April 16, 2025 • 52 mins
What happened when a child from the line of David grew up watching cities burn under Roman occupation? Joan Taylor, Professor Emerita of Christian Origins and Second Temple Judaism at King's College London, transports us back to the traumatic world of Jesus' childhood that shaped his revolutionary message.
Most of us picture Jesus growing up in peaceful Nazareth, but historical evidence reveals a radically different reality. Herod the Great had massacred men from Bethlehem before Jesus was born and built his imposing tomb within view of the town as a constant reminder of Roman power. The political chaos following Herod's death brought no relief—his son Archelaus slaughtered thousands in Jerusalem, and the Romans crucified 2,000 people outside the city. When Jesus' family settled in Nazareth, the nearby city of Sepphoris was burned in a Roman military action, a trauma the young Jesus likely witnessed firsthand.
Taylor helps us see how this context of collective trauma fundamentally shaped Jesus' ministry. His teachings about turning the other cheek, walking the extra mile, and special concern for the marginalized weren't abstract spiritual principles but radical responses to the violence and oppression his community experienced daily. When Satan tempted Jesus with power over all kingdoms, he was offering precisely what many expected of a Messiah—military victory over Rome. Jesus' rejection of this path represents a complete revolution in thinking about power, liberation, and what God's kingdom truly means.
This conversation will transform how you read the Gospels. By understanding Jesus as someone who experienced profound trauma and responded by creating an entirely new paradigm for confronting oppression, we discover the truly revolutionary nature of his message. His teachings weren't about passive acceptance but active resistance strategies designed to maintain dignity and humanity in the face of dehumanizing systems.
Have you ever wondered what Jesus' childhood was really like? Listen now and discover the historical Jesus you never knew.
Watch Joan Taylor and Helen Bond's documentary on Jesus' female disciples: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17QWDhomle8
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Jessica LM Jenkins (00:00):
Welcome back .
Today we are taking a breakfrom our Women in Context
discussions to talk with JoanTaylor about her study of Jesus
in Context.
Joan Taylor is the author ofmany books on ancient religion,
history and archaeology.
She is a New Zealander ofAnglo-Danish heritage and is the
(00:21):
Professor Emerita of ChristianOrigins and Second Temple
Judaism at King's College London.
Joan, thank you so much forbeing with us today.
Thank you for having me.
Can you tell us a little bitmore about yourself and
especially what got youinterested in New Testament
study?
Joan E Taylor (00:41):
Well, that is a very big question in that I
guess I was brought up in aChristian family and went to
Sunday school, went to churchand during my teenage years got
fascinated, as I was actuallythe confirmation experience at
(01:03):
my Methodist church that I wasgoing to in Lower Hutt in New
Zealand.
The minister there was reallyright on in terms of inquiry and
that got me interested andknowledgeable about the fact
that books had been writtenabout how to interpret the Bible
and the history and that reallyset me off.
(01:24):
But I traveled to Israel,Palestine in my early 20s and
roamed around there, went to alot of archaeological sites,
went to museums.
All of these things feed intoan interest and yeah, it really
does.
(01:44):
I was like this is what I needto study.
Jessica LM Jenkins (01:46):
Yes, I relate.
Yes, I know from being inIsrael myself I spent nine
months there that once you'rethere, you just can't get it out
of your, your blood.
You're like I just have to keeplearning all about this for
ever.
Joan E Taylor (02:00):
Absolutely.
Jessica LM Jenkins (02:02):
So I've been , joan.
I've been reading through yournewest book, which is titled Boy
Jesus, and we'll get back tothat, but I know you've written
up quite a few other books aswell.
Can you tell us some of thebooks that you've written?
Joan E Taylor (02:15):
Oh, all kinds of different things I have written
on John the Baptist.
That was one of my earliest onesthe Immerser, john the Baptist
and Second Temple Judaism, andthat really got me into looking
at a figure of the New Testamentwithin the context of his time
and thinking about how he wouldhave appeared at that time.
(02:39):
I've written quite a bit on theDead Sea Scrolls, the context
for the Dead Sea Scrolls, thegroups like, well, the Essenes,
who I normally considered thoseresponsible for the Dead Sea
Scrolls, and this really weirdgroup over in Alexandria called
(03:05):
the Therapeuti, who werecontemporaries of Jesus and
early Christianity, and we'redoing something quite different
over there in Alexandria inEgypt.
So I've written about Philo ofAlexandria, who was also
contemporary and had his ownparticular ideas, philosophical
Jewish ideas.
So I roam into all of thesedifferent nooks and crannies
really whenever I'm interested.
(03:26):
But I also write and havewritten quite a bit over the
years on women and gender issuesin the New Testament and in the
early church and also inJudaism.
I was particularly in the womentherapeutic, for example.
Yeah, oh yeah, yeah.
So, yeah, trying to understandwhat it was like for women, uh,
(03:48):
around jesus.
I wrote a book with helen bondwomen remembered, oh, female
disciples and saw that.
And we also, uh, did adocumentary that is out there on
YouTube.
Okay, you can look at it.
Oh, I'll have to look that up.
Yeah, the new evidence forJesus' female disciples.
(04:10):
Okay, some of the new evidencefor Jesus' female disciples and
really how they were rememberedin the early church.
Jessica LM Jenkins (04:18):
Oh, I haven't found that yet, so I
will definitely look that up.
That sounds fascinating andI'll put a link to that in the
show notes for anybody elsewho's listening.
It's like oh, I want to look atthat too, so I will find that
and put a link on social mediaposts and in the show notes of
this episode.
(04:39):
Thank you, wonderful.
I just did a search, for JoanTaylor was looking at several of
the books you did.
Women Remembered was one of thefirst ones I noticed.
I was like, okay, we're goingto talk about Boy Jesus, which
is amazing, but can you justtell us a little bit about what
Women Remembered is about andwhat you did in that book?
Joan E Taylor (04:57):
Yeah, it did spring from our documentary and
with the documentary we pitchedthe idea to a television
production company, which isquite unusual for scholars.
Normally TV production peoplecome to you and go we want you
to say these things in as shorta time as possible.
(05:18):
And Helen and I had done quite abit of documentary work and we
thought we can do a documentaryand we pitched it and it was
picked up by these people atMinerva Media and we made it.
Um, we, we were on the roaddoing a lot of talking while we
were making the documentary andwe focused on certain, um,
(05:41):
certain women who were disciplesof Jesus, of course, course,
mary Magdalene, yes, but alsoSalome, who was a rather
mysterious figure, and thefigures mentioned in the Gospel
of Luke, like Joanna, who waswife of Cusa, herod's steward
you know, mystery, mystery, yesand sat in the theatre at
(06:06):
Tiberius and just brainstormedon what her life was like.
And because we were doing a lotof brainstorming which wasn't
all picked up by the documentary, we just had so much time to
talk, right, okay, we need to dothis book where we go into what
we can possibly know aboutthese named figures, but also
(06:28):
what we might know about some ofthe unnamed figures who were
clearly Jesus' disciples, likethe woman with the issue of
blood.
She's not named in the Gospels.
She's remembered as beingcalled Veronique, okay, but
she's not named.
But clearly she was telling herstory.
(06:49):
Yes, because there's no way youwould have known about her
experience unless she had toldthat story.
So that idea of women tellingstories to other women was one
of the things that was a threadthrough our book and just really
pointing out that our textsshine the light on the guys.
You know, they're interested inthe men, they're not interested
(07:12):
in the women.
It's a man's world.
But that doesn't meanhistorically there weren't right
women and we know from theresurrection accounts that women
were absolutely everything.
They were.
What was going on there?
Yeah, yeah.
That's the book in a nutshell.
Jessica LM Jenkins (07:31):
I love that.
So I noticed a few of yourother books that you've written
as well, and I cannot wait tobuy Women Remembered.
I'm going to get that as soonas possible.
But I noticed you've alsowritten a book on what Jesus
looked like.
You've written books onChristians in the holy places,
which that one.
I thought that one seemed veryscholarly.
(07:52):
But I just wanted to pick yourbrain briefly on that, because
I've traveled to Israel andthere's all the holy sites in
Israel and the people I wasthere with mentioned that many
of those may not be actuallyaccurate.
Like they say, this is thechurch of the fish and the
loaves.
But do we?
(08:12):
Are the holy sites in Israelaccurate to where those events
actually happened?
Joan E Taylor (08:19):
Yeah, some of them are.
Some of them are, and I think,for example, that the Gethsemane
cave not the garden ofGethsemane, but the Gethsemane
cave is recorded very early onin terms of Christian tradition
as the place where it allhappened.
And that idea of it being acave fits in with our gospel
(08:39):
accounts and I've written aboutthat that Jesus leaves somewhere
and comes back somewhere andthey're all sheltered in the
very cold night that the nighthe was arrested.
So that makes sense.
But then we've got to rememberthat some sites were revealed to
people in dreams, like, forexample you know it's not in the
(09:09):
book, but the cave of John theBaptist on the eastern side of
the Jordan River.
The story is that there was amonk who spent the night in a
cave and John the Baptistappeared to him in a dream.
This is a very important cave.
Pay attention to it.
And then it was considered tobe the cave where John lived and
it attracted a lot of pilgrims.
So with any given holy site, youdon't know really whether
(09:32):
there's a firm tradition behindthem or whether it's been
revealed, because in theByzantine period, that idea that
you would get an angel or a, asaint right telling you this is
this, these are my bones, orright?
This is a really importantplace.
Um, that, uh, that that wasreally important for them, that
(09:54):
that direct revelation, heavenlyrevelation, was more important
than anyone saying, oh, we cantrace a memory right back, you
know.
Yeah, you know, really, theyvalued that.
