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55 results for “Historical Jesus”
Clear searchThe crucifixion in history, Scripture and the Qur'an
Did Jesus Really Die? The crucifixion in history, Scripture and the Qur'an Christianity and Islam cannot both be correct about the death of Jesus. The Gospel declares that Jesus was crucified un…
Read article →Why the Son assumed a complete human nature, not merely a body
Did Jesus Have a Human Soul? Why the Son assumed a complete human nature, not merely a body Why this is useful to know: Christians rightly confess that Jesus is God manifest in the flesh. Yet if…
Read article →The divine identity of Jesus across the Gospels
Not Just a Prophet The divine identity of Jesus across the Gospels Islam honours Jesus in ways which Christians should acknowledge accurately. The Qur'an calls Him the Messiah, describes Him as a word from God, affirms His virgin bi…
Read article →Why the distinction matters when we speak about Jesus
One Person, Two Natures Why the distinction matters when we speak about Jesus Jesus slept in a boat because He was weary. Then He arose and commanded the wind and the sea, and they obeyed Him. He grew in wisdom, yet He knew what was in man. He was tempted, yet w…
Read article →Eitan Bar · Biblical and historical polemic · 2019
…s, and judge each argument upon its own evidence. Messianic prophecy Jewish objections to Jesus Rabbinic interpretation Hebrew Bible Yeshua New Testament Jewish evangelism
View recommendation →The Messiah cut off before the Temple fell
The Daniel Dilemma The Messiah cut off before the Temple fell Islam calls Jesus the Messiah. It also denies that He was crucified. Centuries before Muhammad, however, the book of Daniel described an anointed figure who would be “cut off”, followed by the destructi…
Read article →Isaiah, John, and the Divine Identity of Jesus Christ
“I Am the First, and I Am the Last” Isaiah, John, and the Divine Identity of Jesus Christ If YHWH alone is Creator, Saviour and Lord of all, what are the New Testament writers saying when they place Jesus within that identity? Isaiah does not leave Israel searching f…
Read article →The brothers of Jesus, the sons of Mary, and an argument of strong plausibility
The Messiah and ‘My Mother’s Children’ in Psalm 69 The brothers of Jesus, the sons of Mary, and an argument of strong plausibility Psalm 69 is one of the clearest portraits of the suffering Messiah in the Psalter. Its language repeatedly reappears in the Ne…
Read article →Eustathius of Antioch, the human soul of Christ and the pictures created by our words
…d the pictures created by our words Why this is useful to know: The language we use about Jesus creates a picture in the mind. If that picture presents God merely occupying a human body, Christ’s humanity becomes an instrument rather than a complete human life. If it presents God…
Read article →Origen, Arius and the line between Creator and creation
…too, perhaps even through teachers or classmates. Understanding why Scripture identifies Jesus as the eternal Creator helps us preserve the faith, strengthen our trust in God, answer objections wisely and know Christ more truly. Suggested excerpt: Ambrose argued that Scripture s…
Read article →Which Gospel does the Qur'an affirm?
