Received my first “we want to feature your book in our very real book club” AI scam solicitation today, which means at least one thing: The web page is up!: www.eisenbrauns.org/books/titles...

An Exotic Apocalypse: Revelation and the Appropriation of Judaism in the Roman Empire By Daniel C. Smith

The book of Revelation has long fascinated readers with its strange symbols, dramatic visions, and apocalyptic warnings. Yet debates about whether it is fundamentally a Christian or Jewish text obscur...

eisenbrauns.org

Nothing better than reading the work of brilliant friends like @nathanleach.bsky.social Nathan's book, on John's Apocalypse in the context of ancient divinatory performance, has finally arrived!!

Nothing better than reading the work of brilliant friends like @nathanleach.bsky.social Nathan's book, on John's Apocalypse in the context of ancient divinatory performance, has finally arrived!!

Given that we are all upset today about Anthropic-shredding-books, I’ll add that I address this here, and it’s part of the same infrastructure threatening the preservation and profession of history but people don’t want to talk about that if the same industry is paying for their research.

Sonja Drimmer@sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · 2w ago

“AI has become a blunt instrument in the enterprise to impose precisely this form of sanctioned ignorance about America’s past...Taken together, [Trump’s & Musk’s] plans amount to a one-two punch, history in the hands of the corporate state.” My latest on AI & history: www.salon.com/2026/07/28/t...

friends and neighbors, the newest Element in Religion in Late Antiquity is now *live* and *free to download* through August 4! The inimitable Virginia Burrus on "Martyrdom as Witness in Late Ancient Christian Literature"! www.cambridge.org/core/element...

Martyrdom as Witness in Late Ancient Christian Literature

Cambridge Core - Religion: General Interest - Martyrdom as Witness in Late Ancient Christian Literature

cambridge.org

‘Thousands of university job cuts in humanities and social sciences are creating widespread cold spots for languages, classics and theology degrees, the British Academy has warned’ www.theguardian.com/education/20...

Humanities among degrees being ‘extinguished’ by hard-up universities

Exclusive: Experts fear rise in education ‘cold spots’ and social immobility as 4,000 academic posts lost in one year

theguardian.com

Check out our recent interview with Colossae excavation director Barış Yener. https://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/daily/archaeology-today/colossae-a-biblical-city-of-classical-world/

Colossae: A Biblical City of the Classical World

Excavations at the ancient Phrygian city of Colossae in Turkey are uncovering new insights into the history of early Christian communities.

biblicalarchaeology.org

Vibes are off

What on earth

The Department of Religious Studies is pleased to announce a new addition to its faculty, Dr. Matthew Larsen! We're excited to have him join our outstanding faculty cohort as an Associate Professor of Ancient Mediterranean Religions. Read more about him at the link. tinyurl.com/2s3bs2yp

I’d love it if you’d sign this. It might not prevent me and my colleagues losing our jobs, but it will draw attention to the ideological vandalism being perpetrated by the wealthy execs running our university. Stop Redundancies at the University of Exeter - sign the petition below! c.org/NpvY4sR9gH

Sign the Petition

Stop Redundancies at the University of Exeter

c.org

As a scholar of the book of Revelation I want everyone to understand that hydration/commercial breaks are actually all four horsemen of the apocalypse

University admins, very solemnly: “To protect the mission, it is our sacred duty to ensure that this pile of money survives—nay, grows!—for the rest of human civilization.“ Also university admins: “We’re noticing that books are kinda out rn? So we’re 86’ing three of the four libraries.“

Just had Canvas stop working as I was typing comments on a student paper. I now can’t access anyone’s work or grades. Strangely, this never happened back when I used a grade book and had students email me their papers, a system no shareholders extracted money from.

Jess Calarco@jessicacalarco.com · 3mo ago

Kind of surprised that this hasn't been bigger news. It's finals week for a whole lot of universities, and yet, Canvas (a learning/grading platform used by ~9,000 schools globally) is currently inaccessible because of a pay-or-have-your-data-leaked hack. www.insidehighered.com/news/tech-in...

Cannot wait for a presidential candidate in 2048 to be dogged by questions based on their 2026 Canvas discussion board posts.

"vanity, vanity, all of life is vanity," he says to himself while trapped in a Syriac copy editing doom loop.

