Reading Through Acts, Part 1

[@erpthompsonqueen9130]

Thank you. Watching from Alaska. 🤔 🕊

[@alexdoerofthings]

I like this lady. She has a lot of fun with her face!

[@AtheismActually]

1:07:29 The verse goes well with the cat stroking. Very "Dr Evil". 😈😼

[@JenniferBirdPhD]

@@AtheismActually Haha! I didn’t think about that! 😄

[@WadeMach1977]

Cats like to visit and my cats will sit on my shoulder as I look at a tablet.

[@WadeMach1977]

I use translations with both I use a TNIV so I am pretty understanding of translations that put brothers and sisters. I rarely use just one translation so I may have one that has brothers and brothers and sisters both.

[@harrispinkham]

Was wondering if Acts' Matthias/Barsabbas narrative could have a subtle intertextual link to Matthew's Jesus/Barabbas narrative?

[@harveywabbit9541]

Barabbas is the thief who steals from summer (Jupiter Olympus) to feed winter (Jupiter Stygius). Jupiter Olympus gives and Jupiter Stygius takes away.

[@harveywabbit9541]

Jesus was next brought unto (not into) the hall of judgment. Here Pilate (the arrow-man = Sagittarius, in trine aspect with Aries), asked: --" What do you accuse him of?" He is a malefactor (he was the Sun of winter, and the author of evil), was the reply. Then judge him by your own law, replied Pilate. But, said the Jews, "it is not lawful for us to put any man to death." Why, Christian? Because the "Jews" were the four spring months, during which the harvests are produced. They, therefore, were forbidden to kill. It was their business to sustain life, not to take it away. Pilate, being the first of the four winter months, the killing belonged to him. Pilate, however, queried again:-"Art thou the king of the Jews?" "To this end was I born," said Christ. "I find no fault in him," rejoined Pilate. "But ye have a custom that I shall loose one unto you at the passover." "Shall I release unto you the king of the Jews?" "Oh! no! no!! not this man, but Barabbas, the robber. Bar-abbas (son-of-the-father) was winter, and thence a robber. Pilate (Sagittarius. having passed his zenith), released Barabbas, i.e., winter ended. He next took Jesus, and scourged him, i. e., Scorpio set; for "they chastised with Scorpions" in those days (1 Kings 12: 11. The soldiers platted a crown of thorns (the seven summer months), and placed it upon his head (see Apollo with seven spikes) and clothed him with purple (the blue ether) Thus prepared, Pilot brought him forth, still protesting: “I find no fault in him" (who could) and said " ECCE HOMO "-Behold the man! See Revelation 9, where the scorpion aka Scorpio constellations leads four signs.

[@JenniferBirdPhD]

@@harrispinkham I haven’t looked into the use of the name Barsabbas elsewhere, in terms of how common of a name it might have been, that kind of a thing. But the scenarios are quite different. Not sure what else to say.

[@harrispinkham]

@@JenniferBirdPhD thank you!

[@gritch66]

@@harveywabbit9541 thank you. do you also see Herod here?

[@gritch66]

I now see german historians as possessed sorcerers. (And scholars!) Odyssee is so powerfull 😂

[@eshesherall303]

Leave it as brothers

[@gritch66]

Is this book antisemitic or anti pagan?

[@harveywabbit9541]

No.

[@JenniferBirdPhD]

@@gritch66 I think it is heavily anti-Judaic in terms of the Jews at the time that were not on board with Jesus as the Messiah. Then the language and labels of Judaism and Jews become associated with a tradition that is separate from Christianity, and the there is a lot of fodder for anti-Judaism across the board. Does that make sense?

