As I said in my last post, the definitive doctrine of Purgatory did not exist before the 12th century, even though the basic *idea* had been around for a long time – the idea that even though Christ’s death brought salvation to the world, most people, except for the most holy saints, such as those who had been martyred for their faith, had still to pay for their sins.   By the 13th century Purgatory had become an actual place of torment.  Before then it was not so much a place as a condition of suffering to purge away sins. The question is how early this idea existed.  How long had Christians maintained that suffering was necessary for the sinner – even the believing Christian sinner – before they would be allowed into their eternal bliss in heaven?   The idea is not part of the New Testament, although as we will see in a later post, there are some passages that could be used in support of the view. The first place we find any reference [...]

As I indicated in my previous two posts on the Martyrdom of Perpetua, I'm interested in the question of where the idea of purgatory came from.  Ths idea of purgatory is *widely* misunderstood today; in fact, just about everyone who mentions it to me (including two days ago), doesn't know what it actually is -- including friends who have been Catholic for the entire 70 years of their lives!  (Not to mention the Protestants...) This is how I discussed the issue some years ago when I was working on my book Heaven and Hell: ****************************** Roughly speaking purgatory is a kind of third place, between heaven and hell.  The abject sinners (or those who reject Christ, or whoever you think is destined for punishment) go to hell; the righteous saints go to heaven.  But what about those who will ultimately be saved but who have not lived a good (enough) life?  They go to purgatory.   This has been the standard teaching of the Catholic church since the 12th or 13th century. The classic study of the [...]

In my new book Armageddon, which saw the light of published day just a few days ago, I talk about where the "rapture" came from, the evangelical belief that Jesus was soon to return to snatch his followers out of this world before a horrible time of Tribulation hits the earth. That too will be the subject of a lecture, with Q&A, that I will be giving (unrelated to the blog) on April 15.  For information about THAT, go to my website http://bartehrman.com/courses I left off yesterday with a bit of a tease, indicating that the following passage, one of the main prooftexts for a rapture, is in fact not about the rapture at all.  Here's the passage, and then my explanation: For we tell you this by a word of the Lord: we who are living, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will not go before those who sleep. For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God—and the [...]

Some years ago, after I had written my book How Jesus Became God, I was asked to write an article for a journal to explain why, if I'm an atheist, I'm so interested in Jesus.   Some nine or ten years later, I still get asked that a lot.  Twice this past week! Here's the article I wrote, called  “Why I Am Obsessed with Jesus": ****************************** I finally figured out why I’m so obsessed with Jesus. It makes sense that Jesus mattered to me when I was young. I was raised in a Christian household, we went to church, we revered the Bible, and Jesus was God. It makes sense that Jesus mattered to me as a late teenager, when I had a born-again experience and became a conservative evangelical. (What I converted from to “become a Christian” continues to puzzle me.) At that point Jesus became not only my Lord and Savior, but also my best friend and closest ally. It makes sense that Jesus continued to matter to me as I moved away from the [...]

This is the final guest post by Kyle Smith, based on his recently published book about martyrs and the cult of the saints in Christianity. There is a special bonus for this post! A significant discount offer to buy the book. Go for it! And whether or not you do buy the book, feel free to ask him questions or make comments on this post, on a widely misunderstood but important topic. Kyle is the author or coauthor of five books about Christian saints and martyrs, including Cult of the Dead: A Brief History of Christianity (University of California Press, 2022). As a special bonus for readers of the blog, you can buy Cult of the Dead today at 40% off the cover price! Click here to order directly from the University of California Press, then select “UC Press” under the “Buying Options” drop down menu and enter coupon code CULT40 at checkout. Offer valid until March 31, 2023. ****************************** The Christian passion for martyrdom began with the cross, but it is often forgotten that this [...]

Last week in my class on "Jesus in Scholarship and Film" we were discussing the intriguing little fact that when Jesus is baptized, the voice of God that comes from heaven to call him his Son says different things in each of the three Synoptic Gospels (there is no voice in the Gospel of John).  How does one explain that?  It made me think of the Gospel of the Ebionites, and I started wondering if I ever talked about it on the blog. It turns out the answer is yes.  Here is a post devoted to it, from years ago -- which begins with a general discussion of it along with two other "Jewish-Christian Gospels," and ends with a description of its rather clever way of reconciling the three accounts of the voice from heaven. ****************************** Yesterday in my graduate seminar we spent three hours analyzing the three so-called “Jewish-Christian Gospels.” These are very tricky texts to deal with. We don’t have any manuscripts of them – even small fragments. They come to us, instead, [...]