Synoptics 342 to 344

We had looked at the soldiers mocking Jesus, but there was something that I remember specifically

We had talked about Barabbas. I think we talked about the fact that We talked a little bit about pilots cowardice and his

The political expediency the pressure was placed upon him by the

Jews themselves As recorded a little bit later on There was something else, but maybe it'll come to me as we're

Looking at it fundamentally looking at section 342 Matthew 27 and Mark 15

You have at least in the discussion of the

Roman soldiers And kneeling before him they mocked him saying hail king of the

Jews and they spat upon him and took the reed and struck him On the head and when they had mocked him they stripped him of the robe and put his own clothes on him

You have just briefly here an insight into the cruelty of the

Roman soldier, but It wouldn't just be Your everyday

Roman soldier Israel wasn't exactly the garden spa the world

Unlike today where you've got you know tour buses running up and down the roads constantly and pulling up to various Religiously significant historical sites

Everybody jumps off the bus takes pictures jumps back on the bus leaves That's that's evidently what

I've been told visiting Israel is like Which is one of the reasons I haven't gone yet.

I Wouldn't that doesn't interest me at all. I'm not a touristy kind of person to begin with so If that's all there is to it

But in this day being assigned to any of the Roman cohorts legions, whatever else would have been there certainly wasn't a legion here at this point in time

Being assigned to this area was really punishment, and so you really wouldn't have most of your top -end

Roman soldiers involved here and Really you have more of the ruffians

Maybe the people that had some behavioral issues in the past whatever else it might be and what you see here is the

The fact that the Roman soldiers certainly had very little respect for the

Jewish religion or the Jewish people And As a result you know

When you see hail king of the Jews, this is this is more these people could care less about Jesus they could care less about who he was or What he had done or what he taught or anything else

This was just an opportunity for them to express their detestation for this these people that They had to come and try to keep peace you had the zealots and I'm sure they had seen the hypocrisy of the

Pharisees and and Certainly they knew that these Jews looked down upon them in a tremendous fashion and So what you really have here is is not so much a

You know these people have no idea who who Jesus is but they certainly have a detestation for the

Jewish people Then you have the interesting story of Simon the

Cyrene Now John Simply John does not include any information about Simon and What you have

Matthew says well let's start with Mark. I'm sorry and they let him out to crucify him And they compelled a pastor by Simon Cyrene who was coming in from the country the father about a father of Alexander and Rufus to carry his cross

All right, well then Matthew has and led him away to crucify him Upon a man of Cyrene Simon by name this man they compelled to carry his cross

Luke as they led him away They seized one Simon of Cyrene who was coming in from the country and laid on him the cross to carry it behind Jesus and then

Luke has a portion of the story that no one else Records and there followed him a great multitude of the people and of women who bewailed and lamented him

But Jesus turned to them said daughters of Jerusalem Do not weep for me Weep for yourselves of your children for behold the days are coming

When they will say blessed are the barren and the wombs that ever bore and the breasts that never gave suck Then they will begin to say the mountains fall on us and the hills cover us for if they

Do this when the wood is green what will they do when it is dry to others also who were criminals? Will lead a way to be put to death with him now

When we seek to put these together historically There have been a number of theories proposed and that is that there would be possibility that given the

Beating that Jesus had received that he's only able to go so far And then they need someone else to Pick up the pace or to continue carrying the cross it also seems historically and archaeologically that it be highly unlikely that you would carry a completed cross

Now this raises the issue of what the cross looked like if you've ever

Wasted a few moments of your life arguing with Jehovah's Witnesses at the door on this subject that is there are other subjects that are not a waste of your life, but The Witnesses even in their

New World Translation Do not render the

Greek term to crucify By that term they use the term impale to impale him and They deny that there was a cross beam on The cross there was simply a wooden stake and it hence

Jesus hands would have been placed above his head and a single nail Fixing the hands above the head so there'd be no no cross beam whatsoever the various possibilities

Have included of course you know the standard historical view of the cross as well as a towel -shaped cross

Where there wouldn't necessarily be something above his head well Why do we go with with this well?

