PODCAST · education
Dragons in Genesis
by Dragons in Genesis
A critical bible study which places the individual stories within the context of the culture and contemporary mythologies from the region.
Episodes
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108_Luke Confuses the Reader
As Luke borrowed details from both Mark and Matthew and made his own changes and additions, things begant to get a bit confusing. Jesus reacts to statements which haven't been made and multiple parables which have nothing at all to do with one another come crashing together like stampeding swine...
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107_Luke Brings the Mountains Low
Throughout the bible we encounter the imagery of the lofty being brought low while the lowly are elevated. While this is typical of the promise of a reversal of fate, it does sometimes appear in a more literal sense, such as when Luke copies Matthew’s famous Sermon on the Mount but changes the...
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106_Twin Jesuses on Trial
Concluding Matthew’s gospel brings us more modifications on the gospel of Mark, the influence of the Book of Daniel and his time in the lion’s den on the story of the crucifixion and resurrection, as well as a curious detail that demonstrates that the other criminal, Barabbas, was not a figure…
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105_Matthew's Moses-Jesus
As Matthew’s author copied and expanded Mark’s gospel, he adapted Jesus for an audience that held the Hebrew Bible in higher regard. Thus the messiah became more loyal to Jewish law, more reverent to temple requirements, and more like Moses than originally described.
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104_Matthew Reboots Mark
Among the most popular stories from the life of Jesus is the Sermon on the Mount. 3 chapters of lessons from the most famous teacher in history… though this sermon isn’t found in the earliest gospel. Now did earlier christians know anything about it. That doesn’t mean the teachings didn’t exist…
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103_Mostly Dead
As with his ministry and miracles, the final days of the life of Jesus are rife with allegory and seem to be constructed from scenes borrowed from prior literature. But is there some kernel of truth behind the myth? Is there fact behind the fiction? Surely his trial and death must shed some light...
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102_God Hates Figs
From the transfiguration on the mountaintop to his overturning of tables in the temple, the arrival of Jesus at Jerusalem is filled with memorable scenes that demonstrate his character and illustrate his teachings. But many of those scenes and even his words, were not original to his story.…
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101_Loaves and Fish
Jesus lays out his fate to a crowd of disbelieving disciples who reject the idea that their savior must suffer and die, but prior to this is he repeats his calming of the sea and multiplication of bread and fish miracles. The reasoning behind this repetition can be found in the differences in the...
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100_Marky Mark
Decades after christianity began, an unknown author completely changed scripture by penning a Greek tragedy about the messiah. So popular was his work that in spawned numerous rewrites and imitations during the subsequent decades. His biography of Jesus would set the stage for storytellers for…
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Special Announcement
The Hebrew Bible is now complete, so what's next?
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099_Daniel
In the mid second century BCE, the people of Judea did the impossible… the ended centuries of foreign rule by expelling the Seleucids and reviving the divine Judean kingship. To celebrate their victory, they wrote stories which pretended to predict this achievement and cast a legendary hero from...
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098_Lamentations
In the aftermath of the fall of Jerusalem the population was lost, bereft of king and temple. Their prosperity and security had been taken from them and family members had been carted away to a distant land. But perhaps worst of all, their own deity seemed to have turned his back on them. But…
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097_Zechariah
Perhaps no other single book of the Hebrew Bible is as important to the New Testament authors as Zechariah. From it we find the idea of a suffering servant figure, a Davidic savior, one who is pierced through, who enters Jerusalem riding on a donkey and will remove the sins of the people before...
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096_Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, & Malachai
Could Yahweh be a dying-and-rising god? Does Malachi speak to the worship of Asherah in the Jerusalem Temple? Was Yahweh originally an angel who served his father, El Elyon? All these questions and more are raised by the minor prophets who saw the restoration of Judah as a parallel with the...
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095_Micah Nahum and Jonah
From giants and witches, to sun gods and talking animals, the Bible is littered with strange mythology. Curious stories concerning mystical beings can be found in every book, but one of the strangest stories is that of Jonah. Not only is a man eaten by a fish, but this prophet might just shed…
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094_Amos and Obadiah
Throughout the New Testament we’re treated to countless examples of literary influence from the older texts, including the Book of Enoch and the works of Homer. But most striking are perhaps the numerous examples of New Testament authors borrowing directly from the Hebrew Bible in order to craft...
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093_Hosea and Joel
As the returning exiles begin settling in Judah and our timeline moves nearer the Intertestamental Period, the literature looks both forward and backward in time, to themes of a coming day of judgment that will lay the foundation for Christianity and to the idea that past sins caused their recent...
