Tuesday, November 15, 2011

The scribes and Pharisees Were Quite a Superstitious Lot

The idea of priests wearing  clothing or items to make them stand out from the common person had early beginnings, in the far eastern as well middle Mediterranean areas of the world.


Jewish scribes and Pharisees, for instance,   wore small leather boxes on their foreheads and upper left arm. This was promoted by their literal interpretation of the Hebrew Scriptures or Old Testament.


These small small leather square or rectangular  black boxes, called, phylacteries,  contantained a scripture passage in response to the command from  God, who said,  "These words that I am commanding you today must prove to be on your heart...And you must tie them as a sign upon your hand" and "as a frontlet band between your eyes."


Scholars think that the scribes and Pharisees had succumbed to this practice  by the third or second century B.C.E. And not for good reasons. 


Many of them made these little boxes extra large to impress the common people by their supposed piety. And many also thought that these phylacteries or black boxes were amulets that could protect them --a common superstition of the people of other nations, such as the Greeks. The Greeks called such black boxes "phylakterion and were a "means of protection".



Monday, November 14, 2011

How Far Could You Walk on a Sabbath Day?

How far can you walk in a day?   How far could you have walked on a Sabbath day during the time of Jesus and his apostles?


The answer to the first question would be, "about 20 to 30 miles" walking at a rate of about 2 miles per hour for eight hours, but if you  were a Jew living in or around  Jerusalem during and shortly after the time of Jesus you wouldn't be able to cover anywhere near that much ground.


Under Mosaic Law on the seventh day of the week Israelites -- and even foreigners -- were not stop all strenuous work and other activity in order to rest and have time to focus on religious matters -- such as the reading and meditating on the Scriptures.  God instructed them: "Let nobody go out from his [or her]locality."


The rabbis, as they did with many other aspects of the Law, carried this to an extreme putting a 2,000 cubic limit on how far anybody could walk. They called this a "Sabbath Day's Journey".  The actual distance was somewhere between 0.8 and 1 kilometer.


After witnessing Jesus' ascension to the heavens after his resurrection, his apostles made such a trip from the Mount of Olives back to nearby  Jerusalem.







Tuesday, November 8, 2011

Why is There No Mention of The End of The Seventh Day?

 If those who claim  that the Creative  ays of the Bible were a literal 24 hours were correct  -- why is there no mention to the end of the Seventh  Creative Day?


The simple answer to this question is that it is still continuing and that the Creative Days were not just 24 hours in duration -- but thousands of years

Monday, November 7, 2011

Did the Garden of Eden Ever Exist?

Did the Garden of Eden actually exist or is it merely the stuff of myth and fable? At one time no one doubted its existence,   but skeptics from the time of Plato and Aristotle abound -- even emerging from the world's religions.

 Aristotle and Plato, no doubt witnessing all the suffering in the world claimed that the idea such a paradise as the Garden of Eden could have existed was ridiculous.  "The earth is too wretched a place they would argue".

Early attempts to counter this argument seem hilarious when you look back at them, but were taken quiet seriously by some at the time. These included the idea that God had actually created this paradise on an extra high mountain peak -- just above this degraded earth. Others claimed that it had been at the North Pole or the South Pole.

Skeptics of course were right. Such claims were the stuff of fantasy or science fiction, but that does not mean that the Garden of Eden never existed.

 Bible says it actually existed. The Bible at Genesis 2: 6-14 says it near a river,   which turned into four "heads" or rivers:  the Pishon - "encircling the entire land of Havilah, where there is gold....bdellium gum and the onyx stone"; the Gihon -- "the one encircling the entire land of Cush."; the Hiddekel; -- "the one going to the east of Assyria." and the Euphrates.

So have archaeologists or geologists, following these descriptions been able to find any trace of the Garden? No!  And most have dismissed the idea of a Garden of Eden as nonsense -- a belief  belief shared  even many religious leaders who view much of of the Bible as myth.



But, are they right? Jesus would say no. And he would have witnessed everything that happened at the time of creation from the heavens. He believed in the existence of Adam and Eve and their paradise home.He spoke of them as being real people. Not allegorical figures.  Was Jesus deceived or was he a liar? Neither of these notions is feasible.

So what could have happened to the Garden of Eden?  Quiet simply it could have been obliterated by nature over time. Remember we are speaking of something that existed over 6000 years ago and the Garden was in an earthquake belt that today accounts for 17 percent of the world's earthquakes.  over the centuries these could have changed this area drastically -- even by the time of Moses who wrote about Adam and Eve  2500 years later.

And there was something else that could have made drastic changes in the georgraphy of the Garden of Eden and surrounding areas over the centuries  -- the Flood of Noah's day. The power of water, as seen during the recent Japanese earthquake and tsunami, is devastating, capable of making huge changes in the surface of the earth -erasing the Garden from the surface of the earth.


This is something that God would have permitted. Remember, he had blocked all access to it with angels as described in the Bible. Don't believe it never existed just because we can't find it.


God likely never wanted it to be found after the rebellion of Adam and Eve.

Friday, November 4, 2011

Why Did Pontius Pilate Become Fearful?

Pontius Pilate was a cunning politician and often treacherous but not usually a fearful ruler.Why then did he become fearful when hearing the charge that Jesus had made himself God's Son?  For two good reasons.


