Saturday, July 29, 2006

Back from SNTS

Just got back from Aberdeen and had a top time at SNTS, with both people and papers. I also caught up with some old friends like Michael Lattke and many of the Aberdeen Ph.D canidates like Preston, Roh, Ozzy and Joey who always warm my heart when I share their company. It was a job well done by Francis Watson and the divinity faculty in organizing the event and it all went well (even when the police had to get involved!).

Forgive the endemic 'name dropping' but I met some good people. At a dinner I had the pleasure of sitting between Jimmy Dunn and Marianne Thompson which was great - Christianity in the Making volume 2 is about 2 years away. It was good to learn that there is at least one biblical scholar in the world shorter than me, i.e. Richard Bauckham. Always good to have a chat with David Wenham, I. Howard Marshall, and Craig Blomberg too. I finally got acquainted with two great Aussie scholars in the line of Bill Loader and John Painter over breakfast. It was wonderful that Christoph Stenschke introduced himself to me and we chatted about German politics and the benefits of scholarship - a most likable fellow. Probably a big highlight for me was lunch with Mark Seifrid which I had been looking forward to for weeks. I helped Richard Hays find his room and the restaurant so I figure that he owes me a coke (I may call that one up one day). Ulrich Luz stood behind me one day and started adjusting my collar without being asked (or invited) but that was cool. Chris Stanley is an energetic and interesting fellow to talk too, a funny guy as well. I started chatting to the only other red head there only to learn that it was noneother than Beverly Gaventa. Also attended my first service in Deutsche and apart from 'unser vater' and a few verses in the Hymn it didn't make a lot of sense.

I picked up a coupel of cheap books including Luke 1 by F. Bovon and Colossians by M.M. Thompson.

The group seminars I went to weren't great, but the main papers were pretty good. I will post some thoughts and notes about some of the papers in the next few days.

3 comments:

Alan Bandy said...

What a joy it must have been. At present, I can only stand on the shores of the east coast and cast a longing glance. Please feel free to share with us any additional insights or new interesting ideas discussed.

Derek Brown said...

I took a course with Dr. Chris Stanley last year (here at Regent), and you are right: "energetic" is about the only word to describe him. Each day after class he was looking to play basketball, tennis, or go on an insanely long hike. Overall, sounds like a great conference.

Anonymous said...

Michael,

I am glad you got to meet Mark Seifrid. He's a great guy! I took "New Testament Theology" with him when I was a student at Southern seminary. Did you see Schreiner?

I look forward to reading your future posts.

Thanks for sharing with us.

Blessing,

Cel