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092_Ezekiel 3 (Yahweh in Marduk's Temple)
The influence from neighboring cultures in Second Temple Judaism cannot be overstated, but that influence shows up in some surprising places and comes from some surprising sources. Perhaps none more alarming are the Babylonians themselves who took the upper classes from Jerusalem hostage. From…
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091_Ezekiel 2 (Yahweh vs the Dragons)
An enemy of Judah is an enemy of Yahweh, and what better way to describe his enemies than in terms of his most ancient of foes, the great sea dragon? But this section of Ezekiel isn’t just populated with dragons, but also angels with flaming swords, god-kings, trees that reach into heaven, and...
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090_Ezekiel 1 (Wheels within Wheels)
The Bible is filled with strange scenes, but few can compare with the opening of Ezekiel when the sky is filled with clouds, fire, and lightning and a vision of a strange entity described as “wheels within wheels” terrifies the prophet so that he cannot speak for a week. But it’s hardly the...
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089_Jeremiah 4 (Yahweh and the Dragon)
The Mediterranean region is littered with myths of storm gods fighting great sea monsters, and Israel is no different. Their dragon goes by the name Leviathan and wishes to swallow up the world, and Yahweh, in a great tumultuous flood. This is part of their creation myth, but it can serve another...
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088_Jeremiah 3 (Baruch's Paradox)
As the destruction of the temple draws near, Jeremiah offers mixed messages of hope and despair, of violent ends and joyous beginnings. The city will be dismantled, no, it will be burned down. The temple will be toppled, or perhaps consumed by cleansing flames. And through it all the story of...
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087_Jeremiah 2 (Still Not a Bullfrog)
Moses is presented as the prototypical prophet who brings Yahwism to a nation of people who have forgotten Yahweh. Under his reform and leadership they eradicate idolatry and establish a new covenant. But is Moses the true prototypical prophet, or is he modeled after another?
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086_Jeremiah 1 (Not a Bullfrog)
When the Jewish exiles returned from Babylon they brought with them sweeping changes to their religion, changes formed during and after their captivity. Many changes were unwelcome, but as they were backed by the Persian state, they held sway in the newly-built Jerusalem. As their reforms took...
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085_Isaiah 5
Throughout human history people have attempted to explain tragedy with divine wrath. Great calamity seems to invite magical explanations as we seek meaning in our suffering. The final chapters of Isaiah attempt exactly that, ascribing their crushing defeat at the hands of the Babylonians to...
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084_Isaiah 4
Throughout the Hebrew Bible we’ve found important sections that were inspired by older myths and stories. From the opening chapter of Genesis drawing upon the Babylonian creation epic to Jacob’s struggle with the mysterious figure by the river taking details from the Epic of Gilgamesh, outside...
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083_Isaiah 3
The Hebrew Bible is filled with prohibitions against human sacrifice as Yahweh repeatedly states he is against such practices and has never asked for them. Yet buried within the text are stories which the redactors forgot to remove, stories in which Yahweh fiery pits are maintained for the…
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082_Isaiah 2
The Jubilee Year was a time of change in Jewish lives, a time when property was returned to its original owner and people returned to their homes. A time to return the disrupted nation to a more orderly state. It should come as no surprise that this concept was linked with the Great Flood in…
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081_Isaiah 1
Throughout the story of Jesus we find countless references to Old Testament passages, and no book of the Hebrew Bible is quoted more often than Isaiah. The contents of this book is concerned with themes of judgment and atonement, the remission of sin and the consequences of corruption, the...
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080_Song of Songs
The Song of Songs is a collection of erotic poetry that somehow made its way into Jewish scripture, but how did this occur? Apologists have long struggled with this idea, offering thee excuse that it’s secretly an allegory for the love of Yahweh to his chosen people. But the poetry contained in...
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079_Ecclesiastes
The book of Ecclesiastes, also called Qoheleth, is a curious text whose inclusion into the Hebrew canon has troubled scholars for centuries. It’s an introspective, pessimistic writing that violates traditional wisdom theology by positing that wisdom brings grief and moral behavior is fruitless.
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078_Proverbs 2
We conclude our study of Proverbs with sections 3-8 of the book which includes the Poem of the Good Wife, a work that outlines what it means to be a good woman and the type of person a man should look for when choosing a partner. Moreover, it tells what a husband can expect from a good wife.…
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077_Proverbs 1
The book of Proverbs, attributed to King Solomon despite the fact that most sections are individually attributed to other editors, provides us with poems, phrases, guidance, and sometimes-timeless advice. And in a few places it gives us a glimpse into long-forgotten aspects of Jewish mythology,...
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076_The Psalmiest!
The final episode covering the Book of Psalms includes the Thanksgiving Psalms, Liturgical Psalms, and the Acrostics. But we aren't satisfied with covering 150 psalms included in the Bible. We dig up 5 more psalms that have been discovered in various manuscripts and examine those as well.