So when we come along, we haveto do all of the critical
thinking and think, ok, wheredoes it belong in terms of
(10:15):
tradition and when did peoplefirst start coming here?
Jessica LM Jenkins (10:20):
Yes, our values and our ways of measuring
knowledge are different nowthan back then.
We have a different approach.
Joan E Taylor (10:29):
Which is not to say you know wonderful things
can be, you know there could bewonderful things revealed in
dreams and visions.
Absolutely you know.
But you know, to be reallyforensic and scientific, we want
to know what the earliest stuffis.
Jessica LM Jenkins (10:44):
Absolutely so.
Let's talk about your newestbook, Boy Jesus.
What prompted you to do such adeep research into Jesus'
childhood?
Joan E Taylor (10:56):
I think there's a whole lot of different things.
It's partly just being a mumand thinking about how important
childhood is, you know, wantingto being aware of the
experiences of my children andhow that has shaped them and
also being aware of theexperiences that have shaped me
(11:18):
and also my mother.
Frankly, my mum, her childhoodwas quite traumatic.
She was you mentioned me beingAnglo-Danish Mum is Danish, okay
, and she's very elderly now,but she was in occupied
Copenhagen during the SecondWorld War and she has
(11:42):
experiences that then werepassed on to me and I can
emotionally live through mymother in terms of the traumatic
experiences during that timeand I thought about okay, jesus,
a child of Jesus.
We have these accounts, thesenativity accounts, and both
(12:06):
nativity accounts indicatetrauma of some kind and
displacement of some kind, andit made me think so what is that
?
What is going on here?
And I want to sort of thinkmore about the historical
context and place Jesus'childhood within that historical
context.
(12:26):
Even if we are really, reallydoubtful about the nativity
accounts and a lot of mycolleagues in historical studies
are, I thought, okay, the leastwe can do is put Jesus in his
time as a child.
Jessica LM Jenkins (12:39):
Yeah, yeah, and that I found that to be
really profound in the book.
I have a master's in Israelstudy, so I've learned some of
this, but people who have notdone even a little bit of study
I've done are often completelyunaware of the historical
context and everything that'sgoing on socially and
(13:00):
politically during that timeperiod.
Can you just give us a highlevel overview of the what's
going on in that time period therevolts, the turmoil and all of
that, just so that my audiencecan start to understand this
picture?
Joan E Taylor (13:18):
Yeah, no, it's big, it's a huge amount of stuff
going on.
Jessica LM Jenkins (13:25):
And you outline it really well in the
book.
Joan E Taylor (13:28):
We try to boil it down.
We know in the nativity accountsthere is bad King Herod and he
sort of turns up as a pantomimevillain.
You know, bad you know.
But that actually relied on theaudience having an experience
of King Herod which was negative, and there were very many
(13:49):
reasons for that.
So the big picture is that theRomans had come in and really
wanted to install their peoplein charge of Judea.
So 63 BCE, pompey comes in andgoes into Jerusalem and takes
over and then the Romans takecontrol and they rule via client
(14:14):
rulers wherever they takecontrol.
So Herod is a Roman client king.
He's in the pay of Rome and hehas to do everything right by
Rome.
He had trouble initially takingcharge.
The great enemy of Rome, theParthians you think modern Iran,
(14:34):
it's the same area.
The Parthians wanted their guyin Judea.
They pushed back.
Herod pushed back with the armyof Mark Antony and got control.
It's all very Roman stuff.
And then Herod really wanted tokeep that control.
What the Romans wanted waseverything to be peaceful,
(14:58):
meaning they could harness asmuch taxation from these sorts
of places as possible.
They could have a lot of honourtemples built for the Roman
emperor, and Herod builtimperial cult temples so that
the Roman emperor would beworshipped.
(15:18):
So he was Rome's man, and partof being Rome's man was to quash
any even slight smidgen ofrevolt, and we, herod,
interpreted that as anythingthat would impact detrimentally
on his own rule, because he wasplaced there by rome, he was
(15:40):
placed there by God, you know,ruler of Judea, and so he was
mercilessly cruel and ended upkilling three of his own sons
and his wife Mariam, all sortsof other people, members of the
royal household, servants,anyone who showed any sign of
(16:08):
revolt.
And just before Jesus well,sort of around the time Jesus
was born there were all kinds ofpushbacks against Herod, and
Herod became increasinglyhorrible.
Jessica LM Jenkins (16:21):
One thing that jumped out to me as I was
reading the book is talkingabout Herod and how he, a little
bit before Jesus was born, hadkilled young men from the region
of Bethlehem and then builtwhat became his tomb later
within the eyesight of Bethlehem, and so that was fascinating to
(16:46):
me.
To fill out the context alittle bit more, no, I mean,
it's visually on the horizon.
Joan E Taylor (16:53):
If you go to Bethlehem today, if you can get
up on the roof of a building andlook towards the south, you
will see Herod's tomb.
It's reconstructed on the side,much, much smaller than it
actually was.
He built that overlookingBethlehem.
He built a palace, fortress,overlooking Bethlehem.
(17:16):
It was called Herodion and it'sto commemorate the site of a
massacre of the localinhabitants that had managed to
see off after they attacked him.
So what had happened was theseParthians had installed their
man, mattathias Antigonus, onthe throne of Judea.
(17:38):
Herod had fled from Jerusalem,fled south past Bethlehem.
The local people who hatedHerod, the guys from Bethlehem
and the surrounding villages,went out and tried to attack him
as he was fleeing, and hemanaged, with his own armed
guard, to defeat them andtotally slaughter them.
(18:00):
But there was a memory of amassacre of young men in the
Bethlehem psyche Right.
That's what I think is sointeresting in terms of a
massacre of young men in theBethlehem psyche Right.
That's what I think is sointeresting in terms of the
massacre of the innocents thatwe have in the Gospel of Matthew
, where Herod massacres smallbabies or boys, that there is
(18:21):
this resonance of what hadhappened in 40 BCE.
It's completely chronologicallydisplaced, but sometimes with
memory that happens.
Some of the details change, thedates change as time goes on,
but the actual event that Herodmassacres people in the
(18:41):
Bethlehem area is actuallyhistorically shown.
It's shown in the writings ofthis Jewish historian, josephus,
who had the court records ofHerod's chronicler, nicolaus of
Damascus.
So it's not like he's dreamt itup.
He's actually got thechronicles of the Herodian court
(19:04):
not the chronicles of theHerodian court.
Jessica LM Jenkins (19:11):
And so we see, as we read the nativity
accounts of Matthew and Luke, wesee how there's this underlying
trauma that the people in thisregion carry that was
precipitated on them by Herodhimself, with visible reminders
on their skyline every singleday, and this is part of the
(19:32):
context that the birth of Jesusis coming into.
Joan E Taylor (19:39):
Exactly, exactly.
And that sense of the bad Romanclient rulers the rich and the
mighty, the ones that have thispower and incredible wealth in
comparison to ordinary people.
Jessica LM Jenkins (19:56):
Absolutely, and you get this class tension
as well between the rich and thepoor, as you said.
Talk to us a little bit.
Can you unpack the significanceof being a son of David?
Bethlehem is the city of David.
Jesus is the son of David.
What is significant about thatfor Jesus personally in his
(20:18):
identity?
Joan E Taylor (20:19):
Yeah, so again, it's one of those things in
terms of my colleagues inhistorical Jesus studies were
doubtful about Jesus actuallybeing the son of David at all,
because there's been this kindof western European, american,
north American idea that, ohwell, you couldn't really
remember your genealogy over allof these generations.
(20:40):
But coming from New Zealand, Isee the indigenous people of New
Zealand remembering theirgenealogy and it's hugely
important across centuries andcenturies, and so the fact that
you can't remember yourgenealogy and recite it this is,
you know, we get trapped intocertain ways of thinking.
(21:00):
But people also doubted thatanyone could remember they were
a descendant of David at thetime and there wasn't much
written about that.
But I found two pieces ofevidence that I thought were
really important and one was alittle ossuary bone box
inscription in which someone isburied and on the bone box it's
(21:23):
of the house of David.
It's that person is identifyingas coming from the Davidic line
.
And also in the Mishnah there'seven a job description, the
early Jewish writing for thedescendants of David who have to
take wood to the altar ofJerusalem.
So there were descendants ofDavid around and you would
(21:44):
expect them to be in theancestral town of David, which
is so Herod actually buildinghis fortress palace tomb
overlooking Bethlehem is alsothis idea of Bethlehem being a
place where descendants of Davidlived.
And if you were a descendant ofDavid, you had a lot of hope
(22:06):
attached to you because therewere predictions that there
would be someone from the lineof David who would return to the
throne of Israel.
Micah, chapter five, even talksabout Bethlehem as the place
that the future king, theMessiah, is going to come.
This future king, the Messiah,is going to come.
(22:27):
So if you were from that lineof David and you had these
scriptural predictions thatsomeone from the line of David
would rise to liberate and leadIsrael, that would be a weight
on your shoulders.
There would be a sense of okay,someone from our family is
supposed to lead Israel.
(22:48):
What does that mean?
What does that mean?
And actually I think that whatwe have in the Gospels is a kind
of working out of what itreally meant to be a son of
David for Jesus.
You know there's expectation,there's prophecy, but what does
(23:09):
it really mean?
Does it mean being a greatwarrior and riding your horse
and getting an army together andliberating Jerusalem, only to
get clobbered by the Romans?
Or does it mean somethingdifferent?
How can you think outside thebox?
Jessica LM Jenkins (23:35):
Right, because so many of the messianic
type figures or rebel leadersthat rose up during that time
period were purely military,entirely, and so Jesus was a
complete contrast to what peoplewere expecting, absolutely
During this time period.
There's a lot of violence andrevolts and wars between the
Jewish people and the rulers.
