A Summer Behind the Gospels
It has been a busy summer at Behind the Gospels! And as the posts come thick-and-fast, it is easy to miss out… To catch you up, here is an update on what I’ve been writing.
#1. The Missing Years of Jesus
Since the origins of Christianity, the pious and sceptical have speculated on Jesus’ lost years. We are told that Jesus went to India (see here) or Egypt (so Celsus) or that he popped over to England (and so William Blake was right all along…)
But few scholars have addressed in detail what we really know about Jesus’ childhood.
In an effort to bring together what we can say, I have begun to reconstruct – imaginatively, and rigorously – what went on in the so-called lost years.
My first post in the series sketched the kinds of topics I will address, tackling questions like: What did Jesus do for work? And would he have gone to school?
On the question of Jesus’ literacy, I wrote this primer, and on whether Jesus might have married in his youth, I wrote this. Coming up, I will be looking at the latest research on Nazareth and thinking more about Jesus’ family and profession.
#2. Jesus-Like Figures in Antiquity
Another series I am working on looks at figures like Jesus in classical antiquity.
The inspiration for this series began with an interest I took in the The Life of Aesop during my doctoral research. Although the biography of the ancient fabulist is not well-known to New Testament scholars, it sheds much light on the Gospels.
My first post, then, was Jesus, the Tortoise, and the Hare. It compares the lives of Jesus and Aesop, and considers what Aesop’s biography can tell us about Jesus.
The second piece was inspired by the controversy of the Olympic opening ceremony. In a scene, ostensibly designed to mimic Da Vinci’s Last Supper, we were served a scantily-clad smurf on a silver platter. The ‘smurf’ was the Greek god Bacchus.
Many were scandalised by this scene. However, I could not overlook the fact that Christians have themselves long drawn upon the imagery of Bacchus (or Dionysus) – in fact, I argue that the Jesus-Dionysus connection goes back to the Gospel of John.
I have also looked at the birth narrative of other Jesus-like figures. In a Seven Step Guide, I take a deep dive into the conventions of ancient birth accounts.
#3. Matthew’s Mass Resurrection, Ancient Graffiti & Gospel Numbers
I have also written a number of stand alone pieces. I am someone who ‘writes to think’ rather than ‘thinks to write’, so I took a stab at a passage which often befuddles Gospel readers. It is Matthew’s mass resurrection at Jesus’ crucifixion.
This passage cannot be defended as history. But against those who suggest is is a story invented by Matthew, or a literary device, I suggest that Matthew might be drawing upon an earlier tradition – and Matthew’s readers would have taken it historically.
In another recent post, I look at numerology in the Gospels. Ancient Jewish texts sometimes employed gematria, in which numbers carry deeper meanings. And I argue in this post that the Gospels also employ gematria and numbers symbolically.
Finally, I took a look at a candidate for the earliest image of Jesus. It is a slab of wall, now housed in the Palatine Hill Museum in Rome, which shows two stick-like figures. On the left, a man salutes a cross, where Jesus hangs with a donkey’s head.
Below the inscription read the words, ‘Alexamenos, worship God.’ If you want to find out why this ancient graffiti artist thought Jesus had the head of a donkey, see here.
Upcoming: The Behind the Gospels Podcast
In the coming months, I hope to launch the Behind the Gospels podcast. This will provide another medium for audiences to engage with the latest Gospels scholarship.
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Thank you for your support, and I look forward to writing to you soon.