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075_Pizalm 2 Electric Boogaloo
We tackle 3 more genres of Psalm, the Hymns, Wisdom, and Royal Psalms and discuss their usefulness in early Christian literature.
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074_Psalm Body Once Told Me
In the wake of the the Babylonian Conquest many Jews found themselves living in captivity, prisoners of their conquerors. Their city destroyed, their worship interrupted, they longed for the days when Yahweh would once again rule over them and provide safety for their nation and community. Thus…
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073_Job 2
We conclude our coverage of Job by examining the subsequent layers which were added to the text over the centuries and examine the theological implications of these layers. Does the new information contradict the original narrative, and why is the Book of Job so important to christianity?
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072_Job 1
This is a story all about how Job's life got twist-turned upside down Give me an episode or two and I'll explain How God inflicted Job with a life of pain The story of Job is NOT what you think. In fact, there isn't actually one story presented in the book, but several. And we're covering all of...
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071_Esther
Imagine ancient Jews who didn't observe kosher laws, had no special interest in Jerusalem, didn't practice circumcision, married foreigners, and wrote stories that never mentioned their god. This may seem difficult to imagine, but for Jews living outside of Judah, this was ordinary. Esther…
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070_Nehemiah
The Torah is centered around the idea that the descendants of Abraham are the rightful residents of the land of Israel and the religion they follow is the one true faith. Their law code comes from Moses and the land is granted to them according to divine covenant with Yahweh. But according to the...
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069_Song of Songs
The Song of Songs is the only piece of erotic love poetry included in the Hebrew Bible, and the imagery in the song is borderline pornographic. That's why I chose to recite the poem with appropriate music.
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068_Ezra, Better than
The Post-Exilic return to Judah from Babylon is central to Jewish theology, but why? Shouldn't their religion have simply picked up where the First Temple left off? What if the Second Temple wasn't a mere continuation of the old religion, but a fresh start? What if Moses and Joshua, and even...
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067_Revising History 2
The wild inventions of the Chronicler continue in this episode as we cover the entirety of the First Temple Period beginning with King Solomon and ending with the Temple's destruction at the hands of the Babylonians, ushering in the influence of Persian rule and religion which is evident in the...
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066_Revising History 1
The two books of Chroniclers are yet another attempt by biblical authors to rewrite their national history and create new scripture which contradicts the older versions. What makes Chroniclers stand out is the fact that the older version of history, the books of Samuel and Kings, were too…
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065_Book of Ruth
Set during the time of the Judges, the Book of Ruth follows Ruth and Naomi, two widows returning to Bethlehem during the wheat harvest. Neither has money or prospects, but by the end of the tale they will have secured their future. But is there more to the story than a tale of women taking…
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064_Fall of Jerusalem
Things aren’t going so well for Israel and Judah. Beset on the west by the Egyptians, the east by the Assyrians, and each other from the north and south, God’s chosen people are battling for their lives. But their hardships are due to their own wicked ways as they offend Yahweh at every turn....
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063_Baldilocks and the She-Bears
Elisha the prophet. Elisha the miracle-worker. Elisha the moon god. As the Israelites moved to a lunar calendar the importance of their lunar figures such as Elisha became more important, thus their stories of greatness and miraculous achievements grew until they outshined those of even their sun...
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062_Come on Baalim Light My Fire
How much sun god imagery can you fit into one character? I'm not sure, but the story of Elijah is trying to cram it all in there. From calling down fire from the sky (multiple times) to cursing the land with heat waves, the story of this prophet has it all. He also has more parallels to Moses…
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061_Kings List
Solomon's turn toward strange gods and stranger religious practices has convinced Yahweh to punish the nation of Israel by dividing it into two separate kingdoms, the northern land of Israel and the southern kingdom of Judah. This begins a series of conflicts led be two successions of kings who...
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060_Wisdom of Kings
The greatest structure ever built in Jerusalem was Yahweh's temple, but the story of its construction might be a product of a much later generation. And the details preserved of the early religion still shine through and seem strange to monotheistic religions of today.
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ABOUT THIS SHOW
A critical bible study which places the individual stories within the context of the culture and contemporary mythologies from the region.
HOSTED BY
Dragons in Genesis
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Frequently Asked Questions
How many episodes does Dragons in Genesis have?
Dragons in Genesis currently has 109 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.
What is Dragons in Genesis about?
A critical bible study which places the individual stories within the context of the culture and contemporary mythologies from the region.
How often does Dragons in Genesis release new episodes?
Dragons in Genesis publishes regularly with 109 episodes available. Check the episode list for the typical release schedule.
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Dragons in Genesis is created and hosted by Dragons in Genesis.
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