The Injeel Problem Which Gospel does the Qur'an affirm? Islam says that Allah gave Jesus the Injeel. It was a true revelation from God. It contained guidance and light. The Qur'an claims to confirm it. The People of the Gospel are told to judge by what God revealed within…
Read article →The glory philosophy could not contain
…ide his own system? A recent study by Matthew R. Crawford draws attention to a remarkable historical example. (See Note 1.) In the third century, the Platonist philosopher Amelius read—or at least knew—a clear account of the opening of John’s Gospel. He recognised the eternal Wor…
Read article →Born, begotten and firstborn in the eternal identity and saving work of the Son
…e Son “This day have I begotten thee” appears to be applied to Christ’s resurrection. Did Jesus become the Son of God when He rose—or does Scripture distinguish His eternal Sonship from His resurrection, enthronement and saving work within history? --- More than twenty years ago,…
Read article →The covenant son and the sacrifice that points to Christ
…t of Scripture traces the promise through Jacob, Israel, Judah and David until it reaches Jesus Christ. Islam presents a different Abrahamic framework. The Qur'an associates Abraham and Ishmael with the House at Mecca, while later Muslim tradition predominantly identifies Ishmael…
Read article →The wicked husbandmen, the fruit-bearing nation, and what Jesus said afterwards
…the Kingdom Taken from Israel? The wicked husbandmen, the fruit-bearing nation, and what Jesus said afterwards Few statements of Jesus appear to support supersessionism more directly than Matthew 21:43: "Therefore say I unto you, The kingdom of God shall be taken from you, and g…
Read article →Sources behind Qur’anic narratives
…thin history. The Bible itself uses human languages, recognisable literary forms and real historical settings. The question is more particular. Why do several distinctive Qur’anic narratives resemble post-biblical Jewish and Christian legends more closely than they resemble the e…
Read article →The incarnation, the limits of created perspective and the love philosophy could not imagine
…slam would reject this confession at precisely its most radical point. The Qur’an honours Jesus as Messiah and messenger while denying that God has a Son and warning Christians not to say “Three” (Qur’an 4:171). Islam is not simply Neoplatonism in religious clothing, and its obje…
Read article →Israel's Messiah, Israel's Scriptures, and a gospel for the world
…Recovering this setting does more than add cultural colour. It changes how we understand Jesus, the apostles, the gospel, and the relationship between Israel and the Church. Jesus was born within Israel's covenant world Jesus was not a Gentile religious founder who arrived with…
Read article →Christianity, Islam and the verdict of the evidence
…rd. We have examined what Christians mean when they say that God is one. We have followed Jesus through the Gospels and asked whether He can be contained within the category of prophet. We have considered eternal love, the crucifixion, divine justice, forgiveness and assurance. W…
Read article →History, heresy, and the temptation of private Christianity
…scape rhetoric, elite conversion status, and churchless faith—but fails when it becomes a historical genealogy or a substitute for doctrinal argument. Imagine a Christian whose faith is assembled from prophecy videos, private impressions, conference speakers, and a succession of…
Read article →How an openly transmitted text survived copying, criticism, and centuries of examination
…manuscript record belongs in the light. Across the principal textual traditions, the same Jesus is presented: crucified, buried, risen, and Lord. The same gospel is proclaimed. The same apostolic teaching stands. Differences deserve honest study, but they have not produced compet…
Read article →Responding to five common criticisms without defending what Scripture does not require
…nsationalism is a way of reading the Bible that gives sustained weight to grammatical and historical context, progressive revelation, the distinct identities named in the text, and the unconditional promises God made to Israel. It affirms one way of salvation by grace through fai…
Read article →Does John 6 teach the literal eating of Christ's body?
…a confident Roman Catholic presentation of John 6. The argument appears straightforward. Jesus said that unless we eat His flesh and drink His blood, we have no life in us. His hearers understood Him literally. Rather than correcting them, Jesus repeated the saying in still more…
Read article →A history of interpretation, polemic, and forgotten tension
…is neither simple nor flattering. Some early Christian writers defended essential truths: Jesus is Israel's Messiah, the law cannot justify, Gentiles are full heirs in Christ, and the Old Testament finds its goal in Him. Yet those truths were sometimes joined to a further conclus…
Read article →A response to Hank Hanegraaff on resurrection, Daniel’s final week, and the Tribulation
…ollapsed into a single event when distinction would support premillennialism, while their historical setting is expanded or combined when compression is needed to reach AD 70. What is the position being answered? Hanegraaff begins by presenting pretribulationism as two peoples, t…
