I would like to thank my Mom and Dad, my wife and kids, my pet bunnies…

The always thinking Chris Heard over at Higgaion has awarded me a “Thinking Blogger Award” — even despite the fact that I occasionally resort to posting some “Best of Codex” articles from my archives during my busy seasons (he thinks that practice is, ahem, cheesy; I think it is rather clever!).

This “award” is actually more of a meme and once awarded you are supposed to nominate five others. Here are five quite different blogs that I think deserve the honour (in no particular order):

• Phil Harland, Religions of the Ancient Mediterranean. While Phil’s blog has had its fits and spurts (whose hasn’t?), I have always appreciated his posts on assorted thing relating to “social and religious life among Greeks, Romans, Jews, Christians and others in the Roman empire.”
• Tim Bulkeley, Sansblogue. This New Zealander’s often contrarian posts about biblical studies and open scholarship, pedagogy and podcasts, among other things, are always worth reading. I only wish he would post more on the All Blacks!
• John F. Hobbins, Ancient Hebrew Poetry. Hebrew Bible enthusiasts will always find some hardcore biblical studies happening John’s site, whether it is stichometric analyses of biblical psalms, Hebrew grammar and lexicography, or questions of canon.
• Mark Goodacre, NT Gateway Weblog. Despite the fact Mark deals mainly with that other testament, he still has many thoughtful things to say! He posts widely on NT, biblical studies, film, and everything Q. 🙂
• Loron Rossen III, The Busybody. Loren is always busy sharing his eclectic tastes in biblical studies, film, literature (especially Tolkien), and sundry items from popular culture. Always thoughtful and sometimes controversial.

There is a list over at UnSpun on the “Best Blogs about Biblical Studies.” I’m not sure what significance the list has and who all made it, but Codex is ranked number 5. Cool.

UPDATE: I just noticed that there is another list “Top Ten Biblioblogs” and there Codex is ranked number 3. Even Cooler.

It seems that these rankings may be voted on by anyone and as such are not really that meaningful. That being said, thanks to anyone who thought of me and gave Codex a good ranking.

I’d like to thank God, my parents…

UPDATE #2: Airton José da Silva left a comment below… he’s the one who started the “Best Blogs about Biblical Studies” list (see his roundup here). I also read the FAQ from UnSpun and it looks like these rankings may have some validity as consensus rankings.

They are a nice gesture, though I doubt if they will contribute to my tenure!

UPDATE #3: I just noticed that there is also a “Biblioblogs I Read Most Often” list in which Codex ranks #4.

Two years ago today I decided on a whim to start a blog. Now two years and 648 posts and 856 comments later Codex Blogspot is still alive and kicking. I have had over 190,000 visitors from all over the world to the blog — a statistic that is mind-blowing.

There have been a couple blogging lulls over the last two years (like the last couple weeks!), but I think I have managed to be fairly consistent with posting regularly and on a variety of subjects. I have tried to both have content posts and news posts, long and short posts, academic and more popular posts, and — of course — serious and funny posts. Some of my favourites may be found here.

At any rate, thank you for visiting and making my blogging experience one that is both positive and fruitful.

Cheers!

At precisely 8:39:53 am Eastern time this morning (Monday 19 February 2007) my 150,000th visitor happened upon this blog.

As I mentioned earlier, this lucky visitor gets a free book. The reader was a fellow Canadian from Napanee, Ontario. If you think it was you, then email me at codex [at] biblical-studies [dot] com and let me know some particulars such as your IPS, computer operating system, monitor, and/or browser software and we’ll discuss your book prize!

To everyone else, I just want to say, “Thank you for visiting!� I added the counter on July 7th 2005, so it took about 19 months to reach the 150,000 mark. More significantly, it only took just over three months to get from 100,000 to 150,000. Wow.

Again, thanks for visiting! (I hope it was worth your time!)

OK, I know that the last time I tried this it didn’t work (the person never claimed their prize), but if anything I am persistent!

As this blog approaches its 150,000th visitor (all I can say is “wow, thanks for visiting!”), I want to give away a book. So here’s the deal: if you are number 150,000 I will send you a free book (I’ll give you some options and you can choose).

I figure that number 150,000 should visit by Sunday or Monday.

Thanks for visiting and good luck!