Bible Backgrounds/Church History 2012

I just wanted to go back, and this is more for me, and hopefully it will be beneficial to you guys. Just a little review, and this we covered in the introduction, the first class. Why is it that we study Bible backgrounds? Why do we look at history and culture? What's the purpose?

So we understand scripture more in light of today than it was written. So it applies to us, most of it. So more, have a better context of what's going on. cultural meaning, and not only just culture, but all that goes together to make Bible what it is as the Word of God, chiasm and all the other stuff. It just doesn't come clear to us until we get a closer look at what we are here establishing. Yes, so we lose a lot in modern translation.

I know I've learned more in one week at Holly Hills about history or culture that has brought something to light about what this scripture actually means than I have in 20 years at other churches. So it's good to go over this stuff. What's important is to observe the scripture, and to just really spend a lot of time on observing. And included in that is, we look at language and literary context, and historical and sequential context, and cultural context. And it just brings things to life. It really just shows the importance of some of the scripture, how important or how deep the meaning was to the people at that time.

So let's get started here. This week we're doing the life of Christ, New Testament history. So first slide on the first page of your handout. So if you look at the timeline of the New Testament, this timeline shows the birth of Jesus, his temple visit, this is the life of Christ, and then his ministry, and then... Oh, did I skip one? Oh, okay, I skipped one.

But here's, okay, this timeline here, I'm sorry, this one that shows the, when the Old Testament was written and the New Testament was written. The Old Testament was about 1400 to 400 BC, and then there was a big gap, and I believe, I believe Verdon talked about that last week.

And then the New Testament was written around 40 to 95 AD. So here's the life of Christ, and it shows his ministry up until the cross, just before 30 AD. And then the New Testament, so you can see 40, and then it goes beyond the graph there, 40 to 95 the New Testament was written. Here we have the Gentiles in the church and the book of Acts was written and it records these situations here. Paul in Rome just after 60 AD and that's the end of Acts when Paul went to Rome.

And here is a timeline. I believe this is a supplement. And I don't know, do you guys have that in your handout? Oh, okay. So we have all the supplements in your handout there. And so this gives you just a good overview of Jesus, the life of Jesus, and then highlighting the holy week, the last week of his life.

So before Jesus' birth, the New Testament records that Mary and Joseph were betrothed, they were legally engaged, and living in the town of Nazareth when Mary was approached by the angel Gabriel, and that's in Luke 1, 26-28. The Roman census required them to go to the home of their ancestors, and that would be Bethlehem in their situation, and then The Jewish tradition, here's a Roman census declaration that was discovered, all tattered.

So if they followed the Jewish tradition, they would have traveled around Samaria and go to Bethlehem along the Jordan River. If you heard from Vern, he's talked about the geography of the Jordan River. So they probably would have gone down pretty far in elevation, down to the Jordan River and then back up out of the Jordan River to Bethlehem. The Sea of Galilee and the Dead Sea were, I believe they were both below sea level. So the Jordan was probably good trek and descending elevation.

So what is the Jewish tradition about Samaria? They were pretty much thought of as renegade half-breeds. and we're not really considered as any different than gentiles, really. So, okay, I'll go through there. Yeah. And the Jewish tradition would, they would travel, they would make a day or two, if I remember right, trip to go around Samaria to avoid those people. if they went through it via maybe less than a day trip or maybe a day trip.

So that's good to know. Let's see, this is... Does anybody know what this is? I think this is the Mount of Olives. Or no, this is Bethlehem. I see it in the corner. This is... Bethlehem, it's probably a model image of Bethlehem back in the day. A little washed out. So this is a Jewish house configuration. So the kataluma, the separate room for guests, created by a temporary wall and either a carved or natural cave.

But it was, for the most part, it was mainly for the animals. It's stable for the animals, but when you have gas, you put them in there with the animals. This configuration is kind of like Jessica, my situation right now with our neighbors, they're almost like animals next door. It gets pretty noisy. But can you imagine? So they had a temporary door or some kind of divider between the two areas. You know, you might as well be living in a barn. I mean, it's just that you don't get trampled or made on by the animals.

