The Texas state flag flies in Austin, TX.Photo by Getty Images
By Caryn Tamber-Rosenau
November 25, 2024
I love the Bible. That’s why I’ve chosen to devote my career to reading and dissecting it, finding new ways to parse its texts and meanings, and teaching about it to classrooms full of undergraduates at a state university in Texas. I believe that learning about the content of the Bible is important for understanding not only religion, but also world history, politics, art and literature.
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But not like this.
The Bluebonnet curriculum about to become part of classroom instruction in some Texas public schools is a travesty. Friday, the Texas State Board of Education voted 8-7 to accept a school curriculum that smuggles Christian religious instruction into public schools. The curriculum is voluntary, but school districts that adopt it will receive financial incentives.
The creators of the curriculum have defended its biblical content on the grounds that the Bible is a foundational document of our civilization, so students must understand it to be well-educated citizens. But if an understanding of the Bible — and not indoctrination with a Protestant Christian view of the Bible — is the main goal here, then why does the curriculum show so many signs of biblical illiteracy?
For example, in a kindergarten unit on kings and queens, students learn that King Solomon built the Temple in Jerusalem because “he wanted his people to have a place to gather, pray, and sing songs to God.” The Hebrew Bible does not describe most of these activities taking place at the Temple or its predecessor, the Tabernacle. What it does describe is lots and lots of animal sacrifice. The lesson ignores the actual biblical material in favor of grafting onto biblical Israel what Protestant Christians do in churches today — what a coincidence.
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I also note that biblical scholars have yet to find evidence from outside the Bible of Solomon doing the things the Bible credits him with, or even evidence of his existence. He is an important figure for Jewish and Christian religious believers, but he cannot be treated as historical. In the sections of the kings and queens unit on King Midas and Cinderella, the curriculum prompts teachers to ask students which aspects of the stories could happen and which are “magic or fantasy.” There is no such prompt in the King Solomon lesson. He is treated as a historical figure and the story of his God-given wisdom is treated as fact. It is not.
In another example of biblical illiteracy, the curriculum introduces the biblical Queen Esther to second graders in a unit on “fighting for a cause.” Again, this story is presented as historical, though there is little in the story and nothing outside the Bible to indicate its historicity. More egregiously, the curriculum writes God and faith into a biblical book that famously mentions neither. Esther’s fast is given religious motives, while the text says nothing of the sort. Esther is characterized as fighting for the right of the Jews to practice their own religion, with the curriculum drawing a parallel between this story and historical tales of people seeking religious freedom in the United States.
Again, religious belief is not mentioned in Esther. What is at stake is the survival of the Jews as a people. This is nothing less than a Christian colonization of the story of Esther to make it look more like Protestant narratives of freedom of worship. (It is also more than a little ironic to stress freedom to worship for religious minorities when you are in the process of imposing your religion on those religious minorities.)
The fighting for a cause unit lists as an objective: “Describe the similarities among the methods of nonviolence used by Queen Esther” and the other figures studied. This characterization of Esther’s story as nonviolent would be hilarious if it weren’t part of a pernicious and unsubtle effort to sneak Christian religious instruction into Texas schools. Did the authors of this curriculum read a version of Esther that was somehow missing the final chapters, where the Jews slaughter those who would have killed them? Where Esther asks the king for permission for a second day of killing? Where the 10 sons of Haman are killed? I can only surmise that this is part of the evangelical tendency to sanitize the Bible so it falls more in line with contemporary sensibilities, what my biblical studies colleague Jill Hicks-Keeton calls “making the Bible benevolent.”
While I am a biblical scholar by training, I also teach Jewish Studies courses and direct my university’s program in Jewish Studies. I have observed a tendency among my students, many of whom were educated in Texas public schools, to seriously misunderstand Jews and Judaism. I blame this in part on the misguided concept of the “Judeo-Christian tradition,” a phrase that appears in the Texas education standards more than once. The idea that there is a real thing called “Judeo-Christian” obscures the major differences between these two religions, and between Jewish and Christian interpretations of the Hebrew Bible.
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Many of my students arrive at university believing Judaism and Christianity are essentially the same religion. Some do not understand that Jesus does not figure into Judaism in any way. Those who do know that Jews do not believe Jesus was the messiah or a prophet often assume that Judaism is just Christianity minus Jesus, or perhaps the Old Testament plus time. These students have an especially hard time understanding that Jews and Christians read the Tanakh and the Old Testament, respectively, in radically different ways.
