r/AskBibleScholars

Was Jesus born in Bethlehem?

I have seen many of the verses explicitly stating homosexuality is a sin, and also have the belief and understanding that none of them are as clear cut as people lead you to believe. So please do not try answer with anything of the like, of course unless you have a unique perspective or they support another argument.

So my question is, how does homosexuality go against God's design? Where does the Bible make clear that marriage is only meant for between a man and a woman? And why would God do such a thing? Sensual attraction is not a choice, why would God make us feel this? Animals perform same sex relationships, so it's not unnatural. And finally who does it hurt?

The main question is how, where, and why does the Bible say sex and marriage is only for a man and a woman.

🟢🟡🟠🔵

1. The world beneath the fog
In the beginning, organizations had ordinary wounds.
A number did not tie.
A promise could not be supported.
A control did not operate.
A customer was harmed.
A system produced bad data.
A wall began to crack.
A road began to fail.
A report became easier to defend than the reality beneath it.
At first, the wound had a simple shape:
Something is wrong.
Someone should understand it.
Someone should help repair it.
But repair was costly. Repair required ownership. Repair required patience. Repair required the humility to say, “The process occurred, but the wound remains.”
So people learned another art.
They learned to dress the wound lightly.
They learned to call the unstable thing governed.
They learned to cover the wall before strengthening it.
They learned to say peace before peace had arrived.
The prophets had seen this pattern before. Jeremiah warns against those who treat a serious wound as though it were minor and speak peace where peace has not truly come. Ezekiel gives the image of an unstable wall covered with whitewash: the surface appears acceptable, but the structure cannot withstand the storm.
That was the old fog.
Not darkness.
Not always lies.
Not always evil intent.
Fog is what happens when process separates from reality.

2. The councils before conversion
The councils were not born as monsters.
They were born because complexity is real.
Someone had to interpret the rules.
Someone had to document the judgment.
Someone had to preserve order.
Someone had to keep the institution from collapsing into blame, panic, and confusion.
So the councils learned the language of review, scope, governance, monitoring, materiality, assurance, risk, sustainability, and professional judgment.
Many of these tools were good.
Many were necessary.
Many protected people from chaos.
But every tool faces a temptation.
A hammer can build a house or widen a crack.
A report can reveal reality or make reality survivable.
A procedure can return people to truth or relieve them from needing to face it.
The councils reached the fork.
One path led to restoration.
The other path led to anti-resolution.
Anti-resolution said:
This has been evaluated.
This has been documented.
This has been cleared.
This is within scope.
This is on the roadmap.
This is being monitored.
Restoration asked a different question:
But has the wound been healed?
Has the wall been strengthened?
Has the owner been named?
Has reality changed?
Jesus names a related danger in Matthew 23: the meticulous preservation of religious form while neglecting the weightier matters — justice, mercy, and faithfulness — and the danger of an outwardly clean appearance concealing an inward disorder.

3. The first conversion
The first convert was not the loudest critic.
The first convert was a practitioner who could no longer bear the difference between clearance and healing.
This practitioner had prepared the memo.
Checked the box.
Used the approved wording.
Watched the issue move from meeting to meeting.
Watched the defect become a known limitation.
Watched the known limitation become a stable feature of the system.
At first, the practitioner thought the discomfort was immaturity.
Then the practitioner thought it was lack of sophistication.
Then the practitioner thought it was personal weakness.
But eventually the practitioner saw the truth:
The discomfort was not the enemy.
The discomfort was the remnant of conscience.
So the practitioner did not burn down the process.
The practitioner redeemed the process.
The question changed from:
How do I make this acceptable?
To:
How do I make this whole?
This is the hopeful turn: truth does not need to become cruelty. Ephesians 4 gives the language of truth joined to love, and Galatians 6 gives the posture of gentle restoration rather than humiliation.

4. The breach
When the fog lifted, the convert saw that the organization was not merely guilty.
It was breached.
A breach is not only a defect.
It is a place where trust escaped.
A place where responsibility fragmented.
A place where the wall no longer carried weight properly.
A place where people learned to walk around reality instead of repairing it.
The breach was sometimes technical.
Sometimes moral.
Sometimes operational.
Sometimes financial.
Sometimes environmental.
Sometimes relational.
Usually, it was many of these at once.
The old council asked:
Can this breach be governed?
The repairer asked:
Can this breach be restored?
Isaiah 58 becomes the central hopeful text here. The chapter rejects empty religious performance when injustice remains, then turns toward concrete restoration: loosening burdens, repairing ruins, rebuilding foundations, and becoming “repairers of the breach.”
That phrase is the good word.
Not destroyers of councils.
Not accusers of practitioners.
Not enemies of process.
Repairers of the breach.

