Sadly, the origins of many antisemitic tropes and prejudices can be traced back to the New Testament, in which "the Jews" are cast as the religious "other" against which the Jesus movement is self-defined. As a result, Christians carry around a lot of un-historical and anti-Jewish assumptions are repeated in Sunday School classes and even the halls of academia. Let's fix that! Our guest Meredith Warren just co-edited an excellent book called Judeophobia and the New Testament . Meredith joins Hel...
May 26, 2025•52 min•Season 3Ep. 113
Cyrus II was the founder of the Persian Empire, arguably the greatest empire of the Ancient Near East. Cyrus wasn't only a hero to the Persians. In the Hebrew Bible, Cyrus is the only non-Jew that God calls His "anointed one" or "messiah." But does Cyrus really deserve his reputation as the "liberator" of the Jews from Babylon or is it all a piece of ancient propaganda? The incomparable Lloyd Llewelyn-Jones joins Helen and Dave to discuss the glory of the Persian Empire and how Cyrus was interpr...
May 19, 2025•57 min•Season 3Ep. 112
The laws and punishments meted out in the Bible sound pretty harsh. Eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth—not to mention all of the commandments that are punishable by death! Ancient law expert Bruce Wells joins Helen and Dave to answer the question: were biblical laws really enforced? How did they compare with other law codes from the Ancient Near East like Hammurabi? And if they weren't enforced, why do laws play such a central role in the Hebrew Bible? Check out Bruce's books: Everyday Law in Bib...
May 12, 2025•54 min•Season 3Ep. 111
According to The Da Vinci Code , all sorts of wild things happened at the Council of Nicaea in 325 CE. Constantine, the first Christian Roman emperor, chose the books of the New Testament. The role of women in the Church was suppressed. And most importantly, a bunch of powerful bishops decided (by a slim margin) that Jesus Christ was actually divine. As our guest Sara Parvis explains, the Council of Nicaea was indeed a momentous meeting, but for very different reasons. SUPPORT BIBLICAL TIME MACH...
May 05, 2025•53 min•Season 3Ep. 110
Matthew Novenson is back and he's brought some exciting (wild, even) new ideas about our old friend Paul. In his latest book, Paul and Judaism at the End of History , Matt argues that Paul believed he was living through the end of the world. Paul wasn't "against" Judaism or the law—he simply believed that Jesus's death and resurrection had ushered in a new reality with new rules. SUPPORT BIBLICAL TIME MACHINE If you enjoy the podcast, please (pretty please!) consider supporting the show through ...
Apr 28, 2025•55 min•Season 3Ep. 109
With Easter in the rear view mirror, we take a long-overdue look at the next chapter in the story of Jesus: the Second Coming. Scholar Tucker Ferda is making waves with some compelling new ideas about the origins of Second Coming prophesies. He joins Helen and Dave to discuss what Jesus himself might have believed about the End of Days and His role as the prophesied Son of Man. We highly recommend Tucker's new book, Jesus and His Promised Second Coming: Jewish Eschatology and Christian Origins ....
Apr 21, 2025•50 min•Season 3Ep. 108
The enigmatic figure of Barabbas appears in all four gospels as a "bandit" or "insurrectionist" who is released from prison by Pontius Pilate instead of Jesus. In this special Easter episode, Helen and Dave explore the (many) theories about Barabbas' backstory and what he may have represented to the gospel authors. SUPPORT BIBLICAL TIME MACHINE If you enjoy the podcast, please (pretty please!) consider supporting the show through the Time Travelers Club , our Patreon. We are an independent, list...
Apr 14, 2025•44 min•Season 3Ep. 107
What does the Bible really say about controversial topics like slavery, abortion, homosexuality, Satan and the Apocalypse? Everybody has their take, but few have the ability to interrogate the texts and their ancient origins with as much insight as our guest, Dan McClellan. Dan McClellan is a public scholar of the Bible and religion with a PhD in theology & religion from the University of Exeter. Since 2023, Dan has dedicated himself full-time to combating misinformation about the Bible and ...
