Bart D. Ehrman's Blog, page 258

How Old Was Jesus?

Almost everyone who thinks about the matter thinks that Jesus was 33 years old when he died.  But the New Testament never says so and I bet most people don’t know how that age is calculated.  Moreover, I bet even more people don’t know that there was an early Christian tradition (attested in the second century) that he was much older than that!

Yesterday I was reading one of the most important proto-orthodox authors of the second century, Irenaeus, whose five-volume work “Against the Heresies...

Explaining Jesus’ Apocalyptic Assumptions

One other aspect of Jesus’ teaching is important to emphasize before continuing on to consider his understanding of the afterlife.  That is the thoroughly apocalyptic character of his views.

I have discussed Jewish apocalypticism a number of times on the blog—including some months ago on the current thread.  I don’t want to repeat all that here in the same form, but I do want to summarize what the view is and discuss its underlying assumptions.

In a small nutshell, apocalypticists believed th...

The Preaching of Jesus in a Nutshell

I am trying to set up what I want to say about Jesus’ view of the afterlife, and am finding that it requires a good bit of background information.  I have already done two things: shown what he taught about the coming kingdom and explained that his teaching (about the kingdom and everything else) is very different in John from the Synoptics.  Scholars are almost unanimous that given these differences, the older sources (the Synoptics and the accounts they built on, e.g., Q, M, and L) are more...

The Skeletal Remains of Yehohanan: Readers Mailbag October 8, 2017

 

I have received the following question

QUESTION:

One thing came to mind during the discussion of whether crucified persons were buried.  There is a case where an ossuary was found with a nail through the ankle bone.  [I think it was ankle, might have been wrist.]  Obviously this was an exceptional case; as I recall, there are some 900 bone boxes in Israeli museums and this is the only such case, where according to Josephus hundreds (thousands?) were crucified in 1st Century Palestine.  But...

Reasonable Doubts – How Jesus Became God

I have not posted any audio (or video!) appearances for a while.  Here’s one from a few years ago.   On July 25, 2014, I was interviewed by Jeremy Beahan and Justin Schieber  for their podcast called “Reasonable Doubts” on my book “How Jesus Became God: The Exaltation of a Jewish Preacher from Galilee.”   The issue of the book is how Jesus, an apocalyptic prophet from Galilee, came to be regarded as a God by his followers.

Reasonable Doubts was a production of WPRR Reality Radio (Grand Rapids...

Is This the Same Teacher? Jesus in John and the Synoptics.

I have been talking about the differences between John and the Synoptics, and have discussed the overall contents of John and its unusual take on Jesus’ deeds.  Nowhere is this more obvious than in Jesus’ teachings, whichy are very different here from what you find in the other three Gospels. Here is how I explain it in my New Testament textbook.

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John’s unique understanding of Jesus’ miracles is matched by his distinctive portrayal of Jes...

Jesus’ Miracles in John and the Synoptics

I’m trying to explain how John is so very different from the other three Gospels in its presentation of Jesus’ words and deeds.  As I have shown, John tells different stories from the others. More striking when it tells the same kinds of stories, there are stark and compelling differences.  Here is how I explain it in my New Testament textbook.

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The differences between John and the Synoptics are perhaps even more striking in stories that they have in...

(Birthday) Gifts and (Speaking) Gigs

Two brief blog-related issues, one involving a birthday and the other my speaking gigs.

The birthday – well, it kind-s involves the blog.   This Thursday (October 5) is my birthday.  62.  Who would-a thought?   And who cares?  (Apart from me…)

Well … I bet you’re wondering what you should get me for my birthday.  Here’s an idea, suggested by two blog members already:  How bout you get me a donation to the blog?

None of the money would come to me, of course.  But it would make me SO happy.  I’...

Differences Between John and the Synoptics

In this sub-thread I’m trying to explain why I do not use the fourth Gospel extensively in trying to decide what Jesus actually taught (specifically about the afterlife, but about much of anything else as well).   One of the main issues involves the differences between John and the three Synoptic Gospels (all of them earlier than John), Matthew, Mark, and Luke.   Here I discuss one aspect of these differences: at the very fundamental level, John simply has Jesus say and do different things th...

Lunch in Boston?

I’m thinking about arranging a lunch, with anyone on the blog who is interested and will be in Boston on Thursday November 16 for the Biblical Archaeology Society FEST — or who will be there for any other reason!   Would you be interested?

Here’s the deal.  The Biblical Archaeology Society (BAS) is a great organization, which brings knowledge about the Bible and especially about relevant archaeological digs to a wider interested public.  Every year – for twenty years now — they hold a special...