[This is the second in a series of posts as I write and gear up for the publication of a new introduction to biblical apocrypha for general audiences. EDIT: Apocrypha for Beginners is on sale now! Check out all of the posts in this series here.] One of the most basic questions we encounter in … Continue reading What Are Biblical Apocrypha?
I'm very pleased to announce that I've been asked to write a new book that presents an introduction to biblical apocrypha for general audiences. Over the next several months, I'll be writing the book and gearing up for its publication. EDIT: Apocrypha for Beginners is on sale now! Check out all of the posts in … Continue reading Comparing Biblical Canons
https://www.flickr.com/photos/boston_public_library/6899587060/ Brooklyn Museum, Eastern Parkway, Brooklyn NY But as my mind walks through those placesI’m wonderin’What’s come of them….Neil Diamond, “Brooklyn Roads” This is a story about trying to hunt down a medieval manuscript supposedly in the Brooklyn Museum. It all started when I agreed to contribute an introduction and translation of the Latin Life of … Continue reading Brooklyn Roads: A Manuscript Provenance Story
Just yesterday, The Atlantic published an article by Shannon Chamberlain about fan fiction and sexuality. The article is a smart piece, linking fan fiction practices in the eighteenth century with current pop culture trends. A previous iteration of the article was titled "The Surprising 18th-Century Origins of Fan Fiction," which betrays some of the author's … Continue reading A Response to Shannon Chamberlain on Fan Fiction
I've been thinking for a while about posting my talk from Kalamazoo 2019, and I've finally gotten around to doing that. I was invited to present about my work on apocrypha for a session titled "Old English Homilies I: New Discoveries, New Insight," sponsored by the Dictionary of Old English (DOE) and Electronic Corpus of … Continue reading Preaching Apocrypha in Early England: Historiographic Currents
My book The Gospel of Pseudo-Matthew and the Nativity of Mary is now available from Cascade Books! I've written about these texts and my work on them before, and I'd like to take the opportunity of the book's release to talk a bit about translation. I've been interested in both the practice of translation and … Continue reading Translating the Gospel of Pseudo-Matthew
It's no secret that many people who love the Middle Ages also love dragons. We find dragons in literature like the Old English poem Beowulf, Norse sagas, saints' lives, romances, Arthurian legends, even historical chronicles. We also find dragons in modern fantasy literature inspired by medieval culture, like J. R. R. Tolkien's The Hobbit, Ursula … Continue reading Dragons in the Gospel of Pseudo-Matthew
I'm pleased to say that I have an article forthcoming in the December issue of the Bulletin for the Study of Religion, titled "A History of the Study of Apocrypha in Anglo-Saxon England." I was invited to submit this contribution because of the publication of my recent book, Preaching Apocrypha in Anglo-Saxon England. In my article … Continue reading Forthcoming: “A History of the Study of Apocrypha in Anglo-Saxon England”
It's International Translation Day! Not coincidentally, September 30 is also the feast day of Saint Jerome (347-420), who translated the Bible into Latin (known as the Vulgate), as it was known for hundreds of years in medieval Western Europe. Jerome is also the patron saint of translators because of his reputation. Jerome's legacy as a … Continue reading Prefaces to the Gospel of Pseudo-Matthew and Nativity of Mary
[This post is part 3 in a series of reflections about my book, Preaching Apocrypha in Anglo-Saxon England (order here); read part 1 here and part 2 here.] As discussed in my previous posts about Preaching Apocrypha in Anglo-Saxon England, I've been thinking about the project that has become this book for over 9 years. In that time, my ideas and … Continue reading Preaching Apocrypha: Postscript
Brandon W. Hawk 