Historical Jesus Archives - Page 18 of 34 - The Bart Ehrman Blog

The Name Judas Iscariot: What Does It Mean?

Several members of the blog have commented on my posts about the death of Judas by asking about his name itself. Most interesting, what does “Iscariot” mean? I deal briefly with the topic in my book on Judas, a book in which I deal at length with the newly discovered Gospel of Judas, but then go on to say what I think we can actually know historically about the man himself, and his one most famous nefarious act, the betrayal of Jesus. Here is what I say about the name. **************************************************** The Name Judas Iscariot Sometimes knowing the names of persons from antiquity can give further information about them. People of the lower classes did not have last names, and so to differentiate people with the same first name, descriptive designations were often added. For example, there are several different Marys in the New Testament. “Mary” was one of the most common names in first-century Palestine. And so each New Testament Mary is given some kind of identifying feature: Mary “the mother of Jesus”; Mary [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:41:24-04:00June 12th, 2018|Historical Jesus, Reader’s Questions|

Two Rather Bizarre Accounts of How Judas Died

In my experience, most people don’t realize that there are two different accounts of Judas’s death in the New Testament, let alone that these two are very difficult indeed to reconcile with one another. Virtually impossible, I would say. But even more people don’t know that there are accounts of Judas’s death from *outside* the New Testament in other sources. One of these two almost *nobody* knows about, except for a few specialist scholars. The first account comes to us from Papias, a proto-orthodox church author who wrote a five- volume book called An Exposition of the Sayings of the Lord in about 120-130 CE (it is hard to know exactly when) This must have been a very large book indeed (five volumes!) and to our very great regret, it has been lost. We don’t have it. All we have are snippets of quotations from it by later church fathers, starting with Irenaeus (around 180 CE) and especially the church historian Eusebius (early fourth century). We aren’t sure why exactly the book was not copied [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:41:24-04:00June 8th, 2018|Christian Apocrypha, Historical Jesus|

Can We Know Anything Historically About How Judas Iscariot Died?

In this post I continue with the New Testament accounts of the death of Judas Iscariot. In my previous post I talked about the first account, found in Matthew. Now I look at the second (and only other) one, found in the early part of the book of Acts, written by the same author as the Gospel of Luke. This post comes in two parts, both taken from my book The Lost Gospel of Judas Iscariot. In the first part I discuss the speech allegedly given by the apostle Peter to the other disciples in Acts 1, where he describes Judas’s death – in terms very different indeed from those found in Matthew. Are these reconcilable? In the second part I ask whether we can say anything *historically* about how Judas actually died. ********************************************************************* In his speech, Peter describes Judas’s death in graphic terms: Now this one [Judas] purchased a field with the wages of his unrighteous act [the betrayal] and falling headlong he burst forth in the middle and all his intestines spilled out. [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:41:23-04:00June 7th, 2018|Canonical Gospels, Historical Jesus|

The Death of Judas in Matthew

My recent post on Judas Iscariot has raised a number of questions among readers of the blog. Here is one of them, about Judas’s death. QUESTION: Do you have any sense of how Judas met his end after the betrayal? Matthew's version seems at least somewhat plausible, but Act's doesn't. Or maybe he just took the money and moved elsewhere. RESPONSE This is an interesting question for a number of reasons. For one thing, the only writers who thought that Judas’s demise was important enough to deal with were Matthew and Luke – Mark, John, Paul, and all the others are silent on the matter. As far as we would know from the Gospels of Mark and John, Judas would have lived to be an old man. They just don’t say. And Luke doesn’t give an account in his Gospel, but only later in the book of Acts. Moreover, the account in Acts certainly seems to stand at odds with what Matthew says in his Gospel. To make sense of it all [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:41:23-04:00June 5th, 2018|Canonical Gospels, Historical Jesus|

Why Did Judas Iscariot Betray Jesus?

In this edition of the Readers’ Mailbag I address an interesting and perplexing question about Judas Iscariot: QUESTION You may have mentioned this (I cannot recall) but why did Judas go to the authorities in the first place? RESPONSE I wrestled with this question long and hard while writing my book The Lost Gospel of Judas Iscariot, which includes a section on what we can know about the historical Judas. In the book I argue that there are some things that we can know with relative certainty about Judas (he was one of the Twelve and was the one who actually betrayed Jesus); other things we can profitably surmise based on our evidence (e.g. what it is Judas betrayed to the authorities – not just Jesus’ whereabouts, I argue); and other things that are almost entirely in the realm of speculation. Among the latter I would include the reasons Judas *wanted* to betray Jesus. Scholars have offered numerous suggestions over the years. You may have your own favored view. Here is what [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:41:23-04:00June 3rd, 2018|Historical Jesus, Reader’s Questions|

Do We Know Why Jesus Went to Jerusalem?

