Page 25 – The Bart Ehrman Blog

Could Moses Have Been Thutmose, the Overseer of Borderlands? Platinum Post by Serene

Here is a creative proposal for the true identity of Moses by Platinum Member Serene. She has a daring thesis! What do you think of it? Tell us your response and your views! And remember: you as a Platinum member not only get access to all Platinum posts written by other Platinums, but you also can write some yourself! You don't have to be thoroughly well-versed in the field to write one! Do you have any thoughts or ideas or curiosities you would like others to see and respond to? Send us a post!! ****************************** Egyptologist Jan Assman writes, "Three different interpretations have been proposed for this story [Moses' Exodus]. The first sees in it a legend that is a disguised remembrance of the Amarna period." [1] While many scholars view Moses as a mythical figure placed within a historical context (interpretation three), I suggest Thutmose, the Overseer of Borderlands among many other titles, whose career culminated during the Amarna period (14th century BCE). [2] Thutmose served Amenhotep III and then his radical [...]

Diane2025-09-10T13:09:08-04:00November 11th, 2024|Hebrew Bible/Old Testament, Public Forum|

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|

Albert Schweitzer and the Apocalyptic Jesus
Gallery
Albert Schweitzer and the Apocalyptic Jesus

Historical Jesus

Albert Schweitzer and the Apocalyptic Jesus

In the current thread I’m trying to establish that Jesus believed he was the messiah. I have pointed out that his followers would not have considered him the messiah because they believed he had been raised from the dead (since the messiah was not supposed to die and rise again) unless they had already considered him the messiah prior to his death. But that, of course, does not mean that Jesus *himself* thought he was the messiah. And so we have to look for evidence from Jesus’ life that indicates that this is what he thought about himself, and my argument is going to be that there are several pieces of evidence that strongly suggest it is, of which my plan is to stress two. As background, in my previous post, I laid out the world view that Jesus himself almost certainly subscribed to, a view that scholars have called Jewish apocalypticism. I need to develop these thoughts a bit in this post; and the next; after that I’ll lay out in (very) summary fashion [...]

admin2025-07-16T17:50:45-04:00November 9th, 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|

An Imagined Dialogue for the Dispute Between Paul & Barnabas in Acts Part 4 by Angus Nisbet

We come now to the final post by Angus Nisbet on the dispute recorded in the NT between Paul and Barnabas, in which he tries to reconstruct what may have really happened (covered up by the NT reporting). Is it possible that Barnabas actually lashed seriously into Paul and became his enemy? Is it possible that Paul's enmity with Jewish Christians is what ultimately led to his martyrdom? Read on! And Respond! And remember: you as a Platinum member not only get access to all Platinum posts written by other Platinums, but you also can write some yourself! You don't have to be thoroughly well-versed in the field to write one! Do you have any thoughts or ideas or curiosities you would like others to see and respond to? Send us a post!! ****************************** In this fourth post on an Imagined dialogue between Paul and Barnabas for their dispute mentioned in Acts 15: 37-40, Barnabas points out to Paul in the dialogue that Paul’s words about being all things to all people (1 Cor 9: [...]

Diane2025-09-10T13:09:24-04:00November 8th, 2024|Acts of the Apostles, Paul and His Letters, 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|

November Gold Q&A: Ask Your Questions!

Update: Here is a link to the replay of this Q&A. Hey Golds and Platinums: Mark your calendars – we've got a monthly Gold Q&A coming up on Sunday November 17th at 7pm Eastern. If you can, join us for the live session—it’s a chance to dive into your burning questions and catch the conversation as it unfolds! Can’t make it live? Not to worry; the replay and audio will be available shortly afterward. You can join the live recording via Zoom using this link. Got a Question? Send it to [email protected], and Jen will compile and send me the list. Remember, brevity is key—short, focused questions will rise to the top! Question Deadline: Thursday, November 14th, by 11:59pm (whenever that occurs in your time zone). (Note: We'll send out reminders in the Friday Recap emails leading up to the 17th.) Looking forward to another lively round of inquiries and insights!

jennao2025-09-10T13:09:40-04:00November 4th, 2024|Public Forum|

An Imagined Dialogue for the Dispute Between Paul & Barnabas in Acts Part 3 by Angus Nisbet

