Is there any evidence that any of the NT authors knew Hebrew/Aramaic semi-fluently? Do they ever cite a Hebrew translation of the Bible? Wouldn’t it be common for Jews based in Palestine to be fluent in Hebrew/Aramaic and to cite it?

I've just noticed a weird pattern that exists in the Law of Moses:

Deuteronomy 23:1 -- No one whose testicles are crushed or whose male organ is cut off shall enter the assembly of the Lord.

Leviticus 21:16-20 -- And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, “Speak to Aaron, saying, None of your offspring throughout their generations who has a blemish may approach to offer the bread of his God.  For no one who has a blemish shall draw near, a man blind or lame, or one who has a mutilated face or a limb too long, or a man who has an injured foot or an injured hand, or a hunchback or a dwarf or a man with a defect in his sight or an itching disease or scabs or crushed testicles.

Leviticus 22:24-25 -- Any animal that has its testicles bruised or crushed or torn or cut you shall not offer to the Lord; you shall not do it within your land,  neither shall you offer as the bread of your God any such animals gotten from a foreigner. Since there is a blemish in them, because of their mutilation, they will not be accepted for you.

Deuteronomy 25:11-12 -- When men fight with one another and the wife of the one draws near to rescue her husband from the hand of him who is beating him and puts out her hand and seizes him by the private parts, then you shall cut off her hand. Your eye shall have no pity.

Does anyone have any insight into what exactly is going on here? Why were crushed testicles such a serious concern in Mosaic Law?

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I've seen this theory bandied around in atheist circles but never with any citation other than it sounds plausible. Anything deeper here?

Wikipedia says there are 5,600 Catholic Bishops today.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bishops_in_the_Catholic_Church - not aware of another source...did someone count all the bishops in the link?

Cardinals only came about in the 6th century per Wiki.

https://www.usccb.org/about/bishops-and-dioceses#tab--bishops

That source is for the USA only.

434 active & retired bishops.

17 cardinals

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anyway...the only Bishop by name in my brain is Irenaeus. When he was alive - how many were there?

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I will quote Carl Sagan here: "Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence"

For Moses, Abraham, David, Eve, Daniel, Solomon, Adam, Joshua and many other persons described in The Hebrew bible, is there evidence of their non-existence or just not enough archeological evidence of them beyond Hebrew Bible itself?

Irenaeus of Lyon: “Luke also, the companion of Paul, recorded in a book the Gospel preached by him.”

• To what extent this is correct
• If we disregard Luke as the author of gLuke-Acts, did he necessarily have to be someone who followed Paul and the apostles?
• The author of Luke-Acts sometimes uses "we" to refer to the apostles, would this indicate the author's presence?

In your opinion, what was Jesus doing during the “lost years” of his life? I believe this period was from when he was around 12 years old to about 29 years old.

Is there a general consensus as to what occurred during this time? Why would the gospels leave out such a large span of Jesus’ life? Considering this, it seems we know very little about his life relative to the length of it.

Did someone compile a list of all the internal contradictions in the Torah? The closest I found was skepticsannotatedbible.com however there are two problems. 1. It includes external contradictions and doesn't distinguish between internal and external. 2. It includes a lot of "contradictions" that could be easily solved.

Hi all,

Was reading the synoptics again and found the Parable of the Wheat and the Tares (Matt. 13:24-30) remarkably similar to John 15:1-8 (I am the true vine).

I have a limited knowledge of NT work as my background is in Babylonian exile period stuff but I remember that there are ideas of the Johannine community being completely seperate from the Synoptic traditions.

These passages are very theologically similar - could "John" be repurposing this to explicitly identify Christ as the sower of wheat presented in the parable (as many church fathers interpret these passages in a similar way)

Is it worth buying, or are there better books about Paul out there?

What do scholars make of the parallels and contradictions? It seems both Joshua 14-15 and Judges 1 either had some of the same sources, or one quoted the other, and either that person or a later redactor made some changes resulting in contradictions.