We know that there is a inscription affixed to the cross That says here is the king of the

Jews well The only place you could put that would be above the head it would be visible So it would seem to be this shape and we have the little bit of information provided by John After the resurrection unless I see the print of the nails not the nail

If there had only been if it had been a just a straight up and down Thing like this where the hands are transfixed up here

Like a torture stake as the Jehovah's Witnesses like to say you would have had one nail

It's the nails in his hands is how it is expressed in the gospel of John so We have found

Remains there don't know how long ago this one particular skeleton was found in a bone box an ossuary, but a

Fairly significant nail Spike really was found driven through actually through the ankle bone itself.

It could not be extracted and Seems very obvious that this person had been crucified we know from Josephus that crucifixion was a unsettlingly common means of crucifying rebels in That part of the world at this period in the

Roman Empire Because there were so many rebellions that taking the the rebels and Crucifying them along main roadways so that anyone traveling would have to pass through the gauntlet of these

Dead and dying or obviously if it was to been a little while Skeletons falling apart along the side of the road

You didn't didn't want to mess the Romans when you saw something like this happen You may be familiar with the story of Josephus It was returning to if I recall correctly it was

Jerusalem and found three of his friends who had just then been crucified and he went to the governor and Interceded and had a lot of Connections So their sentence was commuted they were taken down from the cross and Still two of the three died only only one survived because the they had not received

They're only partially crucified I guess because if you include the the death blow death blow

Either the breaking of the legs or the spear thrust they hadn't experienced that obviously

But even with that and With the best medical care that the

Romans could provide at that time Still two of the three passed away from the wounds that they received and the trauma that was inflicted upon the body and crucifixion

So we know one person Historically who received a partial crucifixion who survived

That's relevant of course to the very popular swoon theory that is still

Rumbles around amongst various people that Jesus didn't actually die upon the cross that in the coolness of the tomb he revived

Etc etc Well, you have one person historically that we know of Who did not receive a full crucifixion that received the death blow?

But one person who survived that with with medical assistance Putting wrapping a body and sticking it in a cold grave is not medical assistance

Oh But it'd be so nice in there. She got thinking medically here that's that's not how it works and No fluids no nothing.

No. I'm sorry That's that's not going to accomplish anything so Theory going back to our our text being that Historically the idea developed that well

Jesus took the cross a certain distance But then was not able to take it farther, but if if it was like this

Generally the cross beam would not be attached until you got to the place of crucifixion. It was just You know

I know I've seen all the Movies with you know the cross beam attached and all the rest of stuff, but that that's probably not how it was done

It would be an inefficient way of doing things and the Romans were not inefficient They wanted they wanted the convicted person to get to the place of crucifixion with the minimum

Problem so that they could be up there as long as possible to act as a deterrent they saw this as a deterrent mechanism, that's why no

Roman citizen could be Crucified this was beneath any any

Roman citizen only only non Romans could be could be crucified so it's possible one of the possibilities is that Jesus carries the the smaller of the beams while Simon takes the the largest of the beam if it was

Put together maybe Jesus took it a certain distance, but couldn't take it the rest of the direction It's it's difficult to say, but there have been various efforts in the past to Figure out you know where along the lines this might have happened and of course

I'm sure Mel Gibson figured it all out in in the passion movie, and that's where st.

Veronica got her her Thing wiping Jesus's face, and it comes off perfect, and yeah, right, okay, yes, sir

Yep, yep, yep, there sure is Fundamentally I was about to make a joke about the founder having had a cross and the things fell off and so that that would that would not be really funny, but That would work for Joseph Smith.

I'm not sure we work for anybody else, but It's real simple very very simple answer this is simply one of the

Things that witnesses use to Pry some start start the process of prying someone away from their religious background so they

Come to you, and they say oh, I see you have a cross in your house. Well.