I worry that, when lessons like the ones I point to above from the Bluebonnet curriculum make their way into Texas classrooms, the problems of biblical and religious illiteracy will worsen among my students. By learning readings of the Hebrew Bible that are indefensible from a scholarly perspective and only make sense if your goal is Christian indoctrination, how much more will they struggle to understand that people can read the Bible in more than one way, and that Judaism is not a flavor of Christianity?
I am indignant about Bluebonnet not only as a scholar and a teacher, but also as a Jewish parent. While my children currently attend a Jewish school, when they finish elementary school, they will likely move to public school. If Houston public schools adopt the Bluebonnet curriculum, my children will be attending the upper grades alongside kids who have learned incorrect, misleading, exclusively Christian-source information about the sacred texts of our religion.
If students are taught in kindergarten that King Solomon built a Temple that functioned much like a contemporary Protestant church, or in second grade that Queen Esther was a nonviolent activist for religious freedom, they do not have to do any hard work to understand the Hebrew Bible in its ancient context, not to mention its contemporary Jewish context. The Bluebonnet curriculum takes a rich collection of texts that are sacred for multiple religions and reads them in ways that are inaccurate, misleading and offensive — and that will produce biblically illiterate Texans.
Caryn Tamber-Rosenau is assistant professor of Jewish Studies and Religious Studies at the University of Houston and directs UH’s Jewish Studies program. All views are her own and do not necessarily reflect those of her employer.
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Texas police have released the mugshot of one of the three juveniles arrested over the weekend in connection with 12 separate shooting incidents across Austin that injured four people, as well as a timeline of the alleged 28-hour rampage.
Cristian Fajardo Mondragon, 17, was taken into custody Sunday after allegedly partaking in a citywide shooting spree that left four people injured, struck two fire stations and triggered a shelter-in-place order in South Austin, the Austin Police Department said in a statement.
Mondragon was arrested alongside two additional suspects, a 15-year-old and a 16-year-old, police said. Their names have not been released due to a statewide law regarding what information can be made public involving juvenile suspects.
Saturday, May 16, 2026, 11:30 a.m.
Officers received a report of a stolen firearm from a local business. Surveillance footage subsequently revealed the vehicle driven by the suspects had also recently been stolen, according to authorities.
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Saturday, May 16, 2026, 3:58 p.m.
Less than five hours later, authorities confirmed the first alleged shooting at a trailer residence. However, no injuries were reported.
Cristian Fajardo Mondragon, 17, is one of three suspects accused in an overnight crime spree involving 12 shootings throughout Austin, Texas, on May 16, 2026. Austin Police Department
Saturday, May 16, 2026, 4:30 p.m.
Officers responded to another shooting at the Whisper Hollow apartment complex, in which multiple vehicles and an occupied apartment were struck by gunfire. Witness descriptions and surveillance footage of the suspects led authorities to believe the two shootings were connected.
Saturday, May 16, 2026, 6:08 p.m.
Approximately two hours later, a third shooting was reported after witnesses observed a suspect wearing a black hoodie exiting a black sedan at another apartment complex and firing through the door of a third-floor unit, police said.
Saturday, May 16, 2026, 7 p.m.
Authorities said that a group of suspects matching previous surveillance footage of the alleged shootings stole a Hyundai Elantra from a Motel 6 parking lot, with another shooting being reported just 90 minutes later.
Surveillance footage released by Austin police shows a suspect investigators said was involved in multiple shooting incidents across Austin. Austin Police Department
Saturday, May 16, 2026, 8:49 p.m.
Authorities said a suspect fired a gun into an Austin Fire Department station while firefighters were inside. Thankfully, no injuries were reported.
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Saturday, May 16, 2026, 8:55 p.m.
Just six minutes later, authorities received a report that suspects matching the same description had fired shots from their vehicle and struck the windshield of an occupied car. One victim inside the vehicle was injured by broken glass, according to police.
Sunday, May 17, 2026, 3:50 a.m.
Police said the suspects allegedly stole another vehicle, with authorities discovering a previous vehicle containing bullet damage abandoned near 1800 E. Stassney Lane hours later.
Austin police shared a photo of a white Kia sedan believed to be stolen in connection with 12 shootings throughout Austin, Texas, on May 16, 2026. X / @Austin_Police
Sunday, May 17, 2026, 8:46 a.m.
Authorities received a report regarding a victim who had been shot in the back and stomach near 7409 Janes Ranch Road by a suspect matching previous witness descriptions surrounding the alleged shootings.