Read article →Testing Islam's evidence for divine revelation
…tion Christians are frequently placed on the defensive. Has the Bible been corrupted? Did Jesus really claim to be God? Was He actually crucified? Has the doctrine of the Trinity compromised monotheism? Those questions deserve answers, and the preceding articles have supplied the…
Read article →An unrequited love for the historic Church
…the God of the gospel is the Creator of heaven and earth, that the body is not evil, that Jesus Christ truly suffered in the flesh, and that He rose bodily from the grave. I value ordered worship, accountable leadership, Christian discipline and fellowship that extends beyond the…
Read article →Regathering, national rebirth, and the spiritual renewal still to come
…erienced by Jews and Arabs. Acknowledging providence does not require pretending that the historical process was simple or painless. The event remains extraordinary. A people dispersed for centuries retained a national and religious identity, revived Hebrew as a language of daily…
Read article →Constantine, Arius, the Trinity, the biblical canon—and the myths that refuse to die
…every conspiracy about early Christianity is projected. Constantine invented the Trinity. Jesus was voted into deity. Paganism defeated biblical Christianity. The emperor chose the books of the Bible. Reincarnation was removed. Sunday worship was imposed. The bishops settled ever…
Read article →What mercy, holiness and the cross reveal about God
…evil? The Qur'an repeatedly identifies the kinds of people Allah loves and does not love. Jesus commands His disciples to love those who do not deserve it because the Father Himself is kind to the unthankful and evil. The apostles then point to the cross as the historical manifes…
Read article →Four popular claims tested in context
…ence? It is entirely possible for one person to resemble another in some respects. Moses, Jesus and Muhammad were all male religious leaders. Each opposed unbelief, gathered followers and profoundly affected history. If broad resemblances establish prophetic fulfilment, however,…
Read article →Seeing God, bodily resurrection, and life in the renewed creation
…our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body” (Philippians 3:21). Jesus' own resurrection was physical and recognisable: He could be touched, He bore the marks of crucifixion, and He ate with His disciples. Paul does call the resurrection body “spiritual”…
Read article →Christ the promised Seed, Gentile inheritance, and Paul's final blessing
…to inherit? Paul's answer is an emphatic no. They receive the blessing of Abraham through Jesus Christ by faith (Galatians 3:13-14). That context establishes genuine Gentile inheritance. It does not ask whether Israel retains promises of nationhood, land, Davidic rule, regatherin…
Read article →Unity in Christ and distinction in God's purpose
…is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus." —Galatians 3:28 Ethnicity supplies no rank in Christ. Jewish believers do not approach God through Torah while Gentile believers approach through grace. Both are justified by faith a…
Read article →How the Law reaches its goal and appointed end in Christ
…esurrection. The saving word is near: "That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved." —Romans 10:9 This use of Moses is striking. Paul is not discarding the Old Testament in…
Read article →Why the final seven is unfinished, future, and centred upon Israel and Jerusalem
…evelation. It starts with a measured programme in Daniel concerning Israel and Jerusalem. Jesus takes Daniel's abomination of desolation and places it at the head of an unparalleled tribulation. Paul describes a lawless ruler who exalts himself in the sacred place and is destroye…
Read article →What 'yea and Amen' in Christ means for Israel and the covenants
…eached: "But as God is true, our word toward you was not yea and nay. For the Son of God, Jesus Christ, who was preached among you by us, even by me and Silvanus and Timotheus, was not yea and nay, but in him was yea." —2 Corinthians 1:18-19 God's Son is not uncertain. God's mess…
Read article →Abraham, Lot, divine wrath, and a pattern that must be used carefully
…as removed from the place of judgement. The forms differ; the moral distinction does not. Jesus uses the days of Lot Jesus compares the revealing of the Son of man with the days of Noah and Lot (Luke 17:26–30). Ordinary life continued until judgement arrived suddenly. In Lot's ca…
Read article →Matthew, the Hebrew word almah, and a sign whose meaning reaches beyond Ahaz
…d almah, and a sign whose meaning reaches beyond Ahaz Matthew says that the conception of Jesus by the Holy Ghost fulfilled Isaiah's words: "Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel." —Matthew 1:23 Critics often answ…
Read article →What Christ’s promise establishes—and what claims about infallible teaching still need to prove
…Church Infallibility? Few promises offer Christians greater assurance than these words of Jesus: “I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.” — Matthew 16:18 The Church belongs to Christ. He builds it, and the powers arrayed against it cannot secu…
Read article →Circumcision of the heart and the identity of Paul's inward Jew