5. The ministry of reconciliation
The repairers discovered that resolution was not merely technical.
A broken system separates people from truth.
It separates management from operations.
It separates reports from reality.
It separates practitioners from conscience.
It separates clients from capability.
It separates the institution from trust.
So the work became reconciliation.
Not soft reconciliation that avoids truth.
Not theatrical reconciliation that asks everyone to move on.
Not reconciliation as reputation management.
Real reconciliation.
The kind that brings things back into right relation:
Words with facts.
Controls with risks.
Reports with systems.
Authority with responsibility.
Strategy with operations.
Confession with repair.
Remediation with evidence.
The advisor with the client’s long-term capability.
Paul’s phrase “ministry of reconciliation” in 2 Corinthians 5 is the strongest New Testament anchor for this. The passage frames reconciliation not merely as private feeling, but as an entrusted vocation and message.
So the repairer says:
I am not here to preserve your dependency on my interpretation.
I am here to help restore your ability to face reality.

6. The Zacchaeus moment
Some people had built fog machines.
Some had profited from ambiguity.
Some had sold survivability.
Some had made unresolved conditions easier to live with than to repair.
The old myth would have ended there.
But the hope mythic does not end with exposure.
It asks whether even the fog-builder can convert.
Zacchaeus is the model.
He was not merely invited to feel remorse. He moved toward restitution. His conversion became measurable: distorted relationships were repaired through concrete return. Luke 19 presents Zacchaeus as a wealthy chief tax collector whose encounter with Jesus leads to restitution and restoration in his household.
That is the hopeful path for the fog-machine builder:
Not performative apology.
Not vague values language.
Not a new dashboard about accountability.
Restitution.
Repair.
Changed behavior.
Restored trust.
The converted fog-builder says:
I once used complexity to delay ownership.
Now I will use my knowledge of complexity to locate the breach.
I once knew how ambiguity survived.
Now I will help truth survive.
I once made unresolved things governable.
Now I will help make them whole.

7. The Good Samaritan test
Then the repairers faced their own test.
They found a wounded system by the road.
Many passed by.
The priest saw it and had reasons.
The Levite saw it and had reasons.
The specialist saw it and had scope limitations.
The reviewer saw it and had documentation standards.
The advisor saw it and had independence concerns.
The executive saw it and had budget constraints.
The committee saw it and put it on the roadmap.
Then came one who stopped.
The one who stopped did not begin with a theory.
He began with the wound.
He moved toward the harmed thing.
He treated what could be treated.
He paid a cost.
He transferred care.
He made arrangements for continuation.
The Good Samaritan is the operational parable of anti-fog work: the righteous actor is not the one with the most defensible distance from the wound, but the one who performs mercy in reality. Luke 10 presents the Samaritan as the one who helps the injured man after others avoid him, and the parable concludes around mercy as the defining neighborly act.
So the repairers adopted the Samaritan test:
Did we move closer to the wound?
Did we reduce harm?
Did we pay attention to reality?
Did we leave behind a path for continued care?

8. The one percent sheep
The repairers also learned not to despise small deviations.
A half percent.
One percent.
A tiny exception.
A small mismatch.
A strange outlier.
A field that should not be negative.
A balance that should not behave that way.
A complaint that sounds too specific to ignore.
The fog says:
That is immaterial.
That is noise.
That is not representative.
That is outside scope.
That has been reviewed.
The repairer says:
Maybe.
But maybe the one percent is where the truth escaped.
The lost sheep is the hopeful version of deviation analysis. Luke 15’s parable emphasizes the search for the one that is lost, and it sits in a chapter centered on mercy, finding, repentance, and joy.
The repairer does not worship anomalies.
The repairer does not spiral into obsession.
But the repairer refuses to dismiss a small deviation merely because the ninety-nine look orderly.
Sometimes the breach first appears as one missing sheep.