Now we come to the third of four posts by Platinum member Angus Nisbet on the dispute between Paul and Barnabas recorded in the book of Acts, where he maintains that Mark (as in John Mark, allegedly the author of the Gospel!) was a spy who ratted Paul out. And it involves a connection with the Essenes who produced the Dead Sea Scrolls. Whoa! Check it out and tell us what you think! Remember: you as a Platinum member not only get access to all Platinum posts written by other Platinums, but you also can write some yourself! You don't have to be thoroughly well-versed in the field to write one! Do you have any thoughts or ideas or curiosities you would like others to see and respond to? Send us a post!! ****************************** In this third post on the Imagined dialogue between Paul and Barnabas for their dispute mentioned in Acts 15: 37-40, the dialogue uses verses from Paul’s letter to the Galatians in which Paul attacks those whom he refers to as false [...]

Diane2025-09-10T13:09:23-04:00November 4th, 2024|Acts of the Apostles, Paul and His Letters, Public Forum|

Island Hopping with History: Join Our Greek Odyssey this May!

I will be giving lectures on another glorious tour to some of the Greek Islands this coming May 14-26. This will be fantastic. Some blog members came with me on a similar trip last year, but to different islands. It was life-long-memorable. If it’s humanly possible, think about joining up! Space will be limited – so if you’re interested, check out the brochure I provide below at the bottom of the post. It will give you all the details you would need to know, and I’m happy to address any questions you have. Here is what I say about the trip in the description. ************************* The Greek Islands are some of my favorite places on earth. I’ve been on a number of occasions, and this Thalassa Journey is taking me there again. Wanna come with me? We will be island-hopping to some of the most scenic sites in the world – stunningly gorgeous landscapes and seascapes, incredibly beautiful villages and towns, museums, monasteries, churches, and archaeological sites: some of the oldest remnants of western civilization. [...]

jennao2025-09-10T13:09:40-04:00November 3rd, 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|

An Imagined Dialogue for the Dispute Between Paul & Barnabas in Acts Part 2 by Angus Nisbet

Here Angus Nisbet continues his discussion of Paul and Barnabas and the dispute they had, where he gets into more fascinating issues, involving what might lie behind the dispute and how non-canonical writings that did not make it into the NT might help us figure it out. There are some controversial views here. What do you think? Remember: you as a Platinum member not only get access to all Platinum posts written by other Platinums, but you also can write some yourself! You don't have to be thoroughly well-versed in the field to write one! Do you have any thoughts or ideas or curiosities you would like others to see and respond to? Send us a post!! ******************************* In this second post on the imagined dialogue between Paul and Barnabas for their dispute mentioned in Acts 15: 37-40, I begin the first of 3 sections of the dispute dialogue, in which of Paul’s responses to Barnabas make use of Paul’s actual writings from his New Testament letters. In this first section of the imagined dialogue, [...]

Diane2025-09-10T13:09:23-04:00November 1st, 2024|Acts of the Apostles, Paul and His Letters, Public Forum|

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|

Paul and the Crucified Messiah in 1 Corinthians

Historians usually have reasons for what they say; that is, when they make a historical claim, it is almost always based on a close reading of the surviving sources. When it’s not, they’re just blowin’ smoke. But if they’re reputable scholars AND are blowin’ smoke – that is, taking a guess –they’ll usually tell you. I suppose that’s one difference between an expert (in any field) and an amateur: the expert actually has a deep and nuanced reading of the sources that informs his/her views. I have to say, as you probably have noticed in your own areas of expertise, it is pretty easy if you are an expert to know who else is an expert and who is not. I say that as someone who is an expert in one or two areas, but an amateur in thousands. When I have an interpretation of Hamlet or Lear that I bounce off my wife – who really is a recognized expert on Shakespeare – I realize that, for the most part, I’m just taking a [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T13:09:25-04:00October 30th, 2024|Paul and His Letters|

Why Would A Christian Author Lie About Who He Was?
Gallery
Why Would A Christian Author Lie About Who He Was?

Forgery in Antiquity

Why Would A Christian Author Lie About Who He Was?