Apr 07, 2025•1 hr 5 min•Season 3Ep. 106
Before it was called Christianity, the "Jesus movement" was born in 1st-century synagogues. In today's episode, Anders Runneson joins Helen and Dave to talk about the important role of ancient synagogues of both civic and religious institutions, and how a better understanding of synagogues can shape our reading of the New Testament. You can download a full PDF of Anders' book for free: Judaism for Gentiles: Reading Paul Beyond the Parting of the Ways Paradigm SUPPORT BIBLICAL TIME MACHINE If you...
Mar 31, 2025•1 hr 3 min•Season 3Ep. 105
The books of the Hebrew Bible known as "wisdom literature" — Proverbs, Job and Ecclesiastes — are a strange fit for the biblical canon. They're ahistorical (not interested in Israel's history) and areligious (not interested in God, covenants, the temple or any other pillars of Israelite religion). So where did these funky books come from and how did they find their way into the Bible? Our guest Stuart Weeks is here with some answers! Stuart is a scholar of ancient Israelite wisdom literature and...
Mar 10, 2025•55 min•Season 3Ep. 104
What can Bible stories about animals tells us about power dynamics in the ancient world? A lot, it turns out! Suzanna Millar joins us to talk about the fascinating new field of Animal Studies and how the Hebrew Bible can open windows into studying human-animal power dynamics 2500 years in the past. For more on this emerging field of biblical studies, check out Suzanna's book, co-edited with Arthur Walker-Jones, Ask the Animals: Developing a Biblical Animal Hermeneutic . SUPPORT BIBLICAL TIME MAC...
Mar 03, 2025•46 min•Season 3Ep. 103
The Jewish sabbath (Shabbat), observed from sundown Friday to sundown Saturday, is one of the oldest continuously observed holidays in existence. At first glance, the sabbath seems pretty straightforward; it's a "day of rest" that God commanded his people to observe on the 7th day. But when you read the Hebrew Bible really closely—like our guest Jon Levenson does—you run into all sorts of intriguing questions. Was the "7th day" the same as the sabbath? Was the sabbath a day or rest or a day of b...
Feb 24, 2025•57 min•Season 3Ep. 102
This is a Biblical Time Machine first—a historical reenactment of how the gospel writers wrote (and rewrote) the books of Mark, Matthew, Luke and John. Our guest James Barker made his own scrolls, wax tablets and ancient writing implements to see what the gospel-writing process was really like. It gave him all sorts of fascinating new insights into how the gospel authors worked and how they used and reused each other's material. You really have to check out James' terrific new book, Writing and ...
Feb 17, 2025•59 min•Season 3Ep. 101
Why were certain foods "forbidden" in the Hebrew Bible? And how did the pig attain ultra-non-kosher status among ancient Jews? Guest Jordan Rosenblum joins Helen and Dave as they try to pinpoint the origins of Jewish dietary laws and how they've been interpreted over time. Check out Jordan's terrific new book, Forbidden: A 3,000-Year History of Jews and the Pig . JOIN US FOR THE BTM BOOK CLUB The next meeting of the Biblical Time Machine Book Club will be Saturday, February 22 at 12pm Eastern / ...
Feb 10, 2025•54 min•Season 3Ep. 100
Josephus will always be our pal, but it's time to meet another super-important ancient Jewish writer: Philo of Alexandria. Living in the vibrant intellectual hub of 1st-century Alexandria, Philo applied Greco-Roman philosophical ideas to the Hebrew Bible and wrote some of the first books about biblical interpretation. Today Helen and Dave Learn all about Philo and the remarkable city of ancient Alexandria with guest Maren Neihoff , author of Philo of Alexandria: An Intellectual Biography . MORE ...
