Unit 2 Test

Question 1

Apollonius of Tyana

Answer 1

A pagan philosopher and holy man of the first century C.E., reported to have done miracles and delivered divinely inspired teachings, a man believed by some of his followers to be a son of God

Question 2

Apostle

Answer 2

Generally, one who is commissioned to perform a task from a Greek word meaning “sent” in early Christianity, the term was used to designate special emissaries of the faith who were understood to be representatives of Christ

Question 3

Asclepius

Answer 3

A popular Greek god known in particular for his ability to heal the sick

Question 4

Baptism

Answer 4

It means to “immerse”. The earliest Christian practice of baptism in water appears to have been an initiation rite, it probably derived from the practice of John the Baptist, who baptized Jews, including Jesus in anticipation of the imminent arrival of the end of this age and the coming of to Kingdom of God

Question 5

Gospel

Answer 5

When this word is capitalized, it refers to a literary genre: a written account of the “good news” brought by Jesus Christ, including episodes involving his words and/or deeds

Question 6

Paganism

Answer 6

Any of the polytheistic religions of the Greco-Roman world, an umbrella term for ancient Mediterranean religions other than Judaism and Christianity

Question 7

Passover

Answer 7

The most important and widely celebrated annual festival of Jews in Roman times, commemorating the Exodus from Egypt

Question 8

Plutarch

Answer 8

Famous philosopher, historian, and biographer of the second century (46–120 C.E.), known particularly for his essays on moral philosophy and the biographies he wrote of famous Greek and Roman men.

Question 9

Pontius Pilate

Answer 9

Roman aristocrat who served as the governor of Judea from 26 to 36 C.E., and who was responsible for ordering Jesus’ crucifixion.

Question 10

Roman Empire

Answer 10

All of the lands conquered by Rome and ruled, ultimately, by the Roman emperor, starting with Caesar Augustus in 27 B.C.E.; prior to that, Rome was a republic ruled by the Senate

Question 11

Sanhedrin

Answer 11

A council of Jewish leaders headed by the high priest that played an advisory role in matters of religious and civil policy.

Question 12

Suetonius

Answer 12

A Roman historian of the early second century C.E., best known for a multivolume collection of biographies of the Roman emperors, The Lives of the Caesars.

Question 13

Tacitus

Answer 13

Roman historian of the early second century C.E., whose multivolume work The Annals of Rome provides substantial information about Roman history from the beginning down to his own time.

Question 14

Temple

Answer 14

In pagan circles, a temple was any holy place devoted to one or more divine beings where sacrifices could be made in accordance with established religious principles. For Judaism there was only one legitimate Temple, the one in Jerusalem, an enormous complex that contained the holy sanctuary and, within it, the Holy of Holies, where God’s presence on earth was believed to dwell.

Question 15

Tradition

Answer 15

Any doctrine, idea, practice, or custom that has been handed down from one person to another.

Question 16

Beatitudes

Answer 16

A Latin word meaning, literally, “blessings,” used as a technical term for the sayings of Jesus that begin the Sermon on the Mount (e.g., “Blessed are the poor in spirit . . .”; Matt 5:3–12).

Question 17

Four source Hypothesis

Answer 17

A solution to the “Synoptic Problem” that maintains that there are four sources that lie behind the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke: (1) Mark was the source for much of the narrative of Matthew and Luke; (2) Q was the source for the sayings found in Matthew and Luke but not in Mark; (3) M provided the material found only in Matthew’s Gospel; and (4) L provided the material found only in Luke.

Question 18

Genre Criticism

Answer 18

A method used to study a literary text by asking how its genre functioned in its historical context and thereby exploring its historical meaning (i.e., seeing how its meaning would have been understood to its earliest readers) in light of its literary characteristics.

Question 19

Greco Roman Biography

Answer 19

A literary genre consisting of a narrative of an individual’s life, often within a chronological framework, employing numerous subgenres (e.g., sayings, speeches, anecdotes, and conflict stories) in order to reflect important aspects of his or her character, principally for purposes of instruction, exhortation, or propaganda.