Was there specific politicalaggression against the house of
(23:58):
David, in particular during thistime period?
Joan E Taylor (24:01):
Herod particularly moved against the
memory of David.
To start off with, there was atomb of David remembered in the
middle of Jerusalem.
It was quite a major monumentin Jerusalem.
It's referred to in the Acts ofthe Apostles.
You know David's tomb was inthe city and he went into the
(24:24):
tomb in the middle of the nightwith a bunch of his closest
associates and took the treasureout of the tomb.
So that's a tomb desecration,that's a tomb robbery, and it
wasn't said that it was done forany great reason other than he
wanted the money and he went in.
(24:45):
According to Josephus, he wentinto the deepest part of this
tomb and actually some weirdthing happened and that fire
burst out when he entered thisdeep recess, which I think is
kind of curious, because it'salmost like there was a gas
which you can have in tombs thathave been ignited by the, the
(25:08):
torches that they brought intothe tomb.
So I find that quite plausible,but it's.
It shocked herod and he thenbuilt a propitiatory monument, a
kind of saying sorry monumentoutside the tomb.
But it was remembered that thatherod had done this and as time
goes by we get memories ofearly Christian scholars who say
(25:33):
that Jesus' family who are alsodescended from David, were
targeted by the Romans.
So Jesus' family I think one ofthe what I really wanted to do
in the book is is place Jesuswithin a family, so he's not
just a lone figure, right, andnot at all.
Sometimes you see Jesus with hismother, of course, but it's not
(25:58):
as if he's presented within awider family circle, and I think
that everyone grows up within.
You know, we grow up withinfamilies and this is important
and they shape us.
Well, the family of Jesus tookover the control of the Judean
churches after he was no longeraround.
(26:19):
His brother, james, was incharge of the church in
Jerusalem until 62.
It goes on through other familymembers Jerusalem until 62.
It goes on through other familymembers.
The last family member isSimeon, who is executed by the
(26:41):
Romans as a descendant of Davidand a Christian.
The grandsons of his brother,jude, were interrogated by the
Romans as possibly being able tolead an army.
They were descended from David,the Emperor Vespasian
apparently, according toHedgesippus, another Christian
writer, tried to wipe out all ofthe descendants of David.
So the Romans knew there wasthis prediction of the Messiah
(27:05):
from the line of David and theywanted to get rid of all of them
.
So again, that ties in with themassacre.
Jessica LM Jenkins (27:14):
Yes, and with the Romans trying to get
rid of the line of David, wasthat before Jesus was born, so
he would have been growing upwith that tension?
Or was that after his life anddeath and resurrection growing?
Joan E Taylor (27:27):
up with that tension or was that after his
life and death and resurrection?
It's attested.
I mean, herod's desecration ofthe tomb was 10 BCE and normally
Jesus is understood to havebeen born around and very
confusingly I say BCE, 6, bce, 6BC.
So Jesus was born six yearsbefore Christ.
This is the peculiarity of ourchronological system, right, so
(27:52):
we tend to say BCE is beforecommon era, right?
So it doesn't sound absolutelycrazy, but he was born in the
last years of Herod the Great,and that is clear from the
nativity accounts.
Yeah, last years of Herod theGreat, and that is clear from
the nativity accounts.
Yeah.
And also to make sense of thefact that he was around 30 years
(28:13):
of age when he comes to Johnthe.
Baptist in the year 28, in the14th year of the Emperor
Tiberius.
So it does all work out, butthose final years of Herod, only
a few years before hedesecrated the tomb of David,
and clearly with the blessing ofthe Romans, because they didn't
want anyone from the line ofDavid coming up to cause a
(28:36):
problem in Judea.
Jessica LM Jenkins (28:38):
Yeah, okay.
So Jesus is growing up in atime of great political turmoil.
We have violent revoltshappening.
Herod is massacring people, sohe is born in Bethlehem.
They flee to Egypt.
Talk to us about what's goingon.
(29:00):
When Joseph brings the familyback from Egypt, the political
situation has shifted becauseHerod the Great died.
So what is going on withArchelaus and the other Herod in
Galilee?
What's the situation there?
Joan E Taylor (29:19):
Well, it's complete mayhem at the time of
Herod's death.
Herod, just before he died, haddone the most horrific thing,
which is he had burnt alive thestudents of a particular couple
of teachers in Jerusalem who hadtorn down the Roman golden
(29:40):
eagle from the front of thetemple.
So it was a very anti-Romangesture and all sorts of
abominations that he was doinghappened and then he dies and
everyone's traumatised.
You know, after all of theseterrible things Right.
And the question is who is hisheir?
(30:03):
And whoever is the heir has tothen be approved by Rome, and so
there's this instability.
Jessica LM Jenkins (30:17):
At that point, a number of revolutionary
leaders, as you mentionedbefore, rise up and try and take
back Judea as an independentarea and so all of this is going
on, kind of if we just try tokeep the biblical timeline while
Jesus and Joseph and his familyare in Egypt.
All of this is going on kind ofif we just try to keep the
biblical timeline while Jesusand Joseph and his family are in
Egypt, all of this instabilityis happening in Judah, Palestine
, Israel, yeah, Okay.
Joan E Taylor (30:36):
Instability in terms of a liberation movement,
with various different formshappening, happening, and one of
the things that happen is arevolutionary leader called
Judas takes the capital ofGalilee, sepphoris, which is
just down the road from Nazareth, and creates an independent
area in Galilee.
(30:57):
So that's very important interms of the background for the
Gospel of Matthew, because whatwe have is Joseph feeling, you
know, getting a message that hecan return because the people
that were the great threat havegone, that's Herod and people
associated with Herod.
(31:18):
But then it says, when he heardthat Archelaus was ruler of
Judea, he goes to Galilee.
Well, that's very interesting,because what happens in Judea,
in Jerusalem, is that Archelauskind of takes control.
He still needs to be given theokay by Rome, but he takes
(31:40):
control.
But what has happened is hugenumbers of people have encamped
in the temple demandingliberation, that they can
independent, state and um, hetries to take control of the
situation and ends up massacringthousands of people in in the
jerusalem temple.
(32:01):
So it's a horrific bloodbathand and Archelaus has then
proven to be no better than hisfather, in fact, probably worse,
in various different ways.
Jessica LM Jenkins (32:12):
Didn't you say in the book he crucified
like 2,000 people, right outsideJerusalem, in that area?
Joan E Taylor (32:19):
That's right.
Well, it's the Roman legatefrom Antioch, varus, who comes
down in support of Archelaus.
Okay, it's remembered as thiswar of Varus, this enormous
onslaught by the Romans.
You never messed with theRomans.
Jessica LM Jenkins (32:36):
No, you never won.
Joan E Taylor (32:39):
The Romans came down from Syria with a huge army
including Nabataeans and allsorts of other client rulers who
came in and joined them andthey just went through and they
actually defeated Judas inGalilee and the city of
Sepphoris and enslaved theentire population, as Romans did
(33:02):
.
And they went down to Jerusalemand just annihilated all of the
opposition and cruelly executedyeah, crucified people, and
people fled to the, the Judeanwilderness.
They were hunted down there.
They didn't want to leaveanyone alive who had revolted
(33:23):
against them.
So that incredible cruelty.
And and so what I think of is ofJoseph taking his family back
from Egypt.
They think they're going hometo Bethlehem.
They veer off, as it says inthe Gospel of Matthew, from
Judea to Galilee, where there'sa bit of respite.
(33:43):
There isn't.
Where there's a bit of respite,there isn't a Roman client king
in charge at that time only tohave Varus' armies arrive and
torch Sephoris.
And from Nazareth.
You would have gone up on thehill behind Nazareth and be able
to see Sephoris burn.
And I think, okay, little boyjesus, you know that the smoke
(34:09):
of burning sephorus, um, Iremember myself as a personal
story when I was a child um, ahouse burnt down the end of our
road and I remember I would onlyhave been about three.
Okay, I remember crying.
I sat on the on the sidewalkoutside our house and and cried,
(34:33):
and I remember my motherpicking me up and saying oh you
know, come inside and for for achild to see terrible
destruction has a huge impact onyou.
Jessica LM Jenkins (34:46):
And this I feel like trying to choose my
words, thinking about Jesus'childhood as a mother.
In the context, herodbrutalizes the people of
Bethlehem, builds the Herodianright outside, where they can
see it.
Jesus, that's about 30 yearsbefore Jesus is born.
(35:08):
Jesus is born in Bethlehem.
They're afraid of Herod.
They flee to Egypt.
Joseph is told to come backonce Herod the Great dies.
He's like I don't want to dealwith Archelaus in Judea because
he's just as bad.
I'm going to go up to Nazarethwhere right now you described,
there's a kind of a littlepocket of Judean control.
(35:31):
We're going to go to Nazareth.
We'll be safe.
We're from the line of David.
We're already, as our family,in a precarious position.
They get to Nazareth only tohave the Roman army come through
and the city they can see fromwhere they're living gets burned
, and Jesus could have watchedthat as a little boy.
Joan E Taylor (35:50):
Exactly, it's huge In terms of impact.
It's not said, but it's hintedat.
If you just put Jesus in thecontext of the times, that is
actually what happened.
Jessica LM Jenkins (36:06):
Jesus in the context of the times, that is
actually what happened, and sohis entire ministry, as an adult
, is he's ministering in and toa people group that is
fundamentally and profoundlytraumatized.
His entire ministry is reachingto the poor, lower class groups
(36:28):
that have been absolutelybrutalized and traumatized by
the ruling powers.
So it's not just oh, we don'tprefer Rome, we'd rather be free
.
They have been completelytraumatized and his entire
(36:50):
ministry is in some ways lifting, giving people hope in the
middle of their intense trauma,which he experienced alongside
them as a child.