Feb 03, 2025•1 hr 9 min•Season 3Ep. 99
To the authors of the Hebrew Bible, King Nebuchadnezzar was a grade-A jerk. In the 6th century BCE, he and his army sacked Jerusalem, destroyed the First Temple and carried the Judahites into exile in Babylon. All of that stuff actually happened, but things really start to get wild in the book of Daniel. In that much later text, Nebuchadnezzar goes mad, grows feathers and eats grass for 7 years. Where did that colorful story come from and does it have any basis in reality? Today's guest Peter At...
Jan 27, 2025•43 min•Season 3Ep. 98
Did Roman roads have rest stops? How bad were the snacks on a sea voyage across the Mediterranean? Did Paul get frequent sailor miles? On today's episode, we answer all of your questions about travel in the ancient world. Our guest (live from an Egyptian desert) is Robert Cioffi , who wrote a terrific article titled " Travel in the Roman World ." You can also check out Rob's latest book, Egypt, Ethiopia, and the Greek Novel: Between Representation and Resistance . SUPPORT BIBLICAL TIME MACHINE I...
Jan 20, 2025•47 min•Season 3Ep. 97
Today's guest, historian Steve Mason , has called Josephus's The Jewish War "perhaps the most influential non-biblical text of Western history." And he's got a point! Read alongside the Bible, The Jewish War tells the "rest of the story" — specifically, how the Romans came to destroy the Temple in 70 CE. The trouble is, The Jewish War isn't "history" in the modern sense. It's a narrative written to make moral arguments about "good" and "bad" leaders in both Jerusalem and Rome. In today's episode...
Jan 13, 2025•1 hr 8 min•Season 3Ep. 96
Of course Helen and Dave have a fully functioning, very real Time Machine. But if you can't wait your turn (the line is ridiculously long), check out "documentary papyri." These scraps of ancient writing — letters, legal documents, shopping lists — offer a firsthand glimpse into everyday life in the 1st century CE. Even better, scholars like our guest Christina Kreinecker use clues from these ancient everyday texts to illuminate thorny passages of the New Testament. Check out Christina's book (c...
Jan 06, 2025•55 min•Season 3Ep. 95
The prophet Isaiah lived in the 8th century BCE, yet his writings are quoted throughout the New Testament and especially around Christmas. Who was the historical Isaiah? And who (or what) was he writing about when he prophesied the birth of a king 700 years before Jesus? For this special holiday episode, Helen and Dave are joined by Daniel Stulac , a Christian scholar of the Hebrew Bible who approaches the book(s) of Isaiah in both their historical and theological contexts. SUBSCRIBE AND GET A F...
Dec 30, 2024•1 hr 4 min•Season 3Ep. 94
In the Gospel of Luke, Joseph and a very pregnant Mary travel to Bethlehem because Caesar Augustus has ordered a census of the entire Roman Empire. But does Jesus's birth story in Luke align with what we know about censuses in the ancient world? How were people counted? Who conducted these censuses? And did people really need to travel back to their ancestral homes to register with Rome? For this special holiday episode, Helen and Dave are joined by Andrew Whitby , a data scientist and author of...
Dec 23, 2024•48 min•Season 3Ep. 93
Hanukkah celebrates a miraculous event, when the eternal light of the temple burned for 8 days without being extinguished. In this special holiday episode, scholar Gregg Gardner tells Helen and Dave all about ancient oil lamps, including the magnificent and mysterious 7-branched menorah of the Second Temple. If you'd like to make your own potato latkes for Hanukkah, try this recipe . Don't forget the apple sauce and sour cream (and crack a window). GIVE (& RECEIVE) THE GIFT OF BIBLICAL TIME ...
Dec 16, 2024•48 min•Season 3Ep. 92
Most biblical scholars — including us! — are quick to dismiss the Nativity stories in Matthew and Luke as later theological additions. But what if there are important cultural and even historical memories handed down through these well-worn Christmas stories? According to our guest Joan Taylor , there may be much more to the Nativity stories than we ever thought. Joan's new book, Boy Jesus: Growing Up Judaean in Turbulent Times , will hit the shelves in February 2025, but you can pre-order your ...
