this course to actually be trying to discredit the accuracy and foundation of the Bible and who Jesus was. This is not evident or implied in the description of the course nor in Professor in Ehrman’s bio. I feel it was misleading. It caused me to look up some debates between Ehrman and other Biblical scholars, and some articles that debunk some of his theories, and many things he presents as facts that are unknown or contrary to what many other Biblical scholars have found to be true. I think you should be clear in your description of the course that Prof Ehrman is agnostic and does not believe in the God of the Bible that he is teaching about. Thank you.
Date published: 2019-02-15
Rated 4 out of
5
by
ESmith from
Full of great information
This added considerably to my understanding of the culture, society and information in the New Testament
Date published: 2019-02-15
Rated 4 out of
5
by
Judith123 from
Great content, learned much.
The content was presented in such a way that it was easy to remember. Was kind of disappointed because the lecturer's voice was hard to understand. I suffer from insomnia, so i would listen to it when i went to bed and it would put me to sleep quickly.
Date published: 2019-02-14
Rated 5 out of
5
by
Dee80 from
Very well presented by Bart Ehrman.
My husband and I are very much enjoying Ehrman lectures andthey certainly are springboards for discussion!
Date published: 2019-02-12
Rated 1 out of
5
by
Roger Williams from
Really bad
Painful. The pace is agonizingly slow. In each thirty-minute lecture one gets ten minutes of material and twenty minutes of fluff and repetition.
Date published: 2019-02-09
Rated 5 out of
5
by
prupertohio from
Excellent presentation
I have only watch about half of the series but it is very good. Great presentation.
Date published: 2019-02-07
Rated 4 out of
5
by
Stas from
Learning a lot of interesting information. Not sure I agree with it all but that's okay in academia.
Date published: 2019-02-02
Rated 5 out of
5
by
Molt from
Best answers to questions on sources
Has answers to many questions on fact and most questions on sources
Date published: 2019-01-31
Rated 5 out of
5
by
ktriebol from
Historical Aspect of New Testament
This lecture focuses more on the historical aspect of the New Testament rather than the religious one. That is what separates this lecture from most of the others. I feel the lecture is presented in an unbiased, matter-of-fact style by a knowledgeable professor. Well done.
Date published: 2019-01-29
Rated 1 out of
5
by
mmkeen from
Problem: I asked for this course for Christmas. I wanted CDs to play in my car and my Walkman, and to save my family money, we thought we could dowmload the course and then burn it ti blank CDs. It did not work! I don't own an MPs gadget & therefore have not been able to start The New Testament course. My family is out the cost. Ouch!
Date published: 2019-01-26
Rated 2 out of
5
by
No nickname 1 from
Not happy
Received a brochure that stated I could use the discount code up to 5 times. The second time I tried to use it it was declined.
Date published: 2019-01-24
Rated 5 out of
5
by
GermanHistoryFan from
Making the New Testament New Again
This course by Bart Ehrman is a scholarly challenge to those who believe in the literal inerrancy of Scripture. I said the same thing about Professor Amy-Jill Levine’s Old Testament course, but this one will affect evangelical Christians even more profoundly if they listen to it.
The Gospels, for example, are not the reliable record we would like. They were not written by eyewitnesses to the life of Jesus, son of Joseph. Instead they are collections of stories that circulated by word of mouth for a generation after the Crucifixion and were written down only after several decades. As we all know from the old telephone game, such stories will often change with each retelling. This is not to say that all the stories are untrue, but that we should be on guard against accepting them as literally true--as gospel--without asking hard questions. Furthermore, we should avoid the typical Christian interpretation that sort of mashes all four gospels together as parts of the same story and instead read each for the author’s distinct message. “Mark”—we don’t have the real name of any gospel writer—presents Jesus as a messiah who suffered rather than triumphed according Jewish expectations, while his contemporaries, including the disciples, could not understand who He was. “Matthew” stresses the Jewishness of Jesus and His mission, beginning with a genealogy that connected Him to Abraham, despite the opposition of evil Jewish scribes and Pharisees. “Luke” portrays Jesus as the savior of all mankind, not just Jews, with a genealogy connecting him to Adam. His version of the Sermon on the Mount has a stronger social message than Matthew’s. Unfortunately, Jews reject Jesus even as a boy when He speaks at the synagogue and they are already plotting to kill Him. The Gospel of “John” lacks most of the stories in the other three gospels while containing its own, especially the famous miracles of turning water into wine and raising Lazarus from the dead. While in Mark Jesus asks others to keep His miracles secret, here He uses them to prove His messiahship. Then there are other gospels that didn’t make it into the canon of the early church, which is fortunate; they were even more anti-Jewish than the ones that did.
