BDEhrman, Author at The Bart Ehrman Blog - Page 25 of 207

About BDEhrman

Ehrman is the James A. Gray Distinguished Professor of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he has served as the director of graduate studies and chair of the Department of Religious Studies.

Jewish Sects in the time of Jesus: Pharisees and Sadducees

I am in a short thread discussing Judaism just before and at the time of Jesus. In that connections, I often get asked about the different Jewish sects in the period. So I'll devote two posts to the question, lifting the discussion from my textbook The New Testament: A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings. ****************************** THE FORMATION OF JEWISH SECTS It was during the rule of the Hasmoneans, and evidently in large measure in reaction to it, that various Jewish sects emerged. As we have seen, the Jewish historian Josephus mentions four of these groups; the New Testament refers to three. In one way or another, all of them play a significant role in our understanding of the life of the historical Jesus. I should emphasize at the outset that most Jews in Palestine did not belong to any of these groups. We know this much from Josephus, who indicates that the largest sect, the Pharisees, claimed 6,000 members and that the Essenes claimed 4,000. The Sadducees probably had far fewer. These numbers [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T13:09:54-04:00November 28th, 2024|Early Judaism, Public Forum|

Judaism 200 Years Before Jesus: The Maccabean Revolt

I often get asked about what Judaism was like in the time before and up to Jesus. It's a vital question, since whatever else you might want to say about Jesus, he was definitely Jewish and the Judaism he was born into, raised in, and accepted was the Judaism of his time (not medieval and not modern!). Here' I'll say something about a major period in the history of the history of Judea over the four hundred years from approximately 540 BCE, when the Persians were in control, up to 63 BCE, when the Romans came in and took over. I’ve taken the sketch from my textbook, The Bible: A Historical and Literary Introduction. ****************************** The Later History of Judea In the Persian period (starting in the late 6th century BCE), the land of Judah came be a province called Judea. This will be its name in the time of the New Testament. So too, as we have seen, inhabitants of this land, and descendants of former inhabitants who maintained their ancestral religious and cultural traditions, [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T13:09:54-04:00November 27th, 2024|Early Judaism|

How to be Content with Life Even When It’s Rotten: The Stoic View
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How to be Content with Life Even When It’s Rotten: The Stoic View

Greco-Roman Religions and Culture, Reflections and Ruminations

How to be Content with Life Even When It’s Rotten: The Stoic View

How can you be satisfied and content with life? Even when it seems rotten on the whole? With this post I conclude my thread on the ancient Stoic view of life and how to live it. Thus, Stoics understood that the way to live – and to live with eudaimonia (recall: that means a kind of “happiness,” in the sense of a full satisfaction and contentment about how one’s life) – was to focus on personal choice, freedom, and avoidance, choosing not to be disturbed by things we cannot control, even if everyone around us thinks that hardship, pain, and suffering create ultimate misery. They don’t. Or at least they don’t need to. In the end, they are not the things that matter. We need to train ourselves to be “indifferent” to them. And indifference cuts both ways – we should not be wrought by things we can’t avoid and we should not be desperate to obtain what we don’t have. One of the key terms among Stoics was adiaphora, literally “things that make no [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T13:09:53-04:00November 26th, 2024|Greco-Roman Religions and Culture, Reflections and Ruminations|

How Not To Be Bothered When Bad Things Happen: The Stoics

Here I continue trying to explain the ancient philosophy of Stoicism, and to show how it related to their views of ethics – especially with respect to questions of altruism. It is a little difficult for many moderns to get their minds around the Stoic idea that “reason” is a divine quality that infuses the world; it is possibly even harder to understand how this divine quality relates to the gods. Do they “have” it in greater quantity than us? Is Reason itself actually a distinct divine being of some kind? The problem is exacerbated by the Stoic writings themselves, since often an author, say Epictetus, will speak of “Reason” and sometimes of “Zeus” (the head of the gods) and sometimes of the “gods” -- and in each instance appear to be referring to the same thing. The “Reason/Logos” that infuses the world can be thought of as the sensibility of the world; it can be “the reason” something is or happens as it does; it can be “human reason”; and it can be personalized [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T13:09:53-04:00November 24th, 2024|Greco-Roman Religions and Culture, Reflections and Ruminations|

Does this World Make Any Sense? The Ancient Stoics

From my earlier posts on altruism in the ancient world before Christianity, a number of blog readers have asked me to say some things specifically about ancient Stoics. Didn’t they urge altruistic behavior? Once again, the answer is, well, yes and no. This will take several posts to explain. Stoicism was by far the most widespread moral philosophy at the time of early Christianity. It was named not after its founder (as was, say, Platonism and Epicureanism) but after the place where he taught. The movement began in the wake of Aristotle, with the teachings of a teacher named Zeno (333-261 BCE). Zeno regularly gathered his students in the large “painted portico” (= stoa) centrally located in the Athenian forum. The portico was a long and spacious building open on one side of its length to the outside, lined with columns to support the roof overhead. Since these philosophers and wannabe philosophers could regularly be seen in the stoa they were called Stoics. Over time their movement spread throughout the Greek and then the later [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T13:09:41-04:00November 23rd, 2024|Greco-Roman Religions and Culture|

Intriguing Questions and Attempted Answers!

