Bible and Culture

Welcome to the Frabjous Blog of Ryan M. Armstrong

I'm a Bible scholar with an interest in wide facets of history and culture. I write a lot about the book of Job, the Dead Sea Scrolls, history of Jewish and Christian biblical interpretation, and I toss in some fun stuff about Alice in Wonderland, film history, and hip hop culture.

A Bible Blog? Who is this for?

In this blog I hope to provide solid scholarship, but I want to make it accessible to students. It's an opportunity for me to discuss some of my ideas before or after they're published. I invite questions and discussion from scholars and non-scholars alike. Let's refine our ideas and understand the world better together.

Who am I?

I was born in California, a few minutes from the Mexican border. My dad was a pastor, and I moved around constantly as a kid. I attended eight different schools during K-12, but the Seattle area feels most like home. Since first grade, I've been driven by two things: academic excellence and goofing off. I was straight-A class clown who couldn't stop analyzing the world. As an adult, I just kept studying until I had three masters degrees (covering Hebrew Bible, New Testament, and even philosophy). At the time of writing, I'm currently a few weeks from my doctoral dissertation defense!

As an adult, I've moved around a lot, too, attending schools in Wake Forest, NC, Jerusalem, Vienna, Heidelberg, and Princeton, NJ. I hope this blog brings even more diverse perspectives to flavor my outlook on life and scholarship, so please leave a comment to start the discussion and subscribe!