The oldest written sources for Christianity are the letters of Paul, but which ones did he really write? Scholars generally agree that he was responsible for 1 Corinthians, Romans, and Galatians, while he probably did not write Hebrews, Ephesians, Timothy and Titus. Others are debatable. Forgery was a serious problem in the ancient world, because a little-known author was easily tempted to ascribe his work to a well-known author, either to get more money or to make sure his ideas reached a wide audience.
The last lecture is the most troubling of all, because it describes the many problems with our sources. We don’t have the original texts or even copies of the texts. We have copies of copies of copies of copies, etc., and as with each retelling of stories by word of mouth, there were mistakes and changes with each copying. While many of them were easily recognizable misspellings, others were deliberate alterations by copyists who wanted the text to agree with the facts as stated elsewhere in the Bible or to reflect proper church doctrine. In the Gospel of John some twelfth-century copyist inserted an entire story—the famous one about Jesus refusing to condone the stoning of an adulterous woman, which likely never happened at all. This is a disappointment to all Christians who like the way the story illustrates the superiority of mercy over the harsh letter of the law.
Since there is almost no information about the historical Jesus and his early followers outside of the New Testament, one might easily despair over whether we can know anything about them, but Ehrman offers some comfort here. We can more readily trust New Testament stories where different accounts agree without being based on each other, where they fit the context of the times, and where they go against the witness’s own interest. As an example of the last point, Ehrman cites accounts that have Jesus growing up in Nazareth. In that time Nazareth was a tiny village with no religious significance; it wasn’t Jerusalem or Bethlehem, the childhood home of King David. Jesus therefore really did grow up there; in addition, he was probably born there. We can accept that Jesus really was crucified by Pontius Pilate, because the fact that He died as a criminal enemy of the Roman Empire would have been embarrassing to early Christians seeking converts among the Greeks and Romans. The same point explains why Christians were eager to shove blame onto “the” Jews. In Ehrman’s view, there really was a Jesus who provoked Pontius Pilate by preaching to fellow Jews a message of a coming apocalypse; like John the Baptist He warned that God was coming soon to judge the world, destroy the wicked, and set up a kingdom on Earth. Those who wanted the judgment to go in their favor should engage in good deeds and thoughts while avoiding bad deeds and thoughts. To Roman ears in Jerusalem during the Passover it sounded like a call to rebellion. Hence the crucifixion.
To sum up, this course is fascinating. It analyzes the New Testament closely while challenging your beliefs, if you received a Christian upbringing. The next time you read the New Testament, you will find yourself reading it more carefully. I can’t offer any opinion about what the course looks like on video, since I listened to it on CD, but Ehrman’s lectures are all crisp and clear.
Date published: 2019-01-24
Rated 4 out of
5
by
Issie from
New Testament professor is great,and knowledgeable
I am only on lecture 7 but i am learning new information and enjoying every lecture so far. I haven't started the Old Testament yet. I am using my iPad. The pause and rewind/forward are not user friendly. I opted for the download feature.
Date published: 2019-01-22
Rated 1 out of
5
by
shmcj from
Personal view. I was not able to get through most of the New Testament Study... out dated, and the instructor's view was not one I could get behind...
Date published: 2019-01-22