Joan E Taylor (36:58):
Absolutely, and I think that there's a.
He turns things around.
So instead of thinking ofliberation in terms of a
military way, he's thinking of akind of new way of being, a new
way of operating.
So I mean, I want to explorethat more in the next book that
(37:20):
I'm writing.
Jesus, but just you know, interms of what the trauma has
meant personally to Jesus, Ithink, when he sends out his
apostles, when he sends out the12 to the villages of Galilee,
he asks them to go out to avillage without anything,
(37:41):
without a change of clothing,without extra clothing, without
food, without any money in theirbelts.
They can have sandals, they canhave a walking stick, but they
basically arrive in a villagelooking like poor refugees, not
trying to be anything, nottrying to look fancy.
(38:01):
They're not arriving in suitsand looking like they have it
all.
They're looking the veryopposite.
So it sort of turns everythingaround and he indicates that
anyone who doesn't welcome suchpeople, well, that's what's
going to invite God's justiceultimately.
(38:24):
You know it's a what you giveyou get, kind of thing.
And so he embraces in some waythe model of being hit by the
world.
In a way he goes well, God ison the side of those who have
(38:47):
suffered.
God is on the side of thedowntrodden and the poor and the
marginalised, actually, and ifGod is on your side, actually,
that's mightier than the.
Roman emperor, wow, and it'sstrengthening you against the
claims of Rome.
Jessica LM Jenkins (39:07):
And so that, in his teachings, would have
had a profound impact on thegroups who were trying to align
themselves with Rome religiously.
The Sadducees, the Pharisees,didn't love Rome, but they still
had a bit more power and classthan the average people did, and
so Jesus' message to thisincredibly traumatized group
(39:30):
would have automatically pittedhim against those trying to seek
their own welfare by aligningthemselves with Rome.
Joan E Taylor (39:39):
Absolutely, and a lot of the things he says about
the rich and the mighty.
Behind that is the sense thatyou are rich and mighty in a
world that is aligning itselfwith Rome, that you are
benefiting somehow from thepresent world order.
You know, in the temptationnarrative when Jesus meets Satan
(40:03):
in the wilderness.
Satan basically tempts Jesuswith saying look, you can have
all of this, you can be emperor,you can be world emperor.
And Jesus just pushes rightback at that.
It's the absolute opposite ofwhat God is about.
Jessica LM Jenkins (40:20):
Which, in this context, is profound,
because people are expecting,they're looking for a military
Messiah to be ruler king overJudah, israel and maybe even
more of the world, and Satanoffers that and Jesus is like.
That's not the way this kingdomworks.
Joan E Taylor (40:38):
Yeah, I came to serve, not be served.
Jessica LM Jenkins (40:41):
Oh, it completely shifts everything.
Wow, talk to us a little bitmore about Nazareth.
When he was a boy we often hearthink about Nazareth as kind of
this idyllic picture, as aquiet Nazareth, as kind of this
idyllic picture as a quiet,backwater, nowhere town, where
(41:02):
Jesus is just kind of growing up, running on the hills and
playing and he's a simplepeasant boy.
It's a quiet, unassuming lifein this little tiny, nowhere
town.
How much of that matches whatwe know of Nazareth and Galilee
in this time period.
Joan E Taylor (41:17):
Yeah, Nazareth, we don't know, how big Nazareth
was, because very littlearchaeological excavation has
taken place in Nazareth, but weknow that Galilee generally was
very densely populated.
There were a lot of villagesvery close by.
So it's not like Jesus, whenwalking around Galilee, would
(41:38):
have gone very far beforehitting another village, and
that's been shown by manyarchaeological surveys.
And this dense population,things like various different
diseases, would have been rife.
There would have been highinfant mortality.
There seems to have been evenwithin we can see it in jesus
(42:00):
own teaching a lot of povertyday laborers going out to work
in the fields and just beingready for hire.
The lands were largelycontrolled by rich landowners.
So this, this is the wealth andthe poverty.
There was a certain amount ofvillage land and you know poor
(42:23):
farmers as well, but there werethese.
There would have beenRoman-style villas where there
were wealthy landowners and theyalso feature in Jesus' parables
.
He reflects the time in terms ofwhat he presents there and this
bubbling of discontent.
(42:44):
Josephus talks about theGalileans as being rather macho
warrior guys, you know, wantingto fire off right.
And the message of Judas, whogot thoroughly defeated, was
percolating all along andactually then erupted in the 60s
(43:06):
when the Judean, the greatrevolt happened when the Judeans
, spearheaded by the Galileans,in fact revolted against Rome.
So all of that, you know, wasunder the surface.
There was banditry, banditcaves, sort of.
(43:27):
If you think about the ancientworld, there's no police in the
ancient world, right, yeah, andthere's a lot of crime.
Yeah, it's not a safeenvironment.
You rely on your villagecommunity to support you.
Um, I I think that one of thethings that I noticed was how um
(43:49):
josephus, when he became a aleader of the the revolt himself
, before he switched sides inthe 60s, um, he very quickly
assembled a huge galilean army,and so he knew about what
galileans were like, and I think, okay, if they were this kind
of warrior style uh people, thenum jesus would probably have
(44:15):
been learned learning to fightlike other boys in his village.
Learning to fight in manycultures is just what you grow
up with.
So I think sometimes we thinkabout Jesus, you know, learning
carpentry or the synagogueschool and learning Bible and
all of these things and it beingquite peaceful, but I think
(44:36):
about him also having to learnhow to fight.
Yeah, wield a knife.
Jessica LM Jenkins (44:43):
Yeah, we don't think of Jesus being
scrappy and ready to battle andthen choosing to go the complete
opposite way.
Joan E Taylor (44:51):
Exactly.
So again, you know, turn theother cheek.
You know, if someone asks youto walk one mile, go with them
to.
You know that sense of we'reconsciously going to push back
at you by doing something youdon't expect.
You know you being the attackerin this situation.
(45:13):
So it's a.
It's a it's not passive.
It's an act of turning thingsaround and witnessing to someone
who would otherwise be violenttowards you.
Jessica LM Jenkins (45:34):
How were they important for the early
church?
Because the Gospels werewritten after, right after, the
Great Revolt in 60, 70 AD, whereJerusalem was destroyed.
The Gospels are written afterthat?
Joan E Taylor (45:48):
Am I correct Absolutely?
The first Gospel, the Gospel ofMark, is probably written
shortly after 70, when Jerusalemwas destroyed by the Romans.
Jessica LM Jenkins (46:03):
And so these themes that are all through the
Gospels and all through Jesus'early life would have been
incredibly important for theearly church.
How would that have broughthope and comfort to the early
church?
Joan E Taylor (46:14):
That's a big question.
Jessica LM Jenkins (46:17):
And I sort of have to think about it?
Joan E Taylor (46:19):
Hope and comfort, I think, in a culture where
clubs and societies could bebanned very, very quickly by the
Romans.
This is the Roman world andthere are spies everywhere and
anyone who has any kind of whiffof objection to what the, the
(46:41):
roman, imperial um family, issaying is a traitor and
treasonous.
And you, you die, um.
There there would have beenhope and comfort, but there's
also a preparedness to take theconsequences to.
You know, jesus said to hisdisciples whoever wants to
(47:02):
follow me has to take up theircross.
You know, and follow me.
And they were prepared to dieand in fact they did in the
persecution by Nero in Romeafter the fire of Rome in 64.
That's probably when both Peterand Paul were killed.
(47:23):
So that sense of don't expectthe world to look after you
actually, because the world ishas gone wrong and trust in God
and the right way of followingJesus and his teaching.
But yeah, this is not aboutmaking a safe place for yourself
(47:47):
in the world.
Your hope and comfort reallycomes with a faith in something
much deeper and more meaningfulabout what life is about.
Jessica LM Jenkins (48:00):
So, joan, for you personally, as we wrap
things up, studying Jesus,studying him in context,
studying his childhood, for youpersonally, how does that impact
your walk with Jesus, yourpersonal faith?
Joan E Taylor (48:17):
It does.
All the time.
I feel I learn all the time asI go into the past.
I often feel like Jesus setssuch an incredibly high bar in
terms of a model, if you thinkof him.
as you know, I'm a Quaker andpart of the Society of Friends,
(48:47):
and it's a sense of you look toJesus as an ethical model and a
guide and a support, but he's sofar out in the distance in
terms of what we can achieve.
In terms of what we can achievebut still setting his moral
stance, seeing him create thatmoral standard, is really,
really important and discerningit and being true to it as much
(49:11):
as we can in our own evil way, Ithink is very important for me
and that's why I think it isimportant also to be part of a
faith community, whatever faithcommunity feels comfortable for
you, because we need each other.
We're not just single peopleout in the world, you know,
(49:32):
we're not just little islands.
We need to be clusteredtogether and support each other
Absolutely.
Jessica LM Jenkins (49:41):
Thank you so much, Joan, for coming and
sharing with us about all ofyour writings and your wisdom.
For those who are listening,you can get her Boy Jesus book
now.
It came out March 11th.
She does an excellent job inBoy Jesus, walking through the
scholarship and the background.
There's so much more in thebook than we can get to in our
(50:03):
brief conversation today, but Iwill put in the social media
posts all of her books.
Not all of her books, becauseshe has a lot, but I'll
highlight a few of her booksthat are available, as well as
Boy Jesus.
Joan, we greatly appreciate youtaking the time to come talk
with us about this and Ipersonally can't wait to dive
(50:26):
into some of your otherresources as well.
Joan E Taylor (50:28):
Well, thank you so much.
I really enjoyed being here andI appreciate your questions,
Thank you so much.
Jessica LM Jenkins (50:38):
I've been really blessed by this
conversation.
