Our earliest gospel of Mark implies that Jesus left the Galilee and headed for Jerusalem for Passover in the Spring a few weeks before his death. Based on additional textual sources and geographical references it appears he traveled to the Mt Herman area in the far north, then spent his…
Most people think of Jerusalem as the HQ of the emerging Jesus Movement, but the real “Ground Zero” was the city of Capernaum (Kafar Nahum–ancient village of Nahum the prophet) on the Northwest of the Sea of Galilee. It could well be called the official “birthplace” of the Jesus movement–quite…
Our knowledge of the hamlet of Nazareth, not mentioned in any early non-Christian textual sources, has grown exponentially over the past few decades. In this video I survey what we now know and how it might shed light on our understanding of Jesus and his family–from his childhood growing up…
I am using the term “Luke” here advisedly, for the author of the two-volume New Testament work of Luke-Acts. See “Who Wrote the Gospel of Luke?” by Mikel C. Parsons for who the author might have been and what might be said for the tradition view of a companion of…
We are living in the last days, on this LAST GREAT day of Gregorian Year 2023! We had a really wonderful ZOOM meeting yesterday with a mixture of students from both my on-line courses–Mark as well “Jesus and the Dead Sea Scrolls.” The meeting was recorded and will become part…
The story of Simon of Cyrene carrying the cross of Jesus as related in the gospel of Mark is quite remarkable for both its brevity and its content. It is conveyed in s single verse in Mark 15:21 as Jesus is being led away by the Romans to be crucified.…
Caution: This presentation is 1.5 hours and is for serious students of the historical Jesus–which I believe my Blog readers and subscribers are. In this age of TikTok, Shorts, YT videos that are never supposed to be longer than 12 minutes, it will find its rightful place. It is not…
Anyone up for a fairly in-depth hour and a half discussion of the John the Baptizer/Jesus/James movement and it possible relationship to the group that the historical Josephus, and other classical writers such as Pliny and Strabo, called the “Essenes”? We are not sure of the origins of this Greek…
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…
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,…