Yeah, yeah Grandmother gave that to me or whatever Well you you know the juice didn't die on a

Cross he died on a torture stick Really, yeah, and then they'll give you all this stuff this from various watchtowers and wake magazines and What they're doing is they're planting your mind your church hasn't given you the whole story and then they've got some other little things about holidays and birthdays and Birthdays celebrate birthdays are a bad thing because look what happened to John the

Baptist on somebody's birthday and So on so forth and and they just use these little things that don't have any major theological significance, but it's part of their mechanism for causing you to Start doubting the religious tradition education whatever else it is you've received, so it's really that's really the only reason is

When groups initially start they need some way of differentiating themselves and setting themselves apart and This is just the mechanism that they use

So it's it's not it's there certainly isn't anything Really theologically significant about a torture stake

But it makes them unique and makes them Well, I'm not

I'm not going to say that no one was ever Killed in that way. I suppose if you couldn't find a cross beam of the other way to do it

It wouldn't be as effective because you die a lot faster The The reason that normal crucifixion would take so long and remember in the

Gospels They don't want them up there on the on the Sabbath day

So that's why they break the legs, but the very idea of breaking the legs there would normally be a little platform down here and What you what would kill in crucifixion was asphyxiation you you couldn't breathe you're hanging from your arms and If you can imagine what that's like it eventually that the diaphragm is having to fight against gravity well a diaphragm wasn't designed to do that and So what you do is you would push up with your legs even though that's pushing against a nail in your feet which would be

Excruciating which is what excruciate excruciate means from crucifixion

If you're familiar with the term But That's what you have to do to be able to breathe is to push up on your on your legs to Take the pressure off the diaphragm long enough to get air into your lungs well, that's why breaking the legs was

Once you did that you couldn't push against the legs any longer, and you suffocate fairly fairly quickly so You but if you do this and put the arms directly over now you've got such constant pressure that It would not allow for the crucifixion last long enough to you know it was the gruesome aspect of it of these people

Flailing for for breath that Was the effective deterrent part so you wouldn't want to do this just because it's decreasing what you want this mechanism to accomplish

But I'm sure it probably happened somewhere. You know Yeah, well the witnesses

The witnesses would would would bristle at that obviously But that's because they don't realize that their ultimate authority really isn't the scriptures.

They think it is But their ultimate authority is the governing body of Jehovah's Witnesses in Brooklyn, New York, but yeah,

I mean obviously You know I was listening to a debate yesterday that I'll be reviewing on the dividing line this week between a

New Testament professor at Dallas and Bart Ehrman on whether Jesus Believed himself to be

God Not whether his apostles Believed him to be

God Ermin admits that they did but whether Jesus did and As I'll point out in my review.

You know Ermin approaches. This as a naturalist What you know he from his perspective you can only do history as a naturalist

God you can't you you if God did anything in history there be no way we could ever know it and You can't allow for that possibility.

It's just that's just from his perspective. That's how you do history even when you're looking at texts that are specifically written by people is saying

God intervened in history and So then you do with their texts what you have to do to maintain your particular historiography anyway and of course from from Ehrman's perspective

Any text any words that are attributed to Jesus? That would indicate a

Claim of divinity simply have to be dismissed Jesus never could have said that so No, of course

Jesus didn't think he was God because any evidence to the contrary is dismissed immediately based upon his particular historical

Criteria and that is that nobody in that day would have made that claim so in other words God did not intervene in history therefore you know and so I Expect that from Ehrman You know a lot of us have exposed

His naturalistic presuppositions in the debates. We've had with him certainly not me alone

But what was Disappointing and But again not surprising to me was that When Ehrman had the chance to write ask questions the

Dallas prof Was asked Do you believe there are certain things that happened in the

Gospels? Do you believe there are certain things according the Gospels didn't happen and To maintain your seat at the table

Today in New Testament scholarship the only answer you can give is yes, you have to be able to say well

Yeah, you know since we believe that you know mark writes first and Matthew and Luke are editing mark and and John's just off in Nona land in fact the very last words of Ehrman in the formal part of the debate were

The vast majority of all of New Testament scholars in the world today Do not believe that almost anything the gospel of John is historical

Because he admits the gospel John presents Jesus God. There's no question about it. That's it's it's it's a no -brainer.

It's a duh but Jesus didn't say anything in the gospel John. It's all made up.

It's all fiction It's it's all it comes 60 years later, and it's all fiction. That's his his view and So you know he's asking this professor.

