T.C. Schmidt

Yale PhD | Princeton University Visiting Fellow at the James Madison Program (2025-2026) | Fairfield University Associate Professor

[T.C. Schmidt @ProfTCSchmidt]

Today is the US launch of Josephus and Jesus: New Evidence for the One Called Christ (Oxford). The book, however, is already SOLD OUT! Oxford is printing new copies. Due to a generous donor, you can get a free digital copy at https://t.co/C6quqdHuym

[T.C. Schmidt @ProfTCSchmidt]

A Persian carpet woven by an Afghan Christian about 100 years ago featuring Jesus as the good Shepherd. Note the tree whose roots are shaped like the provinces of Afghanistan reaching out to touch the hem of Jesus's cloak. Beautiful. The carpet is now housed at Princeton Theological Library

[T.C. Schmidt @ProfTCSchmidt]

Wispr is just a speech-to-text app that integrates with other programs/apps on your computer or smartphone. It is massively superior to earlier speech-to-text software in my experience. It makes my typing go much much faster. Emails are now a breeze, especially shorter ones. It still has work to do when it comes to complex emails that require editing but it's been a significant upgrade in productivity for me. So it's not like an AI like ChatGPT or Claude. Instead it harnesses AI learning in order to understand your speech and to properly input it into text form.

[T.C. Schmidt @ProfTCSchmidt]

AI subscriptions will be the next required utility bill, like internet and cell phones before it. I already pay a monthly fee for two different AI services, both of which dramatically boost my productivity. Things are changing fast. A friend of mine fired a worker at his job who could do nothing but regurgitate whatever AI told him without any critical thinking. Then the friend chose not to replace the worker because he realized he could do the worker’s job on his own with the help of AI (but this time using critical thinking). Two other friends have massively increased their efficiency in their jobs with the help of AI.
You young career folks out there, take this opportunity to become human, cultivate your minds so you can offer things AI can’t do, and learn to use AI to full effect not just mindlessly follow what it says — it’s an unknown world out there, but I lived through something like this when the Internet came out and was changing everything. No one knew what would happen, but everything turned out (basically) all right, hopefully it will this time too.

[T.C. Schmidt @ProfTCSchmidt]

@nelson_hsieh7 I will check it out, that's amazing if it's significantly better. Not all versions of ChatGPT are equal. I'm using it in chat 5.5 Thinking mode, which is substantially better than the Instant mode.

[T.C. Schmidt @ProfTCSchmidt]

@mbird12 @suzania Chat GPT and Whispr Flow.

[T.C. Schmidt @ProfTCSchmidt]

@paulthomasloan Chatgpt is the second. It's a very good information aggregator but needs to be verified.

[T.C. Schmidt @ProfTCSchmidt]

@paulthomasloan AI driven speech to text for emails (not the standard speech to text but the newer AI driven speech to text)

[T.C. Schmidt @ProfTCSchmidt]

Fabulous tomb dating to the time of Alexander the Great is being restored beautifully--perhaps it was indeed dedicated to Alexander?

https://t.co/elS3YVVD5P

[T.C. Schmidt @ProfTCSchmidt]

I read through it a while ago so my memory is hazy but if I recall the new fragment contains very similar ideas to the Greek excerpt on baptism published by Pitra. Suciu writes in the conclusion:

"But is Melito truly the author of the homily on baptism, with its highly formulaic language, or does the text merely represent a derivative work or later spin-off of his other homilies? In my view, the coherence of its early Christology and the philosophical orientation
it adopts—firmly rooted in the eclectic intellectual climate of the 2nd century CE, where Platonism mingled with Aristotelian and Stoic elements—suggest that we are not dealing with a late imitation, but with a composition belonging to the same theological mileu as Melito’s works. I therefore consider it an early composition, plausibly dating within Melito’s own
lifetime. Furthermore, its rhetorical style—using litanic exhortations, antithetical parallelism, and formulaic invocations—closely mirrors Peri Pascha and On the Soul and the Body and argues in favor or common authorship. However, one might object that such a sophisticated composition exceeds the profile of Melito, who is primarily known as a Christian poet, who delivered his sermons in verse. Yet, as has already been demonstrated and discussed in this article, the fragment on the baptism of the Sun preserved in Greek florilegia under Melito’s name shows an author conversant with Stoic philosophical exegesis of Homer."

[T.C. Schmidt @ProfTCSchmidt]

New discovery! A fragment of Melito of Sardis’s lost work On Baptism has been identified. Melito wrote around 175 AD and nearly all of his large corpus has been lost. Now one more piece emerges from the darkness by the hands of Dr. Alin Sucio @AlinSuciu1

https://t.co/yWZE5cy1ks

[T.C. Schmidt @ProfTCSchmidt]

@AlinSuciu1 *Suciu

[T.C. Schmidt @ProfTCSchmidt]

technically the fragment is about baptism and may not be specifically from Melito's lost work On Baptism — though I think it likely.

[T.C. Schmidt @ProfTCSchmidt]

Excellent journalism from the Free Press @TheFP on the persecution of Christians in China, I pray for Pastor Ezra Jin and so many like him who are imprisoned and suffering for the Gospel.

https://t.co/7VengTgOkc

[T.C. Schmidt @ProfTCSchmidt]

A winged genie from the palace of Ashurnasirpal II 883-859 BC — courtesy of the Princeton Art Gallery

[T.C. Schmidt @ProfTCSchmidt]

Having spent much time at Yale and Princeton, this is true, and it should change:

Ivy League students are suffering from religious illiteracy https://t.co/T1eLuv769I

[T.C. Schmidt @ProfTCSchmidt]

"St. Jerome in his Study" (1528)

Saw this at the Princeton Art Gallery, by Joos van Cleve

[T.C. Schmidt @ProfTCSchmidt]

@_AndrewTucker Yes, that is a great monastery library! I was there about 12 years ago cataloging manuscripts with Steven Davis

https://t.co/h4Io7IwdGI

[T.C. Schmidt @ProfTCSchmidt]

An early manuscript of Cædmon’s Hymn was recently discovered, one of the earliest pieces of English literature and an important part of Christian mission in England & Scotland. Whispers of Tolkien are sensed as Cædmon sings of how Middungeard "Middle Earth" was made!

Researchers discovered it because its manuscript had been digitized and not properly looked at, we must support such endeavors!
https://t.co/6MsrAIUT4w