9. The rebuilding
Once the breach was named, the repairers began to rebuild.
They did not rebuild with slogans.
They rebuilt section by section.
One team owned the data.
One team owned the control.
One team owned the disclosure.
One team owned the operating process.
One team owned the customer impact.
One team owned the evidence of closure.
One team owned the transfer of capability.
But unlike the old fragmentation, this rebuilding had a whole design.
Every section related to the wall.
Every repair had a named owner.
Every owner knew the larger purpose.
Every completed section reduced the load carried by the defect.
Nehemiah is the biblical rebuilding pattern. Nehemiah 3 records the wall being repaired section by section by named workers and groups; the larger Nehemiah narrative frames rebuilding as organized, opposed, practical, and communal.
This became the repairers’ discipline:
Name the breach.
Assign the section.
Fit the section to the wall.
Finish the repair.
Inspect the result.
Celebrate restored strength.

10. The new use of process
The repairers did not abolish process.
They refused to worship it.
They kept documentation, but documentation had to point back to reality.
They kept governance, but governance had to make ownership clearer.
They kept monitoring, but monitoring had to include goal-oriented decision thresholds.
They kept roadmaps, but roadmaps had to lead to repair.
They kept assurance, but assurance had to distinguish between appearance and closure.
They kept professional judgment, but judgment had to remain accountable to truth.
Process became a bridge, not a fog machine.
A memo was no longer a sedative.
A dashboard was no longer a painted wall.
A committee was no longer a cave where responsibility disappeared.
A clearance was no longer allowed to masquerade as healing.
The new question became:
What changed in reality?

11. The converted council
Some councils resisted.
Some were too invested in the fog.
Some had too much status tied to ambiguity.
Some could not imagine a business model that did not preserve dependency.
But others converted.
They discovered that repair did not end the work.
It purified the work.
Because entropy remained.
Systems still decayed.
People still changed.
Markets still shifted.
Regulations still evolved.
Technology still broke.
Data still mutated.
Incentives still drifted.
New wounds still appeared.
The repairer did not need to keep old problems alive.
The repairer could resolve the old problem and trust that reality would eventually produce the next honest one.
This is the business hope inside the myth:
Resolution is not the end of recurring work.
Resolution is the reason the client comes back.

12. The harvest of peace
The repairers learned that peace is not the absence of conflict.
Peace is repaired order.
False peace says:
Do not disturb the perch.
Do not name the breach.
Do not reopen the prior clearance.
Do not make people uncomfortable.
True peace says:
The wound has been faced.
The wall has been strengthened.
The burden has been shared.
The owner has been named.
The harmed party has been considered.
The system has become more capable.
The truth can stand without fog.
James 3 describes wisdom as peaceable, gentle, open to reason, and connected to a harvest of righteousness. That tone matters: the repairer is not a cynic with sharper words, but a builder whose truth produces peaceable fruit.

13. The creed of the repairers
The repairers began to teach a different creed:
We do not shame people for having lived inside fog.
We invite them to walk out of it.
We do not despise process.
We restore process to its proper purpose.
We do not use truth as a weapon.
We speak truth in love.
We do not confuse clearance with healing.
We ask what changed in reality.
We do not preserve dependency.
We transfer capability.
We do not flee the one percent deviation.
We examine it with discipline.
We do not cover unstable walls.
We repair breaches.
We do not fear resolution.
We trust that new honest work will come.
We are not fog vendors.
We are repairers of the breach.

14. The final hopeful formulation
The old councils made unresolved things visible in harmless forms.
The repairers make unresolved things visible in healable forms.
The old fog said:
This has been evaluated, documented, and cleared.
The repairer asks:
Has it been faced, owned, and repaired?
The old council sold survivability.
The repairer offers restoration.
The old council left the client dependent on interpretation.
The repairer leaves the client more capable of facing reality.
And when the former fog-maker converts, the movement does not say:
You are forever disqualified.
It says:
You know where the fog hides.
Now use that knowledge to restore the wall.
That is the hope mythic:
The wound can be healed.
The wall can be repaired.
The lost sheep can be sought.
The tax collector can make restitution.
The passerby can become a neighbor.
The practitioner can become whole.
The council can become a ministry of reconciliation.
The client can become capable again.
And the one who once preserved the fog may yet be called:
Repairer of the breach.
Restorer of paths to dwell in.