Here are a couple of the tricky and interesting questions I have received lately on the blog, along with my answers to them. They seem important enough to me to share more broadly for everyone’s benefit. As you’ll see, they cover a range of topics. ****************************** QUESTION: I was wondering if in Paul’s letters themselves, if there is any concept of Jesus worship like we see in the gospels? Many examples including the word proskuneo (προσκυνέω) where it is argued Jesus is being worshiped in the New Testament; are these present in Paul’s letters? MY RESPONSE: PROSKUNEO is a tricky word in Greek. It is a compound verb formed of KUNEO, which means to “kiss”, and PROS which means “before” and is generally used in the sense of falling down in reverence before someone and/or to show humility in their presence (by kissing their feet?). It is indeed often translated “worship” because it is the sort of thing one does before a god, or in the Xn tradition before God or [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T13:09:41-04:00November 21st, 2024|Public Forum, Reader’s Questions|

Isn’t It Good Enough to Help Family, Friends, and Community?

I’ve been discussing Aristotle (really, it’s interesting!) and what he thought it took to be “happy” – not the giddy fleeting emotion but have a satisfying sense of contentment and fulfillment in life. For him, it means having the most “excellent” life you can and that requires being the most “excellent” person you can and that means having full amounts of the various kinds of human “excellences.” In English translations of Aristotle, "excellences" are usually rendered "virtues" (that's because our English equivalent of the Greek word he uses comes to us from Latin rather than the Greek, and the word "VIR" in Latin means "man." The excellences of a VIR are his VIRtues). For Aristotle, “virtues” require a good life in community with others. So the virtues involved how to make life good in the socio-political context one inhabits, which for Aristotle was the “polis” – the Greek term for the city (since there were not empires or national governments connected with Greece; it was ruled city states). And that means that virtues [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T13:09:41-04:00November 20th, 2024|Greco-Roman Religions and Culture, Reflections and Ruminations|

How Can We Be Happy? An Age-Old Question.

In my previous post I began explaining why I’m calling the teachings of Jesus the “origins of altruism.” Aren’t people naturally altruistic to some extent? Didn’t ancient Greek (and then Roman) cultures – the context in which Christianity emerged -- understand how we ought to behave to others, and insist people needed to be “good to others”? I started to answer by discussing Aristotle (don’t worry, it’s not boring), and his point (if you have trouble buying this, read the post!) that what people *ultimately* want is not good friends and family, wealth, meaningful employment, material possessions, or a really good blog; in the end, all of these things are simply means to our ultimate desire, to be “happy.” If Aristotle is right on this point (I happen to think he is), the clear implication is that we need, each of us, to figure out how we should live in the world, what we should do, and how we should be in order to attain that state of “happiness.” Not in the simplistic, surface sense [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T13:09:40-04:00November 19th, 2024|Greco-Roman Religions and Culture, Reflections and Ruminations|

What Do You Really Want in Life? And How is that Related to Altruism?

Some readers have wondered why I’m calling my book “The Origins of Altruism: How the Teachings of Jesus Transformed the Moral Conscience of the West.” (At least I’m calling it that at this point). Are you saying Jesus invented altruism? What?? Hasn’t every ethical teacher from the very beginning stressed that we have to balance “what we want” with “what would be good for another”? And isn’t that always part of religion: behaving well toward others as a kind of divine mandate? Answer: well, yes and no. This will take a few posts to explain. As it turns out, and to the surprise of many moderns, ethics did not play a large role in ancient pagan religions. Worshiping the gods normally did not involve any public recognition of bad social behavior or feelings of guilt for mistreating another with requests for forgiveness. If someone had neglected the god, then apology or confession might be in order; but the gods were not focused on how humans treated one another, not all that concerned about whether you [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T13:09:40-04:00November 17th, 2024|Greco-Roman Religions and Culture, Reflections and Ruminations|

Brief Reflections on Time and the Meaning of Life. What Do You Think?

For a long time I’ve thought a lot about time. Usually about how I don’t have enough of it, how I wish I had more of it, how I can use what I have most efficiently, how I can possibly get done what I have to do and … And, over the past couple of years, I’ve begun to think more about how all that (on one level) is nonsense and just creates anxiety and stress. My change began when someone (urgently) recommended me to read Paul Loomans' book Time Surfing (easily available to purchase online). I wasn’t sure about it at first, just lookin’ at the cover. But oh my god. I read it three times and it started a revolution in my brain, that continues and has made the most enormous difference, not so much in how I fill my days, hours, and minutes (in my case, time-obsessive guy that I am, and seconds…) but about my emotional approach and attitude toward what I do and the time I have to do it. [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T13:09:40-04:00November 16th, 2024|Reflections and Ruminations|

How Do We Explain Human Moral Codes: So Similar Yet So Different?

