John M. Hull (1) (1935–2015)

Much more exciting than it looks. In the first half, Hull gives a grounding in Hellenistic magic. There’s not much to go on: a few texts that assume the reader’s familiarity and the scruffy written remains of the magicians themselves. What he’s able to sensibly infer from this is quite remarkable. Really eye opening. It’s a deep dive into the ancient world, but also illuninates modern magical beliefs. There’s a particularly interesting chapter on the distinction between magic and miracle. If anything, this first half could be longer. For example, page 32:

‘Plond. 121 (PGM VII. 620), contains a charm which will make the user invisible to everyone and yet without any disadvantage to his love life.’

Does it? Can he not tell us the spell? It’s not like I’d use it. In fact, I think I can confidently assert that no-one will ever see me using it. Well, it’s not often I’m told that my search has returned no results, but eventually I found a translation and transcription on page 35 of Greek Magical Papyri in Translation by Hans Dieter Betz. Be careful though. Did you hear the one about Superman flying over the city? He looks down and sees Wonder Woman laying naked on her rooftop garden. So he flies down, shags her at the speed of light and flies on. ‘What the fuck was that?’ asks Wonder Woman. ‘I don’t know.’ says the Invisible Man, ‘but my arse really hurts!’

I suppose a lot of the brevity is because this was published by a little theology press and there can’t be much money in it, but the book does mirror itself across the two parts and Hull might be making an artistic choice.

Anyway, in the second half Hull takes his findings and applies them to the synoptics. I suppose I have to say that this book is not about whether or not Jesus was a wizard. If you want to be told that Jesus and Gandalf were mates then you’re digging in the wrong place. You’ll find your tummy hole half way up your body on the FRONT. Hull is interested in the gospels themselves. His questions are ‘what did these words mean to the person who wrote them?’ and ‘what did they mean to the people who first heard them?’ Particularly instructive as so often I’ve found that cultural differences made me completely misunderstand what the writers were saying, placing importance on something with a banal explanation or completely missing something critical.

The whole book is characterised by deep thought and close arguments. Recommended.… (más)

Too much prooftexting, disconjointed discussion. Sometimes a passage was just a vehicle to tell an anecdote or give advice on interacting with a blind person. Not a terribly profound interpretation of texts (sometimes took too much offense to examples of biblical stories involving blindness -- any other marginalized group could do the same thing with the bible).
Never pulls out an overarching theme or implication, so those 'messages' he does pull out are sometimes in conflict with each other.

And it didn't give me too much insight for my course paper.… (más)