Paul indicates that “seeing the Lord” is an essential criterion for one claiming to be an apostle. According to the book of Acts the main criteria in deciding who would replace Judas Iscariot as the Twelfth apostle after he had betrayed Jesus and killed himself was that the one chosen…
Jesus was born of a woman. On that everyone but the most extreme docetic Gnostic would seem to agree–if there are any still left around. But how was it that Mary became pregnant? There are three basic positions that have been offered in response to the two birth stories we…
Something of which I am more and more convinced is the paramount importance of James the brother of Jesus to the very survival of the Messianic movement in the critical months and years following the tragic and brutal murders of both John the Baptist and Jesus. I present my extended…
The issue of the relationship of Jesus to the “Essenes,” as well as to the the Dead Sea Scrolls, whether Essene or otherwise, is central to our attempts to view Jesus in his historical contexts. In other words, we are essentially asking, in our historical Quest–“what kind of a Jew…
The well-worn admonition to “put Christ back into Christmas” raises some fascinating issues for those of us who study the origins and history of Christianity. Most know that Christmas as celebrated today has evolved over the centuries, drawing from a diverse and rich assortment of customs, none of which go…
One would not normally think of the apostle Paul around Christmas time since all of the focus of the holiday, beyond the shopping, gift-giving, and family gatherings–is on the birth of Jesus. Many biblical scholars would argue that Paul knows nothing of the “virgin birth” of Jesus but I argue…
And they went out and fled from the tomb, for trembling and astonishment had seized them, and they said nothing. Most general Bible readers have the mistaken impression that Matthew, the opening book of the New Testament, must be our first and earliest Gospel, with Mark, Luke, and John following.…
One of the more controversial but significant arguments I make in my new book, Paul and Jesus, is that the traditional words attributed to Jesus at the Last Supper–“This is my body,” “This is my blood” over the bread and wine–originated with Paul not with Jesus! Here is a summary…
For years I have considered Thomas Hardy (1840-1928) one of the most moving, informative, and influential novelists of my own reading experience. I remember first reading Tess of the d’Urbervilles and Jude the Obscure over 30 years ago and the images and power of those tragically realistic portrayals of human…
Ben Witherington ((Ben Witherington is Amos Professor of New Testament for Doctoral Studies at Asbury Theological Seminary and on the doctoral faculty at St. Andrews University in Scotland, see “About Ben Witherington” )) has a new blog post titled “Once More with Feeling: Did the James Ossuary come out of…