I'm going to be pondering on alot of the themes that we've
brought up in this conversationfor a long time, and I think
it's going to help me personallyreally, as I interpret the
Gospels and think about theoverall context, especially how
Jesus is ministering in the faceof trauma and PTSD symptoms
(51:03):
constantly.
Trauma and PTSD is the culturalcontext in which Jesus' entire
ministry is taking place, and sothat's just one of the many
things I'm going to be chewingon as I come back to the texts
of Scripture.
After engaging with you andreading your work, I am so
thankful for you and for yourwork and I cannot wait to read
(51:28):
more.
Thank you, thanks so much.
You're so welcome.
Well, I'm going to close us offnow.
Well, I'm going to close us offnow and one of our next
episodes we will be returning towomen of the Bible in their
historical context.
So when I return to the we whoThirst podcast next, that is
what we will be going back to.
(51:48):
Thank you all for tuning in andlistening and have a great week
.
Welcome back .
Today we are taking a breakfrom our Women in Context
discussions to talk with JoanTaylor about her study of Jesus
in Context.
Joan Taylor is the author ofmany books on ancient religion,
history and archaeology.
She is a New Zealander ofAnglo-Danish heritage and is the
(00:21):
Professor Emerita of ChristianOrigins and Second Temple
Judaism at King's College London.
Joan, thank you so much forbeing with us today.
Thank you for having me.
Can you tell us a little bitmore about yourself and
especially what got youinterested in New Testament
study?
Joan E Taylor (00:41):
Well, that is a very big question in that I
guess I was brought up in aChristian family and went to
Sunday school, went to churchand during my teenage years got
fascinated, as I was actuallythe confirmation experience at
(01:03):
my Methodist church that I wasgoing to in Lower Hutt in New
Zealand.
The minister there was reallyright on in terms of inquiry and
that got me interested andknowledgeable about the fact
that books had been writtenabout how to interpret the Bible
and the history and that reallyset me off.
(01:24):
But I traveled to Israel,Palestine in my early 20s and
roamed around there, went to alot of archaeological sites,
went to museums.
All of these things feed intoan interest and yeah, it really
does.
(01:44):
I was like this is what I needto study.
Jessica LM Jenkins (01:46):
Yes, I relate.
Yes, I know from being inIsrael myself I spent nine
months there that once you'rethere, you just can't get it out
of your, your blood.
You're like I just have to keeplearning all about this for
ever.
Joan E Taylor (02:00):
Absolutely.
Jessica LM Jenkins (02:02):
So I've been , joan.
I've been reading through yournewest book, which is titled Boy
Jesus, and we'll get back tothat, but I know you've written
up quite a few other books aswell.
Can you tell us some of thebooks that you've written?
Joan E Taylor (02:15):
Oh, all kinds of different things I have written
on John the Baptist.
That was one of my earliest onesthe Immerser, john the Baptist
and Second Temple Judaism, andthat really got me into looking
at a figure of the New Testamentwithin the context of his time
and thinking about how he wouldhave appeared at that time.
(02:39):
I've written quite a bit on theDead Sea Scrolls, the context
for the Dead Sea Scrolls, thegroups like, well, the Essenes,
who I normally considered thoseresponsible for the Dead Sea
Scrolls, and this really weirdgroup over in Alexandria called
(03:05):
the Therapeuti, who werecontemporaries of Jesus and
early Christianity, and we'redoing something quite different
over there in Alexandria inEgypt.
So I've written about Philo ofAlexandria, who was also
contemporary and had his ownparticular ideas, philosophical
Jewish ideas.
So I roam into all of thesedifferent nooks and crannies
really whenever I'm interested.
(03:26):
But I also write and havewritten quite a bit over the
years on women and gender issuesin the New Testament and in the
early church and also inJudaism.
I was particularly in the womentherapeutic, for example.
Yeah, oh yeah, yeah.
So, yeah, trying to understandwhat it was like for women, uh,
(03:48):
around jesus.
I wrote a book with helen bondwomen remembered, oh, female
disciples and saw that.
And we also, uh, did adocumentary that is out there on
YouTube.
Okay, you can look at it.
Oh, I'll have to look that up.
Yeah, the new evidence forJesus' female disciples.
(04:10):
Okay, some of the new evidencefor Jesus' female disciples and
really how they were rememberedin the early church.
Jessica LM Jenkins (04:18):
Oh, I haven't found that yet, so I
will definitely look that up.
That sounds fascinating andI'll put a link to that in the
show notes for anybody elsewho's listening.
It's like oh, I want to look atthat too, so I will find that
and put a link on social mediaposts and in the show notes of
this episode.
(04:39):
Thank you, wonderful.
I just did a search, for JoanTaylor was looking at several of
the books you did.
Women Remembered was one of thefirst ones I noticed.
I was like, okay, we're goingto talk about Boy Jesus, which
is amazing, but can you justtell us a little bit about what
Women Remembered is about andwhat you did in that book?
Joan E Taylor (04:57):
Yeah, it did spring from our documentary and
with the documentary we pitchedthe idea to a television
production company, which isquite unusual for scholars.
Normally TV production peoplecome to you and go we want you
to say these things in as shorta time as possible.
(05:18):
And Helen and I had done quite abit of documentary work and we
thought we can do a documentaryand we pitched it and it was
picked up by these people atMinerva Media and we made it.
Um, we, we were on the roaddoing a lot of talking while we
were making the documentary andwe focused on certain, um,
(05:41):
certain women who were disciplesof Jesus, of course, course,
mary Magdalene, yes, but alsoSalome, who was a rather
mysterious figure, and thefigures mentioned in the Gospel
of Luke, like Joanna, who waswife of Cusa, herod's steward
you know, mystery, mystery, yesand sat in the theatre at
(06:06):
Tiberius and just brainstormedon what her life was like.
And because we were doing a lotof brainstorming which wasn't
all picked up by the documentary, we just had so much time to
talk, right, okay, we need to dothis book where we go into what
we can possibly know aboutthese named figures, but also
(06:28):
what we might know about some ofthe unnamed figures who were
clearly Jesus' disciples, likethe woman with the issue of
blood.
She's not named in the Gospels.
She's remembered as beingcalled Veronique, okay, but
she's not named.
But clearly she was telling herstory.
(06:49):
Yes, because there's no way youwould have known about her
experience unless she had toldthat story.
So that idea of women tellingstories to other women was one
of the things that was a threadthrough our book and just really
pointing out that our textsshine the light on the guys.
You know, they're interested inthe men, they're not interested
(07:12):
in the women.
It's a man's world.
But that doesn't meanhistorically there weren't right
women and we know from theresurrection accounts that women
were absolutely everything.
They were.
What was going on there?
Yeah, yeah.
That's the book in a nutshell.
Jessica LM Jenkins (07:31):
I love that.
So I noticed a few of yourother books that you've written
as well, and I cannot wait tobuy Women Remembered.
I'm going to get that as soonas possible.
But I noticed you've alsowritten a book on what Jesus
looked like.
You've written books onChristians in the holy places,
which that one.
I thought that one seemed veryscholarly.
(07:52):
But I just wanted to pick yourbrain briefly on that, because
I've traveled to Israel andthere's all the holy sites in
Israel and the people I wasthere with mentioned that many
of those may not be actuallyaccurate.
Like they say, this is thechurch of the fish and the
loaves.
But do we?
(08:12):
Are the holy sites in Israelaccurate to where those events
actually happened?
Joan E Taylor (08:19):
Yeah, some of them are.
Some of them are, and I think,for example, that the Gethsemane
cave not the garden ofGethsemane, but the Gethsemane
cave is recorded very early onin terms of Christian tradition
as the place where it allhappened.
And that idea of it being acave fits in with our gospel
(08:39):
accounts and I've written aboutthat that Jesus leaves somewhere
and comes back somewhere andthey're all sheltered in the
very cold night that the nighthe was arrested.
So that makes sense.
But then we've got to rememberthat some sites were revealed to
people in dreams, like, forexample you know it's not in the
(09:09):
book, but the cave of John theBaptist on the eastern side of
the Jordan River.
The story is that there was amonk who spent the night in a
cave and John the Baptistappeared to him in a dream.
This is a very important cave.
Pay attention to it.
And then it was considered tobe the cave where John lived and
it attracted a lot of pilgrims.
So with any given holy site, youdon't know really whether
(09:32):
there's a firm tradition behindthem or whether it's been
revealed, because in theByzantine period, that idea that
you would get an angel or a, asaint right telling you this is
this, these are my bones, orright?
This is a really importantplace.
Um, that, uh, that that wasreally important for them, that
(09:54):
that direct revelation, heavenlyrevelation, was more important
than anyone saying, oh, we cantrace a memory right back, you
know.
Yeah, you know, really, theyvalued that.
So when we come along, we haveto do all of the critical
thinking and think, ok, wheredoes it belong in terms of
(10:15):
tradition and when did peoplefirst start coming here?
Jessica LM Jenkins (10:20):
Yes, our values and our ways of measuring
knowledge are different nowthan back then.
We have a different approach.
Joan E Taylor (10:29):
Which is not to say you know wonderful things
can be, you know there could bewonderful things revealed in
dreams and visions.
Absolutely you know.
But you know, to be reallyforensic and scientific, we want
to know what the earliest stuffis.
Jessica LM Jenkins (10:44):
Absolutely so.
Let's talk about your newestbook, Boy Jesus.
What prompted you to do such adeep research into Jesus'
childhood?
Joan E Taylor (10:56):
I think there's a whole lot of different things.
It's partly just being a mumand thinking about how important
childhood is, you know, wantingto being aware of the
experiences of my children andhow that has shaped them and
also being aware of theexperiences that have shaped me
(11:18):
and also my mother.