These chapters recount the taking of territory and cities in Judah, Hebron in particular, with Joshua 14 emphasizing it being given by Joshua to Caleb, and Judges 1 adding this almost as an afterthought, perhaps by a second writer. Also see the disjointed passage involving 'the descendants of Moses' father-in-law the Kenite' and the 'City of Palms' (ie Jericho) in Judges 1:16.

And what to make of Joshua 15:63, which tosses in a comment about Judah being unable to dislodge the Jebusites, while in the textually later time period of Judges 1:21 it says the Benjamites couldn't dislodge them. And according to the boundaries given in Joshua 15 and 17, Jerusalem was in Benjamin territory, though Judges 1:8 says Judah took Jerusalem, put it to the sword and burned it.

The Othniel/Caleb/daughter springs tale seems to be a nearly exact copy between Joshua and Judges. It establishes water and land claims for Othniel, and tells an interesting story about social engineering amidst the bloody campaign to destroy and drive out the 6, 7 or 10 nations in Canaan (depending on the Bible passage).

What scholars have written on this topic?

Noth and many others since have documented involvement by the Deuteronomist in Joshua, Judges, Samuel and Kings; what is the evidence in this case?

In Hidden Book, Friedman made a case that the Jahwist author wrote passages from Genesis thru Kings, including parts of Joshua and Judges.

Is there evidence of E or P, THE Redactor, or another?

Did he do it because he was a true believer in Christ or for political reasons?

I’ve seen conflicting accounts on this, with answers ranging from baptism originating in priestly duties described in Leviticus 16 to baptism being an invention of second temple era Judaism.

Is there a scholarly consensus on the origins of the practice and what it symbolized prior to being associated with Jesus’ death and resurrection?

And I will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem a spirit[a] of grace and supplication. They will look on[b] me, the one they have pierced, and they will mourn for him as one mourns for an only child, and grieve bitterly for him as one grieves for a firstborn son.

God is speaking, so the "I" refers to God. He is the one they have pierced. Then there is a shift to third person "him." They mourn "him" like one mourns a first born son and an only child. This either refers to God himself (in which case the Christian interpretation is obvious) or to someone else. If to someone else, someone who is mourned like a first born and only son, who is it?

What does it mean for God to be pierced in this context?

If it is a literal piercing, then the Christian interpretation is obvious, but even if it is a metaphorical piercing of his heart because of the one they killed, who is this one, the one who is mourned like a first born and only son?

Hi everyone, not a scholar, just interested in the Bible, and I’m looking for feedback on my hypothesis:

Out of all the sayings of Jesus it is most likely he said something along the lines of “It is bad for one to divorce their spouse.”

I arrived at this hypothesis by looking at the earliest sources in the Bible: Mark, the genuine Pauline epistles, and also the theorized Q source.

The genuine Pauline epistles only directly quote Jesus three times, from my estimation. This one stuck out to me because it is similar to something shared in Mark and Q:

“…that the wife should not separate from her husband (but if she does separate, let her remain unmarried or else be reconciled to her husband), and that the husband should not divorce his wife.” (1 Corinthians 7:10-11, NRSV).

This is the corresponding passage in Mark:

“Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her; and if she divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery.” (Mark 10:11-12 NRSV).  

And the corresponding passage in the Q source, Matthew 5:32 and Luke 16:18:

“Whosoever shall put away his wife causeth her to commit adultery, and whosoever shall marry her that is divorced comitteth adultery.”

I’m not making a judgement on whether this is important or not, I’m just interested in the question of what sayings of Jesus we have the MOST evidence for. I’m looking forward to scholars here critiquing my methods and telling me more about these early sources.

If Matthew was written after the destruction of Jerusalem in 70AD and he was retrospectively describing the events, portraying them as prophecy spoken by Jesus, what was the Abomination of Desolation that Matthew said, when you see standing in the holy place you should flee the city. I’ve heard it said that this was Titus entering the Temple during this siege but that wouldn’t be much of a warning to flee, by then it would be too late to flee. What of Eusebius account that the Church fled to Pella before the siege, is there any truth to that, and if so, was something they witnessed connected to Matthew’s Abomination of Desolation? What of Emperor Caligula’s attempt to place his statue in the Temple? It was a failed attempt but it seems that Paul’s 2 Epistle to the Thessalonians 2:3-4 seems to imply early Christians believed that after a rebellion(possibly the Zealots) the man of lawlessness would be set up in the Temple, sorta like what happened with the Bar Kochba revolt which led to Hadrians Temple to Jupiter. Now I know it’s unlikely that Matthew is speaking of Hadrians Temple, but based off the Abomination of Desolation recorded in 1 Maccabees, being a statue of Zeus in the Temple, was something like this happening in Jerusalem before 70AD which the Christians would of saw as a sign to flee Jerusalem, or at least be what Matthew was referring to should of been a sign to Christian to flee?

