I have seen a tremendous uptick on social media, web sites, and Youtube in particular of presentations and discussions about how the current War in Israel with Gaza and its Iranian proxies could well be the beginnings of what is often referred to as the “Battle of Armageddon.” Later this…
By the “Jesus Apocalypse” I mean the core text of Mark 13 in which Jesus is said to have laid out a scenario for his final generation. In this video I compare two rewritten accounts, found in Matthew 24 and Luke 21–both very different and going in opposite ways. The…
I have been fascinated with the “Year of the Four Emperors” for since graduate school days. I got convinced years ago, reading S. F. F. Brandon’s classic work, The Fall of Jerusalem and the Christian Church: A Study of the Effects of the Jewish Overthrow of 70 AD on Christianity,…
In this video I offer an informal account of my thirty-year history of research on the Dead Sea Scrolls, beginning in 1992 when our team spent a month surveying the site, doing radar ground scan, and surveying caves from Qumran to Ein Gedi. My new course, “Jesus and the Dead…
I know many of my blog readers have been anticipating the release of my new online course titled “Jesus and the Dead Sea Scrolls.” I have worked on this for several months and I am excited about its content and quality. It comes with a hefty course pack of study…
In this 2nd in my new Youtube series on “Bible Prophecy Through the Ages.” I take a look at the First Messiah in Jewish history–the Messiah BEFORE Jesus, who flourished in the late 2nd Temple period–100 years before Jesus and his movement. We don’t even know the name of this…
This most useful collection of essays in the Yale Anchor Bible Reference Library, edited by James H. Charlesworth, Jesus and the Dead Sea Scrolls: The Controversy Resolved (New York: Doubleday, 1992) 370 pp [paper and hardcover] has endured the test of time over the past three decades. It contains twelve…
The short answer is “It’s Complicated.” So much depends on what one means by “Essene” and what sources have gone into this or that use of the term–whether ancient or modern. In this interview with YouTube host Neal Sendlack (@GnosticInformant), we explore the core issues and many others related thereto,…
Geza Vermes, The Complete Dead Sea Scrolls in English 7th Edition (Penguin, 2012). I bought my first copy of this fine little paperback volume in 1973 in graduate school at the university of Chicago–it was the 1st edition and I still have it–and I have bought every edition since then.…
Some Oral Remarks by Prof. James Tabor reflection on Qumran down to WacoPlenary Session: When Prophecy Fails Delivered at the American Academy of Religion Annual Meeting, 1997 English translations of the Dead Sea Scroll quotation here are from Geza Vermes, The Dead Sea Scrolls in English. Note: As an Amazon…