Biblical Allusions Flashcards
Abraham, Sarah, and Isaac:
Abraham was the patriarch of Judaism; God made a covenant, or promise, to give him numerous descendants who would one day dwell in the Promised Land; his wife, Sarah, was past childbearing years, but Abraham still believed the promise, which was eventually fulfilled in their son Isaac; God asked Abraham to sacrifice Isaac but provided a ram for the sacrifice when he saw that Abraham was willing to obey; Abraham is frequently recognized for his faith; Isaac, considered another of the Jewish patriarchs, married Rebekah and had twin sons named Jacob and Esau.
Adam and Eve:
the first man and woman, whom God created to live in the garden of Eden; they were commanded not to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil; however, Satan (in the form of a serpent) tempted Eve to eat of the tree, and she then tempted Adam to do so, thus committing the first sin and condemning mankind (often referred to as “the Fall”); as punishment for this first sin, they were evicted from the garden of Eden (and barred from returning by the placement of cherubim and a flaming sword) and cursed with difficulty in childbearing, difficulty in work, and eventual death, though God also promised their offspring would one day crush the serpent, foreshadowing Jesus Christ’s eventual triumph over sin and death.
Antichrist and Armageddon
an antagonist of Jesus who will appear before Jesus’s Second Coming and bring destruction on the world, ushering in Armageddon, or the final battle between good and evil.
Babylon
: capital of the Babylonian empire; defeated Israel and took the Jews captive (around 597 BCE); devoted to materialism and sensual pleasure.
Cain and Abel
: first sons of Adam and Eve; Cain was a farmer whose sacrifice to God was less pleasing than his brother Abel’s because Abel, a herdsman, gave God the first and best of his flock; jealous, Cain killed Abel in the fields, uttering the well-known phrase “Am I my brother’s keeper?” when God asked what had happened to Abel; Cain was forced to roam as an outcast as punishment for committing the first murder.
Daniel
: young Hebrew prophet who refused to obey any Babylonian laws that conflicted with God’s commandments; as punishment for praying to God even though the law forbade it, he was sent to the lion’s den but survived because God rewarded his faithfulness and prevented the lion from eating him.
David
: young shepherd who defeats Goliath using only a slingshot; becomes the Hebrew king and frequently described as “a man after God’s own heart”; wrote many of the Psalms; had an affair with Bathsheba, who became pregnant, and had her husband Uriah killed in battle to cover it up. Jesus descended from the line of David, and despite David’s sins, he is seen as a great king and forerunner of Christ (described in one hymn as “great David’s greater king”).
The Divine Comedy:
1472 Italian narrative poem by Dante Alighieri; written in three parts: “Inferno,” “Purgatorio,” and “Paradiso,” in which the narrator visits Hell, Purgatory, and Heaven; had a major influence on Western civilization concentions of these places, especially hell’s organization into circles to which people are assigned based on the severity of their sins; gave us the quotation “Abandon all hope, ye who enter here,” posted at the entrance to Hell.
Eden
: garden in which Adam and Eve lived before the Fall; earthly paradise in which God and man dwelt blissfully together. Adam and Eve were kicked out and barred from returning after committing the first sin.
Gideon
: ancient Israelite judge who led the Israelites in battle against the Midianites: despite being vastly outnumbered, the Israelites won, in part because they blasted trumpets to trick the Midianites into thinking their forces
were bigger.
Goliath
: giant (or at least very tall man) from the Philistines, enemies of the ancient Israelites; one of the Philistines’ greatest warriors but defeated by David, a young shepherd boy wielding a slingshot with stones.
Good Samaritan
: praiseworthy character from one of Jesus’s parables, told to answer the Pharisees question “Who is my neighbor?” in which they tried to ascertain exactly whom Jesus meant when he commanded them to “love your neighbor as yourself”; in the parable, an Israelite man is assaulted by robbers and lies.dying on the side of the road; neither a priest nor a Levite (high-ranking Israelites) stops to help him, but a Samaritan, whom the Israelites viewed as an enemy, goes out of his way to help the man at great personal expense.