So here's a little image of some of the houses built into the hillside. They probably had some caves built back into the hill. Here's an image of a trough. I believe it's a water trough or a feeding trough. A feeding trough. And that's possibly what they laid Jesus in. That's what it looks like in Bethlehem anyway. That they have as his manger is that feeding trough. By the way, some people, especially from one particular Christmas time song, think before Mary she had to give birth in the manger. That's not what happened. He was late. Oh, OK. So it's probably too small for marriage.

So here's an image of a shepherd, some sheep. So the shepherds in the area of Bethlehem, they most likely raised sheep for the temple sacrifices. And they were of low esteem in the culture of that time. They were considered dirty and filthy. They were. Well, they were. They lived in the fields with the sheep. And they probably were very colorful people.

It's interesting though to think about because they raised the sheep for the sacrifices and these were, you know, the Jews had to fulfill the law and cover their sins by the blood of the sacrificed animals. And so they were very important, they were integral to the culture or the the Jewish religion, the temple sacrifices and their practices. So they were lowly people, but they were very important and integral.

Here we go on to Herod the Great in Matthew 2, fits with what is known of him from records outside scripture. So there are historical documents that record Herod. And then the wise man, the Magi, came from Parthia, asking about the birth of the king of the Jews. And that's in Numbers 24, 17. Parthia, as you can see, let's see. There's Parthia on the map.

And I think that's part of current day, I think this is Iran, current day Iran around here. Just to give you a modern context. Okay, so we have images here, and this is recorded in Matthew 2, 13 through 15. So when the Magi visited Jesus, they brought gold, frankincense, and myrrh. And I'm assuming that's what. That looks like gold. And these are other frankincense and myrrh. And here's a satellite image of the area.

So for the census, I'm sorry, they went to Bethlehem. So because of Herod, so Herod was I believe it was the Magi asked where this baby was and they wanted to see him and Herod deceived them or he didn't accomplish but he said let me know so I can visit and worship him as well and he just wanted to find him and kill him so he made a decree to kill all the Somebody help me out here. All the boys? Two and under. Okay.

And so Mary and Jesus and Joseph went to Alexandria. They left to escape, basically. They went to Alexandria, second largest city in the Roman Empire, and they had a large number of Jews. Does anybody know why there were so many Jews there in Alexandria? Because Alexandria was transplanted.

Okay. They had P.S. for volunteers, but they had to learn a Greek language real good, too. Oh, okay. Then why would he choose the Jews, the Jewish people? It's just because they've been conquered. They've conquered people around. All of them had to learn Greek and some other things. And that was common with other cultures where they would divide people up and spread them out so they can basically revolt.

I believe in this case, I think Alexander the Great And I can't remember all the details, but I believe he had a good relationship with the Jewish people. And so it was more of a, it wasn't so much a conquering type of move to move them, but it was because he was on good terms with them and he wanted I don't know, hundreds or thousands of them to be moved over to this city to build this city in Alexandria. And I'm sorry I'm kind of butchering that, but I could look more into that and give more details. I think it was based on that he had a good relationship with the Jews.

Yeah? I think Bert said when Alexander the Great came through Israel, they said, oh, we've been looking for you. OK. And it was because of Daniel's prophecy, which they have in their literature. And so that pleased Alexander the Great. And he didn't do to them what he did to some of the others. Right. Yeah, that's good. Thank you.

Also, if you're seeing this, But before this time, the Jews of Alexandria actually fought for Cleopatra. You know, they were sallying the Romans and other things that actually had an army that fought for them in that area. So they had more of an ally status? And they prospered there. They probably contributed a lot to that great library in Alexandria. Sure.

You have to wonder what ancient records were there that the Jews brought with them. Wasn't it one of the great wonders of the world, the library in Alexandria? Something like that. collection of writings from all over the world. So here's ancient Alexandria, around the time of Hypatia.