[@gritch66]

@@JenniferBirdPhD Yes I understand. But I was also trying to talk about the other natives of the roman empire and ex pagans who where also persecuted, nevertheless being greeks, celts, iberics, egyptians, numidians... Their cultures hadn't been completly destroyed at that time already. Right? or they were just all slaves? I don't see any democratic debate in this book ie Plato vs Pythagoras (who is more womanist inclusive I think) or may be because I misknow the tribes? Even after Octavian defeated Cleopatra and Marc Antony, Minerva was still venerated in Rome right? I am thinking of persecution of Essenes, witches, homosexuals. May be out of context. But I agree with you that nothing is possible in this book.

[@JenniferBirdPhD]

​@@gritch66 My short take response to your question is that this book is mostly about fighting within Judaism and making claims to "the right way" to understand and interpret that tradition. Is there also inherently some anti-pagan content in early Christian writings? Yes, no question. All over the place. As a biblical scholar, with many years engaging this content with people of varying ideologies, I find it most challenging to get people to see the anti-Judaic level, thus that is where I stay. I agree that the anti-pagan content is quite damaging; it is just that most Christians have never been asked to properly consider the relationship between Judaism and the origins of Christianity. (Admittedly, there are scholars who hash this out every year and there is no consensus on how we ought to view it all). This dynamic that you have asked about it not even as clear cut, imho, as the Hebrew people vs. others dynamic in the Hebrew Bible. There that is precisely what is happening: leave your former ways, stop regressing to your familial practices. In the Newer Testament, because of Paul's ideas regarding bringing Gentiles into the covenant, the religious identities are all over the place. But the predominant issue is the correct trajectory of Judaism, it seems to me.

[@gritch66]

​@@JenniferBirdPhD ok thank you, I still try to follow you. Even though for me your garden of Eden ideology is a major pain (soft euphemism..) I don't see why the hebrew people would be hurt by a gender tolerant god. My theory is that Athena helped Odyseus get home during troyan war, and then aphrodite is imported from persian Ishtar, the jealous demoness who has killed my hero gilgamesh 's lover! Would you have an opinion on this? See also Dan Mclellan and Lillith (the demon who asks for gender equality) in the alternative Eden.

[@harveywabbit9541]

Lots of astrology in the book of Acts.

[@gritch66]

I am left behind there. I did not get into cosmogony of hebrew tribes yet. Tiamat and Marduk are completly out of this story?

[@harveywabbit9541]

@@gritch66 The six nights = Tiamat Jacob, the father of 12 signs, is a woman.

[@gritch66]

@@harveywabbit9541 thank you i would conclude that no explicit talk about demons was allowed in this book right?

[@harveywabbit9541]

@@gritch66 Demons are commonly associated with the winter season (6 nights Gen. 1). Having taken a ship (Noah's) at Capernaum, with his disciples, Jesus passed over the lake (the rainy season), and arrived at the country of the Gadarenes (a patronym of Gad, God or Aries "Cæsar's tribute" was the decrements of the days as shortened from the summer solstice, and spoken of in Luke 2: 1. It was the opposite of that received by Levi, which was the increments of the lengthening days. March). As he was about to land, a naked man (the dreary and desolate Earth) met him. This poor man was possessed by a legion, or collection of Devils, who compelled him to go naked and dwell in the tombs (winter months). He had often (every winter) been caught by them and bound in chains and fetters (frost). But he had just broken his fetters, and was dwelling in the wilderness, the devils still keeping possession of him. The man wanted to get rid of them but they held on. When the Savior sided with the man, the naughty devils besought him not to order them into the deep. So, Jesus, commiserating the poor devils, told them to get into a herd of swine close by. No sooner, however, had they got possession of the unlucky grunters, than they raised the devil with them, and they all ran violently down a steep bank into the lake, and were choked. The hog was an emblem of winter. It is too late in the day to deny this. On some very ancient Greek coins a lion is seen killing a boar, i. e., summer succeeds winter. The Syrian Adonis was killed by a boar, and his death and resurrection were once celebrated the same as in the case of our Savior. See R. Payne Knight's Symbolical Language of Anc. Art and Myth., p. 86, "The Dumb man possessed of a Devil" was the Earth in winter; the blind man, the same..