Question for my NT colleagues: does anyone have easy access to the Jewish Annotated New Testament and could tell me the print page numbers of David Frankfurter's Revelation introduction?

Last day of free download! 😱

Monika Amsler@monikaamsler.bsky.social · 5mo ago

🧯Hot off the press: Education in Religious Contexts of Late Antiquity (Cambridge Element) > free download until April 8! www.cambridge.org/core/element...

Calling all Professors of Religion! Do you teach an intro to the study of religion course? If so, would you be willing to share your syllabus? Collecting for research purposes.

Rip to every president who lost a war in the middle east but I’m different. And better. Maybe even good enough to win a war in the middle east

Senior thesis advising has to be the most rewarding part of undergraduate teaching. And now that I think of it, that is probably why the work functionally amounts to unpaid labor.

What the students don't know (and surely don't care to know) is that all my clever little titles for class sessions are actually just pithy titles of books I like.

The TA is, far and away, the strongest NTT faculty union contract I've ever seen. Includes not just the 20% raises (as if that weren't enough!) but: - Paid prof development leave (i.e., sabbaticals) - Course releases for union service - Union security (fair share fees) - PI rights - Academic Freedom

Dan Greene@dmgreene.bsky.social · 5mo ago

A thousand NYU contingent faculty went on strike Monday and today they have a real contract with real security in one of the most expensive places on earth

🗣️ new Element in Religion in Late Antiquity! 🗣️ @monikaamsler.bsky.social's EDUCATION IN RELIGIOUS CONTEXTS OF LATE ANTIQUITY ⚡⚡⚡ free through April 8! ⚡⚡⚡ www.cambridge.org/core/element...

Education in Religious Contexts of Late Antiquity

Cambridge Core - Religion: General Interest - Education in Religious Contexts of Late Antiquity

cambridge.org

So, um... this is bad. Really bad. I looked at the letters that were translated by the AI, and the very first one I found was almost entirely hallucination. Thread:

Sarah E. Bond@sarahebond.bsky.social · 5mo ago

The new project mapping 7,000+ ancient letters is impressive: romanletters.org . The database & geolocation (although noting Pleiades rather than just AWMC would be nice) are great. But I absolutely cannot get over use of AI—however transparent—for translation. 🚨 Value human translators 🚨

Parts of Antioch's cemeteries were erratically excavated in the 1930s. I gathered that data and published it, most of it for the first time. If your research touches on Antioch's cemeteries, have fun exploring this piece and the supplementary appendices! ajaonline.org/article/exhu...

Exhuming the Archive: Examining the Cemeteries of Antioch-on-the-Orontes Through Legacy Archaeological Research | April 2026 (130.2) | American Journal of Archaeology

Parts of ancient Antioch (modern Antakya, Türkiye) were excavated from 1932 to 1939 by a team led by Princeton University. Key findings were published in five volumes, but much more data remains in th...

ajaonline.org

And now he is dropping late antique references? And correctly on top of that?

Mayor Zohran Kwame Mamdani@mayor.nyc.gov · 5mo ago

Happy St. Patrick's Day, New York.

My latest for @hyperallergic.com is on Egyptian Blue—& a new study by Mishael Quraishi which prices out the Roman cost & manual labor needed to paint the “Blue Room” at Pompeii. Shout outs & thx: @hilarybeckertxny.bsky.social , @diffendale.bsky.social , @chapps.bsky.social, @valentinadl.bsky.social!

How Much Did It Cost to Paint a Pompeii Room Egyptian Blue?

The price of covering a room in the prized pigment was equal to between 50% and 90% of a Roman legionary's annual salary, a new study estimates.

hyperallergic.com

A LATE-BREAKING TT JOB..... Assistant Professor, Near Eastern Archaeology, University of Toronto Archaeology of the Levant (from south-central Türkiye to northwestern Saudi Arabia) during the Bronze and Iron Ages (3,000 to 500 BCE), universityaffairs.ca/search-jobs/...

Among the many delights in this preview is a reminder of the lovely days I got to spend in Naples. If anyone would like me to return to Naples to talk about literally anything, I shall gratefully accept your invitation.

Ancient Jew Review@ancientjewreview.bsky.social · 6mo ago

A new publication preview of “Listen to the Sibyl”: The History, Poetics, and Reception of Sibylline Oracles (Brill, 2026).