Dec 09, 2024•1 hr 2 min•Season 3Ep. 91
Every good churchgoer knows that after we die the faithful will be welcomed into a heavenly paradise and the baddies will be consigned to eternal damnation. But don't go looking for any of that stuff in the Bible! As our guest James Tabor explains, ancient people had very different conceptions of the afterlife, including the authors of the Hebrew Bible and New Testament. For more great stuff from James, check out his blog, JamesTabor.com and his YouTube channel . Here are some articles and books...
Dec 02, 2024•54 min•Season 3Ep. 90
Mary Magdalene is one of the most intriguing figures in the New Testament. She clearly held a special place in Jesus's heart and in his ministry, but that popularity also made her controversial. In today's episode, scholar Elizabeth Schrader Polczer presents compelling evidence that someone in the early Church tried to erase (and replace) Mary Magdalene in the Gospel of John. Check out Elizabeth's eye-opening journal article, " Was Martha of Bethany Added to the Fourth Gospel in the Second Centu...
Nov 25, 2024•55 min•Season 3Ep. 89
Scholars have been searching for the Historical Jesus for centuries, but have they been looking in the wrong places? Chris Keith and James Crossley think it's high time to reimagine and reinvigorate the "quest" for the Historical Jesus, opening up the field to entirely new and exciting lines of inquiry. Check out their new edited volume (featuring a chapter by Helen) The Next Quest for the Historical Jesus . SUPPORT BIBLICAL TIME MACHINE! If you like the podcast, please consider supporting the s...
Nov 18, 2024•53 min•Season 3Ep. 88
You're in for a treat. Israeli archeologist Oded Lipschits knows more than anyone about the archeology of the ancient Kingdom of Judah. In this episode, Dave and Helen travel back to the 8th century BCE and learn how the biblical authors interpreted (and reinterpreted) historical events to fit their changing theological and political realities. If you like what you hear, check out Oded's podcast The Untold Story of the Kingdom of Judah . SUPPORT BIBLICAL TIME MACHINE! If you like the podcast, pl...
Nov 11, 2024•52 min•Season 3Ep. 87
Marriage is between one man and one woman. Adultery is bad. (Prostitution is worse.) And divorce should be avoided at all costs. The Bible is perfectly clear on these and other moral topics, right? Ha! As our guest Jennifer Knust explains, the Bible is a product of the ancient world, where laws about sex, marriage, adultery and divorce had more to do with property than morality. Check out Jennifer's terrific book, Unprotected Texts: The Bible's Surprising Contradictions About Sex and Desire . NE...
Nov 04, 2024•54 min•Season 3Ep. 86
Just in time for Halloween, we're talking magic, incantation bowls and a pinch of necromancy with Gideon Bohak , author of Ancient Jewish Magic: A History . NEW COLLEGE FESTIVAL If you're anywhere near Scotland from November 7-9, you're invited to attend the New College Festival " Books and Belief " at the University of Edinburgh. Come say Hi to Helen! SUPPORT BIBLICAL TIME MACHINE! If you like the podcast, please consider supporting the show through the Time Travelers Club , our Patreon. We lov...
Oct 28, 2024•47 min•Season 3Ep. 85
Across the Ancient Near East, it was common to offer food and sacrifices to appease dead ancestors and "hangry" ghosts, but the Hebrew Bible is largely silent on interactions between the living and the dead. Our guest Kerry Sonia pieces together archeological evidence with clues from the Bible to paint a picture of what she calls the "cult of dead kin" in Ancient Israel. If you like today's episode, check out Kerry's book Caring for the Dead in Ancient Israel . NEW COLLEGE FESTIVAL If you're any...
Oct 21, 2024•1 hr 3 min•Season 3Ep. 84
