Jesus and Nicodemus.Henry Ossawa Tanner, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
Many of us in our fellowship community have been reading the Bible daily in a two-year plan. In this blog post, I will take the time to investigate an intriguing character encountered in John, Nicodemus, a Pharisee and “member of the Jewish ruling council” (New International Version Bible, 2011, John 3:1). Jesus himself called Nicodemus “Israel’s teacher” (John 3:10). A question about Nicodemus that Bible scholars have explored and that interests me is, did Nicodemus ever truly commit to following Jesus? What does the text say? Let’s go back to the Gospel of John, take a look at the three times that Nicodemus is mentioned there, and see what answers may be found there.
Jesus and Nicodemus (耶穌與尼哥底母).Henry Ossawa Tanner, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
我們團契中,許多人正依照一個為期兩年的讀經計畫每天讀《聖經》。這篇文章中,我想花點時間來探究《約翰福音》一位耐人尋味的人物尼哥底母,他是法利賽人,也是「猶太人的官」(《約翰福音》3:1,和合本) 或「猶太公會的成員」(a member of the Jewish ruling council) (NIV)。耶穌甚至稱尼哥底母為「以色列人的先生 (或教師)」(《約翰福音》3:10)。聖經學者長期討論的一個問題,也是我所關心的:尼哥底母究竟有沒有真心委身跟隨耶穌?經文怎麼說?讓我們看看《約翰福音》提到尼哥底母的三次記載,尋找可能的答案。
POSTER FROM THE LATE 1940’S DEPICTING THE SHAVUOT (FEAST OF PENTECOST) HOLIDAY. ëøæä îñåó ùðåú ä-40 ùì çâ äùáåòåú. Public Domain. WikiCommons.
On the last occasion, I wrote about Easter, when we celebrate Jesus’s resurrection from the dead. While too much can be made of a holiday or feast day (New International Version Bible, 2011, Col 2:16-17), the timing of this particular blog post has encouraged me to study the Bible to derive meaning from another event that occurred two thousand years ago and specifically, seven weeks after the resurrection of Jesus, on the day of Pentecost (Acts 2:1). What did the apostles already understand about Pentecost, even before the transformational events of that day occurred? Let’s explore the significance of Pentecost as depicted in the Old Testament, seeking to enrich our understanding of the context of Acts 2.
The Firstfruits of Wheat
The name Pentecost literally means “the fiftieth day” (Ferguson, 1993). It is basically the Greek term for the Old Testament Jewish festival referred to as the Feast of Weeks or Feast of Harvest (Ferguson, 1993). Its comparable Jewish term is Shavuot (Moore, 2013). Perhaps not surprisingly, debate existed about when to observe this Feast of Weeks (Ferguson, 1993).