In the third and final part of our interview series Professor Dale B Martin discusses his own personal beliefs and his work in christian theology.  Taking a strongly postmodernist approach he argues that some facts can be true theologically but false historically.  Toby quibbles with this from an atheist perspective, they also discuss the history of religion and the study of the ancient world.

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Dale B. Martin specializes in New Testament and Christian Origins, including attention to social and cultural history of the Greco-Roman world. Before joining the Yale faculty in 1999, he taught at Rhodes College and Duke University.

 

His books include: Slavery as Salvation: The Metaphor of Slavery in Pauline Christianity; The Corinthian Body; Inventing Superstition: from the Hippocratics to the Christians; Sex and the Single Savior: Gender and Sexuality in Biblical Interpretation; Pedagogy of the Bible: an Analysis and Proposal; and New Testament History and Literature.

 

He has published several articles on topics related to the ancient family, gender and sexuality in the ancient world, and ideology of modern biblical scholarship, including titles such as: “Contradictions of Masculinity: Ascetic Inseminators and Menstruating Men in Greco-Roman Culture.”

 

He currently is working on issues in biblical interpretation, social history and religion in the Greco-Roman world, and sexual ethics. He has held fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation (Germany), the Lilly Foundation, the Fulbright Commission (USA-Denmark), and the Wabash Center for Teaching and Learning in Theology and Religion. He is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (elected 2009).

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He is the presenter of the youtube series 'New Testament History and Literature' which has been viewed a cumulative 3.5 million times.