Biblical Heritage Center Blog

Rabbi Dr. Eugene Korn is editor of Meorot: A Forum for Modern Orthodox Discourse and the American director of the Center for Jewish-Christian Understanding and Cooperation in Israel. His article on “The Perfect But Imperfect Noah” is very interesting an informative. “Noah was a righteous man; perfect in his generation.” As many students learn in their first Torah classes, the phrase “in his generation” gave our Rabbis license to fling open the gates of interpretation. Some saw it as additional praise for Noah, while others saw it as a criticism of his righteousness: perfect “in his generation” — but, evidently, not in the generation of Abraham or Moses. What is this rabbinic ambivalence all about? Noah provided the Rabbis with a central idea in Judaism. The Torah paints a generally negative picture of gentiles (think of Genesis, where Abraham’s neighbors are immoral pagans, or Exodus, where they are Egypt’s cruel slavemasters; in Leviticus, gentiles engage in abominable practices l...

How old is Christianity? When did it stop being a Jewish sect and become its own religion? New archaeology discoveries of churches are crucial Biblical archaeology findings that help answer those questions. But when did Christianity begin to build these churches? Early Christian gathering places are difficult to identify because at first Christians met together mostly in private homes. Even as Christian populations grew, distrust and persecution by their Roman rulers forced the early church to stay out of the public eye. Read complete article at -- http://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/daily/biblical-sites-places/biblical-archaeology-sites/when-did-christianity-begin-to-spread/?mqsc=E2950031

Do you think Adam and Eve ever told their sons about the “good old days in the garden”? According to the account in Genesis there were only four people alive at that time – Adam, Eve, Cain and Abel. So, what did they talk about? It doesn’t seem like Adam and Eve would have had a large variety of prior experiences to draw upon, even if they did live hundreds of years back then. By the way, how large would their vocabularies have been anyway? I wonder if Adam and Eve ever had any arguments or quarrels after leaving the garden.   Do you think the boys ever heard dad say to their mom, “If you just hadn’t eaten that fruit!” Or did their mom say, “Why did you just stand there and keep your mouth shut! Were you afraid of a snake?” Surely, after living in the Garden of God, where all of their needs were met without having to work, those days would weigh heavily upon their minds. Something, however, would happen that would cause their eldest son to murder his younger brother – immediate a...

Dates, History, Customs, Jewish New Year Explained Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, is celebrated in 2011 from sundown on Sept. 28 to nightfall on Sept. 30. The Hebrew date for Rosh Hashanah is 1 Tishrei 5772. Though Rosh Hashanah literally means "head of the year, " the holiday actually takes place on the first two days of the Hebrew month of Tishrei, which is the seventh month on the Hebrew calendar. This is because Rosh Hashanah, one of four new years in the Jewish year, is considered the new year of people, animals and legal contracts. In the Jewish oral tradition, Rosh Hashanah marks the completion of the creation of the world. Find more about Rosh Hashanah at -- http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/09/23/rosh-hashanah-2011-the-je_n_978220.html#s370737&title=Apples_and_Honey

John the Baptist was a Jew doing something that was very common, and still is, in Judaism. He would have been called "John the Immerser," not “John the Baptist.” Ritual immersion has been an important part of Judaism for thousands of years. Click on this link below for Rabbi Leynor’s discussion about the Jewish meaning of baptism - http://groups.google.com/group/biblical-heritage-center/browse_thread/thread/eeedbeb9163d8806

The Jewish Jesus was a teacher and the men he called to be the apostles were called “disciples,” which means they were students. The Jesus Movement was a movement built upon an educational model.   The definition of the word “teach” is “to cause to know,” so what did Jesus want his disciples to know? Read the current issue of Discovering the Bible at – http://www.biblicalheritage.org/BHC%20Newsletters/bhcnews.htm

The Biblical Archaeology Society published two very informative articles in its “Bible History Daily.” Was Jesus a Jew? But Jesus was born in a Jewish home and lived in the Jewish culture and in the land of Israel. Was Jesus a Jew? Yes, Theological study is further discovering the Jewish Jesus and what his Jewishness means to Christian theology and Jewish-Christian relations. What Price the Uniqueness of Jesus? To wrench Jesus out of his Jewish world destroys Jesus and destroys Christianity, the religion that grew out of his teachings. Even Jesus’ most familiar role as Christ is a Jewish role. If Christians leave the concrete realities of Jesus’ life and of the history of Israel in favor of a mythic, universal, spiritual Jesus and an otherworldly kingdom of God, they deny their origins in Israel, their history, and the God who has loved and protected Israel and the church. They cease to interpret the actual Jesus sent by God and remake him in their own image and likeness.  Rea...