If you’ve read the gospels, you know that Jesus had a fair number of run-ins with a group called “the Pharisees.” It’s easy to see them as the “bad guys” of the Jesus story. The Pharisees are variously portrayed as “hypocrites,” or “lovers of money,” or worse. But there are several problems with such a one-dimensional portrait of the Pharisees: Now would be a good time to talk about the various political parties within Judaism during the lifetime of Jesus. This is important because these parties changed radically within a few decades after Jesus died—and before most of the New …
Randy Ingermanson’s Blog
The Simple Message of Jesus
What’s the point of the Jesus story? It’s sometimes called “the greatest story ever told,” but in my opinion, most of the Jesus movies I’ve seen have been pretty boring. Jesus walks around in a bathrobe. He heals people wearing bathrobes. He preaches to people wearing bathrobes. He argues theology with people wearing bathrobes. Then some guys wearing helmets and miniskirts kill him. What’s so great about that? Why do we celebrate the birthday of Jesus? Why do we celebrate his life? Why do we celebrate his death? My own opinion is that the point of the Jesus story is …
Everything We Know About Doubting Thomas
“Doubting Thomas” was one of the Twelve disciples of Jesus, but we actually know very little about him. Thomas is mentioned as a member of the Twelve disciples in all four major lists: in Mark, Matthew, Luke, and Acts. But that’s all these sources say about Thomas, which is disappointing. Fortunately, the gospel of John mentions Thomas several times. The name “Thomas” comes from the Hebrew name “Toma,” which means twin. The gospel of John tells us Thomas was also called “Didymus,” which is a Greek word meaning twin. Some legends say Thomas was the twin of Jesus, but there’s …
Who Killed Jesus?
The question “who killed Jesus” is a deceptively simple question. If you ask different people, you’ll get wildly different answers. Here are some that I’ve heard over the years: Let’s look at each of these answers and see what we can learn. We’ll see that they fall into two basic groups, depending on what they’re trying to explain. Did “Your Sins” Kill Jesus? It’s common for Christians to say that their sins killed Jesus. The first thing to notice is that this is a theological claim. And what do I mean by a theological claim? I mean that this is …
The Job Titles of Jesus
To understand the story of Jesus, it’s helpful to ask what his job title was. If you asked a modern Christian, they’d probably say something like this: The job title of Jesus was to be the Messiah, which is the same thing as the biological Son of God, which is the same thing as the Second Person of the Trinity. But if you asked Jewish people in the first century, you’d have got a whole range of answers. Here is a list of a number of job titles that the New Testament tells us that Jewish people in the first …
The Violent World of Jesus of Nazareth
Jesus of Nazareth was born into a violent world. Much like ours, only different. At the time Jesus was born, Judea and Samaria and Galilee had been under the control of the Roman empire for about sixty years. King Herod the Great ruled over these regions as a “client king” of Rome—meaning that he answered to Caesar and ruled in Caesar’s name. Rome dominated its empire, usually by threats of violence, and (when necessary) by actual violence. Herod the Great dominated his kingdom in the same way, by threats and by force. Herod was an evil, violent man. He killed …
The Greatest Rabbi You Never Heard Of
Jacob Neusner was one of the best-known scholars of Jewish studies in the 20th century. He reckoned that the three most influential Jews of all time were Moses, Jeremiah, and Yohanan ben Zakkai. Odds are you’ve heard of Moses and Jeremiah. Moses was the great lawgiver. Jeremiah was the great prophet who had the bad luck to see Jerusalem destroyed by Babylon in the year 587 BC. But Yohanan who? What’s he famous for? What We Know About Yohanan ben Zakkai Essentially everything we know about Yohanan ben Zakkai comes to us from the rabbinic writings—the Mishnah, the Tosefta, and …
The Mysterious Aristocrats of Ancient Jerusalem
When I was a kid listening to the stories about Jesus, a mysterious group of “bad guys” kept cropping up. They went by various labels. Here’s a list, which I’m sure you’ll find familiar: Some Synonyms and Definitions The New Testament doesn’t define any of these terms. The authors expected people to know what they meant. The terms have a lot of overlap, and some of them are essentially synonyms. Here’s my best attempt to explain what these terms meant and which are synonyms: Money, Power, and Religion What these groups have in common is that almost all of them …
What Do We Really Know About Nicodemus?
Nicodemus appears in the Bible only in the gospel of John, in three separate passages. According to John, Nicodemus was a Pharisee and a member of the ruling council, the Sanhedrin. The three passages don’t tell us much: This is not much information. Later Christian traditions claimed Nicodemus as a Christian saint, although these come centuries after the time of Jesus. There’s no particular reason to think these traditions are historically reliable. So other than the gospel of John, we have no first-century sources of information about Nicodemus. A Rare Name The name Nicodemus is not common. The Jewish historian …
What Do We Really Know About Mary Magdalene?
Mary Magdalene is one of the most mysterious people mentioned in the Bible. Was she really a prostitute? Was she really married to Jesus of Nazareth? In this blog post, I’ll cover the 9 New Testament passages that mention Mary Magdalene in first-century sources. That’s right—there are only 9 passages in the entire Bible that mention Mary Magdalene. Financial Support in Galilee Luke 8 tells how Jesus walked around Galilee with 12 disciples and a number of women who gave him financial support. The first woman on the list is Mary Magdalene, and Luke tells us Jesus cast 7 demons …