In my previous post I said a bit about “forgeries” in the NT, that is, books whose authors claimed to be a famous person (Peter, Paul, James, Jude), knowing full well they were someone else. In the ancient world, these books were called “lies” (pseudoi) or “books inscribed with a lie” (pseudepigrapha). But why would a Christian author lie about who he was? How could he live with himself? I discuss the matter at length in my books Forged and even more in Forgery and Counterforgery. In my textbook, The New Testament: A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings (Oxford University Press) I can discuss the matter only briefly in a sidebar box, to give my students a sense of the situation in antiquity. With this post I'll be concluding for now my thread giving some of these kinds of boxes, but since this is such an intriguing subject, I'd like to set it up by first quoting a paragraph from my book Forged, about the author of Ephesians, who claimed to be Paul (lying [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T13:09:25-04:00October 29th, 2024|Forgery in Antiquity|

Blog Etiquette in These Troubling Times!

In these massively troubling times (no need for me to itemize the issues) and the incredibly disturbing bifurcation of opinions, views, and perspectives, where very few people have even the slightest interest in listening to someone on "the other side," there is at least one thing that virtually everyone agrees on: these are massively troubling times with incredibly disturbing bifurcation of .... Well. right. We can at least agree it's a mess. And what, I ask you, does that have to do with the blog? Well, in short, nothing and everything. Over lo these many years, I have tried very hard to allow everyone to express their opinions on matters connected with the blog -- principally, the study of the New Testament, the historical Jesus, the origins of Christianity, the first several centuries of Christian literature and history, and cognate fields such as Hebrew Bible, early Judaism, Greek and Roman religion, with a touch of personal religious views and modern religion, etc. I have also tried very hard not to take sides on the social [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T13:09:40-04:00October 28th, 2024|Public Forum|

An Imagined Dialogue for the Dispute Between Paul & Barnabas in Acts Part I by Angus Nisbet

Here is the first of a four-post thread for Platinum members by long-standing Platinum member Angus Nisbet. It is a terrifically imaginative discussion of Paul and Barnabas (focused on the book of Acts) that touches on a wide range of issues that we deal with a lot on the blog -- Paul's conflict with other apostles such as James; the views of Christ and salvation dominant among the earliest Jewish followers of Jesus; early Christian Gnosticism; the reliability of the book of Acts; and ... more! Angus will be interested in your feedback, and so will I! Remember: you as a Platinum member not only get access to all Platinum posts written by other Platinums, but you also can write some yourself! You don't have to be thoroughly well-versed in the field to write one! Do you have any thoughts or ideas or curiosities you would like others to see and respond to? Send us a post!! ****************************** This first post is an introduction to a series of 3 further posts, in which I have [...]

Diane2025-09-10T13:09:09-04:00October 28th, 2024|Acts of the Apostles, Paul and His Letters, Public Forum|

Forged Books, Anonymous Books, and The Use of Secretaries as Authors in the NT

My books Forged, for normal human beings, and Forgery and Counterforgery, for abnormal scholars, both deal with issues of the authorship of the writings of the New Testament (and other books in early Christianity) and with why there are good reasons for thinking that some of them were forgeries (written in the name of famous people like Paul or Peter by people who knew full well they were not Paul or Peter), others are anonymous though later attributed to famous people who didn't write them (Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John). It also deals with why I don't think we can explain any of these writings on the popular but, based on my research, totally unfounded idea that "secretaries" wrote them for these famous people. In my book The New Testament: A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings, 8th ed, with Hugo Mendez I address such issues only briefly, on side-bar boxes, to give students a brief sense of the issues. Here they are! ****************************** Box 25.3 Another Glimpse Into the Past Authors and Their [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T13:09:25-04:00October 27th, 2024|Forgery in Antiquity|

Unexpected Social Agendas in the New Testament. Who Woulda Thought?

Most Christians turn to the Bible to some degree or another for guidance on their ethical views and perspectives on social agendas. For those who read it closely, the Bible can be problematic ethically. Most people realize there is a problem with the endorsement of slavery in the Bible (both Old and New Testaments); few have ever seen that there is also a problem with what today we think of a "family values." In my book The New Testament: A Historical Introduction, now in its eight edition with Hugo Mendez (Oxford University Press, 2024), I address these issues very briefly in a couple of those side-bar boxes I've mentioned in the two previous posts. Here they are! ****************************** Box 22.12 What Do You Think? The New Testament and Slavery Many people who read the book of Philemon simply assume that Paul writes the letter in order to urge Philemon to set his slave Onesimus free. After all, slavery is, and was, a horrible institution, and surely the apostle would have done everything [...]

BDEhrman2025-09-10T13:09:25-04:00October 26th, 2024|Public Forum|

Previous 1···242526···218 Next