These laws sound rigid and austere in their proclamations, and we cannot say for sure how often this particular punishment was employed. What we can say for sure is that exceptions were allowed, as illustrated by Jesus. He did not demand that the woman caught in adultery be executed but instead disarmed her executioners and urged her to leave her lift of sin (John 8:3-11).
Continue reading EVERYDAY LIFE IN BIBLE TIMES (STONING “AS A FORM OF EXECUTION” PT2)
MEANING: “Good fortune (or “warrior”)
SYMBOL: Tents, like a battlefield camp
STONE/COLOR: Emerald (or diamond) /Possibly a stone with little color
Continue reading INFORMATION ABOUT GAD, ASHER, ISSACHAR (3 OF THE 12 TRIBES OF ISRAEL)
As the Israelites met and engaged the people who occupied the Promise Land before them, they might have been tempted to adopt the sacred-stone concept. To be sure, the Lord did allow a certain amount of parity between pagan worship and Israelite worship, such as the use of sacrifice, temple, and priesthood; but the line was drawn at employing sacred stone. “Do not make idols or set us an image or a sacred stone for yourselves, and do not place a carved stone in your land to bow down before it. I am the LORD your God” (Lev 26:1; see Deut 16:22). But what about the sacred stones that had already been built by the previous occupants of the Promised Land?
Continue reading EVERYDAY LIFE IN BIBLE TIMES (SACRED STONE “TO SET UP OR TO DESTORY” PT3)
By the time Sarah was seventy-six years old, she felt certain she would never give Abraham a child. “Go and sleep with my servant,” she told him. “Perhaps I can have children through her” (Genesis 16:2). Abraham slept with Hagar, and Ishmael was born.
Continue reading LITTLE KNOWN FACTS ABOUT (SURROGATE MOTHER, ANCIENT STYLE)
Most often, however, it appears that a masseba was set up as a sacred stone. In this case, the unnaturally placed stone or series of stones provided worshipers with a physical location at which to meet their deity. To this day, surviving sacred stones break the natural contours of the landscape, inviting us to come in for a closer look.
Continue reading EVERYDAY LIFE IN BIBLE TIMES (SACRED STONE “TO SET UP OR TO DESTROY” PT2)
When contemporary hikers traveling the backcountry encounter places where the well-worn path gives way to solid rock, they often find cairns to guide their footsteps on an otherwise invisible path. Cairns are made from natural stones that have been stacked on top of one another in an unnatural way to catch the hiker’s eye. The ancient world had something similar, but it had nothing to do with hiking.
Continue reading EVERYDAY LIFE IN THE BIBLE TIMES (SACRED STONE “TO SET UP OR TO DESTORY” PT1)
These were some of the same religious who had succeeded in having Jesus executed. They started thinking that His disciples might remove the body from the tomb and claim that Jesus had been raised from the dead.
Continue reading BIBLE CUSTOMS AND CURIOSITIES (SEALED AND SURE)
5 And he said unto them, Which of you shall have a friend, and shall go unto him at midnight, and say unto him, Friend, lend me three loaves;
6 For a friend of mine in his journey is come to me, and I have nothing to set before him?
Continue reading SCRIPTURE OF THE DAY (LUKE 11:5-13)
Roads of Bible times were little more than paths, rough and crude by modern standards. When a king traveled, his servants would go ahead of him, removing stones, filling in low places, and straightening curves so the king’s journey would be more pleasant.
Continue reading BIBLE CUSTOMS AND CURIOSITIES (GET READY FOR THE KING)
Place name meaning “swelling,” “fat,” “bulge,” or “mound,” It became the proper name of a portion of the hill on which the city of David was built (2 Chron 27:3). The Ophel was just south of Mount Moriah, on which the temple was constructed, joining the old city with the area of Solomon’s palace and temple. The hill has been inhabited since pre-Israelite times by peoples such as the Jebusites from whom David took the site.
Continue reading DEFINITION OF THE DAY (OPHEL)