Browsing through my blog posts I came across this one from exactly six years ago today. Amazingly, I still agree with it! It deals with an unusually important question, one that, in a sense, involves a decision that changed the entire history of our world. QUESTION Just what did the historical Jesus think he was doing that last week in Jerusalem? It looks to me like he was working as hard as he could to get himself killed. If that's what he was doing, then why was he doing it? RESPONSE Interesting question! There have been scholars, of course, who have argued that this is precisely what Jesus was doing, that he went to Jerusalem in order to be crucified. It is interesting that those who take that view cover as wide a range of ideology and theology as you could possibly imagine. Conservative Christian thinkers (from protestant fundamentalists to Roman Catholic theologians to … well, take your pick) have long thought that the point of the Jerusalem trip was in fact the [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:41:07-04:00May 19th, 2018|Historical Jesus, Reader’s Questions|

Seeing Capernaum and the “Jesus Boat”: A Blast From the Past

I will be going to Israel with a tour group in October, and browsing through the blog I see that I made a number of posts from Israel last time I was there. Here's an interesting one from five years ago today about the town of Capernaum and an intriguing archaeological discovery made there in relatively recent times. *************************************************************************************** I am typing just now on the third floor of the Scots Hotel in Tiberias, in a room with a glorious view of the Sea of Galilee. In the distance, across are the sea, are clearly visible the Golan Heights, where we spent a day or so, having lunch yesterday just 40 miles from Damascus. All may not be quiet on the Western Front (well, in this case, the Eastern Front) but we are safe and sound, and feel more secure than typically we do even in New York City (!). Yesterday there were two highlights to our trip, for me. Capernaum has always been one of my favorite spots in Israel. It is [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:41:06-04:00May 6th, 2018|Historical Jesus, Public Forum|

Degrees of Punishment and Purgatory

Christians have always had a wide variety of beliefs about the afterlife, and just about everyone (who chooses) is able to find biblical support for their views. The Bible itself has an enormous range of views. Among other things, there have always been Christians who have thought that there must be varying levels of punishment for sinners in the afterlife. The guy on the street who does his best but is not always a very good father surely doesn’t get punished to the same degree as Hitler. Among such believers who are convinced that there are different levels of punishment I would certainly class those who believe in purgatory. Even though it is a view almost universally rejected by Protestants, purgatory can make a lot of sense even to some of them. The afterlife is not just black and white, one thing or the other, either/or – it is not either eternal bliss for all the saints and eternal torment for all the sinners. There must be gradations, right? And purgatory is a way of [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:40:50-04:00April 9th, 2018|Afterlife, Historical Jesus|

Who Invented the Idea of a Suffering Messiah?

For this week’s readers’ mailbag I give a very interesting and important question. QUESTION: Where did the idea of a Jewish messiah dying for the sins of mankind originate from? OT? Did Jews prior to Jesus’ existence believe this notion of the messiah dying for other’s sins? RESPONSE: I deal with this issue in a couple of my books. Christians often point to messianic prophecy about Jesus in the Old Testament and suppose the suffering messiah was "right in front of the Jews' faces" all along. In fact, it wasn't. Here is one of my fuller discussion from Did Jesus Exist?, where I talk about the issue in connection with the question of why Paul originally opposed Christians before converting to the faith. ***************************************************************** Why, as a highly religious Jew, did Paul originally persecute the Christians before he himself joined their ranks? It appears to have been for one reason only: the Christians were saying that Jesus was God’s special chosen one, his beloved son, the messiah. But for the pre-Christian Paul it [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:40:50-04:00April 8th, 2018|Early Christian Doctrine, Historical Jesus, Reader’s Questions|

The Unforgivable Sin and Purgatory

In my previous post I discussed one of the passages of the New Testament that has traditionally been used to support the idea of Purgatory, the place that most of the “saved” go after death to be purged of their sins (Matt 5:26 “you won’t get out of there until you have paid the last penny”). In my judgment this passage is not talking about what happens in the afterlife, even though it has been read that way. With another passage, the matter is not quite so clear. In a famous passage, again in Matthew, Jesus talks about the “unforgiveable sin”: “Therefore I tell you every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven people, but the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven; and whoever speaks a word against the Son of man, it will be forgiven; but whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit it will not be forgiven, either in this age or the ages to come.” As you might imagine, over the Christian centuries there have been numerous interpretations of what that [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:40:50-04:00April 6th, 2018|Afterlife, Historical Jesus|

Did Jesus Teach About Purgatory?