Well. You know what what in the Gospels? What did the Gospels say that Jesus said or that took place?

that never did and It's over the past couple of years become really popular to talk about the zombie apocalypse in Matthew 27

I'm not sure we came up with the zombie apocalypse part, but It's the

Partial resurrection, I think it's was a Matthew 2751 We'll get to it here in a little while Where only

Matthew records that certain of the dead Rose up and went into Jerusalem, and we're recognized which tells me these had to have been

People who had recently passed away or who would have recognized them. I mean if it was somebody from 300 years ago how somebody walking down the street in Jerusalem going

It's Isaiah. You know he saw his picture. You know it doesn't work that way Doesn't work that way so It has become exceptionally popular even amongst quote -unquote conservatives to view this as a

Theological what term they use a Theological peril a parable

Of produced only by Matthew that there wasn't any historical reality to it.

It's just meant to Sort of a grant is direction of Christ That has theological significance sort of like saying that John Changed the

Date of Jesus's crucifixion, and we've gone over this before To make it happen on the at the time of the

Sacrifice of the Passover lamb to make a theological point that Jesus the Passover Believe me.

I've told you before if you go to the Christian bookstore almost any commentary

That you're gonna buy at the Christian bookstore unless it's a little bit older I'm gonna probably gonna go with that.

I guess say yeah, you know John alters the timeline to make a theological point or something along those lines and So once you're once you've bought into that ermine knows how to drag out of you further concessions and All you get him to say was well

You know maybe that thing in Matthew 27 51 possibly is there anything else anything else where well?

Anything that Jesus ever said that you don't think he actually said Well Maybe in John 17 3

This is life eternal they may know you the only true God and Jesus Christ whom you have sent

Jesus wouldn't have called himself the Christ and so you know Jesus didn't say that that's that's just John You know putting those words in Jesus mouth, etc.

Etc so You know it all ended up boiling down to Jesus didn't

Identify himself as God because we don't have a clue, but any of Jesus actually said I mean that's that's sort of the fundamental thesis when you get down to it and once you've bought into the modern

New Testament perspective, it's Yeah, we don't really know what Jesus said, but we've got this sort of general trustworthy tradition idea sort of except for John which is weird, so we sort of put that out and and you know we really can't be certain when there are differences between Matthew Mark and Luke and all the whole idea of the preaching of the early church the eyewitnesses that live for decades after all stuff just got just Disappeared from the conversation it was a

It was a shame. I haven't decided yet. We're going to play all of Ehrman's comments, and then the interaction or just what because it takes a long time to do that, but we'll see we'll see how

I'll go through it, but there are a bunch of places where my response To Ehrman's questions would have been significantly shorter and different Which would have led to a completely different?

Well, which would have led to Ehrman just simply saying well the vast majority of scholarship disagrees with you. Well, that's nice I'm well aware of that.

I'm also well aware of the fact that the vast majority of scholarship is just simply repeating what it's been taught and Like when it comes to dating the

Gospels You talk to the vast majority of people who use a late date for the

Gospels and ask why? Have you ever considered this ever considered this ever considered this they haven't that's just Everybody at my school said that's that's what

I believe you know at least. I'm consistent. You know when I say the conservative Who believes in conservative conclusions?

Well? Why have you ever thought about this? You know I my darts flow fly both directions as far as that goes you got to know why?

But I found conservatives to be Considerably more aware of the arguments against their position than liberals are against for the arguments against their just Just the reality of things

I mean man Even in this debate Ehrman told a number of the same jokes.

He's told in our debate It's just like really honestly you're gonna. I mean like His favorite joke now and since he wrote the book about how

Jesus became God is To say and I and I I realize I'm up against a really hard task here because I mean it says right there in John chapter 15

Gia said I am divine you are two branches and so therefore there is Jesus divine

You know not the vine divine divine get it Yeah, well he still gets chuckles about it.

I'm not sure why Well, I think it's I think it's people going

To be honest with you. I think it's people going we've heard of this Bart Ehrman guy And so if he shows up and has any personality at all sort of like oh, he's not as bad as we thought let's laugh

You know I think it's sort of how it works, but anyway So the road to Golgotha there's the various theories as to the carrying of the cross and Mark chapter 15

My eyes are so dry today. I keep trying to drink some water do something, but whoo I'm wondering if the humidity crashed this morning or something.