Here is another selection from the draft of my book, which, at this still early point, I am calling The Origins of Altruism: How the Teachings of Jesus Transformed the Moral Conscience of the West. This bit is the introduction to my chapter 6, which deals with how the early Christians began to change and soften Jesus' ethical teaching soon after his death.I'm calling the chapter: "Transforming the Ethics of Jesus: Moral Discourse in Early Christianity.' Let me know what you think. ****************************** Many codes of human ethics are widely shared across time periods and cultures and yet so many others are surprisingly disparate. That is hard to explain if we were all granted our moral compass from a power on high, but it makes perfect sense given evolutionary and social pressures. Our overarching “code” has developed over millions of years of evolution; but significant variations occur because humans have evolved in myriad different environments and cultures. The basic code makes sense to nearly all of us because in order to survive in virtually every [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T13:09:40-04:00November 14th, 2024|Reflections and Ruminations|

How I Begin My Book on Jesus, Ethics, and Altruism

I’ve decided to excerpt a few bits of my book that is now in draft, to see what you think. Here’s how I’m planning to being it (the start of the Introduction) ****************************** Most people I know are moved by news of tragedy. A terrible earthquake, a drought, a famine, a flood, displaced people, innocent victims of military aggression, -- we feel pity for those pointlessly suffering and feel a desire, even an obligation, to help, for example by donating to disaster relief. Almost never do we know the people in need; they are complete strangers, often in far-off lands, people we will never meet and possibly wouldn’t like if we did. Yet we – at least most of us – want to help. This sense of moral obligation to strangers in need is unnatural. It is not written into the human DNA nor did it exist in the ancient roots of our Western cultural heritage, either in Greek civilization from the literary and philosophical greats of Homer to Plato onward or in [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T13:09:40-04:00November 13th, 2024|Public Forum|

Another Reason for Thinking Jesus Called Himself the Messiah
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Another Reason for Thinking Jesus Called Himself the Messiah

Historical Jesus

Another Reason for Thinking Jesus Called Himself the Messiah

I now can mount a second argument for why Jesus almost certainly called himself the messiah during his lifetime. Remember: by that I do not mean that Jesus wanted to lead a military rebellion against the Romans to establish himself as king. On the contrary, I think Jesus was not a supporter of a “military solution.” Jesus was an apocalypticist who believed that God himself would take action and do what was needed – overthrow the evil ruling authorities in a cataclysmic show of power and destroy all that was opposed to himself, and so bring in a good, utopian kingdom on earth. And Jesus would be made the king. I don’t need here to give the extensive reasons for thinking that Jesus held to this kind of apocalyptic view in general – I’ve talked about it at length both in a number of my books and on the blog. The question here is the more narrow one: did Jesus think he would be the king of the coming kingdom? I have given one strong [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T13:09:40-04:00November 12th, 2024|Historical Jesus|

Why Should We Think Jesus Called Himself the Messiah?

This thread is about whether Jesus considered himself to be the Jewish messiah. My view is that Yes, he did. But he meant something very specific by that, and it is not what most people (Christians and non-Christians) today mean by it. Recall what I have tried to show thus far. There were various expectations of what the messiah would be like among Jews of Jesus’ day – a political ruler over Israel, a great priest who ruled God’s people through God’s law, a cosmic judge of the earth who would destroy God’s enemies in a cataclysmic act of judgment. All these views had one thing in common: the future messiah would be a figure of grandeur and might who would come with the authority and power of God. And who was Jesus? For most people of his day, Jesus was just the opposite – an itinerant Jewish preacher from the backwaters of rural Galilee who ended up on the wrong side of the law and was tortured and executed for his efforts. [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T13:09:40-04:00November 10th, 2024|Historical Jesus|

Jerusalem Through the Ages! Interested in an Expert Discussion?

Are you interested in the amazing and important history of Jerusalem, from the ancient world till today? I am! I am pleased to announce a special event being put on by my Department of Religious Studies. a panel discussion of the new book by my colleague Jodi Magness: Jerusalem Through the Ages: From Its Beginnings to the Crusades. It will be on Sunday November 17, 1:00, remote via Zoom. I will be moderating the discussion. Many of you will know about Jodi. She is one of the world's leading experts on the archaeology of ancient Israel, and has been my colleague at UNC since, well, roughly the beginnings of Jerusalem. In all these years I have never heard her asked a question she could not answer authoritatively. This book is exceptionally good. The people on the panel are all smart, interesting, and insightful. If you're interested, here is the brochure announcing the event. It is a fund-raiser for my department. We have a departmental fund that I myself started years ago called the Robert Miller [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T13:09:40-04:00November 8th, 2024|Public Forum|

What Would an Apocalyptic Jew (Jesus!) Mean By Calling Himself Messiah?

