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Jun 28 Blog

Understanding the Good Samaritan Parable

By: BAS Staff

Who were the Samaritans? Dr. Amy-Jill Levine of Vanderbilt University explains how getting an accurate answer to this question can shed light on how shocking the Good Samaritan parable would have been for Jesus’ audience.

bamah-shiloh

Jun 27 Blog

High Places, Altars and the Bamah

By: Ellen White

The open-air altar shrine, called a bamah (plural bamot), is known through several books of the Biblical canon. Often referred to as “high places” in translations of the Bible, bamot were worship sites that usually contained an altar.

Ferdinand Christian Baur

Jun 24 Blog

The Quest for the Historical Paul

By: James Tabor

What can we reliably know about Paul and how can we know it? As is the case with Jesus this is not an easy question.

Mary Simeon Anna

Jun 22 Blog

Mary, Simeon or Anna: Who First Recognized Jesus as Messiah?

By: Ben Witherington III

Who was the first person to truly recognize Jesus as the messiah and understand the implications? Biblical scholar Ben Witherington III takes a close look at the account given in Luke, and sheds some light on what the Biblical narrative has to say about who was the first to recognize Jesus as the messiah.

Mary Magdalene

Jun 15 Blog

Was Mary Magdalene Wife of Jesus? Was Mary Magdalene a Prostitute?

By: Biblical Archaeology Society Staff

Was Mary Magdalene a prostitute who repented or simply an influential female follower of Jesus? Mary from Magdala has popularly been saddled with an unfavorable reputation, but how did this notion come about?

Jun 6 Blog

Was Jesus a Jew?

By: Biblical Archaeology Society Staff

Was Jesus a Jew? Some people claim that Jesus was a Christian. Some have claimed that he was an Aryan Christian. But in recent decades scholars have been returning to ancient historical settings and discovering the Jewish Jesus.

The Face of Jesus?

Jun 4 Blog

What Did Jesus Really Look Like?

By: Biblical Archaeology Society Staff

What did Jesus look like? In “Painting a Portrait of Jesus,” D. Moody Smith examined the difficulties in answering this question.

Apr 30 Blog

Who Was Thecla?

By: Megan Sauter

The leading lady of the apocryphal work the Acts of Thecla may not be a well-known figure today, but nearly every early Christian knew her name.

Women-at-Tomb-s

Apr 18 Blog

The “Strange” Ending of the Gospel of Mark and Why It Makes All the Difference

By: James Tabor

James Tabor presents a fresh look at the original text of the earliest Gospel.

Cornelius

Apr 9 Blog

The Origin of Christianity

By: Noah Wiener

Geza Vermes explores the origin of Christianity by examining the characteristics of the Jewish Jesus movement to see how it developed into a distinctly gentile religion.

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