I don't know and They brought him to the place called Golgotha which means the place of a skull and they offered him wine mingled with myrrh

But he did not take it and they crucified him now Our Greek speaking brother can confirm this but when you look at Matthew 27 you look at Mark 15

You look at Luke 23 and you look at John 19 Have you ever noticed that?

the gospel writers record the crucifixion as a subclause in other words

They do not Do what most the movies do with the zoom ins and the slow -mo and the music and and all the rest that kind of stuff

They they don't even make it a sentence unto itself. It's a subclause

And they crucified him comma and it's part of a larger sentence it's

For for many of us it's It's almost anticlimactic because it's it's like you you want you want details

You want to know the Roman soldiers name you want to know the time of day

But none of the gospel writers will do that They just simply record the reality of the action of crucifixion

They don't give details they don't dwell upon it instead notice it says

Matthew and Mark the rest of the sentences they divide his garments among them by casting lots

Then they sat down and kept watch over him there Mark gives us at least the time of day, and it was the third hour when they crucified him and then

Matthew Specifically says and over his head they put the charge against him which read this is

Jesus the king of the Jews Now again Let's note because by the way speaking of Bart Ehrman Bart Ehrman thinks that none of us

Ever do what we've been doing for the past the ten years Where's it 96 wasn't it was 96?

Okay, so we're coming up on we're gonna. We're gonna beat ten years. We're gonna. It's gonna be close, but we're September of 96 okay, so well we've got we've got time

We're gonna we got to beat it by a little more than that, but Bart Ehrman is absolutely convinced and tells his audiences that believers like us

We just read Matthew And then we read Mark and it sounds like Matthew and then we read Luke and it sounds like Mark and read

John that sounds a little bit like the others and That we never read them in parallel, which is what we've been doing for a decade

I know it's not been a decade every Sunday I I've been traveling a lot over the past five or six years, but but we've spent a long time

I'd be interested if we have a means of actually counting Is there a series on the synoptics, or is it just Sunday school?

We actually have to go back and count wouldn't we yeah?

It would be interesting to to see how many I would estimate probably And probably right on 300 probably about 300 studies so far in the synoptics

Which makes sense is worth section 344 so that sort of averages out?

But he tells all his audiences. This is this is something we never do because if we did we just wouldn't believe these things, but you know we've done this for so long now that we look at this and and We see

That Matthew has this is Jesus the king of the Jews Mark and Luke simply have this is the king of the

Jews or the king of the Jews and John has the longest description Jesus of Nazareth the king of the

Jews and then John gives the much extended discussion

Many Jews read this title for the place of Jesus crucified was near the city, and it was written in Hebrew and Latin and in Greek The chief priest the

Jews then said to pilot do not write king of the king of the Jews But this man said I am king of the Jews Pilot answered what

I've written. I have written when the soldiers had crucified Jesus They took his garments and made four parts one for each soldier also his tunic

But the tunic was without seam woven from top to bottom They said to one another let us not tear it the cast loss for it.

See whose it shall be this was to fill scriptures They parted my garments among them My clothing the cast loss of soldiers did this but standing by the cross of Jesus were his mother and his mother's sister

Mary the wife of Clopas and Mary Magdalene now. There is a huge by the way

I'm just gonna note this and not gonna go into it But there is a huge discussion of the identity specifically of these women

How many women there were How to punctuate it because there's just a bunch of Mary's Mary Mary Mary Mary Mary Mary Mary Mary and then there was another

Mary. I mean there are Mary's everywhere and It becomes somewhat relevant in trying to figure out what the relationships between all of them were and the only

Only reason I mention it is that it has come up I had to deal with it really in depth once because of an argument about the

Perpetual virginity of Mary and whether Mary had children so it's it's relevant to argument with Roman Catholic apologists and it can get very deep and there are a number of articles to talk about The number of women at the cross that we won't go into now, but I just let you know that there is a big brouhaha

About that and the disciple whom he loves standing near he said to his mother woman behold your son

They said the disciple behold your mother and for that hour the woman took her took the the disciple took her to his own home

I'll talk about that in just a moment, but the point is You will have people who will say see

What was written above Jesus head or is it even above Jesus head only Matthew says it's above Jesus Well, I'm not sure where else well.