Now I should have gone ahead Here's what we were talking about. So a large number of Jews had gone there at the request of Alexander the Great. Right there. There's the Jewish Quarter. Oh, there's the library we were talking about. And he collected books from every culture he conquered all over the known world.

So Jesus was in the temple at age 12. Luke 2, 41-52 records the pilgrimage back to Jerusalem involving Jesus, Joseph, and Mary and the teachers at the temple. The entire account fits with the culture of the time except Jesus' level of understanding. So Jesus was, he was 12 and he was discussing the Old Testament with the teachers, the rabbis and teachers in the temple.

And so that's why his level of understanding didn't quite fit. It was kind of a mystery. to them at the time. We know now, we know why he had that great understanding. And his father was a carpenter, Jesus' father, Joseph was a carpenter in Nazareth. And there was then being thought his father. I'm sorry? As he was thought of as being the son of Joseph.

So, as tradition would have it, he carried on his father's trade, and this is recorded in Matthew 13.55, Mark 6.3. And they may have been doing this or had a workshop in the one-room house in which the family lived, or maybe they had a shop on the side, maybe an outside shop. It's probably a little bit nicer weather than here. So Jesus enters his ministry, so at about 30 years, and this is such a, we're just blasting over it, it's a brief There is so much back story to this.

30 years of age, Luke 3.3, Jesus entered his ministry, focusing most of his time in the areas of Galilee and Jerusalem, almost entirely toward the Jews.

There is a temple model in the Jordan River entering the Sea of Galilee. So these are key geographical places. that fill us in on what the scripture has to tell us. Jesus selects his disciples. They're all Jewish men. Matthew 10, 2-4, Mark 3, 16-19, Luke 6, 12-16. They were substantially from Galilee, and that's in Acts 2-7. These men were, however, diverse in some other ways.

So we see Matthew, he was a tax collector in Matthew 9.9.

Simon a zealot in Luke 6.15.

James and John were brothers, Mark 3.17, and were fishermen. And Judas Iscariot, the disciple's treasurer, betrayed Christ.

That's in Luke 6.16. significant when we see the diversity there. Matthew, he was a tax collector. So he's a Jew and he's working for the Romans to collect tax from probably most likely the Jews. And then Simon the Zealot, he was a Jew who was anti-Roman. So he was another extreme. There were polar opposites as far as political views. And that's significant when we learn of...

I believe Jesus paired up Matthew and Simon and sent them out two by two to tell people the gospel. And so just think about how did that go down? Was it smooth? Did they get along? Or were they just button heads the whole way? Or did they come together for the purpose of the Gospels?

And so it's interesting to know the backgrounds of these two guys. It's quite possible that maybe this is just my own private speculation. in particular to disciples might have contributed more in God's economy to the conversion of 3,000, first day of Pentecost, simply because they're together on a mission. And you would not have expected that in your wildest dreams back at that time to be so opposite in their backgrounds. the other affairs. But it seems like, in my estimation, that that was kind of a big drawing card for the interest of what Jesus had to say through his disciples.

Sure. They were of one mind and of one purpose. They had one message. They were both bold men. You would have to be bold to be collecting taxes for the people who run your country among your people. Some would see him as a betrayer of the Jewish people, which the Zealots probably did. And you probably saw the zealots in the extreme light as well. The character of Christ's ministry. Christ focused his and his disciples' ministry upon Israel.

This is in Matthew 10.6 and 15.24.

Being those who were the lost sheep, recorded in Psalms 119.76, Jeremiah 50. 4-7, Ezekiel 34, Luke 15, 1-7. And tax collectors and sinners. It's interesting that those two were lumped together, tax collectors and sinners. And then we have more references there, Matthew 9, 10 and 11, 11 verse 19. Mark 2, 15, 16, Luke 5, 30, 7, 34, and 15, 1.