Frankly, my mum, her childhoodwas quite traumatic.
She was you mentioned me beingAnglo-Danish Mum is Danish, okay
, and she's very elderly now,but she was in occupied
Copenhagen during the SecondWorld War and she has
(11:42):
experiences that then werepassed on to me and I can
emotionally live through mymother in terms of the traumatic
experiences during that timeand I thought about okay, jesus,
a child of Jesus.
We have these accounts, thesenativity accounts, and both
(12:06):
nativity accounts indicatetrauma of some kind and
displacement of some kind, andit made me think so what is that
?
What is going on here?
And I want to sort of thinkmore about the historical
context and place Jesus'childhood within that historical
context.
(12:26):
Even if we are really, reallydoubtful about the nativity
accounts and a lot of mycolleagues in historical studies
are, I thought, okay, the leastwe can do is put Jesus in his
time as a child.
Jessica LM Jenkins (12:39):
Yeah, yeah, and that I found that to be
really profound in the book.
I have a master's in Israelstudy, so I've learned some of
this, but people who have notdone even a little bit of study
I've done are often completelyunaware of the historical
context and everything that'sgoing on socially and
(13:00):
politically during that timeperiod.
Can you just give us a highlevel overview of the what's
going on in that time period therevolts, the turmoil and all of
that, just so that my audiencecan start to understand this
picture?
Joan E Taylor (13:18):
Yeah, no, it's big, it's a huge amount of stuff
going on.
Jessica LM Jenkins (13:25):
And you outline it really well in the
book.
Joan E Taylor (13:28):
We try to boil it down.
We know in the nativity accountsthere is bad King Herod and he
sort of turns up as a pantomimevillain.
You know, bad you know.
But that actually relied on theaudience having an experience
of King Herod which was negative, and there were very many
(13:49):
reasons for that.
So the big picture is that theRomans had come in and really
wanted to install their peoplein charge of Judea.
So 63 BCE, pompey comes in andgoes into Jerusalem and takes
over and then the Romans takecontrol and they rule via client
(14:14):
rulers wherever they takecontrol.
So Herod is a Roman client king.
He's in the pay of Rome and hehas to do everything right by
Rome.
He had trouble initially takingcharge.
The great enemy of Rome, theParthians you think modern Iran,
(14:34):
it's the same area.
The Parthians wanted their guyin Judea.
They pushed back.
Herod pushed back with the armyof Mark Antony and got control.
It's all very Roman stuff.
And then Herod really wanted tokeep that control.
What the Romans wanted waseverything to be peaceful,
(14:58):
meaning they could harness asmuch taxation from these sorts
of places as possible.
They could have a lot of honourtemples built for the Roman
emperor, and Herod builtimperial cult temples so that
the Roman emperor would beworshipped.
(15:18):
So he was Rome's man, and partof being Rome's man was to quash
any even slight smidgen ofrevolt, and we, herod,
interpreted that as anythingthat would impact detrimentally
on his own rule, because he wasplaced there by rome, he was
(15:40):
placed there by God, you know,ruler of Judea, and so he was
mercilessly cruel and ended upkilling three of his own sons
and his wife Mariam, all sortsof other people, members of the
royal household, servants,anyone who showed any sign of
(16:08):
revolt.
And just before Jesus well,sort of around the time Jesus
was born there were all kinds ofpushbacks against Herod, and
Herod became increasinglyhorrible.
Jessica LM Jenkins (16:21):
One thing that jumped out to me as I was
reading the book is talkingabout Herod and how he, a little
bit before Jesus was born, hadkilled young men from the region
of Bethlehem and then builtwhat became his tomb later
within the eyesight of Bethlehem, and so that was fascinating to
(16:46):
me.
To fill out the context alittle bit more, no, I mean,
it's visually on the horizon.
Joan E Taylor (16:53):
If you go to Bethlehem today, if you can get
up on the roof of a building andlook towards the south, you
will see Herod's tomb.
It's reconstructed on the side,much, much smaller than it
actually was.
He built that overlookingBethlehem.
He built a palace, fortress,overlooking Bethlehem.
(17:16):
It was called Herodion and it'sto commemorate the site of a
massacre of the localinhabitants that had managed to
see off after they attacked him.
So what had happened was theseParthians had installed their
man, mattathias Antigonus, onthe throne of Judea.
(17:38):
Herod had fled from Jerusalem,fled south past Bethlehem.
The local people who hatedHerod, the guys from Bethlehem
and the surrounding villages,went out and tried to attack him
as he was fleeing, and hemanaged, with his own armed
guard, to defeat them andtotally slaughter them.
(18:00):
But there was a memory of amassacre of young men in the
Bethlehem psyche Right.
That's what I think is sointeresting in terms of a
massacre of young men in theBethlehem psyche Right.
That's what I think is sointeresting in terms of the
massacre of the innocents thatwe have in the Gospel of Matthew
, where Herod massacres smallbabies or boys, that there is
(18:21):
this resonance of what hadhappened in 40 BCE.
It's completely chronologicallydisplaced, but sometimes with
memory that happens.
Some of the details change, thedates change as time goes on,
but the actual event that Herodmassacres people in the
(18:41):
Bethlehem area is actuallyhistorically shown.
It's shown in the writings ofthis Jewish historian, josephus,
who had the court records ofHerod's chronicler, nicolaus of
Damascus.
So it's not like he's dreamt itup.
He's actually got thechronicles of the Herodian court
(19:04):
not the chronicles of theHerodian court.
Jessica LM Jenkins (19:11):
And so we see, as we read the nativity
accounts of Matthew and Luke, wesee how there's this underlying
trauma that the people in thisregion carry that was
precipitated on them by Herodhimself, with visible reminders
on their skyline every singleday, and this is part of the
(19:32):
context that the birth of Jesusis coming into.
Joan E Taylor (19:39):
Exactly, exactly.
And that sense of the bad Romanclient rulers the rich and the
mighty, the ones that have thispower and incredible wealth in
comparison to ordinary people.
Jessica LM Jenkins (19:56):
Absolutely, and you get this class tension
as well between the rich and thepoor, as you said.
Talk to us a little bit.
Can you unpack the significanceof being a son of David?
Bethlehem is the city of David.
Jesus is the son of David.
What is significant about thatfor Jesus personally in his
(20:18):
identity?
Joan E Taylor (20:19):
Yeah, so again, it's one of those things in
terms of my colleagues inhistorical Jesus studies were
doubtful about Jesus actuallybeing the son of David at all,
because there's been this kindof western European, american,
north American idea that, ohwell, you couldn't really
remember your genealogy over allof these generations.
(20:40):
But coming from New Zealand, Isee the indigenous people of New
Zealand remembering theirgenealogy and it's hugely
important across centuries andcenturies, and so the fact that
you can't remember yourgenealogy and recite it this is,
you know, we get trapped intocertain ways of thinking.
(21:00):
But people also doubted thatanyone could remember they were
a descendant of David at thetime and there wasn't much
written about that.
But I found two pieces ofevidence that I thought were
really important and one was alittle ossuary bone box
inscription in which someone isburied and on the bone box it's
(21:23):
of the house of David.
It's that person is identifyingas coming from the Davidic line
.
And also in the Mishnah there'seven a job description, the
early Jewish writing for thedescendants of David who have to
take wood to the altar ofJerusalem.
So there were descendants ofDavid around and you would
(21:44):
expect them to be in theancestral town of David, which
is so Herod actually buildinghis fortress palace tomb
overlooking Bethlehem is alsothis idea of Bethlehem being a
place where descendants of Davidlived.
And if you were a descendant ofDavid, you had a lot of hope
(22:06):
attached to you because therewere predictions that there
would be someone from the lineof David who would return to the
throne of Israel.
Micah, chapter five, even talksabout Bethlehem as the place
that the future king, theMessiah, is going to come.
This future king, the Messiah,is going to come.
(22:27):
So if you were from that lineof David and you had these
scriptural predictions thatsomeone from the line of David
would rise to liberate and leadIsrael, that would be a weight
on your shoulders.
There would be a sense of okay,someone from our family is
supposed to lead Israel.
(22:48):
What does that mean?
What does that mean?
And actually I think that whatwe have in the Gospels is a kind
of working out of what itreally meant to be a son of
David for Jesus.
You know there's expectation,there's prophecy, but what does
(23:09):
it really mean?
Does it mean being a greatwarrior and riding your horse
and getting an army together andliberating Jerusalem, only to
get clobbered by the Romans?
Or does it mean somethingdifferent?
How can you think outside thebox?
Jessica LM Jenkins (23:35):
Right, because so many of the messianic
type figures or rebel leadersthat rose up during that time
period were purely military,entirely, and so Jesus was a
complete contrast to what peoplewere expecting, absolutely
During this time period.
There's a lot of violence andrevolts and wars between the
Jewish people and the rulers.
Was there specific politicalaggression against the house of
(23:58):
David, in particular during thistime period?
Joan E Taylor (24:01):
Herod particularly moved against the
memory of David.
To start off with, there was atomb of David remembered in the
middle of Jerusalem.
It was quite a major monumentin Jerusalem.
It's referred to in the Acts ofthe Apostles.
You know David's tomb was inthe city and he went into the
(24:24):
tomb in the middle of the nightwith a bunch of his closest
associates and took the treasureout of the tomb.
So that's a tomb desecration,that's a tomb robbery, and it
wasn't said that it was done forany great reason other than he
wanted the money and he went in.
(24:45):
According to Josephus, he wentinto the deepest part of this
tomb and actually some weirdthing happened and that fire
burst out when he entered thisdeep recess, which I think is
kind of curious, because it'salmost like there was a gas
which you can have in tombs thathave been ignited by the, the
(25:08):
torches that they brought intothe tomb.
