Like others, I have enjoyed Michael Bird's
Top 25 NT Scholars and of course the fun of it is to be impressed, outraged and amused, not necessarily in equal measure. The real problem, I suppose, is doing the list across 20 centuries. I can't even begin to think about how Origen compares with C. K. Barrett, or how Luther can Calvin compare with Bultmann and Käsemann. So I will only comment on the moderns. I suppose I'd want to see Bultmann and Sanders a bit higher; I think the list is a bit evangelical heavy -- Wright too high, Howard Marshall and F. F. Bruce I'd delete. I think I like the idea of Bauckham making it, but I'd push down a few places. Of Michael's honorable mentions, I'd promote one to my 25 -- Gerd Theissen. There are some absentees who don't even make it to Michael's honourable mentions, and who would make my list, viz.:
- John Dominic Crossan
- W. D. Davies
- Helmut Koester
- Michael Goulder
- Wayne Meeks
- Nils Alstrup Dahl
- Krister Stendahl
- Elizabeth Schüssler Fiorenza
- Dale Allison
- Christopher Rowland
- Bruce Metzger
- Bart Ehrman
All of those have in some way broken new ground and have stimulated the imagination in such important ways that they deserve a place on the list above those very fine scholars Michael does mention, but who have not quite changed the landscape.
Update (Sunday, 23.16): Doug Chaplin comments on
Metacatholic. He also wants to see Theissen and Meeks there.
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