Gospels
: the first four books of the New Testament (Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, all named for their writers), which tell the “Good News” of Jesus’s birth, life, death, and resurrection.
Herod
: is the first century ruler of Galilee and Perea (on behalf of the Roman empire) who had John the Baptist beheaded for condemning his divorce and remarriage and played a small role in Jesus’s trial; often confused with Herod the Great, who orders the death of all male Hebrew infants under the age of two after the Magi refer to Jesus as “King of the Jews” (Mary and Joseph fled to Egypt with Jesus to protect him).
Holy Grail:
the cup from which Jesus drank at the Last Supper (the meal Jesus shared with his disciples on the night he was arrested); many quests were undertaken, particularly in the Middle Ages, to find this sacred object, especially because some people believed it had magical powers.
Jacob
: son of Rebekah and Isaac and twin brother of Esau; tricks Esau into trading his birthright (as the oldest son) for a bowl of stew; has twelve sons (representative of the twelve tribes of Israel) with Rachel and Leah (and quite a bit of familial conflict); known for wrestling with God and having a dream in which he saw angels ascending and descending on a ladder between heaven and earth, which symbolized Jesus; considered one of the Israelite patriarchs.
Jesus Christ
: son of God and born to the virgin Mary (in a manger in Bethlehem); worked as a carpenter alongside his earthly father, Joseph; when he was baptized (by John the Baptist), the Holy Spirit identified him as the son of God;
Jezebel
: wife of King Ahab: known for being wicked, leading the Israelites to worship foreign gods and killing God’s prophets; she was eventually thrown from a window and her body eaten by stray dogs.
Job (pronounced with a long “o”):
righteous man whom Satan accused of only loving God because God had blessed him: to prove Satan wrong, God allows Satan to take everything from Job and inflict great suffering on him, but Job does not curse God (though he certainly cries out to God in pain and frustration); God later restored blessings to him.
John the Baptist:
Jesus’s cousin and the long-awaited prophet who would prepare God’s people for the Messiah; known for wearing clothes made of camel’s hair and eating locusts and wild honey; baptized many people, including Jesus; eventually killed by Herod Antipas for condemning Herod’s divorce and remarriage (his head served on a platter at the request of Herod’s new wife’s daughter).
Jonah
: Israelite prophet who refuses to obey God’s call to go to Ninevah, a country known for its cruelty, because he believes it is unfair that God would allow them to repent; when God sends storms to disrupt the boat on which Jonah has stowed away, the sailors throw him overboard, and he is eaten by a giant fish; the fish eventually spits Jonah out (foreshadowing Jesus’s eventual death and resurrection), and Jonah goes to Ninevah, but he is not happy about it.
Joseph
: the 11th son (of twelve) of Jacob and Rachel, and his father’s favorite; known for wearing a multicolored coat; his brothers, jealous of him, sold him into slavery; after a series of misadventures that cause him to end up in prison (despite being a righteous man), his ability to interpret dreams is needed by the Pharaoh, and he becomes Pharaoh’s righthand man, successfully navigating Egypt through a famine; Joseph’s brothers eventually come to Egypt seeking food, and after a series of tests, Joseph forgives them and is reunited with his father. [Note: This is not the same Joseph who was married to Mary and became the adoptive father of Jesus!]
Judas Iscariot
: one of Jesus’s twelve disciples; betrayed Jesus by identifying him with a kiss (on the cheek, as a sign of friendship) on the night of his arrest; received 30 pieces of silver for the betrayal but hanged himself out of guilt.
Lazarus
: a friend of Jesus’s whom Jesus raised from the dead after he had been in a tomb for four days; this act directly led the Jewish leaders to carry out their plan to have Jesus crucified.