”“So when you see the abomination of desolation spoken of by the prophet Daniel, standing in the holy place ( let the reader understand), then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains.“ ‭‭Matthew‬ ‭24‬:‭15‬-‭16‬ ‭

”Let no one deceive you in any way. For that day will not come, unless the rebellion comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of destruction, who opposes and exalts himself against every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, proclaiming himself to be God. Do you not remember that when I was still with you I told you these things?“ ‭‭2 Thessalonians‬ ‭2‬:‭3‬-‭5‬ ‭

Also which of the patriarchs signed it and how many bishops overall?

I am in a debate with my brother on the historicity of the bible, and he brought up the question that a lot of the contradictions in the Septuagint are explained in the various rabbinical commentaries, which were allegedly passed down by oral tradition from the time the story took place. How do I respond? I understand that a lot of these are post hoc, but I want to hear your answer.

I know it is stated that the book of revelation is very different from other books in the NT. How much of a difference is revelation compared to the rest of the NT. Can you find a connection with Paul’s teachings or the gospels in Revelation?

Hello scholars, recently I have been wondering if the 4 gospels could be fabricated stories of a true man/messiah and his walk. Have any scholars had such a view. I do believe that Jesus was a real man and prophet of God and even the Son. But do you think the New Testament could have been made by people who fabricated and mixed the stories of the gospel with the true walk of Jesus maybe to paint there own narrative on the savior.

I may be misguided so please correct me if I am wrong, but -

I was under the impression that Paul was always throughout his life, a Jewish man, living in a Jewish community, and believed all the basics of Judaism. Knowing this, where would he get some of his ideas from, that would later influence christian doctrine. For example in Romans 10:9 when he talks about people needing to confess that Jesus was lord, in order to be saved - if he was a Jew, why did he think people needed salvation? Doesn't that go against Jewish thought? And even if he believed that people needed salvation (as in salvation from an eternal punishment of some kind) why would he think that could be found in the Jewish messiah? Wasn't the Jewish messiah always understood to be 100% human? If so, did Paul simply create these ideas completley from his own reasoning? Or was it something else? Thank you in advance.

I hope this is okay for a main feed question, I apologize if not.

What would be your recommendation if I asked you for an extra-biblical resource for studying the religous history of the Isrealite people.

Thank you to all who views and comments!

I read these creatures in Genesis 18 and other apocryphal texts, who are them? Trinity? is this just another theophany like that "Bush that Moses saw" and the "Angel of Adonai".

In the Epistle to the Ephesians, text 2:2 refers to Satan as "the prince of the power of the air". But what is this air, exactly? Most people assume it's the spiritual dimension that Satan and his demons reside in. And Ephesians 6:12 seems to back this up. ("For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.") So is the "air" a literal place where the Devil houses his residence and army? Or is just a metaphor for the influence he has over the Earth?

Who is the suffering servant? he is related to the Messiah? does his description fit Jesus?

Also curious to see references in the early church writings of why Acts ends the way it does?

Was there perhaps an even older gospel than Mark? In what language? Was there perhaps a sayings source similar to Q but not Q?

Joshua 24:26 says that "Joshua recorded these things in the Book of the Law of God." I'm not sure exactly, but "these things" seem to refer to the renewal of the covenant at Shechem.

It's my understanding that the mainstream view of Deuteronomic History views "the Book of the Law of God" as originally Deuteronomy 12-26 and later the entire book. Doesn't the book of Joshua contradict this, since it asserts that Joshua added to the book an account set long after the end of Deuteronomy's events?