The Bible TI251 Fall 2020

In 1 Timothy 6:3-5, I really like what it says.  It says, “Whoever teaches otherwise and does not agree with the sound words of our Lord Jesus Christ and the teaching that is in accordance with godliness, is conceited, understanding nothing, and has a morbid craving for controversy and for disputes about works.  From these come envy, dissension, slander, base suspicions, and wrangling among those who are depraved in mind and bereft of the truth, imagining that godliness is a means of gain.”  I think these verses really hit home for me because as a Catholic college student, I often feel like many people think that we can fill the void we feel in our hearts with materialistic things, love, etc., however, these are ‘morbid cravings.’  Despite feeling good in the moment, they only drag us farther away from God.  The temporary happiness in reality doesn’t drown out the fact that we have to write five papers, and study for finals.  It really just makes us unhappy longer because we wanted the temporary happiness.  That is why God wants us to put the morbid cravings to rest!  He proceeds to tell us to be people of faith and rebuke all of the envy and other evil cravings that us as humans may think are inevitable.  If we make a mistake He wants us to come and confess, and fight the good fight of faith.  He encourages us to not be rich in money and things but rich in faith and good heart.

So, how does this connect with slavery?  If the slaves have believing masters, it is important for the slaves to treat their master with utmost respect, for they are members of God’s family.  As a matter of fact, the slaves are encouraged to be even more helpful.

Archaeology suggests that the Exodus never happened, and that Joshua never conquered Jericho. So how did the Israelites end up inhabiting the land of Canaan?  Well the dates don’t exactly line up, so some archaeologists believe that Jericho could have been destroyed by fires.  This hypothesis is also supported by the evidence that was found.  Evidence suggests that there is an even higher chance that there was an earthquake though, given the location of Jericho.  It has been shown that there are earthquake patterns that reflect that of an earthquake storm, where earthquakes continue to occur along the faults, shaking up and moving the people, thus explaining how the Israelites ended up in Canaan. I have never heard of this prior to taking this class.  I have only ever thought that the story of Joshua was exactly what happened, but this story has definitely opened up my eyes to view stories in the Bible from a new perspective.

One point from the video that I found very interesting is that this is a story of liberation. The archaeologist mentions that if we take the story’s details as exactly how they are written, it leaves out the main point of the story, which in this case is liberation.  The point is that there was an important leader named Joshua, and the Israelites ended up in Canaan, but there is no way that we can know exactly what happened.  All we have to work with is evidence, which suggests that the Wall of Jericho is along or near the fault lines, where there is much seismic activity.  Therefore, there is no way to conclude that there was actually a war fought, or that Joshua lead them to conquer the land.

Our discussion on Revelation and how it is apocryphal literature reminded me of the many people I know that think that there might be a chance that we are nearing THE END OF TIME.  Yes, I know it sounds crazy, however the time is going to come sooner or later, all in God’s perfect timing.  When I was younger, my mom would always talk to me about the Book of Revelation and how it talked about the end of time, and I just was never really interested in it.  Recently, death has been something that I have just had to accept as part of life, and I think that flipped a switch, because now, I think about Judgement day a lot.  There is a Christian song that I absolutely love and that will move you to tears.  There was also a movie created about the making of the song.  It is called “I can only imagine” sung by Mercy Me.  In the movie, it explains how the son had to make amends with his father, because his father gave him a hard childhood.  When the father gets sick and the son finds out, he has a change of heart, and therefore forgives his father.  One of the most moving parts for me was when the father and son both come to terms and realize that the son was in the wrong for holding a grudge on all the mistakes the father had made, and how the father was wrong in how he treated their family.  Anyways, the song talks about Judgement day and how we will react when we stand before God and have to say all that we did during our life.  Every time that I listen to this song, it causes me to reflect, and through reading Revelation, I now know that this song is directly referring to Revelation 20:11-15.

Connecting prophecy, prophesy and prophets really enlightened me, and gave me flashbacks to when I took Old testament in High school.  Prophecy is the noun, prophesy is the verb, and prophets are the people prophesying.  When it comes to prophets, I found it interesting that they were often seen as God, however, I can understand why the people thought this.  Often times they were delivering messages directly from God and therefore it makes sense that the people thought that the prophets were God.  The prophecies seemed crazy and shocking to the people because they were often warnings to the people that they needed to change their ways to connect more with God.  They were reminders and warnings to the people that the people need to withhold their end of the covenant and act ethically.

Revisiting the flood stories, I reflected on what key differences existed between the Yahwist version and the Priestly Writers version.  The first was the most obvious, and I also think the most important: the use of the term Yahweh vs. Elohim.  Yahweh in Hebrew translates to mean “LORD” and Elohim translates to mean “gods” or “deities.”  I found this difference quite significant because as a child I was always told that LORD was “YHWH” or the one and the only God.  The differentiation between gods and God was always emphasized when I was younger, and I think this is an example where the differentiation becomes critical.  God refers to our God, the one and only all powerful and all knowing God, however, gods refers to other “gods” that people turned from God to worship, such as Ba’al and others.  Another key difference is the duration of the flood.  Being raised in a Catholic school, I have reflected on this story many times.  The duration of the flood in the Yahwist version is forty days and forty nights, however forty days and forty nights is simply symbolic of a long time.  It is very interesting that the Priestly Writer’s version mentions 150 days.  In the notes at the end of the article it says that the flood lasted one year and 10 days.  This got me thinking that we potentially have an idea of how they measured time, however, there is no way to know that the article’s one year and ten days is accurate.  These are two key differences between the two versions that I found very important to highlight.