Question 20

Redaction Criticism

Answer 20

The study of how authors modified or edited (i.e., redacted) their sources in view of their own vested interests and concerns.

Question 21

Synoptic Gospels

Answer 21

The Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke, which narrate so many of the same stories that they can be placed side by side in parallel columns and so “be seen together” (the literal meaning of “synoptic”).

Question 22

Synoptic Problem

Answer 22

The problem of explaining the similarities and differences between the three Synoptic Gospels. See also Markan Priority; Q.

Question 23

Aeons

Answer 23

In Gnostic myth, divine beings who are offspring of the one true, unknowable God.

Question 24

Catholic

Answer 24

From a Greek word meaning “universal” or “general,” used of the New Testament epistles James; 1 and 2 Peter; 1, 2, and 3 John; Jude; and sometimes Hebrews (the “catholic” epistles) to differentiate them from the letters of Paul.

Question 25

Christology

Answer 25

Any teaching about the nature of Christ. See also Adoptionism; Docetism.

Question 26

Contextual Method

Answer 26

A method used to study a literary text first by determining its social and historical context and then using that context to help explain the text’s meaning.

Question 27

Docetism

Answer 27

The view that Jesus was not a human being but only appeared to be, from a Greek word meaning “to seem” or “to appear”

Question 28

Gnosticism

Answer 28

A group of ancient religions, some of them closely related to Christianity, that maintained that elements of the divine had become entrapped in this evil world of matter and could be released only when they acquired the secret gnosis (Greek for “knowledge”) of who they were and how they could escape. Gnosis was generally thought to be brought by an emissary of the divine realm.

Question 29

Heracleon

Answer 29

Gnostic living around 170 C.E. who wrote a commentary on the Gospel of John, the first known to have been written by a Christian on any part of the Bible.

Question 30

House Churches

Answer 30

Private homes where, for centuries, Christian communities met for worship, instruction, fellowship, and the celebration of rituals such as baptism and Eucharist. Often it was the owner of the home who was the leader of the church.

Question 31

Ialdabaoth

Answer 31

In Gnostic texts, the name of the Creator-God (i.e., the “Demiurge”)

Question 32

Ignatius

Answer 32

The bishop of Antioch, Syria, in the early second century. He was arrested by the Roman authorities for Christian activities and sent to Rome in order to be thrown to the wild beasts in the arena. On his journey to martyrdom, he wrote seven letters, which still survive. These letters are included among the writings of the Apostolic Fathers.

Question 33

Irenaeus

Answer 33

Famous proto-orthodox Church Father and “heresiologist” (i.e., “heresy-hunter”) of the second century, whose five-volume work Against Heresies, written around 180 C.E., is a major source of information for Gnostic and other “heretical” groups.

Question 34

Johannine Community

Answer 34

The community of Christians in which the Gospel of John and the Johannine epistles were written. We do not know where the community was located, but we can reconstruct some of its history using the socio-historical method.

Question 35

Justin Martyr

Answer 35

One of the earliest “apologists,” who lived in Rome in the mid-second century.

Question 36

Marcion

Answer 36

A second-century Christian scholar and evangelist, later labeled a heretic for his docetic Christology and his belief in two Gods—the harsh legalistic God of the Jews and the merciful loving God of Jesus—views that he claimed to have found in the writings of Paul. Ancient Christians who adhered to this variety of Christianity are referred to as “Marcionites” by scholars today.

Question 37

Messiah

Answer 37

From a Hebrew word that literally means “anointed one,” translated into Greek as Christos, from which derives our English word Christ. In the first century C.E., there was a wide range of expectations about whom this anointed one might be, with some Jews anticipating a future warrior-king like David, others a cosmic redeemer from heaven, others an authoritative priest, and still others a powerful spokesperson from God like Moses.

