The Bible Geek Podcast 21-001

In Mark 6:15 Herod wonders if Jesus might be John the Baptist raised from the dead. Could it be that this doesn't refer to Jesus as sorcerer but to Jesus (or several people in a movement) manifesting the Celestial Christ to participants in a pentecostal-like movement (as per Stevan Davies)?

I am wondering what your translation philosophy was for the Pre-Nicene New Testament.

What purpose do you think Luke 8:1-3 serve? Also, I find the "afterward he went on through cities and villages." Why the sudden vagueness of cities and villages? Finally, what do you make of the mention of the women traveling with Jesus and the twelve? What of Joanna and Susanna (who appear only in Luke)?

I have read that Greek scholars recognize that when the plural form is used without a qualifying number, it’s understood as meaning the minimum plural amount, dual. For example, John A. Bengel said: “The plural, kairous, times, denotes two times. The plural number is to be taken most strictly.” Is this correct? Hence in Revelation 12:14/Dan. 7:25; 12:7 (Septuagint) “time, times and half a time” the “times” is two times, hence 3 1/2 times in total. Is that correct?

Were many Jews inspired by the book of Daniel: was the book of Daniel a contributor to the Jewish revolt, leading to the diaspora?

I was hoping you could speak to the changing of the tax collectors name from Levi, son of Alpheus, to Matthew.

One of the main foundations of Christianity, as I understand it, is the fact that God sacrificed his only son for our sins. But how much of a sacrifice was it?

Thomas Hobbes was such a complete materialist that he denied the existence of spirit and said that God himself was entirely corporeal, that nowhere in the Bible did it explicitly say that angels and over heavenly beings were not material. I am starting to think that Hobbes would have found a lot of scriptural support for his views, or was he wrong?

Re Mathew 12:31: So what exactly is the Spirit, and why would his or its rejection be a greater mortal sin than that of God the Father or the Son?


I've found certain apologists weirdly insistent that only humans go to heaven, not animals. It seems to me these apologists must never have had a pet, or they'd know it can't be heaven if your pets aren't there too. Is there any biblical basis for their insistence?

What do you make of the baptism for the dead mentioned in 1 Corinthians 15:29?