Welcome to the podcast Think Biblically, conversations on faith and culture.

I'm your host Scott Ray, Dean of Faculty and Professor of Christian Ethics here at

Talbot School Theology at Biola University. And I'm your co-host Sean McDowell,

Professor of Apologetics at Talbot School Theology Biiola University. We're here today with Dr. Ken Burding, who's a professor of New Testament in the undergraduate

Bible and theology program here at Biola University who spends his life investing

the Bible and theology into the lives of hundreds of undergrad students every year.

But Kent also has a specialty that you might not be aware of in a book that's come out just recently on the Apostolic Fathers.

So in case you're wondering who are those guys, Ken, tell us a little bit, who are the Apostolic Fathers and why are they

so interesting to you?

Well, thanks for having me today.

Really glad to be with you.

So the Apostolic Fathers are the writings that come right after the period of the

Apostles. It's a collection of writings, actually a modern collection of writings, but

somewhat similar to the writing, the collection of the New Testament, including letters, letters of Ignatius, a letter of Polycarp to the Philippians,

a letter from the Church in Rome, First Clement,

to the church in Corinth.

There's a martyrdom in there, a martyrdom of polycarb.

There's a sermon, second Clement.

There's a polemical essay in the form of a letter, which is a second,

which is Epistle of Barnabas. And there's a group of visions or like an apocalypse,

the Shepherd of Hermos.

Oh, there's also an apology too,

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