Northern Virginia Catholic Bible Study
House notes/rules…
1. The Zoom Meeting Logon information is the same every week: Zoom ID: 861 1782 2081 Password: 406952
2. The notes/recaps from our meetings are posted on our Catholic Catacombs Light website https://catholiccatacombs.wixsite.com/website/blog, usually within a day.
3. See The Chosen. Knowing Jesus Christ means being able to better relate to God. Check it out: The Chosen at https://thechosen.link/1Y1R7.
4. Respectfulness. Of course we will discuss differences between religions and even between Christian denominations, but we agree to use respectful words and tones in doing so. Specifically, Protestants are our friends and brothers in Christ (I myself owe part of my return to the faith to them).
5. No politics. It would be easy for us to self-destruct; however, that’s not our goal. Our goal is to learn the Bible, explain the Catholic faith – what it means and especially its origins in Scripture and Jesus Christ – and helping people develop a closer relationship with Jesus Christ in their daily lives.
6. Questions encouraged. If you have questions about anything, you can email the group via Meetup, or me directly at ron@hallagan.net.
Week 2: Bible Timeline
Gen13-14 – Abraham & Lot split; Abraham fights 4 kings to save Lot; meets Melchisedech
Opening Prayer Dear God, we thank you for everyone gathered here today and ask that you surround us with your powerful, life-changing presence. Fill our hearts with your love, fill our words and conversations with truth and grace. We also pray for all those in need in the world… those who have been subjected to injustice or violence… those suffering from Covid-19 … and we pray for the family and friends of everyone here, and for their intentions here mentioned in the silence of their hearts. Lord, thank you for hearing us and for sending your grace and strength to those whom we have asked your help. And as you taught us to pray: Our Father Who art in Heaven, Hallowed be Thy Name. Thy Kingdom come, Thy Will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven. Give us this day our daily Bread; And forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner. Amen. Upcoming Catholic Holy Days Christmas Season – Dec 25 to Jan 9 Christmas 12/25 Feast of Holy Family 12/26 Epiphany of the Lord 1/2 Baptism of the Lord 1/9 Upcoming Jewish Holy Days: Purim (March 16-17) 14th of the month of Adar. Hebrew months:
1-Tishrei (Rosh Hashanah)-Sept 2-Marcheshvan - Oct 3-Kislev (Hanukkah) – Nov/Dec 4-Tevet - Jan 5-Shevat (5 ½ AA*) 6-Adar - March *Leap Year every 3 yrs, add Adar Aleph 7-Nisan (Passover/Easter) 8-Iyar – May 9-Sivan (Shavuot/Pentecost) 10-Tammuz – June/July 11-Av – July/Aug 12-Elul – Aug/Sept
Last week, we missed Boy Jesus in the Temple. Here is a quick overview.
Boy Jesus in the Temple – Luke 2:41-52 Each year Jesus’ parents went to Jerusalem for the feast of Passover, and when he was twelve years old, they went up according to festival custom. After they had completed its days, as they were returning, the boy Jesus remained behind in Jerusalem, but his parents did not know it. Thinking that he was in the caravan, they journeyed for a day and looked for him among their relatives and acquaintances, but not finding him, they returned to Jerusalem to look for him. After three days they found him in the temple, sitting in the midst of the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions, and all who heard him were astounded at his understanding and his answers. When his parents saw him, they were astonished, and his mother said to him, “Son, why have you done this to us? Your father and I have been looking for you with great anxiety.” And he said to them, “Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?” But they did not understand the statement he said to them. He went down with them and came to Nazareth, and was obedient to them; and his mother kept all these things in her heart. And Jesus advanced in wisdom and age and favor before God and man. Q: How far was the walk from Nazareth to Jerusalem? If they traveled by way of the Jezreel Valley and Samaria, 70 miles. If they traveled along the Jordan – 80 miles. Four to seven days.
Q: Every year Mary and Joseph to Jerusalem for feast of the Passover. How long was this feast?
8 days. The Passover in those days combined two feasts: Passover and Unleavened Bread, both part of the memorial of the Exodus redemption (freedom from Egyptian slavery). Unleavened bread was all they could take with them for the Exodus journey. The feasts begins at sundown on the day of the Passover.
Passover was one of the three "pilgrimage feasts" in which every man of the covenant who was thirteen years and older was required to appear before God's altar with his sacrifices. It was a joyful time and many families made the journey to Jerusalem just as the Holy Family.
Q: How many days was Jesus missing? What is the significance of the number of days?
Jesus was missing for three days in Jerusalem, just as He will be missing on the three days between His crucifixion and Resurrection. Therefore, "finding" Jesus on the third day prefigures the events of Easter.