After reflecting on these two versions, I have discovered that when comparing these two versions of this story with the Bible that I have, details from both versions of the story are present.  Both versions are intertwined to help more thoroughly tell the story, which I find very helpful, but a little redundant at times.  Overall, these two stories have some key similarities, however some crucial differing details from both  that are included in the story of Noah and the flood.

Our discussion about Revelation was one of my favorite lectures this semester. Reading it is extremely confusing, but hinges mostly on one’s knowledge of horses and the number 7. For some reason, I never knew that the number 666 originated in the Bible, I just knew it as a demonic symbol. In my personal experience, my mother and pastors believe in the prophetic aspect of this book. It’s terrifying. Blood, anguish, and monsters dominating the earth pales in comparison to the pandemic and climate change we’re going through now. Whether you read it as a literal prediction of events or an epic metaphor for the end of times (whether a certain time period or the end of the earth in general), it’s still a lot to process especially in comparison to the stories of hope preceding it. The New Testament often talks about the hope of Jesus and the early church, so this is a stark contrast through the images of pain and judgment.

Last class, we discussed the question of whether Jesus had siblings or not, and since then I can’t stop thinking about that question.  Prior to taking this class, I had never thought that Jesus had a sibling, human or Godly.  I had only ever been taught that he was the one and only son of God.  So if Mary did have more children, or Joseph had children from a prior marriage, why don’t we hear about it more in the Bible?  I mentioned in class that I thought that brothers was figurative, in that Jesus had brothers in Christ, in that they shared their belief in God (much like how we use that term today).  However, it got me thinking about if Jesus did have a brother, would he have had the same relationship with God that Jesus had?  How would miracles work?  Could they both perform different types of miracles or would they only be able to perform specific types?  Would they both need to be present for the miracle to work completely?  The questions keep flowing, but I think it is safe to say that there is much clarification needed if Jesus did have a brother.

Discussing whether James was Jesus’ brother or not during class was very interesting.  I decided to look at my Bible to see exactly what it says and any references it has in the introduction to each of the books, and sure enough, it referred me to Galatians 1:19.  In Galatians 1:19, there is reference to Jesus’ brother, but there are no other specifications.  While reading the Letter of James, I found it very interesting in the first verse that there is mention of the Lord Jesus Christ, however it refers to James as the servant (otherwise translated as slave).  So this still leaves me with the lingering question of, “Is James really Jesus’ brother, or does brother have another meaning here?”  Despite not having any answers, I really enjoyed reading the Letter of James.  I haven’t read it in a while so it was a very refreshing review.

Revelation makes my brain hurt, but it’s also my favorite lecture of the semester so far. I found it interesting thinking about the anti-Christ and who this person may be. It’s so hard to think about where we may be in a hundred more years as the 1920’s and now are almost two whole different worlds. This being said I don’t think the antichrist is alive merely because it is statistically unlikely. I also think that all of the different ways of calculating ones name into a number has become completely disingenuous because they don’t even know what language it’s supposed to be in or if it should add up to 666 or 616. It’s weird to hear about something so dystopian and pretty sad in the Bible, but I’ve become genuinely compelled to read the book of Revelations to more fully understand what the end of the world is supposed to look like.

Revelation is often referred to as a prophecy. This book in the Bible was a vision that John received. This book is becoming more and more referenced as it talks of the “Anti-Christ” or the beast with the referencer to the number 666. As we talked about in class due to theses sign somehow everything can related to it including Barney the dinosaur, or specific dates. These markings/signs are referenced as becoming the last days of humanity. The End of the world, and religion. In class we also brought up the rapture. This was never specifically listed in revelation but it is the idea that all believers in God and pure people would be saved and sent to heaven as the rest of the people would be left on earth in a post apocalyptic world. Revelation was a very interesting chapter as it brought up a lot of different ideas.

During Tuesday’s class, we talked about Paul and James. I learned a lot of new things that I previously did not know. First, Paul and James disagree on a lot of things. They use “faith” and “works” in different ways. James believes more I good actions while Paul focuses on following the rules and the law. I think it is clear that Paul and James are talking past each other. Neither of them offers a counterargument of each other’s points and only focusing on their side/opinion. It is also clear the influence of Jesus’ teaching on both of them. One last thing I found interesting is the difference in time Paul spends on Genesis. I feel as though this proves Paul was not telling the truth. In my opinion, liars tend to come up with more complex, detailed stories in order to prove their side. I feel like its more clear when it’s shorter because they aren’t thinking about someone doubting them. Secondly, Dr. McGrath talked about Bone boxes which honestly blew my mind. The idea of these is crazy. A year after someone dies you collect their bones and put it in a box? This sounds very traumatizing to me and I can’t believe people used to do this. I don’t think it was a tradition for very long and I understand as to why.