…unbelief does not make the faith of God without effect (Romans 3:3). They possess genuine historical advantages, although those advantages cannot justify them or exempt them from the universal guilt established in Romans 3:9-20. The transition shows that Romans 2:28-29 has not er…
Read article →Fulfilment in Christ, the inclusion of the Gentiles, and Israel's future mercy
…n Christ, Israel's promises, and Gentile blessing with unusual precision: "Now I say that Jesus Christ was a minister of the circumcision for the truth of God, to confirm the promises made unto the fathers: And that the Gentiles might glorify God for his mercy." —Romans 15:8-9 Ch…
Read article →What the Father's love for the Son reveals about God
…ch makes every alternative logically impossible. The biblical case is stronger than that. Jesus does not leave us to speculate about whether love might have existed before creation. He speaks of love which was actually given and received: "For thou lovedst me before the foundatio…
Read article →Conditional blessing, irrevocable promise, and fulfilment in Christ
…human failure does not turn the covenant into a promise God may permanently discard. Its historical line, stated land, and blessing to the nations belong to the oath God swore. The Mosaic covenant governs Israel's obedience At Sinai, God entered into covenant with the nation He…
Read article →Signs, expectancy, and the event the Church is told to await
…ooking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ." —Titus 2:13 "For our conversation is in heaven; from whence also we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ." —Philippians 3:20 The object of expectation is not first the…
Read article →The LORD, Zion, and the meaning of Beulah in Isaiah 62:4–5
…the land He promised her. Zion and Her Land Isaiah 62 opens with an explicit concern for historical Zion and Jerusalem: “For Zion’s sake will I not hold my peace, and for Jerusalem’s sake I will not rest, until the righteousness thereof go forth as brightness, and the salvation…
Read article →A response to Michael Horton on the land promise, Amos 9, and the people of God
…fore necessary to distinguish: God's grant of the land to Abraham's descendants; Israel's historical entry into and possession of that land; Israel's conditional enjoyment of it under the Mosaic covenant; and the prophetic promise of ultimate restoration under divine renewal. Jos…
Read article →What God's faithfulness to Israel means for everyone who trusts His promises
…God is able to graft them in again (Romans 11:17-24). The Church's unity does not require historical amnesia. Jewish and Gentile believers possess the same righteousness, Spirit, access, and hope in Christ. Yet Paul can still call himself an Israelite, address Gentiles as Gentile…
Read article →Why a loaded label does not settle the question
…from the wider context, not inserted into one noun. John 14 supplies that wider movement. Jesus tells His disciples that He is going to His Father's house to prepare a place for them, then promises: “I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be…
Read article →Spiritual ecstasy, altered states, and discerning what is from God
…fluence—including his own mother. The work is a literary tragedy rather than an impartial historical record of Greek worship. Nevertheless, it preserves a disturbing ancient understanding: spiritual ecstasy could overwhelm reason, dissolve moral restraint, and lead people to comm…
Read article →The near was real. The far is still coming.
…Isaiah 32–35 Across the Prophetic Horizon The near was real. The far is still coming. The historical horizon and the question of fulfilment “Was this fulfilled, or is it still future?” That is often a necessary question when reading biblical prophecy. Sometimes, however, it becom…
Read article →One Messiah, one gospel, and God's continuing purpose for Israel
…appear. After following the argument through the covenants, the prophets, the teaching of Jesus, Acts, Romans, Galatians, Hebrews, and the history of Christian interpretation, the cumulative answer is no. God has judged Israel severely. The nation remains largely in unbelief and…
Read article →Governmental restraint, the final ten kings, and the preparation of the temple
…is a serious case for understanding this restraint in relation to governmental authority, historically embodied in Rome. An existing order can obstruct a would-be ruler; its displacement can allow power to be reorganised and concentrated in his hands. Early Christian writers reco…
Read article →A forensic reading of Christ's Olivet Discourse
…etting is Judea The discourse begins at the temple. The disciples point to its buildings; Jesus foretells their destruction; and they ask about His coming and the end of the age (Matthew 24:1-3). His answer soon narrows to a particular land and crisis: "When ye therefore shall se…
Read article →How Christians can think politically without surrendering conscience to a package deal
…is not a creed. Its leader is not a shepherd of our souls. Christian loyalty begins with Jesus Christ. Christians should therefore bring every party, leader, policy and political narrative under the judgement of God's Word. Scripture fixes moral ends—truth, justice, protection o…
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