Although they tolerated their Roman rulers within  Israel there was always some group, such as in the infamous Dagger Men, who often assassinated  Roman officials in broad daylight, seeking the opportune moment to instigate rebellion against Rome.


 Exactly how much this threat affected Pilate when passing sentence on Jesus is not clear  but it is no secret that  Roman rulers  had tried to appease the Jewish people by leaving much of the day to day government, including religious matter up to the Jews themselves and did not want to become entangled in religious problems unless it was something that threatened Rome.


So Pilate likely was concerned about alienating the Jewish religious leaders as well as most of the general Jewish population who had so much hatred for Jesus.


On top of this there was the Roman emperor himself.  By the time of Pilate and Jesus Roman emperors had become regarded as gods, successors to Julius Caesar who had been posthumously declared a god.  So all  of his successors were declared  divi filius  or "Son of a Divine One."


Thus when the Jewish High Priest alleged  Jesus was trying to establish him as a God and King in opposition to Caesar and that Pilate would be an accomplice to him if he did not execute Jesus Pilate caved in to their demands out of fear.  


And he was afraid of more than just getting the Jewish people mad.  The Roman emperor at this time was Tiberius Caesar, a man who demanded complete loyalty. He executed anybody he considered an enemy -- without hesitation.


So when the Jews started claiming the Pilate would be disloyal to Caesar if he did not order the execution of Jesus he fearfully ordered Jesus" scourging and execution on a stake.


He ordered Jesus execution although he knew that Jesus was innocent of the Jewish charges as described in John 19: 8, 12-16.



Wednesday, November 2, 2011

Travel Around the Time of Christ

Travel during the time of Jesus Christ and his Apostles  could an arduous -- often dangerous adventure by land or sea. You had to be tough and determined to reach your destination.


Travel by Land


The Romans by this time had built a system of roads major centers in the empire. These were up to 15 feet wide, paved with stone and even had curbs.  Addition to this many of these Romans roadways had a series of inns constructed every so many miles. Although many of these were often dirty and centers for things like prostitution they did provide a place to rest for the careful traveler.


In Palestine, however travelers faced far more dangers from the weather, wild animals, and robbers while traveling along these dirt trails cut through fields and ravines -- which provided ideal hiding places for robbers wanting to ambush travelers.


As night fell  travelers, loaded down with personal belongings such as a staff for protection, extra shoes and clothing, a money bag, a collapsible leather bucket for drawing water from streams, a water flask and other items either made quick encampments beside the roads or stayed in caravansaries -- stone enclosures with rooms build around a court yard built every so many miles beside the roadways.


These places were often dirty but did provide some protection from the weather and thieves.


These roadways were used by a wide variety of  travelers -- from people on foot, loaded down with their personal belongs when making longer journeys to merchants transporting their goods on donkeys, in wagons pulled by oxen for heavier loads, and even on the backs of camels and couriers racing by with mail or royal decrees.


Lucky travelers  could stay with family or friends along the route.


Travel By Sea


Travel by sea could also be a very hazardous undertaking. The Apostle Paul, says at 2 Corinthians 11: 25-27 that, "Three times I experienced shipwreck, a night and a day I spent in the deep."


Following the lead of the early sailors from Tyre and Israel, who were the early pioneers in Mediterranean coastal and deep ocean voyages, sailors from Israel and other countries such as Rome and Greece had become very skilled coastal and deep water sailors.


But still their wooden vessels, whether the small coastal ships or larger Roman galleys  were no match  for the sometimes violent Mediterranean, shipwrecks, such as the ones Paul mentioned, were fairly common and few long voyages were attempted between the middle of September and May.


And even when the weather was good these were not cruise ships for travelers. Most of them were used for ferrying troops  as well as cargo up and down the Mediterranean.


There were few comforts on these vessels for the travelers such as Paul and others.With below decks crammed with cargo travelers had to sleep on the open decks in all kinds of weather, dependent on the food and other items they brought with them to make the trip as bearable as possible. The ship's captain or master provided passengers only with water.


Such was travel through the Mediterranean area during the time of Christ and the Apostles -- with none of the comforts  travelers or tourists enjoy today.  Still the early Christians made good use of  these road and maritime routes to spread their message and traders and merchants used them to establish profitable  trade routes from one end of the Mediterranean to the other.



Tuesday, November 1, 2011

The Houses of Ur

Abraham and Sarai  gave  a great deal of comfort when they responded to God's command to leave their homes in Ur and spend the rest of their lives as nomads living in tents.


When Leonard Woolley excavated the site of ancient Ur  between 1922 and 1934 he found at least 73 two-story homes that had  built of brick -- not clay or other less durable materials.


These homes he found which featured up to a dozen rooms or more and featured whitewashed walls, a drainage system and others features  were the homes of the middle- class such as "shopkeepers , petty mer chants, scribes, and so on, "


Many of these homes were constructed with the rooms opening onto a paved central courtyard. This courtyard sloped gradually towards a central drain for carrying away waste and rain water -- a style also used by the Romans


In addition to these features,   many of the larger homes featured  en-suite lavatories in the guests rooms  on the ground level of the house.


Other rooms on the ground or main level contained  slaves quarters  and kitchens with fireplaces for cooking and heating.


The family slept in the upper rooms which were at the top of a staircase.  These family bedrooms were  entered through  a wooden balcony which were built around the upper walls of the courtyard below.  A very attractive and practical design very similar to the way  some townhouses and even office building are laid out today.