The character of Christ's ministry, he was often at odds with the various religious and pro-Roman or anti-Roman political groups in Israel. Now I read that and I think, You know, when people ask me, are you Democrat or Republican? Or are you conservative or liberal? And, you know, sometimes I might say, neither. I mean, this looks like... Christ was at odds.

He was none of these. He was not pro-Roman or anti-Roman. He had his agenda and this was to save his people. He went to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. And that's probably why he could spend time with tax collectors. Leisure time. Hanging out with tax collectors and sinners. Because none of that mattered. There was something more important that he was working on.

He encountered these groups most often as he sat things straight at the temple or when they confronted him. And the Pharisees, they went after him with a vengeance. Mark 12, 13-17, Luke 20, 19-26, 27-46. At times they would seek him out. They would pursue him to try to kill him.

In the things he set straight, he would be in the temple and the Pharisees would ask him a question, and he wouldn't answer it, but he'd go to the original intent of the law. He'd go to the heart of the law, and he would say that the Jewish leaders, the rabbis, they were the ones who were leading Israel, and they were supposed to be the prime example of following the heart of the law, but they were the furthest from it, and they were leaving Israel away from the original intent. And that's what Jesus brought up. He said, you say this, but the word says this, is said in scripture, and he would set them straight.

So understanding the history and culture behind the Gospels will allow us to see innumerable rich insights into the inspired Word of God, 2 Timothy 3, 16 and 17. That perspective will allow us to understand what is said and done far more clearly, both for those things that are in line with the culture and for those things that are in stark contrast with the culture. Like I said before, I've learned more in one week here about history and culture that brings to light what the scripture is trying to say than I have in a lifetime. And often times, and I'm guilty of it, you read something and you just assume And like Tom was saying, there's a loss in translation of understanding. So we can read something in our modern translations and it doesn't give the depth or true meaning of certain words or the culture or things like that. So I'll just jump to a conclusion or jump to an interpretation. before observing and really understanding what these things really mean. And often times my assumptions will be in sharp contrast to what the Bible is actually saying.

Even though we will find that Christ and the inspired authors of scripture will at various points call believers out of the human culture into a life based on Christ's personal history, They will do so with words, phrases, illustrations, and figures of speech drawn from human culture and developed within the context of human history, fitting with that time and date.

So even though Christ was fully human, but what for believers, for us in the church age, Where is our citizenship? We're heavenly citizens. And so, even though we're in our culture, we're in our city, we're citizens of this earth, Christ tells us that we are citizens of heaven. That's more true than our physical state. He has placed us with Christ in the heavenlies.

So Jesus used, being a carpenter, used illustrations that others would understand. So he talks in Matthew 7, 1 through 5, about a speck and a beam in one's eye. And I'm guessing this picture is probably Burns' house. partially built and then didn't get to live in. I don't know. Anyway, it's a picture of construction of a house with a hand-hewn ceiling beam. So imagine that being in your eye. It illustrates the severity in his illustration where he used the beam. It illustrates the severity of that. Millstones, two women working the hand mill was so common and essential to life, a long-standing Jewish practice.

See Deuteronomy 24.6. Everyone would understand Christ's illustration in Matthew 24, 41. And a larger millstone was used in Luke 17, 2. It's like an image of a millstone being controlled by a horse. There's a larger millstone. This is interesting.

So fish, the disciples, a lot of them were fishermen. in the area where Jesus' ministry was, was mostly fishing economy. And there are a lot of fishing and fish themes in the gospel. And so the understanding in this culture and the time, the understanding of eating and keeping the fish, is important. It's different in our day, so when we read about these things in the Bible, we kind of overlook it, or it doesn't seem that important. Because we think of our cultural context.

You put the fish in the fridge and it lasts a few days. and we don't eat them quite the same way. So the fresh fish were least commonly eaten. They're typically called Ichthys, Luke 5-6, and 24-42. They didn't have refrigeration. So if you're gonna eat fresh fish, you probably, as soon as you catch it, you eat it, type of thing. The next most common was fish that was dried in stacks with layers of salt between layers of fish or on racks. They were called ikthus in Matthew 14, 19.

