A new collection of articles by Jerusalem School scholars has recently been released.
A Response to Kilty and Elliott on the Talpiot Tomb
Kevin Kilty and Mark Elliott have written yet another article arguing that the Talpiot tomb is likely to be the tomb of Jesus’ family. Their new article aims to overturn a number of objections made by Jodi Magness in her book Stone and Dung, Oil and Spit: Jewish Daily Life in the Time of Jesus (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2011). As with their earlier work, Kilty and Elliott’s latest effort displays a faulty understanding of the numbers involved in calculating the odds that the Talpiot tomb is the tomb of Jesus’ family.
Excerpts from David Flusser’s The Sage from Galilee
The late David Flusser (1917-2000) was one of the world’s foremost Jewish authorities on the New Testament and early Christianity. The Sage from Galilee is Flusser’s biography of Jesus (written in collaboration with Flusser’s student, R. Steven Notley). In this biography, Flusser tells what he learned in a lifetime of studying the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth.
A Short Response to Steven Notley’s “Let the One Who Has Ears to Hear”
The order of The Four Types usually implies ascending gradation from worst to best. When I read The Parable of the Sower, I am inclined to see the third group as representing the category in which most of us fall—including me.
A Brief Critique of George Eldon Ladd’s Views on the Kingdom of God
I found myself cheering Ladd onward as I read what he wrote about Jesus’ emphasis on the present reality of the Kingdom of God, or more clearly said in English, the present reality of God’s reign in people’s lives.
The Statistics behind “The Tomb”
Rather than being treated as liabilities to a statistical study, conjectured details are turned into historical givens and are even factored in as positive data. Consequently, most of the connections made in the documentary fall under the heading of “special pleading.”
James Tabor Responds to JerusalemPerspective.com Review
Professor James D. Tabor, Ph.D., Chair of the Department of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, has responded to Dr. Jack Poirier’s critical review of Tabor’s recently published The Jesus Dynasty: The Hidden History of Jesus, His Royal Family, and the Birth of Christianity (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2006).
Book Review: James Tabor’s The Jesus Dynasty
Tabor has an annoying habit of promoting remote possibilities into even possibilities, and then into probabilities.
The Best Long-term Investment—Making Loans to God
In our day, the 20th-century disciple of Jesus feels the challenge of his call to lay up treasure in heaven more than ever. In the face of an emerging global society drunken with consumerism and materialism, Jesus’ words shatter the silence: “You cannot serve God and mammon!”
Book Review: Robert Lindsey’s A Comparative Greek Concordance of the Synoptic Gospels
With the publication of the third and final volume of A Comparative Greek Concordance of the Synoptic Gospels, Dr. Robert Lindsey has given to the scholars who have been following his work, as well as to future scholarship, a necessary tool for the study of the synoptic Gospels.
Book Review: Robert L. Lindsey’s Jesus, Rabbi and Lord
This is an unusual book, at once intriguing, illuminating, provocative, even frustrating. It is written in a popular style with no footnotes or lengthy academic discussions, and at times the book seems directed to anyone interested in the life of Jesus. However there is a sophistication in the analysis that requires an extensive technical background in order to evaluate or appreciate the suggestions.
Robert L. Lindsey’s The Jesus Sources
In the winter of 1982–1983, Robert Lindsey delivered a series of lectures in Jerusalem. These lectures were recorded and transcribed by Walli Callaway, edited by James Burnham and published as The Lindsey Lectures. Lindsey reedited the lectures in the spring of 1990, adding new material, and they were published that summer as The Jesus Sources.
Book Review: Michael Sokoloff’s A Dictionary of Jewish Palestinian Aramaic of the Byzantine Period
From the third to the seventh century A.D., the Jews of Palestine used Aramaic as their primary spoken and written language. This dialect has been of considerable interest to Christian scholars, and some have argued that it is the closest dialect to the Aramaic which Jesus would have spoken.
Book Review: Michael Hilton and Gordian Marshall’s The Gospels and Rabbinic Judaism
Based on studies held for lay audiences over the years by a Dominican priest and a Jewish rabbi, this book focuses on seven themes particularly relevant to Jewish-Christian dialogue today: The Great Commandment, the synagogue, the parable, halachah, the Sabbath, divorce and forgiveness.
Book Review: David Flusser’s The Spiritual History of the Dead Sea Sect
Many images flash across the mind when this sect of Jewish mystics is mentioned. Life in the desert, asceticism, harsh discipline, caves, scrolls and idealism seem inextricably associated with the Essenes. It is these images that Professor David Flusser addresses, attempting to carry the reader back through the centuries to explore the life and thought of these fascinating men. His purpose is to paint a broader picture of the Essene sect so often neglected by the generally narrow focus of the scholarly world.
Book Review: Marvin Wilson’s Our Father Abraham: Jewish Roots of the Christian Faith
For too long discussion of the Jewishness of Jesus has remained academic. Few scholars have had the interest or ability to unfold the practical meaning of the Gospels’ Jewish roots for today’s Church. Marvin Wilson, professor of Biblical and Theological Studies at Gordon College, has finally filled that void with [i]Our Father Abraham[/i]. And the result is simply revolutionary.
Book Review: Brad Young’s Jesus and His Jewish Parables
From the outset Young argues that the best way to understand what Jesus was teaching in his parables is to try to hear him as he spoke to his people. The author argues that this can best be done by analyzing the parables of Jesus together with those told by other rabbis of his day.
Book Review: David Flusser’s Personal Perspective on Brad Young’s Jesus and His Jewish Parables
I am pleased to recommend Brad Young’s research into the parables of Jesus, and I am sure that his new book, “Jesus and His Jewish Parables,” will help its readers gain a clearer understanding of Jesus’ words and teaching.