I do it for a couple of reasons. I'm a believer that scholars should serve the public interest. Too many scholars ignore strange subjects and bogus research that fascinates people whose worldview revolves around such ideas. They claim they're too busy or it's not important. I can't think of anything much more potentially paradigm-shifting than the question of whether there is extraterrestrial life or whether aliens came to earth in antiquity (i.e., the ancient astronaut strangeness). The issues takes you into religion, politics, physics, metaphysics, etc., and potentially redefine reality as we know it. I don't like seeing people base their worldviews on ideas that are demonstrably wrong. People should not be duped, and scholars and scientists who know better should not stand on the sidelines allowing them to be duped.

Spiritually speaking, I want to minister to those whose experience has caused them to feel abandoned by their church or synagogue because their spiritual leadership isn't intellectually equipped to help them, or fears real interaction with the supernatural. And if there is a scientifically verifiable ET reality that can be divorced from demonic entities, and that reality has intersected with our own, the public has a right to know about it (at least at the "yes" or "no" level). The Church also needs to understand how its theology can accommodate it (since it's spent so much time laughing at it or ignoring it).

I've found there are basically five kinds of people involved in UFO research and the UFO community at large: (1) the nuts and bolts scientists - they are dealing with questions of interstellar travel, the possibility of ET life, and propulsion issues. The religious dimensions of the issue are barely on their radar. They typically have already dismissed God because of their faith in evolution (and their failure to discern the philosophical incoherence of an uncreated or self-created universe). A good number in this category are also politically active for the cause, but should not be confused with # 5 below. (2) The UFO or abduction experiencer who wants to keep their Judeo-Christian faith but is struggling with that. These are the people who have some experience and have tried in vain to get help from their pastor or other Christian friends to process the experience, to fit it into their faith worldview. They may or may not leave the organized church, but they surely are left on their own to deal with the experience. They rely on alternative sources of information and fellow experiencers to make spiritual sense out of it. They are vulnerable to nonsense like that of Zecharia Sitchin since some see it as the only way to make sense of things from their Bible. They are also vulnerable to redefining their faith in Gnostic terms. (3) The UFO or abduction experiencer who rejects the faith afterward, and who becomes antagonistic toward the faith. These people often operate out of anger toward the Church and may become openly hostile toward it. (4) The people who see the UFO / ET issue as the platform they've wanted for years to vent their hatred toward Christianity and make money while doing it. These are the self-styled pseudo-scholars in the movement (usually with respect to ancient texts that they can't actually translate). This crowd treats those of the Judeo-Christian faith with contempt and ridicule. These are the people whose bluff needs to be publicly called. (NOTE: I don't put Sitchin in this category since he doesn't seem overtly hostile to Christianity or traditional Judaism). (5) The "New Agers" who want to use the UFO issue for a religion, for left-wing political purposes, or to become avatars in their own time and mind. They see ET as their saviors in just about every way.

I'm guessing most of you in the Christian realm (academic or not) will consequently understand why I do this. If not, please feel free to email me and tell me why I should let the people in this community continue on in their Christ-less or God-less worldview, or why I should refuse to help them in their spiritual struggle.

Has Mike ever had a paranormal experience? Has he ever seen a UFO?

No, not that I know of.

Yes, but only occasionally. You would have to contact me about it. My schedule is tight. I do not require an honorarium, though it is appreciated. I do require all expenses paid.

Is is true that Art Bell asked Mike to debate Zecharia Sitchin when he was the host of Coast to Coast AM?

Yes, this is true. The request was made in 2002 as I recall. I of course agreed immediately. As far as why Sitchin never agreed, I think the answer would be that he isn't stupid. He had nothing to gain and a lot to lose. But it was nice of Art to ask.

Does Mike do any teaching or writing on the Bible that is available online?

Yes. I blog on biblical studies at my Naked Bible blog. I plan to start podcasting via that blog early in 2012. There are also some videos of classes I have taught where I go to church.

Is Mike a rabbi or ordained?

No, and no.

Has Mike been interviewed by any media about his views and areas of expertise?

Yes. I've been interviewed by a few dozen shows. Most have been on Coast to Coast AM, and most have focused on material related to my novel, The Facade, or my views as a biblical scholar on ancient astronaut mythology and whether Christianity could accommodate a genuine extraterrestrial reality (the sorts of things I blog about on PaleoBabble and UFO Religions). For a listing of many of the shows I've been on, click here.