The topic I’m dealing with on this destined-to-be-a-very-long thread seems to me to be particularly important. Most of my scholarship is of interest mainly to people concerned about the life and teachings of Jesus, the New Testament, the history of Christianity, and so on; but this is of interest to *all* of us. What happens when we die? Or more specifically, what happens to *me* when I die? My current discussion of purgatory may be of little interest to people, until they think about it for a second. Do most people have to go through horrible suffering after death, even if they are not destined for the eternal flames of hell? I for one don’t look forward to getting a tooth ache or ending up in the hospital. What if there are years, decades, centuries of physical torment ahead for me? Shouldn’t I want to know about that and, well, make some preparations? But it’s a topic most of us don’t think about. Those of us raised in a Protestant tradition simply don’t buy it [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:40:36-04:00April 2nd, 2018|Afterlife, Historical Jesus|

The Golden Rule

After all the background I gave yesterday, I can now give a succinct answer to the question that was raised by a reader. Here it is again. QUESTION: I was surprised to see that, in the Didache, the form of the Golden Rule is in the negative. I’ve read that the positive formulation in the Sermon on the Mount may be original to Jesus. If the Didache used Matthew as a source, how does one account for that reversion? RESPONSE: I think this question has a simple answer. It is that the Golden Rule, which is known to everyone today mainly by the way Jesus said it, was a common teaching but was almost expressed negatively rather than positively (as I’ll explain below). When the author of the Didache states the rule he does so in the form that he was most familiar with rather than in the form known to Matthew. It is important to recognize that when one speaks of Matthew as a “source” for the Didache it is not the same thing [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:40:35-04:00March 13th, 2018|Early Christian Writings (100-400 CE), Historical Jesus, Reader’s Questions|

What Did Jesus Look Like?

I recently read an intriguing short article by my friend and colleague at King’s College London, Joan Taylor, on what Jesus probably looked like. Good question. I’ve always thought: how would we know? But in fact, there are some things to be said. I zapped her a note and she agreed to write up something for the blog. The original piece was published in The Irish Times, here: <https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/books/what-did-jesus-really-look-like-as-a-jew-in-1st-century-judaea-1.3385334>. She has slightly edited it for us. Here is what she says. **************************************************************** What Did Jesus Look Like Joan Taylor Everyone knows how to recognize Jesus. He is portrayed in art, film and literature in much the same way. His image is found repeatedly in countless churches and Christian buildings. He is usually somewhat European: a man with nut-brown hair (sometimes blond) and light brown or blue eyes. He has a long face and nose, and long hair and a beard. His clothes are also long: a tunic down to the ground, with wide baggy sleeves, and a large mantle. He is fairly well-tended [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:40:19-04:00February 27th, 2018|Historical Jesus|

Pilate’s Own Account of Why He Crucified Jesus

I have been talking about how Pontius Pilate becomes increasingly innocent over time in Christian accounts of the death of Jesus. One of my arguments is that the motive behind this exoneration of the Roman governor is an attempt to blame “the Jews” for killing their own messiah. This exoneration increases over time and after a while stops being at all subtle. Check out this non-canonical account that allegedly gives Pilate’s own version of the matter. This is in an apocryphal text called the Anaphora Pilati (= The Report of Pilate – a report he allegedly sent to the emperor Tiberius). You can find this text in the book I co-edited with my colleague Zlatko Pleše, The Other Gospels. Here is the introduction taken from there and my translation of the text itself (it’s preserved in Greek) *********************************************** Introduction The “Report” of Pontius Pilate to the Emperor Tiberius (the “Anaphora Pilati”) relates the events of Jesus’ trial, death, and resurrection from the perspective of the Roman governor. We learn that despite his many divine [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:40:19-04:00February 22nd, 2018|Christian Apocrypha, Historical Jesus|

The Increasing Innocence of Pilate in the Death of Jesus

QUESTION: How is it that all four gospels portray Pilate as recognizing the innocence of Jesus and being extremely reluctant to order his execution? RESPONSE: What is most intriguing (and enlightening) is that over time in the Christian tradition – both inside the New Testament and outside of it – Pilate becomes more and more innocent in the death of Jesus with the passing of time. You can see this clearly simply by lining up the Gospels chronologically and seeing how they portray Pilate at the trial of Jesus. Our earliest Gospel is Mark (15:1-15). There Pilate is somewhat reluctant to do what the Jewish leaders ask him to do – crucify Jesus – and he seems a bit bewildered. He has a custom of releasing a prisoner during Passover and suggests Jesus. But the crowd, stirred up by the chief priests, wants Barabbas instead. And so, after a very brief trial Pilate, does what they ask. Here Pilate is simply complying with the Jews’ wishes; he puts up some resistance, but not a [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:40:19-04:00February 19th, 2018|Canonical Gospels, Historical Jesus|