Q: Where did Joseph and Mary find Jesus?
At the Temple conversing with the teachers of the Law.
Prior to this, Jesus had grown up like any child. How many years would pass before the significance of who he was might slip your mind during the hustle and bustle of daily life?
This episode certainly reminded them who their son was. But, also, Jesus makes it clear that He knew His true identity. This is the first manifestation to us that Jesus is conscious of being "the Son" as He confirms in Joseph's presence that God is His Father.
Q: What does this passage mean? “But they did not understand the statement he said to them.”
We are apt to think that they should have understood. But wouldn’t skeptical criticism be a contradiction to Luke’s earlier passages of the Annunciation in Luke 1:35?
“The Holy Spirit will … will overshadow you; therefore also the Holy One being born to you shall be called the Son of God.”
So then what does this question mean? When looking at other commentaries, the meaning most described was that they didn’t know what this incident – including his words – meant for them. Was his ministry starting now, at 12? Were they supposed to know this?
When I looked at the Hebrew words being translated, I found more help. For example, another translation for “statement” (ῥῆμα -rhēma) is “implication.” So, instead of “they did not understand the statement he said,” another way of reading this is: “they did not understand the implication of what he said.”
This makes more sense, especially in the heightened anxiety they must have been in leading up to this exchange. They must have been out of their minds, and his response, “Did you not know I must be about my Father’s business,” would have stopped them like a deer in the headlights.
The only other conclusion we can draw from this is that it’s probably a good thing that Joseph didn’t smack him.
Abram and Lot Part Ways – Genesis 13
From Egypt Abram went up to the Negev with his wife and all that belonged to him, and Lot went with him. Abram was very rich in livestock, silver, and gold.
From the Negev he traveled by stages toward Bethel, to the place between Bethel and Ai where he had first built the altar. There Abram invoked the LORD by name.
Lot, who went with Abram, also had flocks and herds and tents, so that the land could not support them if they stayed together.
There were quarrels between the herders of Abram’s livestock and the herders of Lot’s livestock.
So Abram said to Lot: “Let there be no strife between you and me, or between your herders and my herders, for we are kindred.
Is not the whole land available? Please separate from me. If you prefer the left, I will go to the right; if you prefer the right, I will go to the left.”
Lot looked and saw how abundantly watered the whole Jordan Plain was as far as Zoar, like the LORD’s own garden, or like Egypt.
Lot, therefore, chose for himself the whole Jordan Plain and set out eastward. Thus they separated from each other.
Abram settled in the land of Canaan, while Lot settled among the cities of the Plain, pitching his tents near Sodom. Now the men of Sodom were exceedingly wicked and sinful against the LORD.
After Lot had parted from him, the LORD said to Abram: “Lift up your eyes and look at the place where you are, northward, southward, eastward, and westward; all the land that you see I will give to you and your descendants forever.”
So Abram moved his tents and went on to settle near the oak of Mamre, which is near Hebron. There he built an altar to the LORD.
Q: A dispute broke out between their kinsmen. What is the meaning of “kinsmen?”
The Hebrew word translated is literally “brothers.” In Hebrew, the term “brother” is a sibling, half-sibling, step-sibling, cousins, and anyone adopted into the family. The term is used in the same context in the NT when referring to Jesus’ “brothers and sisters” (kinsmen).
Q: What was the dispute that broke out between Abraham and Lot?
Both had large herds of animals. The herdsmen were likely fighting over water and grazing rights.
Q: What land does Lot take?
Lot takes the better land. The irrigated, green valley was the better choice given his livestock. However, he pitches his tents near Sodom. The passage says that the people of Sodom were wicked. Sodom was Las Vegas of ancient Near East. More specifically, it means they ran roughshod over the laws of the Noahic Covenant.
Q: What was the Noahic (or Noahide) Covenant?
There were seven laws given to Noah after the flood that became known as the Noahic Covenant. They include prohibitions against (1) worshipping idols, (2) cursing God, (3) murder, (4) adultery and sexual immorality, (5) theft, (6) eating flesh torn from a living animal, and (7) the obligation to establish courts of justice.
Q: What are your thoughts about Abraham offering Lot to choose and then taking the less desirable land?
The story almost suggests that Lot is the natural choice to be the ancestor of a great family or nation, since Lot is young, wealthy, and takes the most fertile land. In contrast to Lot, Abraham waits for God to tell him to lift his eyes and see the land he will receive. Abraham’s visionary possession of the land foreshadows that of Moses, who God tells to do the exact same thing about 500 years later (Deut 3:27, 34:4).