Question 38

Nag Hammadi

Answer 38

Village in upper (southern) Egypt, near the place where a collection of Gnostic writings, including the Gospel of Thomas, were discovered in 1945.

Question 39

Proto-orthodox Christianity

Answer 39

A form of Christianity endorsed by some Christians of the second and third centuries (including the Apostolic Fathers), which promoted doctrines that were declared “orthodox” in the fourth and later centuries by the victorious Christian party, in opposition to such groups as the Ebionites, the Marcionites, and the Gnostics.

Question 40

Secessionists

Answer 40

Members of the Johannine community who, according to the author of 1 John, “seceded” from (i.e., left) the community to form a community of their own. First John, which calls these people “antichrists,” suggests that they had adopted a docetic Christology, not allowing that Christ was fully human.

Question 41

Sethians

Answer 41

A prominent group of Gnostics known from second- and third-century sources, who told complicated myths about how the divine realm and the material world came into being in order to explain both how individuals souls had come to be entrapped here and how these souls could escape by acquiring gnosis. See also Gnosticism; Valentinians.

Question 42

Socio-Historical Method

Answer 42

A method used to study a literary text that seeks to reconstruct the social history of the community that lay behind it.

Question 43

Sophia

Answer 43

In Gnostic mythology, the final (female) aeon who fell from the divine realm, leading to the birth of the Demiurge (Ialdabaoth), who then created the material world as a place to imprison her.

Question 44

Synagogue

Answer 44

Jewish place of worship and prayer, from a Greek word that literally means “being brought together.”

Question 45

Tertullian

Answer 45

A brilliant and acerbic Christian author from the late second and early third centuries. Tertullian, who was from North Africa and wrote in Latin, is one of the best-known early Christian apologists.

Question 46

Valentinians

Answer 46

A group of second- and third-century Gnostics who followed the teachings of Valentinus using a set of myths comparable to that used by the Sethians but more closely aligned with proto-orthodox Christians, in whose churches they worshiped and from whom it was difficult to distinguish them. See also Gnostics; Sethians; Valentinus.

Question 47

Diatesseron

Answer 47

A “Gospel harmony” produced by the mid-second-century Syrian Christian Tatian, who took the Four Gospels and combined their stories into one long narrative (Diatesseron literally means “through the four”: this, then, is the one long narrative told through the four accounts).

Question 48

Docetism

Answer 48

The view that Jesus was not a human being but only appeared to be, from a Greek word meaning “to seem” or “to appear.”

Question 49

Ebionites

Answer 49

A group of second-century adoptionists who maintained Jewish practices and Jewish forms of worship

Question 50

Eusebius

Answer 50

Early-fourth-century Church Father known as the “Father of Church History,” as his ten-volume book, History of the Christian Church, was the first to provide an extensive chronicle of Christianity’s early years, from the days of Jesus down to Eusebius’s own time (the early part of the reign of Constantine). Eusebius is the primary source of information for many of the events and writers of the first three centuries of the church.

Question 51

Gospel Harmony

Answer 51

Any literary attempt to take several Gospels and combine them into a longer, more complete Gospel by incorporating the various accounts into one, such as Tatian’s Diatesseron.

Question 52

Herod Antipas

Answer 52

Son of Herod the Great, and ruler of Galilee from 4 to 39 C.E.; this is the Herod who executed John the Baptist and who was involved with the trial of Jesus according to the Gospel of Luke (and the Gospel of Peter).

Question 53

Passion

Answer 53

From a Greek word that means “suffering,” used as a technical term to refer to the traditions of Jesus’ last days, up to and including his crucifixion (hence the “Passion narrative”).

Question 54

Pontius Pilate

Answer 54

Roman aristocrat who served as the governor of Judea from 26 to 36 C.E., and who was responsible for ordering Jesus’ crucifixion.