Jesus Kissing Mary Magdalene: A Blast From the Past

Now for something *completely* different. Here is a question that was asked and answered almost exactly four years ago, of ongoing intrigue! ****************************************************************** QUESTION: I know that the “Gospel of Philip does not have much if any real historical veracity to it about Jesus’ life, but does the references about Jesus and Mary Magdalene being lovers and the holes in the papyrus ‘kissing’ verse (verses 32 and 55 in your “Lost Scriptures” book), help support the view that this most likely Gnostic Christian sect truly believed and taught that Jesus and Mary M were married? RESPONSE: Yes, this is one of those questions I get asked about on occasion. I have a reasonably full discussion of the relevant issues in my book Peter, Paul, and Mary Magdalene. In the book I put the discussion in the context of – yes, you guessed it -- Dan Brown’s Da Vinci Code, the one source many people turn to for the Gospel of Philip. (!) Here’s what I say there: ************************************************************** Some of the historical claims about the [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:40:00-04:00February 6th, 2018|Christian Apocrypha, Historical Jesus, Reader’s Questions, Women in Early Christianity|

Jesus and Paul: Similarities and Differences

In my previous post I raised the question of whether Jesus and Paul represent fundamentally the same religion or not. Here I continue the discussion by pointing out what seem to me to be the main similarities and differences between them, as I spelled it out in a post several years ago: ******************************************************************* I have been talking about the relationship of Jesus’ proclamation of the coming Kingdom of God to Paul’s preaching about the importance of the death and resurrection of Jesus. In the previous post I argued that the fundamental concerns, interests, perspectives, and theologies of these two were different. In this post I’d like to give, in summary fashion, what strikes me as very similar and very different about their two messages. Again, in my view it is way too much to say that Paul is the “Founder of Christianity”: that assumes that he is the one who personally came up with the idea of the importance of the death and resurrection of Jesus for salvation, whereas almost certainly this view had [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:40:00-04:00January 29th, 2018|Historical Jesus, Paul and His Letters|

Are Paul and Jesus on the Same Page?

In response to my previous post on the importance of Paul, I have had several people ask me about the relationship between the teachings of Jesus and Paul: are they actually representing the same religion? I dealt with that question some years ago on the blog. Here is the first of two posts on the issue. ****************************** I have spent several posts explicating Paul’s understanding of his gospel, that by Christ’s death and resurrection a person is put into a restored relationship with God. He had several ways of explaining how it worked. But in all of these ways, it was Jesus’ death and resurrection that mattered. It was not keeping the Jewish law. It was not knowing or following Jesus’ teaching. It was not Jesus’ miracles. It was not … anything else. It was Jesus’ death and resurrection. I then summarized in my previous post, the teaching of Jesus himself, about the coming Son of Man and the need to prepare by keeping the Law of God, as revealed in the Torah, as summarized [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:39:59-04:00January 26th, 2018|Historical Jesus, Paul and His Letters|

Was Jesus Given Special Treatment?

Every now and then on the Blog I get bored with a topic and simply want nothing more to do with it (for a while). For some reason I feel like that about this question of whether Jesus was really buried on the afternoon of his death. It’s an effort to respond even to the comments. But for some reason I can’t seem ever just to let it die (so to speak). Still, this is my last post about the matter for the next 29 years. I think. I just want to make one major point, which probably has relevance to a range of topics we deal with here on the blog. For most of us, if we had to pick one person to name as the Single Most Important and Influential Figure in the history of Western Civilization, it would almost certainly be Jesus. Who else would it be? There are others that people today might choose – Hitler, Constantine, Caesar Augustus, pick your name. But I think it’s pretty obvious that none of [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:39:59-04:00January 23rd, 2018|Historical Jesus|

Pilate, Who Never “Learned His Lesson”

This is the second of my two posts from over three years ago that try to show that Pilate almost certainly would not have removed Jesus' body from the cross on the afternoon of his death simply because not to do so would have been in violation of Jewish sensitivities. (NOTE: Pilate is not said to have done so for the other two who were crucified with Jesus. Are we to think he made an exception in Jesus' case, since, after all, he was far more important?) To make the best sense of this post it is important to keep in mind what I said in the previous one. In his response to my views of in How Jesus Became God – that Jesus most likely was not given a decent burial on the day of his crucifixion by Joseph of Arimathea – Craig Evans has maintained, among other things, that Pilate was not the kind of governor who would ignore Jewish sensitivities. For Craig, Pilate started his rule by making a big mistake of [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T12:39:59-04:00January 22nd, 2018|Early Judaism, Historical Jesus|

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