Starting reference map for Bible researchers
The core passages to assign for deeper study:
Isaiah 58:6–12 — repairer of the breach; true restoration versus empty ritual.
Jeremiah 6:14 / 8:11 — superficial healing; “peace” before real peace.
Ezekiel 13:10–15 — whitewashed wall; cosmetic treatment of structural weakness.
Matthew 23:23–28 — weightier matters; outward cleanliness versus inward disorder.
2 Corinthians 5:18–20 — ministry of reconciliation.
Ephesians 4:15, 25 — truth spoken in love; putting away falsehood.
Galatians 6:1–2 — gentle restoration of those caught in error.
Luke 19:1–10 — Zacchaeus; conversion expressed through restitution.
Luke 10:25–37 — Good Samaritan; real mercy over ritual distance.
Luke 15:3–7 — lost sheep; the one percent deviation as worthy of search.
Nehemiah 2–6, especially Nehemiah 3 — rebuilding by named sections under opposition.
James 3:17–18 — peaceable wisdom and the harvest of righteousness.

I heard about other gods mentioned in Bible besides Jesus, but wondering if Zeus was mentioned as a false-god.

2 Timothy 3:16

Just the Old Testament? Does he include his own letters? The Gospels that hadn't yet been written? Or, does scripture include everything that had ever been written?

I know the trinity isn’t directly in the Bible but Jesus claims to be something. From a biblical scholarship point of view, what does he claim to be. I know that Dan McClellan believes he was “Adonai’s Divine image” or atleast that’s his theory. Is there a biblical consensus on this?

Do scholars have any theories about why ʾIlu is not attested as a creator of the world god in the Ugaritic texts? Was this simply not a prominent motif, or was creation of the world not conceptualized in that way within the Ugaritic tradition?

Relatedly, at what point in time (approximately) is El and or El/YHWH attested to as a creator of the world?

What happens if Jewish people pass away before accepting Jesus will they go to heaven or hell? I have 2 Jewish neighbors and I have always wanted to know what happens if and when they die, they say they are Jewish but don’t really practice Judaism

Could it be possible that Pontius Pilate, while not wanting to crucify Jesus, but also needing to appease the hostile Jewish crowd, could have fabricated Jesus’ death on the cross? Some of the more compelling points:

1. Pilate and his wife (Mt 27:19) argued at length with the Jews against executing Jesus. Clearly Pilate had no desire to carry this out.

2. Jesus was on the cross for such a short period of time, when it often took days to die on the cross.

3. In Luke, Pilate sends Jesus to Herod for judgment. I find it curious that Herod was excited to meet Jesus, and even more curious that Herod and Pilate possibly went from being enemies to being friends after that. (Lk 23:12)

4. Pilate did not seem to get along with the Jewish establishment, and he had motive to make it look like they were wrong about Jesus. If Jesus “rose” from the crucifixion, the Jewish leaders, who condemned him, would have lost much of their credibility. And to have the crowds follow the peaceful teachings of Jesus would be preferable to the rebellious teachings of the Jewish establishment.

5. The flogging, crown of thorns, spitting on, etc. seems a bit extreme on the part of the Romans given that Jesus was a non-threatening peasant in their view. (And Pilate didn’t want to crucify Jesus in the first place.) Perhaps Pilate wanted to put on a good show in order to make this "fake crucifixion" more believable.

6. The gospel of John is the only one to mention that a Roman soldier put a spear in Jesus’ side to make sure he was dead. Could this have been added by the author as a response to rumors that Jesus was alive when he was removed from the cross?

7. Right before Jesus breathed his last, he was given “wine vinegar” (Mt. 27:49). Could this have been some sort of drug that rendered Jesus unconscious?

8. After Jesus “died”, those that knew him stood at a distance and watched (Lk. 23:49). So if Jesus was still moving, breathing, groaning, etc. they would have been too far away to detect it.

9. Joseph of Arimathea: Pilate’s accomplice? Why would a rich man put the body of a condemned “criminal” in his own expensive rock tomb? Why would Pilate let him?

10. This would also explain all of the sightings of Jesus after his crucifixion.

A couple of side notes: For this to be possible, I don’t think that Jesus could have had his feet nailed because he wouldn’t have been able to walk with only three days of healing. Also, if Pilate did do this, I don’t think he would have ever dreamt that it would turn into a world religion. Finally, Jesus would had to have left Palestine for the rest of his life. Thoughts?

Hello, recently I've noticed it seems the vast majority of Christians these days believe in a pre trib rapture where Jesus comes and takes us up into Heaven before the awful tribulation.

My problem with this is that the rapture didnt even become a thing until the 1800's. The Church before that always taught that the "Rapture" and the coming of Christ were one and the same. Thats when we are taken up. When He comes back.

I personally believe the rapture is the same as when Jesus comes back. I dont believe He comes secretly to gather His believers before He comes back for the whole world.