Yes, but only non-fiction. Here are titles of interest I have reviewed:

Alien Intrusion: UFOs and the Evolution Connection, by Gary Bates (Master Books, 2005)

Lights in the Sky & Little Green Men: A Rational Christian Look at UFOs and Extraterrestrials, by Hugh Ross, Kenneth Samples, and Mark Clark (NavPress)

Body Snatchers in the Desert: The Horrible Truth at the Heart of the Roswell Story, by Nick Redfern (Paraview-Pocket Books, a division of Simon & Schuster, 2005)

Wonders in the Sky: Unexplained Aerial Objects from Antiquity to Modern Times, by Jacques Vallee and Chris Aubeck (Tarcher / Penguin, 2009)

Mirage Men: An Adventure into Paranoia, Espionage, Psychological Warfare, and UFOs, by Mark Pilkington and John Lundberg (Skyhorse Publishing, 2010)

Final Events and the Secret Government Group on Demonic UFOs and the Afterlife, by Nick Redfern (Anomalist Books, 2010)

UFOs: Generals, Pilots, and Government Officials Go On the Record, by Leslie Kean (Three Rivers Press, 2011)

The Myth and Mystery of UFOs by Thomas Bullard (University of Kansas Press, 2010)

No. I know of no credible scientific confirmation that extraterrestrial life either has existed or does exist. Equations (like the overblown Drake Equation) are not evidence for aliens. I reject the idea that the Bible affirms aliens (disguised as angels). ET life forms would be biological entities that need to perpetuate their species, draw nutrition, and are subject to dimensional laws of physics or else they would die. The Bible does not describe angels this way. Until science verifies (rather than speculates about) an intelligent ET life form, I see no reason to affirm their existence.

No, and this would extend from my answer to the previous question. However, I do think most people who claim to have had this experience are not lying or hoaxing. I believe they experienced something, but I see no reason to conclude alien abduction is the correct way to parse the experience.

My research into what is called "alien abduction" leads me to conclude that there are a range of possible explanations:

(2) Sleep paralysis. This is a common experience, and there is good research to connect this to some "abduction" experiences (see here and here).

(3) Abductions by military personnel (i.e., MILABS) who implant an alien screen memory into the victim's mind, using technology that has been known (and further developed) since the 70s. One researcher to watch here is Leah Haley. Leah has recently concluded, after years of work with abductees, that it has nothing to do with extraterrestrials.

(4) abductions where the victim's mind replaces their actual traumatizer with the alien - traumatization where the victim responds by what is known in psychology as dissociative identity disorder (DID) - what used to be called multiple personality disorder). This may or may note involve ritual traumatization by cults or other groups. I know several people who work with DID survivors.

I am well aware of the work of scholars in alien abduction research, like the late Dr. John Mack of Harvard and Dr. David Jacobs (Temple University) on the subject, but what I'd need to believe we were really dealing with aliens would be (a) actual evidence there are real aliens and (b) some sort of hybrid offspring -- again, tested and verified by a credible laboratory. I don't expect any such thing to be brought forth. I also think that the recent Emma Woods incident (see here -- it is a large file) has tarnished Jacobs' work beyond the inherent criticisms of using hypnosis for retrieving repressed memories.

Far from it. Click here for a brief discussion on this. You can also visit my Sitchin site.

Has Mike received any recognition for this research in ufology?

Yes. FATE Magazine named Mike to its list of "The 100 Most Influential People in UFOlogy" in

In Mike's opinion, what are the best (i.e., most credible) books on UFOs?

Here are my "must reads" for the subject of UFOs:

UFOs and the National Security State: Chronology of a Coverup, 1941-1973, by Richard Dolan

UFOs and the National Security State: The Coverup Exposed: 1973-1991, by Richard Dolan

These volumes by Dolan are unquestionably the best for documenting the U.S. government’s burning interest in UFOs and its deliberate duplicity in informing the public about that interest. Rich is an academic (runner-up for a Rhodes scholarship as a grad student) and a careful researcher. If I had to pick one book to recommend to someone who said "convince me UFOs are worth looking into," Rich's first book would be it, or perhaps the shorter work by Leslie Kean below. A more general scholarly introduction would be the edited volume by Jacobs, also below.

