A visit to Birmingham

A week ago I was on a visit to the ITSEE in Birmingham.

The institution is part of the Graduate Institute for Theology & Religion, and is situated in the brown building, "Elmfield House" on Selly Oak Campus (behind the sign).

The staff there booked me in at Woodbrooke college,
which was a very nice place, and one of central institutions of the quakers. Earlier it used to be a college affiliated to the university, and back in those days, it turned out, Rendel Harris, who was apparently a quaker, had been one of the first principals of the college.

Thus, there was still a room at the college

dedicated to his memory, "Rendel Harris' room,"
with a bust (to the right) and what was left of his
grande collection of books. I was told that his
collection of bibles had been sold (sob!), including
an Erasmus first edition for £50.000, if I remember
correctly. Woodbrooke had had some financial
trouble, but not any longer...

At the ITSEE I met the staff, and
presented my own work on the
Epistle of Jude in a seminar. I also got to see
some amazing images of the Codex Sinaiticus (on the
big monitor in the picture to the right). The only
problem will be how to distribute these
+100 MB images without loosing information.

It was interesting to follow the work a few days at
this institution, meeting all the people and observing Professor Parker hovering over his team of students and postgraduates, of which I was very jealous ... If only I had been one of them.