Sunday, May 17, 2026, 9 a.m.
Shortly after, officers recovered several other stolen vehicles believed to be connected to the alleged shooting spree.
Sunday, May 17, 2026, 10:46 a.m
A second incident involving shots being fired into another Austin Fire Department station was reported to authorities, with the suspects allegedly stealing yet another vehicle — a white Kia Optima — three hours later.
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Sunday, May 17, 2026, 1:44 p.m.
Authorities said two victims were shot in a drive-by shooting involving a white Kia Optima, with two additional shootings being reported within 20 minutes.
Sunday, May 17, 2026, 2:29 p.m.
Authorities said surveillance footage showed a white Kia sedan approaching a victim before the individual fell to the ground with an apparent gunshot wound. The victim was subsequently transported to a local hospital with life-threatening injuries.
Austin Police Chief Lisa Davis speaks during a press conference alongside city officials following a series of shootings across Austin. Austin Police Department / YouTube
Sunday, May 17, 2026, 3:23 p.m.
About one hour later, officers with the Manor Police Department spotted the Kia sedan believed to be connected to the alleged shootings, prompting a pursuit in which the three suspects abandoned the vehicle and fled on foot.
One suspect was immediately detained, with authorities taking the other two individuals into custody separately after a brief search.
The incidents led to the injuries of four people and five vehicles being stolen, police said.
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“At this time, investigators believe the incidents were a mix of random and targeted shootings,” APD said in a statement. “Some victims were known to the suspects, while other incidents appeared to occur without any known connection.”
Davis went on to describe the investigation as “complex” because of the sheer number of crime scenes, stolen vehicles and random shootings throughout the city.
Formal charges against the three suspects remain under review, but are expected to include aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, aggravated assault/motor vehicle, deadly conduct, unauthorized use of a motor vehicle, evading arrest, theft of a firearm and other related offenses, APD said.
Fox News Digital reached out to the Austin Police Department for comment.
The second-busiest commercial air carrier at Harry Reid International Airport is expanding service to and from Austin, Texas.
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Atlanta-based Delta Air Lines will double the number of daily flights to and from the Texas capital to two beginning in the fall.
Demand for trips to Austin, which calls itself “The Live Music Capital of the World” and features multiple music festivals all year, including March’s SWSX multimedia event, is growing, according to Delta. The airline said it expects both markets will benefit from the service expansion.
Delta competes on the route with market leader Southwest Airlines, Frontier Airlines and Allegiant Air.
Police release new footage of gunman who opened fire at Austin bar
Police released new CCTV and body cam footage of the gunman who opened fire at an Austin bar.
Three juvenile individuals are in custody following a weekend crime spree of 12 shootings that left four people injured and multiple car thefts in Austin, Texas.
The crimes occurred starting at 4 p.m. on Saturday, May 16, and ended on Sunday, May 17, resulting in the arrest of a 15-year-old, a 17-year-old and a third individual, Austin Police Department Chief Lisa Davis said Sunday, May 17.
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“The 17-year-old has a warrant for his arrest for a theft of a gun from the same store the 15-year-old stole a gun from,” Davis said at a news conference.
The string of crimes started when Austin PD was first notified of a stolen vehicle from an apartment complex, followed by the theft of a firearm. Following that, Davis said an estimated 20 service calls were received in the South and Southeast Austin areas regarding the individuals.
“Two times they fired at a firehouse and struck a truck,” Davis said. “Into apartment buildings where officers had to go door to door, ensuring that everyone was safe.”
In total, two separate fire houses, several buildings and apartment complexes were fired upon by the individuals, in addition to four vehicles being stolen.
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Of the four individuals injured, three have been confirmed to have sustained non-life-threatening injuries, with the fourth sustaining critical injuries.
Police were able to connect these events to the three individuals, but Davis said there is no known motive for the series of events.
The crime spree concluded when Manor PD conducted a traffic stop on a vehicle that the individuals were driving. The individuals fled, but two of them were apprehended on Sunday.
Following the news conference, the Manor Police Department announced a third individual — a juvenile — who had fled the vehicle earlier on Sunday had been detained with no ongoing threat to the public.
Gov. Greg Abbott released a statement on social media calling the individuals dangerous.
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“If they are ever released from jail, they will surely harm again,” Abbott said. “The DA & Court must do their job and keep these criminals behind bars.”
Anyone with information should contact the Aggravated Assault Unit at 512-974-5177 or submit tips anonymously through austincrimestoppers.org or by calling 512-472-8477.