UFOs: Generals, Pilots, and Government Officials Go on the Record, by Leslie Kean

UFOs and Abductions: Challenging the Borders of Knowledge, ed. David Jacobs (University of Kansas Press, 2000). This was the first book on UFOs every published by a university press (but see the note above about David Jacobs and the use of hypnosis for retrieving repressed memories).

The UFO Enigma: A New Review of the Physical Evidence, ed. Peter Sturrock, PhD.

Also quite good. If you think there is no physical evidence for UFOs, you are uninformed. This book isn't about fuzzy photographs.

Passport to Magonia : On UFOs, Folklore, and Parallel Worlds by Jacques Vallee, PhD

The above title by Vallee is one of his early efforts at dealing with his view that "aliens" may not be truly extraterrestrial - but entities of a spiritual or inter-dimensional nature. The following three titles by Vallee are a trilogy and, as you can tell by the titles, reveal his less-than-optimistic verdict about the "goodness" of the visitors. Vallee's works are especially significant since he has no religious axe to grind. A more recent volume by a scholar who takes a folklore approach to UFOs and alleged alien contact is that of Bullard, below.

The Myth and Mystery of UFOs, by Thomas Bullard (University of Kansas Press, 2010)

Dimensions: A Casebook of Alien Contact by Jacques Vallee, PhD

Confrontations: A Scientist's Search for Alien Contact by Jacques Vallee, PhD

Revelations: Alien Contact and Human Deception by Jacques Vallee, PhD

UFOs: Operation Trojan Horse by John Keel (Putnam, 1970)

A classic by the author of The Mothman Prophecies. Like Vallee, Keel argues strongly that UFOs are a demonic presence--and he is not a Christian.

Project Beta: The Story of Paul Bennewitz, National Security, and the Creation of a Modern UFO Myth by Greg Bishop

A fascinating look at how the government systematically used now-deceased electrical physicist Paul Bennewitz to perpetuate disinformation about UFOs. Various government agencies fed Bennewitz him lies to keep him believing in an imminent alien invasion until he was completely discredited and utterly insane. Eventually, author and UFO researcher Bill Moore was recruited to help in the disinformation campaign.

In Mike's opinion, what are the best (i.e., most credible) websites and blogs for UFO research? Besides his own blog, UFO Religions, of course)

My answer here is about which sites are doing research and which ones are waxing eloquent about aliens(for which there is no proof). Here are the web resources I find most useful:

The Black Vault

This is the motherlode for genuine government documents relating to the UFO phenomenon. The site consists of its owner's scanned Freedom of Information Act requests, the scanned responses, and text-conversions of those scans. Literally tens of thousands of pages (most of which are unspectacular) demonstrate both the military's disingenuous attitude toward the UFO phenomenon and its own documented experiences.

Leslie Kean's UFOs on the Record Research Site

CUFOS (Dr. J. Allen Hynek's Center for UFO Studies)

UFO Related PDF Documents

UFO Casebook

This site reports on UFO news. There's pretty much a sighting a day, every day, though who knows what they actually are. It also provides good coverage to UFO research news of importance.

Mike's own linguistic report on the Majestic Documents

What does Mike think about the work of Zecharia Sitchin and the idea of ancient astronauts?

Not much. I actually don't think Sitchin knows any ancient languages. His books suggests that much. I have a whole website devoted to Sitchin's nonsense, and have blogged a number of times about the myth of ancient astronauts.

Is it true that Mike was interviewed for a UFO show on the History Channel and they censored him out of the show?

Yes; this happened back in 2003. You can read all about this fiasco here. Let it never be said (around me anyway) that the History Channel is really interested in all side of the "ancient astronaut" issue. Nonsense. They are interested in what sells. The History Channel came back to me years later (a different studio than the one in my recounting) to be in the "Ancient Aliens" special. I sent them the link above and that was that ... until January 2012, when they asked again (they wanted a "biblical expert" to talk about the alien spacecraft in Ezekiel 1 -- more "just the facts" TV journalism, I guess). I sent them the same link with a short "I'm not your guy" explanation.

Is Mike really a scholar in biblical studies and ancient languages? What are his credentials?

Yes, I really am. You can read my CV here.