So I find that quite plausible,but it's.
It shocked herod and he thenbuilt a propitiatory monument, a
kind of saying sorry monumentoutside the tomb.
But it was remembered that thatherod had done this and as time
goes by we get memories ofearly Christian scholars who say
(25:33):
that Jesus' family who are alsodescended from David, were
targeted by the Romans.
So Jesus' family I think one ofthe what I really wanted to do
in the book is is place Jesuswithin a family, so he's not
just a lone figure, right, andnot at all.
Sometimes you see Jesus with hismother, of course, but it's not
(25:58):
as if he's presented within awider family circle, and I think
that everyone grows up within.
You know, we grow up withinfamilies and this is important
and they shape us.
Well, the family of Jesus tookover the control of the Judean
churches after he was no longeraround.
(26:19):
His brother, james, was incharge of the church in
Jerusalem until 62.
It goes on through other familymembers Jerusalem until 62.
It goes on through other familymembers.
The last family member isSimeon, who is executed by the
(26:41):
Romans as a descendant of Davidand a Christian.
The grandsons of his brother,jude, were interrogated by the
Romans as possibly being able tolead an army.
They were descended from David,the Emperor Vespasian
apparently, according toHedgesippus, another Christian
writer, tried to wipe out all ofthe descendants of David.
So the Romans knew there wasthis prediction of the Messiah
(27:05):
from the line of David and theywanted to get rid of all of them
.
So again, that ties in with themassacre.
Jessica LM Jenkins (27:14):
Yes, and with the Romans trying to get
rid of the line of David, wasthat before Jesus was born, so
he would have been growing upwith that tension?
Or was that after his life anddeath and resurrection growing?
Joan E Taylor (27:27):
up with that tension or was that after his
life and death and resurrection?
It's attested.
I mean, herod's desecration ofthe tomb was 10 BCE and normally
Jesus is understood to havebeen born around and very
confusingly I say BCE, 6, bce, 6BC.
So Jesus was born six yearsbefore Christ.
This is the peculiarity of ourchronological system, right, so
(27:52):
we tend to say BCE is beforecommon era, right?
So it doesn't sound absolutelycrazy, but he was born in the
last years of Herod the Great,and that is clear from the
nativity accounts.
Yeah, last years of Herod theGreat, and that is clear from
the nativity accounts.
Yeah.
And also to make sense of thefact that he was around 30 years
(28:13):
of age when he comes to Johnthe.
Baptist in the year 28, in the14th year of the Emperor
Tiberius.
So it does all work out, butthose final years of Herod, only
a few years before hedesecrated the tomb of David,
and clearly with the blessing ofthe Romans, because they didn't
want anyone from the line ofDavid coming up to cause a
(28:36):
problem in Judea.
Jessica LM Jenkins (28:38):
Yeah, okay.
So Jesus is growing up in atime of great political turmoil.
We have violent revoltshappening.
Herod is massacring people, sohe is born in Bethlehem.
They flee to Egypt.
Talk to us about what's goingon.
(29:00):
When Joseph brings the familyback from Egypt, the political
situation has shifted becauseHerod the Great died.
So what is going on withArchelaus and the other Herod in
Galilee?
What's the situation there?
Joan E Taylor (29:19):
Well, it's complete mayhem at the time of
Herod's death.
Herod, just before he died, haddone the most horrific thing,
which is he had burnt alive thestudents of a particular couple
of teachers in Jerusalem who hadtorn down the Roman golden
(29:40):
eagle from the front of thetemple.
So it was a very anti-Romangesture and all sorts of
abominations that he was doinghappened and then he dies and
everyone's traumatised.
You know, after all of theseterrible things Right.
And the question is who is hisheir?
(30:03):
And whoever is the heir has tothen be approved by Rome, and so
there's this instability.
Jessica LM Jenkins (30:17):
At that point, a number of revolutionary
leaders, as you mentionedbefore, rise up and try and take
back Judea as an independentarea and so all of this is going
on, kind of if we just try tokeep the biblical timeline while
Jesus and Joseph and his familyare in Egypt.
All of this is going on kind ofif we just try to keep the
biblical timeline while Jesusand Joseph and his family are in
Egypt, all of this instabilityis happening in Judah, Palestine
, Israel, yeah, Okay.
Joan E Taylor (30:36):
Instability in terms of a liberation movement,
with various different formshappening, happening, and one of
the things that happen is arevolutionary leader called
Judas takes the capital ofGalilee, sepphoris, which is
just down the road from Nazareth, and creates an independent
area in Galilee.
(30:57):
So that's very important interms of the background for the
Gospel of Matthew, because whatwe have is Joseph feeling, you
know, getting a message that hecan return because the people
that were the great threat havegone, that's Herod and people
associated with Herod.
(31:18):
But then it says, when he heardthat Archelaus was ruler of
Judea, he goes to Galilee.
Well, that's very interesting,because what happens in Judea,
in Jerusalem, is that Archelauskind of takes control.
He still needs to be given theokay by Rome, but he takes
(31:40):
control.
But what has happened is hugenumbers of people have encamped
in the temple demandingliberation, that they can
independent, state and um, hetries to take control of the
situation and ends up massacringthousands of people in in the
jerusalem temple.
(32:01):
So it's a horrific bloodbathand and Archelaus has then
proven to be no better than hisfather, in fact, probably worse,
in various different ways.
Jessica LM Jenkins (32:12):
Didn't you say in the book he crucified
like 2,000 people, right outsideJerusalem, in that area?
Joan E Taylor (32:19):
That's right.
Well, it's the Roman legatefrom Antioch, varus, who comes
down in support of Archelaus.
Okay, it's remembered as thiswar of Varus, this enormous
onslaught by the Romans.
You never messed with theRomans.
Jessica LM Jenkins (32:36):
No, you never won.
Joan E Taylor (32:39):
The Romans came down from Syria with a huge army
including Nabataeans and allsorts of other client rulers who
came in and joined them andthey just went through and they
actually defeated Judas inGalilee and the city of
Sepphoris and enslaved theentire population, as Romans did
(33:02):
.
And they went down to Jerusalemand just annihilated all of the
opposition and cruelly executedyeah, crucified people, and
people fled to the, the Judeanwilderness.
They were hunted down there.
They didn't want to leaveanyone alive who had revolted
(33:23):
against them.
So that incredible cruelty.
And and so what I think of is ofJoseph taking his family back
from Egypt.
They think they're going hometo Bethlehem.
They veer off, as it says inthe Gospel of Matthew, from
Judea to Galilee, where there'sa bit of respite.
(33:43):
There isn't.
Where there's a bit of respite,there isn't a Roman client king
in charge at that time only tohave Varus' armies arrive and
torch Sephoris.
And from Nazareth.
You would have gone up on thehill behind Nazareth and be able
to see Sephoris burn.
And I think, okay, little boyjesus, you know that the smoke
(34:09):
of burning sephorus, um, Iremember myself as a personal
story when I was a child um, ahouse burnt down the end of our
road and I remember I would onlyhave been about three.
Okay, I remember crying.
I sat on the on the sidewalkoutside our house and and cried,
(34:33):
and I remember my motherpicking me up and saying oh you
know, come inside and for for achild to see terrible
destruction has a huge impact onyou.
Jessica LM Jenkins (34:46):
And this I feel like trying to choose my
words, thinking about Jesus'childhood as a mother.
In the context, herodbrutalizes the people of
Bethlehem, builds the Herodianright outside, where they can
see it.
Jesus, that's about 30 yearsbefore Jesus is born.
(35:08):
Jesus is born in Bethlehem.
They're afraid of Herod.
They flee to Egypt.
Joseph is told to come backonce Herod the Great dies.
He's like I don't want to dealwith Archelaus in Judea because
he's just as bad.
I'm going to go up to Nazarethwhere right now you described,
there's a kind of a littlepocket of Judean control.
(35:31):
We're going to go to Nazareth.
We'll be safe.
We're from the line of David.
We're already, as our family,in a precarious position.
They get to Nazareth only tohave the Roman army come through
and the city they can see fromwhere they're living gets burned
, and Jesus could have watchedthat as a little boy.
Joan E Taylor (35:50):
Exactly, it's huge In terms of impact.
It's not said, but it's hintedat.
If you just put Jesus in thecontext of the times, that is
actually what happened.
Jessica LM Jenkins (36:06):
Jesus in the context of the times, that is
actually what happened, and sohis entire ministry, as an adult
, is he's ministering in and toa people group that is
fundamentally and profoundlytraumatized.
His entire ministry is reachingto the poor, lower class groups
(36:28):
that have been absolutelybrutalized and traumatized by
the ruling powers.
So it's not just oh, we don'tprefer Rome, we'd rather be free
.
They have been completelytraumatized and his entire
(36:50):
ministry is in some ways lifting, giving people hope in the
middle of their intense trauma,which he experienced alongside
them as a child.
Joan E Taylor (36:58):
Absolutely, and I think that there's a.
He turns things around.
So instead of thinking ofliberation in terms of a
military way, he's thinking of akind of new way of being, a new
way of operating.
So I mean, I want to explorethat more in the next book that
(37:20):
I'm writing.
Jesus, but just you know, interms of what the trauma has
meant personally to Jesus, Ithink, when he sends out his
apostles, when he sends out the12 to the villages of Galilee,
he asks them to go out to avillage without anything,
(37:41):
without a change of clothing,without extra clothing, without
food, without any money in theirbelts.
They can have sandals, they canhave a walking stick, but they
basically arrive in a villagelooking like poor refugees, not
trying to be anything, nottrying to look fancy.
(38:01):
They're not arriving in suitsand looking like they have it
all.
They're looking the veryopposite.
