Every culture has a particular way of thinking, mental images for certain concepts, and connotations for various words. In Jesus’ day, it would have been the Greco-Roman culture influencing how people thought. Have the world of Jesus’ opened in a new way by studying the mind of the ancients.
Abram’s wife Sarai took Hagar the Egyptian, her maid, and gave her to her husband Abram as his wife. He went in to Hagar, and she conceived; and when she saw that she had conceived, her mistress was despised in her sight….So Sarai treated [Hagar] harshly, and she fled from Read more…
The ancient Hebrews deeply revered the name of God. By Jesus’ day, they wouldn’t even utter it aloud. It was too holy to be spoken by unclean lips. We still know there’s power in the name of Jesus. We know the verses, and we sing the songs…and then we go Read more…
“How blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered!” ~ Psalm 32:1 In one of my first classical studies courses, my professor told us the ancients didn’t think in terms of “either this, or that,” but rather as “both this, and that.”[1] This was said in relation Read more…
One of the fundamental building-blocks of the Judeo-Christian belief is that there is sin in the world. Everything underpins this belief. If you don’t believe in sin, there is no need for a savior. In the Bible, sin has a variety of meanings, but “gives no formal definition” of this Read more…
Last time I talked about the interaction between the Greeks and the Israelites around the time of the judges. We talked about Mycenaean Greeks and tunics and Homer. All wonderful things, and all to show how the (almost) constant contact between Greece and Israel makes it important to study “the Read more…
I made a bold statement last week about how studying the Greco-Roman culture will help us understand many aspects of the Bible better. However, you don’t create culture overnight; it spans centuries of tradition. A lot of the subjects I’ll discuss are ancient ways of thinking. They go at least Read more…
Being of an anxious disposition as a child (ok, and as an adult, too), I often worried over whether I would have been a follower of Christ if I lived in the ancient world. Would I have recognized those truths? Would I have felt the call in my heart? How Read more…