In this thread I am trying to argue that Jesus understood himself to be the messiah. So far I have made one of my two main arguments, with the understanding that *both* arguments have to be considered in order to have a compelling case. So the first prong doesn’t prove much on its own. But in combination with the second argument, it makes a strong case. The first argument is that Jesus’ followers would not have understood him as the messiah after his death (as they did) unless they believed him to be the messiah before his death – even if they came to believe he had been raised from the dead, that would not have made them think he was the messiah. I’ve explained why in my previous post. The second second involves showing that it was not only the disciples who understood Jesus to be the messiah before his death, but that Jesus himself did. This is even harder to show, but I think there is really compelling evidence. There are [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T13:09:39-04:00November 7th, 2024|Early Judaism, Historical Jesus|

Can We Know What Jesus Said About Himself?

Do we know what Jesus said about himself? Yesterday I started my two-prong argument for why Jesus probably considered himself the messiah. The first prong is that Jesus must have been called the messiah during his lifetime, or it makes no sense that he would be called messiah after his death. Even if there were Jews who believed that Jesus was raised from the dead after he was crucified (as indeed there were! Otherwise we wouldn’t have Christianity), the resurrection of a dead person would never lead anyone to say “Ah, he’s the messiah!”. No one expected the messiah to be a resurrected person. So Jesus was being called the messiah before his death. Otherwise, we can’t make sense of the fact that he was called the messiah after his (believed-in) resurrection. Do We Know What Jesus Said About Himself? Several readers have pointed out that this does not mean that Jesus *himself* thought of himself as the messiah. It simply means that some of his followers did. That is absolutely right. [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T13:09:39-04:00November 6th, 2024|Historical Jesus, Public Forum|

Take My New Testament Pop Quiz!

A blog member recently asked me if I could post the pop quiz that I used to give t0 my New Testament class on the first day of the semester. I say "used to" because I have stopped teaching the course, after doing so for 35 years (!), yielding it over to the capable hands of my colleague Hugo Mendez, to allow me to teach small seminar-courses instead here as I progress into geezerhood. I was simply going to refer the blog member to the post where I had given the quiz recently, and ... and I can't find where / when I did! I'm sure I did! Then again, I'm sure I know where my glasses, keys, and phone are. But so far as I can tell, it's been years since I did. So -- well, here it is. I think this is the post in which I *first* revealed the quiz to interested blog members some ten years ago. [editor's note: Found it! My New Testament Pop Quiz]. After some preliminary remarks, I [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T13:09:39-04:00November 5th, 2024|Public Forum|

Would the Resurrection Make Anyone Believe Jesus Was the Messiah?

I have been talking about the early Christian understandings of Jesus as the messiah. Not just the messiah, but the “crucified messiah,” a concept that would have seemed not just unusual or bizarre to most Jewish ears in the first century, but absolutely mind-boggling and self-contradictory. I’ve been arguing that it was precisely the contradictory nature of the claim that led almost all Jews to reject the Christian claims about Jesus. Several readers have asked me whether I think Jesus understood himself to be the messiah. Probably those who know a little bit about my work and my general views of things would think that my answer would be Absolutely Not. But, well.... I think Jesus did consider himself the messiah. But not the to-be-crucified-messiah. The key to understanding Jesus’ view of himself is to recognize what he *meant* by considering himself the messiah. I will get to that in a later post. For now I want to give the evidence that Jesus thought that in *some* sense (a sense distinctive to Jesus) [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T13:09:39-04:00November 2nd, 2024|Historical Jesus|

A Particular Problem with a Crucified Messiah

In my previous post I started to show that most Jews rejected Christian claims about Jesus because Jesus was just the *opposite* of what the messiah was expected to be. The messiah was to be a figure of grandeur and power who would overthrow God’s enemies and set up a new kingdom on earth in which God’s will would prevail. Jesus was and did none of that. He was a lower-class peasant who was arrested, humiliated, tortured, and executed. He didn’t destroy God’s enemies. He was crushed by them. Paul is the first Jewish persecutor of the Christians that we know by name; there is really no doubt that he was bent on wiping out the followers of Jesus – since he himself says so (and says so to his own shame [Gal 1:13); he did not gain any glory for this rather despicable past--despicable in both his eyes and the eyes of the Christians). Presumably his reasons for hating and opposing the followers of Jesus were comparable to those of other Jewish persecutors. But [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T13:09:25-04:00October 31st, 2024|Paul and His Letters|

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