If elohim is a plural word, how can it describe the singular God of Israel?

The Hebrew word elohim is morphologically plural (that is, it's "shaped" as a plural, or "spelled" as a plural). However, in roughly 2,200 cases (by far over 90% of the biblical occurrences), the word elohim is used as a proper name for the ONE God of Israel. We know this because it's a cold, hard fact from the text. In those 2,200 or so cases, elohim is the subject of a SINGULAR verb (all languages have subject-verb agreement) or is referred to by a SINGULAR pronoun (him, his). Don't take my word for it; you can see the data for yourself here.

What this means is that, most of the time in the Hebrew Bible, although elohim has plural FORM, it's MEANING is singular. It all depends on the sentence in which it's found and the surrounding grammar and context. We have words like this in English. If I say "sheep", by itself you can't tell if I am referring to one sheep or more than one sheep. I need to put it in a sentence where the grammar tells you what is meant. "The sheep is lost" refers to ONE sheep since "is" = a singular verb form. "The sheep are lost" refers to more than one sheep because the verb form is plural.

Far from it. Click here for a brief discussion on this. You can also visit my Sitchin site.

I don't accept the Sethite interpretation (that the sons of God in Gen 6:1-4 are the line of Seth marrying with the line of Cain). It simply has no merit. It cannot account for the morphology of the Hebrew term nephilim (see here for that). It is contradicted by the New Testament (Jude, 2 Peter 2, which presuppose an angelic sin that is compared to the sexual transgressions of Sodom). This view was not held by anyone, Jew or Christian, prior to the 3rd century A.D. and is internally contradictory. There are a number of decent critiques of this view on the Internet (e.g., here; note that inclusion here does not necessarily mean endorsement of the entire articulation). Nephilim are clearly cast as giants in the Old Testament, though I do not believe any such people were taller than unusually tall people of today (see here). Skeletal remains of alleged giants are unpersuasive, since they are typically fakes and, more importantly, have never undergone scientific analysis. Without the science, there is no more validity to them than reports of aliens.

Where can I learn more about the divine council? Are there any good books on it?

The best introductory resource is my divine council website. As far as published resources, there are many good scholarly articles, but nothing for the layperson. The closest one comes to that are dictionary articles in the following sources that will be in any Christian college library and many public libraries:

"Assembly, Divine" in Anchor Bible Dictionary

"Divine Council" (by yours truly) in InterVarsity Press's Dictionary of the Old Testament: Wisdom, Poetry and Writings

"Divine Council" (also by yours truly) in InterVarsity Press's Dictionary of the Old Testament: The Prophets

"Council" in Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible

"Sons of God" in Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible

Does Mike believe the Bible teaches ghosts are real? Aren't ghosts demons?

I believe the biblical text makes a distinction between disembodied human spirits and disembodied non-human spirits (see here for the data). The latter would fall into the "demon" category as we think of it, thought the Old Testament only uses the word "demon" twice, and not specifically in the context of mediums ("mistress of the 'ob, in biblical Hebrew parlance). But a malevolent non-human spirit seems conceptually the same as demons of later biblical literature. As far as disembodied human spirits goes, other than the case of Samuel (1 Sam 28:13), there is no proof that God sends them back to interact with humans (and that would be his choice; human solicitation of the disembodied human dead was forbidden in the Bible). The idea of a disembodied dead person's spirit coming back was part of the spiritual worldview of the disciples (it was their first impulse when they saw the resurrected Jesus; Luke 24:37). If one understands "angel" as generic term for any resident of the spiritual world (a "messenger from the other side"), then Acts 12:15 may describe the same idea if Peter's friends believed he was going to die. It may be that God allows a departed loved one to "say goodbye" to other loved ones, but that would be up to God. We have no way of correctly parsing such experiences (and I have heard about several of these first hand, from pastors and Christian friends and relatives), so we should not assume we can know precisely what's going on in light of the little said on the subject in the Bible. My advice is let such an event be what it is and not pursue it or make it part of one's faith.

Does Mike do any teaching or writing on the Bible that is available online?

Yes. I blog on biblical studies at my Naked Bible blog. I plan to start podcasting via that blog early in 2012. There are also some videos of classes I have taught where I go to church. Mike also offers online courses in ancient languages and biblical studies at his MEMRA institute.