Question 55

Signs source

Answer 55

A document, which no longer survives, thought by many scholars to have been used as one of the sources of Jesus’ ministry in the Fourth Gospel; it reputedly narrated a number of the miraculous deeds of Jesus.

Question 56

Son of God

Answer 56

In most Greco-Roman circles, the designation of a person born to a god, able to perform miraculous deeds and/or to convey superhuman teachings; in Jewish circles, the designation of persons chosen to stand in a special relationship with the God of Israel, including the ancient Jewish kings.

Question 57

Son of man

Answer 57

A term whose meaning is much disputed among modern scholars, used in some ancient apocalyptic texts to refer to a cosmic judge sent from heaven at the end of time.

Question 58

Tertullian

Answer 58

A brilliant and acerbic Christian author from the late second and early third centuries. Tertullian, who was from North Africa and wrote in Latin, is one of the best-known early Christian apologists.

Question 59

Criterion of Contextual Credibility

Answer 59

One of the criteria commonly used by scholars to establish historically reliable material; with respect to the historical Jesus, the criterion maintains that if a saying or deed of Jesus cannot be credibly fit into his own first-century Palestinian context, then it cannot be regarded as authentic.

Question 60

Criterion of Dissimilarity

Answer 60

One of the criteria commonly used by scholars to establish historically reliable material; the criterion maintains that if a saying or deed of Jesus does not coincide with (or works against) the agenda of the early Christians, it is more likely to be authentic.

Question 61

Criterion of Independent Attestation

Answer 61

One of the criteria commonly used by scholars to establish historically reliable material; with respect to the historical Jesus, the criterion maintains that if a saying or deed of Jesus is attested independently by more than one source, it is more likely to be authentic.

Question 62

Josephus

Answer 62

First-century Jewish historian appointed court historian by the Roman Emperor Vespasian, whose works The Jewish War and The Antiquities of the Jews are principal resources for information about life in first-century Palestine.

Question 63

Mishnah

Answer 63

A collection of oral traditions passed on by generations of Jewish rabbis who saw themselves as the descendants of the Pharisees, finally put into writing around 200 C.E. See also Talmud.

Question 64

Pliny the Younger

Answer 64

Roman aristocrat who ruled the province of Bithynia-Pontus in the early second century C.E., and whose correspondence with the Emperor Trajan contains the earliest reference to Christ in a pagan source.

Question 65

Stuetonius

Answer 65

A Roman historian of the early second century C.E., best known for a multivolume collection of biographies of the Roman emperors, The Lives of the Caesars.

Question 66

Superstition

Answer 66

In the ancient world, superstition was understood by the highly educated upper classes as an excessive fear of the gods that drove a person to be excessively scrupulous in trying to avoid their displeasure.

Question 67

Tacitus

Answer 67

Roman historian of the early second century C.E., whose multivolume work The Annals of Rome provides substantial information about Roman history from the beginning down to his own time.

Question 68

Talmud

Answer 68

The great collection of ancient Jewish traditions that comprises the Mishnah and the later commentaries on the Mishnah, called the Gemarah. There are two collections of the Talmud, one made in Palestine during the early fifth century C.E. and the other made in Babylon perhaps a century later. The Babylonian Talmud is generally considered the more authoritative.

Question 69

4 BCE

Answer 69

Birth of Jesus

Question 70

30 CE

Answer 70

Crucifixion of Jesus

Question 71

50-60

Answer 71

Paul’s letters written

Question 72

64

Answer 72

The great fire of Rome; Peter and Paul executed shortly after

Question 73

65-70

Answer 73

Writing of Mark

Question 74

70

Answer 74

Fall of Second Temple

Question 75

80s

Answer 75

Writing of Luke, Matthew

Question 76

95

Answer 76

Writing of John

Question 77

125

Answer 77

Writing of Gospel of Thomas

Question 78

180

Answer 78

Irenaeus writes “Against Heresies”

Question 79

1945

Answer 79

Discovery of the Nag Hammadi documents