Or this type of fish more specifically called Opsarion in John 6, 9. So you could probably, it was probably like beef jerky. Fish jerky. Fish jerky, yeah. And then the most popular throughout the Roman Empire, people ate fish that was ground up, fermented, and applied as a pastry bread.

Prosphagion, John 21.5, and it's only in John 21.5, that word.

And I've always wondered, Vern has talked about this and others have thought about it, and I've always wondered, when are we going to get a picture? Well, leave it to Vern. He found a picture of Asian fermented fish paste. And this is key when we look at the scripture where Jesus has been resurrected and then he reveals himself to people in many places, to many people at several times.

Well this one, his disciples were They're like, well what do we do now? Let's go fishing. So they did what they knew. They went fishing and they didn't catch any fish. They were unsuccessful all night. And then Jesus is on the shore and they don't recognize him as Jesus. But he has fish cooking on the shore ready for them to eat. And he yells out at them and he says, and basically This is what the meaning is. You don't see it in scripture if you just read it. He basically says, hey boys, did you catch any fish paste? And so that's interesting.

So Jesus had a sense of humor, I guess. The four Gospels. So here's, we're looking at context of the writers, the backgrounds of the writers of the four Gospels. Matthew wrote from a perspective that addressed Jewish scriptures, history, culture, and traditions. Mark wrote, here's an image of the Gospel of Matthew on papyrus. So Mark wrote to the Roman mind, which is why Jesus so often is said to do things immediately. So it must be from the Roman mindset. You have to have things done right now. Luke wrote to the Greek mind, writing from his medical background. John wrote to the broadest audience focusing upon the overriding purpose that his readers should believe. We see that throughout John, Revelation. This is written so that you will believe, so that you may know and that you may believe.

And then we see Christ traveled all over Israel during his years of ministry. And this is the Holy Week highlighted here. And it's nice to have a timeline and kind of an overview. Palm Sunday, Jesus triumphantly enters Jerusalem. So the triumphal entry, quote, unquote, triumphal entry, was five days before the crowd yelled, crucify him. So it didn't sound so triumphant. That was Sunday. Monday, cleansing the temple and cursing of the fig tree. Tuesday, fig tree withered. The Temple Controversies, Olivet Discourse, Matthew 24 and 25. This is a picture of the Mount of Olives.

Day of Quiet, Wednesday, possibly at Bethany, the home of Mary, Martha, and Lazarus. There's an image of Jerusalem and Bethany. Thursday, preparation for and observance of the Jewish Passover. This is the traditional side of the Last Supper. It's where a lot of people think it took place in that image. Friday, prayer, betrayal in the Garden of Gethsemane before leaders, crucifixion, and burial.

And you have in your handouts a supplement, a good Friday clock. So this is like a more detailed version of that day in a timeline clock. It's nice to get that overview image. Saturday, the tomb remained sealed with pilot's seal, guarded by Roman soldiers.

And then Sunday, Christ's resurrection and initial post-resurrection appearances. And then here's the Mount of Olives, the Ascension, Acts 1, 6-11. And then Zechariah 14, 3-35, it talks about his return on the Mount of Olives. And here's a modern photograph of the Mount of Olives.

So this is why we look at history, and culture, and language. Ultimately, it's to see Christ in His Word. It's to behold Him through His Word and to have fellowship with Him. It's to have a greater understanding of what He has already revealed to us. Do you guys have any questions or comments? Okay, let's pray. Father, we thank you that you have revealed your word to us. We thank you that you have given it to us so that we can know it, and that we can understand it, and ultimately it's that we can have fellowship with you, that we can behold you through your word, and we thank you for giving us all these details of your life and what you have identified with us in your death, burial, resurrection, ascension and seeding. We thank you for this day and we pray for Roger in teaching us more about your work in Jesus' name.