Congrats! Massive accomplishment!!!

this painting. I recommend Sandra Joshel and Lauren Hackworth Petersen’s book The Material Life of Roman Slaves for more about the artwork and enslaved servers generally!

leading guests to the upper room, preparing food, bringing out the food and wine out, etc. I used this fresco from Pompeii depicting a Roman style meal to illuminate the Gospel passage. Notice the enslaved servers on the far left and bottom right. Much could be said about…

socioeconomic status suggests that he owns *at least* one more enslaved person. Therefore we should probably imagine that as he offered hospitality to Jesus and his disciples for their Passover meal, there were multiple enslaved workers performing tasks for them: door keeping, washing feet…

antiquity, but this socio-economic detail is informative. The householder is likely an enslaver of some means, and one of his enslaved persons returned home from fetching water (see Jennifer Glancy’s book Slavery in Early Christianity for more enslaved labors). The householder’s…

Chance will probably have very helpful reading recommendations! Ann Killebrew argues that “upper rooms” are typical of wealthier homes in ancient Palestine (see her contribution in The Oxford Handbook of Jewish Daily Life in Palestine). One didn’t have to be wealthy to own enslaved persons in…

I’d be very interested to read your paper, @norbertnagy.bsky.social!

I used your latest article with Religion Dispatches in a sermon for Maundy Thursday. I discussed how Jesus and his disciples enjoyed an enslaver’s hospitality and most likely exploited enslaved servers at their Passover meal (Luke 22:8-13). This complicates the foot washing scene in John 13!

Why Jesus Never Condemned Slavery YouTube video by Bible & Archaeology

Come listen to me talk about the uncontroversial topic of Jesus and slavery on the Bible & Archaeology podcast!

youtu.be/_H7IivvTn8E?...

Not an early Christian writer, but a weird autocorrect. I was very into BMX during my teen years. My phone would often autocorrect “skate park” to “slave park” whenever I texted a friend about meeting up there.

My wife just delivered our baby one month ago. This is the kind of dad I want to be.

What an intriguing idea. I’m excited to read!

Acceptance email for the 2026 SBL meeting in Denver.

I’m delighted that my paper proposal on invisible enslaved labor in the Mishnah was accepted for SBL this November! I tested out some of the this paper’s ideas for the fist time in conversation with colleagues at SBL last year. It will be fun to share a polished version and see how they land.

What is your article called? Would love to read it. I remember feeling struck by all the issues you mentioned here while reading for my HB comp. Cross’s ideas about “oral traditions” adapted from Parry-Lord and Noth’s about the amphictyony seemed so hollow with hindsight.

That’s a helpful angle for exploring this issue.

Already sent out my annual email to local evangelical pastors, where I explain this historical context and plead with them to reconsider their church’s upcoming “seder” event.

Currently on spring break. But when I come back next week, we’re starting units on Paul within Judaism + Paganism!

Good thing some US colleges are closing their Religious Studies departments—definitively not “useful” at all or an area of expertise that might be relevant for understanding our present…

Very encouraged by my students at University of Dayton who overwhelmingly nailed a quiz on Second Temple Judaism and the Pharisees this week. I’m witnessing them develop into critical and informed thinkers who know how to spot Christian anti-Judaism.

Recently learned my great grandfather Edwin Vossman was a classics scholar who taught Greek and Latin at Marquette back in the 1930s-1940s. I inherited some of his books this weekend. He had very old copies of Pliny the Younger’s letters and Virgil’s poetry!

Excited to read it!

Is this the book on monotheism (or lack thereof)?

CALL FOR PAPERS Society of Biblical Literature - Annual Meeting 2026 The Slavery, Resistance and Freedom Section will host an open session and invite papers dealing with any aspect of Mediterranean or West Asian slavery and their intersection with biblical, early Christian, or early Jewish literature. We are particularly interested in new contributions to scholarship that further our understanding of how enslaved and formerly enslaved persons navigated intersectional social, economic, and/or religious identities, as well as contributions that explore how the condition of slavery affected families, kinship, and relationality. Submit your paper via the QR code below, or at https://shorturl.at/bEYpe

🚨 Please share 🚨

If you’re going to SBL in Denver this fall, consider submitting a paper for the Slavery, Resistance, and Freedom open call!

We’d love to hear your work

CALL FOR PAPERS Society of Biblical Literature - Annual Meeting 2026 The Slavery, Resistance and Freedom Section will host an open session and invite papers dealing with any aspect of Mediterranean or West Asian slavery and their intersection with biblical, early Christian, or early Jewish literature. We are particularly interested in new contributions to scholarship that further our understanding of how enslaved and formerly enslaved persons navigated intersectional social, economic, and/or religious identities, as well as contributions that explore how the condition of slavery affected families, kinship, and relationality. Submit your paper via the QR code below, or at https://shorturl.at/bEYpe

✨ Please re-post ✨

Call for papers for the Slavery, Resistance, and Freedom section at SBL is officially open! If you’ll be there in Denver this year, please consider submitting your ideas about slavery in the ancient Mediterranean and West Asia.

Very excited for this book!

The Book as Extractive Technology

The Institute for Ideas and Imagination has posted a lecture I gave in September on extractivism, ”AI”, and book slavery in Ancient Rome on their podcast feed. open.spotify.com/episode/5cGH...

for those looking for a temporary reprieve from *waves hands at everything*, i’ll be giving a paper on a new project at birmingham’s biblical studies seminar on 18 Feb at 11am ET.

the paper’s entitled, “the enslaved seer: slavery and literate labour in the book of revelation.” DM for the zoom link!

Chance was kind enough to read a draft and provide multiple article recommendations! And of course, Candida’s work has been invaluable for my thinking. I also recently finished Isaac’s Cambridge Element on enslaved literate workers.

My dissertation proposal (tentatively titled "Invisible Hands: Despotic Fiction and Enslaved Labor in Early Rabbinic Literature") has been approved! Time to keep reading and writing. Also time to submit a condensed version of my work to SBL for November.