It says inscription over him and Luke, so I guess that but mark

Gives the time But doesn't say where the inscription is well Where else you're gonna put it yeah, you know

It's gonna be on the side of the cross someplace on the back. Yeah, that's that's not gonna make any sense

But the idea is well Did it say this is Jesus? Was the term

Nazareth included And This is some barter movie do it depends on which gospel you read

Once again by now. We've we've read through so many Parallel accounts that it's we've become accustomed to going wait a minute

It none of them say This is Jonah vice -gerent of Tiberius Okay, that would be a contradiction

That would be identity identifying this person as someone else the position is something else the the point is

Especially how do you know since we according to John now if we didn't have

John But it's written in Hebrew Latin and in Greek Might have been different between those three which one is

John giving us which ones Matthew giving us which ones mark giving us You know there's all sorts of Reasons and even if they're all giving us the the same thing one

They're all giving us the same information some with a little fuller rendering than others that that's all the difference between them is and once you start seeing people focusing upon that level of Well, if it's going to be accurate it has to be a photocopy reproduction

Rather than they are all giving the exact same information and John even goes so far as to tell us multiple languages and Since John obviously connections the high priest circles he is aware of the fact that the

Jews actually come to Pilate and object to the wording and At this point you can tell

Pilate they already pulled the stunt of No friend of Caesar's they've pretty much burned their last favors

And you can sort of tell that in Pilate's response what I've written. I've written

If you don't want to disappear quietly in the night Shut up, you can just sort of that's sort of written between the lines in the textual variant someplace

In in Pilate's words at that at that point, but you can sort of sense it.

You can can hear it coming But Again, it's just simple matter of how much data you provide there.

It's not contradictory data unless you have this absurd idea That every historical account is going to be a photocopy of every other historical account

And if there's any difference whatsoever if one has more information one say oh, it's all contradictions all kind of expert

I think the reason people get away with this these days is because almost no one reads history anymore I mean

You know if if you applied those standards to anything in history We would know nothing about anything.

There are no two there are no two accounts of Napoleon There are no two accounts of anything

Caesar did that are word -for -word identical And no one would expect them to be word -for -word identical for crying out loud but when you get to the

New Testament all of a sudden all the bets are off and all the all the stairs get changed and If you end up with more information by the way, it is interesting

As I mentioned John possibly you know John we know had

Connection to the high priest family because that's how he is goes in and gets Peter in and so on so forth

The Dallas prop brought up what Jesus said in front of Sanhedrin in John chapter 14 about the

Son of Man and I could not believe it. I could not believe it, but ermine said so who is in the meeting?

the Sanhedrin and Jesus nobody else is in there, so how does mark know anything about this?

How does mark know anything about what was said before the Sanhedrin, and I'm sitting here going okay?

Just on a naturalistic level just on naturalistic level other than Nicodemus who converts

Who would have had access that information so there's there's a way the information could have been obtained just on a naturalistic level

But what's the real obvious? face plant in this and That is the very writers themselves say

Jesus rose from the dead But they didn't talk during those days after the resurrection.

They just walked around and glowed. I don't know You don't think that may have been part of the conversation, but no when you're a good naturalist like ermine

There was no there was no resurrections. There couldn't be any of that conversation, so it all has to be fiction it all has to be made up and The result is sometimes humorous to hear the type of argumentation is is being used

Okay, what we'll do I Went long Make a note, so I remember

I need to talk about woman behold your son Because this is a key

Roman Catholic text What you just read there is where Mary is made the mother of the church?

That's how that's how someone like Jerry Maddox can say Do you have you accepted

Jesus as your Savior? Well have you accepted Mary as your mother? Right along with it, and it's

Yes, yes Yes, I will be well. I plan on me. Let's put that way

Yes, yes, Lord willing deo volente Off of off of the Latin all right.

Let's close our time over prep Once again father we do Thank you for this time to consider the great act of redemption itself to consider these

Records that have been left to us their relationship to one another and to grow in our ability to be able to Explain these truths to others and to do so in the context of a world that is becoming all the more opposed to the

Christian faith We ask that you would help us to remember these things That you would help us to be bold witnesses, and that you'd be with us now in worship pray in Christ's name