Genesis Chapter 14 – Lot’s Captivity; The Four Kings; Melchizedek
Chedorlaomer, king of Elam, along with the kings of Shinar, Ellasar, and Goiim made war on the kings of Sodom, Gomorrah, Admah, Zeboiim, and Zoar. All these kings then joined forces in the Valley of Siddim (the Salt Sea). For twelve years they served Chedorlaomer, but then in the thirteenth year they rebelled. In the fourteenth year, Chedorlaomer and the kings allied with him came and defeated the whole country and neighboring lands. Thereupon the king of Sodom, the king of Gomorrah, the king of Admah, the king of Zeboiim, and the king of Zoar marched out, and in the Valley of Siddim they went into battle against them.
Now the Valley of Siddim was full of bitumen pits; and as the kings of Sodom and Gomorrah fled, some fell into them and the rest fled to the mountains. So the enemy took all their possessions and food supplies and then went their way; they also took Lot, Abram’s nephew, who dwelt in Sodom, as well as his possessions.
Q: What might be another reason for these kings to fight over the land, besides the land itself?
The travel route between Mesopotamia in the north and Egypt in the South. TRADE.
Q: How did Abraham win with 318 men?
All I can think of is God. It is interesting to see how non-believers comment on these wars. They say that since Abraham clearly wasn’t a warrior and apparently had no troops, the whole story must be made up.
Abraham doesn’t disagree. He gives credit to God throughout, not himself.
Melchizedek
When Abram returned after from his victory, the king of Sodom went out to greet him in the Valley of Sha’veh (the King’s Valley).
Melchizedek, king of Salem, brought out bread and wine. He was a priest of God Most High. He blessed Abram with these words: “Blessed be Abram by God Most High, maker of heaven and earth. And blessed be God Most High, who has delivered your enemies into your hand.”
Then Abram gave him a tenth of everything.
The king of Sodom said to Abram, “Give me the captives, but the goods you may keep.”
But Abram replied to the king of Sodom: “I have sworn to the LORD, God Most High, maker of heaven and earth, that I would not take so much as a thread or a sandal strap from anything that is yours, lest you be able to say, ‘I have made Abram rich.’ I will take nothing but what the young men have eaten, and a share that is due to the men who went fought with me—Aner, Eshcol and Mamre.”
Q: Who was Melchizedek?
He was called the Priest-King of Salem, and also the King of Righteousness.
Some have speculated he was Shem, the good/first son of Noah.
Q: Where was Salem?
Salem is where Jerusalem is now. Salem translates as “peace” (shalom). Jerusalem means “City of Peace.”
Q: By not taking the spoils of war he deserved after saving the king of Sodom, Abraham is making an important statement. What?
Abraham refuses to let anyone enrich him but God. He acknowledges that his victory isn’t from him. It is from God alone.
Q: Why did Melchizedek do bread and wine?
It was a prefiguring of the bread of the presence and the wine in the Tabernacle during Exodus, and of the Last Supper.
Q: Where do we hear the name of Melchizedek in the Mass?
In the Eucharistic prayers, Jesus is compared to Melchizedek. Why?
King David prophesized the return to a priesthood like Melchizedek’s in Psalm 110:4: “Yahweh has sworn an oath he will never retract, you are a priest forever of the order of Melchizedek,” also quoted in the New Testament in Hebrews 5:6. This Psalm 110 passage is also quoted by Jesus, a passage which He applies to Himself in Matthew 22:43-45, referring his perpetual priesthood.
Up until the time of Moses, priests were always the eldest son in each family. After the disastrous golden calf incident, priests could no longer be from each family. Instead, they were designated to be one tribe, the tribe of Levi, and the brother of Moses – Aaron – was the first. Henceforth, the priests were all Levites, after the tribe of Levi.
However, Jesus was a descendant of David of the tribe of Judah, not Levi. So how could he be a “Priestly Messiah”?
Well, clearly the fact that he came before Moses and was the Son of God trumps the Levite requirement. But also, the Levites were established because of the golden calf incident. Before this, priests were in each family.
Well, Melchizedek was also priest before the institution of the Levites, and he was the pre-eminent priest of the Old Testament (even the greatest Patriarch, Abraham, gave him a tenth of everything taken in battle). So it is more appropriate that Jesus is a priest more in the line of Melchizedek, not Levi. This was first noted in the Book of Hebrews, referring to Jesus:
“You are a priest forever, in the order of Melchizedek.” – Hebrews 7:17
Q: What are the exact words in the Mass?
Look with favor on these offerings and accept them as once you accepted the gifts of your servant Abel, the sacrifice of Abraham, our father in faith, and the bread and wine offered by your priest Melchizedek.
Closing Prayer
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