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| The son of King Philip of Macedonia and conqueror of most of the known world. United Greece and vast territories of the Persian Empire as far east as India. |
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| The ultimate enemy of Jesus Christ, who, according to Christian apocalyptic traditions, will manifest himself at the End of time to corrupt many of the faithful, only to be vanquished at Christ's Second Coming. |
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| A person sent forth or commisioned as a messenger, such as the Twelve whom Jesus selected to follow him. |
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| A disclosure of spiritual realities or truths that are normally hidden - in the future or in the invisible world of spirit beings. |
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| The language of the Arameans (ancient Syrians), a West Semitic tongue used in parts of Mesopotamia from about 1000 BCE. Became common language of Palestinian Jews and was probably the language spoken by Jesus. |
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| The resurrected Jesus' ascent to heaven. |
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| The list of blessings or sources of happiness with which Jesus begins the Sermon on the Mount. |
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1. A list of books that a religious community finds sacred and authoritative.
2. A standard by which religious beliefs or documents are judged acceptable. |
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| Seven short New Testament documents that were addressed to the church as a whole and thus are described as general, or "catholic" (universal). |
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| The theological interpretation of the nature and function of Jesus, including doctrines about his divinity, his prehuman existance, and his role in creating the universe and in human salvation. |
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| A vow, agreement, or contract between two parties, a model of the relationship between God and his people. |
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| The promise that Yahweh made to King David to maintain David's heirs on Israel's throne forever, the basis of Israel's messianic hopes. |
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| Beliefs about the supernaturally directed destiny of humanity and the universe; from the Greek word meaning "study of last things." Associated with an apocalyptic worldview, eschatology has both personal and general applications. |
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1. The Christian message, literally meaning "good news".
2. The literary form of Christian narratives about Jesus or compilations of his teachings. |
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| A widespread and extremely diverse movement in early Christianity. Followers of Gnosticism believed that salvation is gained through a special knowledge revealed through a spiritual savior and is the property of an elite few who have been initiated into its mysteries. In its various forms, became a major heresy in the early church, though little is certain about its precise tenets. |
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| The presence of God active in human life. In post-New Testament times, the Holy Spirit was defined as the Third Person in the Trinity. |
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| The influence and adoption of Greek thought, language, values, and customs that began with the conquest of the eastern Mediterranean world by Alexander the Great and intensified under his Hellenistic successors and various Roman emperors. |
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| An ascetic who preached the imminence of judgement and baptized converts in the Jordan River as a symbol of their repentance from sin. The Gospel writers viewed him as an Elijah figure and forerunner of the Messiah who baptized Jesus, but also recognized his superiority. |
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| Wrote letters to the church. |
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| An Anglicized form of the name Judah or Judas, one of Jesus' brothers (or a close male relative), perhaps a son born to Joseph before his marriage to Mary. Jude is less prominent in the early Christian community than his brother James, and is the traditional author of the Epistle of Jude, though most scholars doubt this claim. |
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| An important Jewish historian whose two major works - Antiquities of the Jews and The Jewish War - provide valuable background material for the first-century Judaism and the early Christian period. |
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| The rule or dominion of God in human affairs. |
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| The common Greek in which the New Testament is written. The everyday language of the Hellenistic world. |
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| A Greek term meaning both "word" and "reason," used by Greek philosophers to denote the rational principles that creates and informs the universe. Found its most famous expression in the prologue to the Fourth Gospel to denote the prehuman Jesus - "the Word became flesh and dwelt among us." |
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| An early Gnostic Christian who attempted to establish a Christian Scripture distinct from the Hebrew Bible, which he rejected. Marcion's canon included only Luke's Gospel and the Pauline letters, the only documents he believed to reflect true belief. The church in Rome expelled him as a heretic about 140 CE. |
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| The belief in the existance of one God. |
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| Greek term meaning "presence" or "coming," that New Testament writers use to denote Jesus' reappearance on earth, when, as Israel's divinely empowered Messiah, he will judge all humanity and establish God's universal rule. |
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| A short fictional narrative that compares something familiar to an unexpected spiritual value, from the Greek parabole, meaning "a placing beside" or "a comparison." A recurrent tradition held that Jesus used parables to prevent most of his hearers from understanding his message. |
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| The term commonly used to denote Jesus' suffering and death. |
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| The most influential apostle and missionary of the mid-first-century church and author of seven or nine New Testament letters. |
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1. Also known as the Feast of Weeks, the Feast of Harvest, and the Day of First Fruits, a one-day celebration held fifty days after Passover at the juncture of May and June.
2. The occasion of the outpouring of the Holy Spirit on early Christians assembled in Jerusalem, regarded as the spiritual baptism of the church. |
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| The most prominent of Jesus' twelve chief disciples, also known as Simon, Simeon, and Cephas. Son of Jonas or John, brother of the apostle Andrew, and a native of Bethsaida, was called by Jesus to be a "fisher of men." First to recognized Jesus as Messiah, later denied him three times before death, and became leader of the Jerusalem Church after Jesus' death. |
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| The first five books of the Hebrew Bible, the Torah. |
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| A leading religious movement or sect in Judaism during the last two centuries BCE and the first two centuries CE. Although the New Testament typically presents them as Jesus' opponents, their views on resurrection and the afterlife anticipated Christian teachings. |
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| The belief in more than one god, the most common form of religion in the ancient world. |
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| German term for "source," a hypothetical document that many scholars believe contained a collection of Jesus' sayings. The theory of its existence was formed to explain material common to both Matthew and Luke but absent from Mark's Gospel. It is assumed that Matthew and Luke drew on a single source (Q), assembled about 50-70 CE, for this shared material. |
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| Ruins of a community near the northwest corner of the Dead Sea, where most scholars believe the Dead Sea Scrolls were produced. |
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| A belief that events usually associated with the eschaton, such as divine judgement and resurrection to eternal life, are even now realized in or fulfilled by Jesus' spiritual presence among his followers. |
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| The international, mulitcultural government centered in Rome that conquered and administered the entire Mediterranean region from Gaul in the northwest to Egypt in the southeast. The empire ruled the Jewish state in Palestine from 63 BCE until Hadrian's destruction of Jerusalem during the second Jewish War. |
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| The anti-hero protagonist in the Watchmen graphic novel. Born Walter Kavocs, is killed by Dr. Manhatten in the end. |
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| An ultraconservative Jewish sect of the first century BCE and the first century CE composed largely of wealthy and politically influential landowners. An aristocracy controlling the priesthood and Temple, they cooperated with Roman rule of Palestine, a collusion that made them unpopular with the common people. |
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| Professional copyists who recorded commercial, royal, and religious texts and served as clerks, secretaries, and archivists at Israel's royal court and Temple. Often linked with Pharisees as Jesus' opponents who conspired to kill him, although some became his followers. |
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| A Greek edition of the Hebrew Bible traditionally attributed to seventy or seventy-two Palstinian scholars during the reign of Ptolemy II, but actually the work of several generations of Alexandrine translators, begun about 250 BCE and not completed until the first century CE. Included in the Old Testament as the Apocrypha. |
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| Mark, Mathew, and Luke: Gospels that are strikingly similar. |
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| The study and interpretation of concepts about God's nature, will, and intentions toward humanity; from the Greek theos, meaning "god," and logos, "reason." |
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| The Pentateuch (first five books of Hebrew Bible) and in a general sense all the Hebrew canonical writings, which are traditionally regarded as a direct oracle, or revelation, from Yahweh. Torah is usually translated as "law," "instruction," or "teaching." |
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| The Romans sacked Jerusalem and destroyed Herod's Temple. |
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