So it sort of turns everythingaround and he indicates that
anyone who doesn't welcome suchpeople, well, that's what's
going to invite God's justiceultimately.
(38:24):
You know it's a what you giveyou get, kind of thing.
And so he embraces in some waythe model of being hit by the
world.
In a way he goes well, God ison the side of those who have
(38:47):
suffered.
God is on the side of thedowntrodden and the poor and the
marginalised, actually, and ifGod is on your side, actually,
that's mightier than the.
Roman emperor, wow, and it'sstrengthening you against the
claims of Rome.
Jessica LM Jenkins (39:07):
And so that, in his teachings, would have
had a profound impact on thegroups who were trying to align
themselves with Rome religiously.
The Sadducees, the Pharisees,didn't love Rome, but they still
had a bit more power and classthan the average people did, and
so Jesus' message to thisincredibly traumatized group
(39:30):
would have automatically pittedhim against those trying to seek
their own welfare by aligningthemselves with Rome.
Joan E Taylor (39:39):
Absolutely, and a lot of the things he says about
the rich and the mighty.
Behind that is the sense thatyou are rich and mighty in a
world that is aligning itselfwith Rome, that you are
benefiting somehow from thepresent world order.
You know, in the temptationnarrative when Jesus meets Satan
(40:03):
in the wilderness.
Satan basically tempts Jesuswith saying look, you can have
all of this, you can be emperor,you can be world emperor.
And Jesus just pushes rightback at that.
It's the absolute opposite ofwhat God is about.
Jessica LM Jenkins (40:20):
Which, in this context, is profound,
because people are expecting,they're looking for a military
Messiah to be ruler king overJudah, israel and maybe even
more of the world, and Satanoffers that and Jesus is like.
That's not the way this kingdomworks.
Joan E Taylor (40:38):
Yeah, I came to serve, not be served.
Jessica LM Jenkins (40:41):
Oh, it completely shifts everything.
Wow, talk to us a little bitmore about Nazareth.
When he was a boy we often hearthink about Nazareth as kind of
this idyllic picture, as aquiet Nazareth, as kind of this
idyllic picture as a quiet,backwater, nowhere town, where
(41:02):
Jesus is just kind of growing up, running on the hills and
playing and he's a simplepeasant boy.
It's a quiet, unassuming lifein this little tiny, nowhere
town.
How much of that matches whatwe know of Nazareth and Galilee
in this time period.
Joan E Taylor (41:17):
Yeah, Nazareth, we don't know, how big Nazareth
was, because very littlearchaeological excavation has
taken place in Nazareth, but weknow that Galilee generally was
very densely populated.
There were a lot of villagesvery close by.
So it's not like Jesus, whenwalking around Galilee, would
(41:38):
have gone very far beforehitting another village, and
that's been shown by manyarchaeological surveys.
And this dense population,things like various different
diseases, would have been rife.
There would have been highinfant mortality.
There seems to have been evenwithin we can see it in jesus
(42:00):
own teaching a lot of povertyday laborers going out to work
in the fields and just beingready for hire.
The lands were largelycontrolled by rich landowners.
So this, this is the wealth andthe poverty.
There was a certain amount ofvillage land and you know poor
(42:23):
farmers as well, but there werethese.
There would have beenRoman-style villas where there
were wealthy landowners and theyalso feature in Jesus' parables
.
He reflects the time in terms ofwhat he presents there and this
bubbling of discontent.
(42:44):
Josephus talks about theGalileans as being rather macho
warrior guys, you know, wantingto fire off right.
And the message of Judas, whogot thoroughly defeated, was
percolating all along andactually then erupted in the 60s
(43:06):
when the Judean, the greatrevolt happened when the Judeans
, spearheaded by the Galileans,in fact revolted against Rome.
So all of that, you know, wasunder the surface.
There was banditry, banditcaves, sort of.
(43:27):
If you think about the ancientworld, there's no police in the
ancient world, right, yeah, andthere's a lot of crime.
Yeah, it's not a safeenvironment.
You rely on your villagecommunity to support you.
Um, I I think that one of thethings that I noticed was how um
(43:49):
josephus, when he became a aleader of the the revolt himself
, before he switched sides inthe 60s, um, he very quickly
assembled a huge galilean army,and so he knew about what
galileans were like, and I think, okay, if they were this kind
of warrior style uh people, thenum jesus would probably have
(44:15):
been learned learning to fightlike other boys in his village.
Learning to fight in manycultures is just what you grow
up with.
So I think sometimes we thinkabout Jesus, you know, learning
carpentry or the synagogueschool and learning Bible and
all of these things and it beingquite peaceful, but I think
(44:36):
about him also having to learnhow to fight.
Yeah, wield a knife.
Jessica LM Jenkins (44:43):
Yeah, we don't think of Jesus being
scrappy and ready to battle andthen choosing to go the complete
opposite way.
Joan E Taylor (44:51):
Exactly.
So again, you know, turn theother cheek.
You know, if someone asks youto walk one mile, go with them
to.
You know that sense of we'reconsciously going to push back
at you by doing something youdon't expect.
You know you being the attackerin this situation.
(45:13):
So it's a.
It's a it's not passive.
It's an act of turning thingsaround and witnessing to someone
who would otherwise be violenttowards you.
Jessica LM Jenkins (45:34):
How were they important for the early
church?
Because the Gospels werewritten after, right after, the
Great Revolt in 60, 70 AD, whereJerusalem was destroyed.
The Gospels are written afterthat?
Joan E Taylor (45:48):
Am I correct Absolutely?
The first Gospel, the Gospel ofMark, is probably written
shortly after 70, when Jerusalemwas destroyed by the Romans.
Jessica LM Jenkins (46:03):
And so these themes that are all through the
Gospels and all through Jesus'early life would have been
incredibly important for theearly church.
How would that have broughthope and comfort to the early
church?
Joan E Taylor (46:14):
That's a big question.
Jessica LM Jenkins (46:17):
And I sort of have to think about it?
Joan E Taylor (46:19):
Hope and comfort, I think, in a culture where
clubs and societies could bebanned very, very quickly by the
Romans.
This is the Roman world andthere are spies everywhere and
anyone who has any kind of whiffof objection to what the, the
(46:41):
roman, imperial um family, issaying is a traitor and
treasonous.
And you, you die, um.
There there would have beenhope and comfort, but there's
also a preparedness to take theconsequences to.
You know, jesus said to hisdisciples whoever wants to
(47:02):
follow me has to take up theircross.
You know, and follow me.
And they were prepared to dieand in fact they did in the
persecution by Nero in Romeafter the fire of Rome in 64.
That's probably when both Peterand Paul were killed.
(47:23):
So that sense of don't expectthe world to look after you
actually, because the world ishas gone wrong and trust in God
and the right way of followingJesus and his teaching.
But yeah, this is not aboutmaking a safe place for yourself
(47:47):
in the world.
Your hope and comfort reallycomes with a faith in something
much deeper and more meaningfulabout what life is about.
Jessica LM Jenkins (48:00):
So, joan, for you personally, as we wrap
things up, studying Jesus,studying him in context,
studying his childhood, for youpersonally, how does that impact
your walk with Jesus, yourpersonal faith?
Joan E Taylor (48:17):
It does.
All the time.
I feel I learn all the time asI go into the past.
I often feel like Jesus setssuch an incredibly high bar in
terms of a model, if you thinkof him.
as you know, I'm a Quaker andpart of the Society of Friends,
(48:47):
and it's a sense of you look toJesus as an ethical model and a
guide and a support, but he's sofar out in the distance in
terms of what we can achieve.
In terms of what we can achievebut still setting his moral
stance, seeing him create thatmoral standard, is really,
really important and discerningit and being true to it as much
(49:11):
as we can in our own evil way, Ithink is very important for me
and that's why I think it isimportant also to be part of a
faith community, whatever faithcommunity feels comfortable for
you, because we need each other.
We're not just single peopleout in the world, you know,
(49:32):
we're not just little islands.
We need to be clusteredtogether and support each other
Absolutely.
Jessica LM Jenkins (49:41):
Thank you so much, Joan, for coming and
sharing with us about all ofyour writings and your wisdom.
For those who are listening,you can get her Boy Jesus book
now.
It came out March 11th.
She does an excellent job inBoy Jesus, walking through the
scholarship and the background.
There's so much more in thebook than we can get to in our
(50:03):
brief conversation today, but Iwill put in the social media
posts all of her books.
Not all of her books, becauseshe has a lot, but I'll
highlight a few of her booksthat are available, as well as
Boy Jesus.
Joan, we greatly appreciate youtaking the time to come talk
with us about this and Ipersonally can't wait to dive
(50:26):
into some of your otherresources as well.
Joan E Taylor (50:28):
Well, thank you so much.
I really enjoyed being here andI appreciate your questions,
Thank you so much.
Jessica LM Jenkins (50:38):
I've been really blessed by this
conversation.
I'm going to be pondering on alot of the themes that we've
brought up in this conversationfor a long time, and I think
it's going to help me personallyreally, as I interpret the
Gospels and think about theoverall context, especially how
Jesus is ministering in the faceof trauma and PTSD symptoms
(51:03):
constantly.
Trauma and PTSD is the culturalcontext in which Jesus' entire
ministry is taking place, and sothat's just one of the many
things I'm going to be chewingon as I come back to the texts
of Scripture.
After engaging with you andreading your work, I am so
thankful for you and for yourwork and I cannot wait to read
(51:28):
more.
Thank you, thanks so much.
You're so welcome.
Well, I'm going to close us offnow.
Well, I'm going to close us offnow and one of our next
episodes we will be returning towomen of the Bible in their
historical context.
So when I return to the we whoThirst podcast next, that is
what we will be going back to.
(51:48):
Thank you all for tuning in andlistening and have a great week
.
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