Category: Scripture
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The Gospel Of Thomas…. Doubt-Free
In 1945 one of the greatest historical finds ever emerged in Nag Hammadi, Egypt. Dozens of early Christian texts suddenly came to the awareness of the western world. Called the Nag Hammadi Library, it was a collection of a 52 mainly gnostic texts along with Plato’s Republic and The Corpus Hermeticum. One theory is that…
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Understanding Jesus: Separating Faith from Early Christian Influence
If you grew up in (or are currently a member of) a protestant church, you have probably been allowed to believe that your faith has been relatively unchanged throughout the millennia. Catholicism (your church’s grand-pappy) has had a colorful history filled with all manner of exciting events among them the councils. The catholic councils would…
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John the Baptizer, Messiah or Nah?
In the New Testament, John the Baptist was portrayed as the only person holy enough to be able to baptize Jesus of Nazareth at the inauguration of his ministry. The story (present in all four gospels) has Jesus requesting the ceremony at one of John’s baptism services. John seems to be reticent about performing the…
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The Lost Gospel: Q
First of all, No. This has nothing to do with the conspiracy theory bearing the same letter as a name. During studies of Christian origins, one is very quickly guaranteed to run into the term Q-source quite often when discussing the synoptic gospels. Q stands for “Quelle”, the German word for “source.” It is a…
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The Evolution of Modern Christian Eschatology (The ever changing end of the world.)
With all the terrible events transpiring in Europe and Israel, Christians (mainly evangelicals) are in full-blown rapture mode. Dozens of YouTube channels about end-times prophecy pop up every day with all of their episodes carrying a call to salvation. These are certainly scary times; no doubt about it. We teeter closer than we ever have…
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Political Intrigue and the Crucifixion; First-Century Watergate. Part Two: Changing Money.
The scene of Jesus overturning the tables of the Temple money-changers is one of the most iconic of the New Testament. While his righteous wrath at the desecration of the Temple seems to be in line with what we know about Jesus, just about everything else in the story seems very odd. In this entry,…
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Political Intrigue and the Crucifixion; First-Century Watergate. Part One: Branches and Hosannahs.
The story of the last week of the life of Jesus of Nazareth is…..off. As the new convert reads of his trip into Jerusalem, they are filled with many questions…..as am I. Several aspects of the story do not make sense. In this series of posts, we will touch on a few of them as…
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Papias of Hieropolis
Papias of Hieropolis is more than just an amazing name for your next child; he may be one of the most important players in early Christian history that you have (probably) never heard of. It is through him that what little we know about the author of the “main” gospel, Mark, comes to us today.…
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Gnosticism; Then and Now
Most of us are aware of the story of Jesus around which the world’s largest religion is shaped. Over the almost two millennia since the death of Jesus of Nazareth, the Christian version of his story has coalesced into the form that most of us are familiar with today. As popular and nearly ubiquitous as…
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Thecla; the First First-Woman of the Church.
For as long as anyone can remember, Mary the mother of Jesus has held the position of the highest revered woman of the Church. By sheer volume, more prayers are said to her than any other person; including Jesus. In the early Church however, there was another woman who contended for that honor. Thecla. The…
The Incredible Jesus 