The Bible says the last days will be like the days of Noah. Noah did not get taken up. He got put in a boat and protected from what was to come. God didnt swoop Him up into heaven. I believe this is a key clue here.

My reason for posting here however, is I've noticed the vast majority would disagree with me it seems. The majority of Christians i know believe in the rapture before the actual coming of Christ.

My worry for this belief is what if the rapture is actually a form of deception? Causing Christians to accept the mark of the beast because they think they'll be raptured up before its even implemented?

I'd love the thoughts of you scholars.

Thanks in advance.

Why is there so many different bibles from different religions New Testament Old Testament. If there was only 1 TRUE story why isn’t it just 1 Bible ? Which one is telling the truth lol

I want to study the Bible in the original languages. Can anyone suggest a Hebrew-Greek-English Interlinear Bible? Can I only purchase one online? Are there any bookstores in the Dallas area that might have one I can look at in person? Are there any other resources you recommend to study and understand the Bible in its original Hebrew & Greek?

(Revelation 12:7–12) The army of Michael and the army of the dragon wage war against each other. Satan and his angels are cast down from heaven to the earth...

(Revelation 17:8–14) It also says that the beast and the kings will wage war against the Lamb. But the Lamb is the Lord of lords and the King of kings, so He overcomes them...

I was just thinking about how when it comes the story of creation, the downfall of man being knowledge seems accurate.
With how things have gone in modern day, knowing so much and understanding more than we ever have been able to has brought on more evil than we could’ve previously imagined for the future.

Then it got me wondering;
the knowledge of good and evil is, I assume not applicable to animals. So they cannot sin right?
But they may do behaviors that we classify as sin if they weren’t animalistic.

So my question is, what was the downfall of man specifically in contrast to how it could’ve been?
Is the root of the downfall disobedience, knowledge or evil itself?
If it’s the knowledge of good and evil itself
would knowledge about it be the downfall? Or would evil still exist and find its way to humanity without the knowledge of it and ultimately still cause a downfall and separation from God?
And on a side note, do animals not sin because the downfall was just simply knowledge and they have no knowledge of morality?

I’ve been having a really hard time reconciling this aspect of the Old Testament and it’s really testing my faith.

It started with the fact that David and Solomon are referred to as great men despite sleeping with hundreds of women and having so many concubines. That should be frowned upon because the New Testament clearly states it’s one man and one woman. It also was Adam and just Eve and the Old Testament talks a lot about one man and one woman. So why would God call them good men when they have so many wives and concubines, especially when a lot of them are pagan?

Second, the story of Tamar and Ammon bugged me a lot. David did nothing for Tamar and it’s horrible because the culture of Israel, which is supposed to be God’s holy land, made it so that after Ammon raped Tamar, she tore the dress that indicated she was a virgin and it said she was no longer able to marry and remained desolate for life. Why would David’s household put so much pressure on the daughter’s virginity to the point there were outfits indicating that, and even if they were raped they were no longer able to marry? If David was a good man why would he allow that to happen? Why not let his daughter marry and allow her to be considered a virgin? Even if it’s culture, could he not make the culture of a religious country more moral?

Third, why do genealogies only consist of men? And when families want kids, they only mention their sons not their daughters? Why does God not value daughters as children? Isn’t it still a blessing to have daughters? Why am I less than because I’m a woman if I was born during that time?

Please help it’s making me very angry!!

EDIT: wow. I’ve never been more hurt and disregarded by the Christian community that I have been today. To be clear, I would die for Jesus in a heartbeat. I also have worked through things that have made me uncomfortable, like the fact that our whole goal and God’s goal is to glorify God and it is dying does that or living a ‘bad’ life on earth glorifies Him than so be it. I feel I’m a worse position. Who knew after I was left alone by my whole secular side of my family and raped for converting back that Christians would hurt me. I have to remember that He said it would be a hard life. I’ll keep running the race and living as morally as possible and spreading the gospel but nevertheless, I’m hurt.

I'm a Catholic and have been studying the bible for some time. I am also a part of a bible talk group affiliated with a non-denominational church because I admire their passion of scripture and am curious about the basis of their beliefs.

However, this group has become to claim that I am not saved as I was baptised as an infant*. In response I would say their baptisms aren't valid as they were performed not by a Holy priest but by Sue from down the street.

To any non-catholics, what is your perspective on who has the right to perform baptism and what are your thoughts on infant baptism?

*they are trying to convert me from Catholicism to ICC by cherrypicking verses that once I read in full rebuke their claims...