What were Jesus and early Christians like?

[watchamadoodle]

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From looking at wikipedia articles, Herod was in Judaea from 27 CE to at least 37 CE. Where do the traditional dates come from? Are they simply adding the traditional age of Jesus to the dates from the nativity stories?

If that was the case, the dates would doubtlessly be different, as needed to make the Gospel story work. The Gospel dates are so horribly off from the rest of history that if the rest of history were based on the Gospels, then someone did a lousy job.

By the way, I didn't mention this but according to the Gospel of John, the crucifixion is dated to 29 CE. How do I know this? Everyone open your Bibles to John chapter 2.

John 2:20 Then said the Jews [to Jesus], Forty and six years was this temple in building, and wilt thou rear it up in three days?

This quote was from the first Passover of JC's ministry in the Gospel of John. The Gospel of John tells us about three Passovers during that ministry. Temple construction started in 20 BCE. There was no year 0. So, doing the math, this conversation recorded in the Bible happened during the Passover of 27 CE. Plus two years gives us 29 CE.

...which is funny because Luke's Gospel tells us that John the Baptist didn't even start his ministry until 28 CE.

It's a mess.

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Maybe Jesus wasn't very good at math?

On the war with the Nabataeans, wikipedia describes the divorce as one of several causes. Maybe Aretas was waiting for favorable military conditions or diplomatic arrangements, or maybe he needed a few additional grievances to make up his mind about war? That would explain the delay. I assume the Nabataeans would have been very concerned about Roman retaliation. Maybe they waited until it became obvious that Rome was going to attack them regardless? (I'm just imagining possibilities of course. )

There are several wikipedia quotes, but here is one that mentions other grievances:

Besides provoking his conflict with the Baptizer, the tetrarch's divorce added a personal grievance to previous disputes with Aretas over territory on the border of Perea and Nabatea. The result was a war that proved disastrous for Antipas; a Roman counter-offensive was ordered by Tiberius, but abandoned upon that emperor's death in 37 AD.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herod_Antipas