Ep 83: The God-Forsaken Psalm

00:00So before we start the show, I just want to jump in on something an event has occurred,

00:06an announcement has been made, Dr. Dan McClellan, that something big is going to be happening

00:13and you can pre-order it now.

00:15What's happening?

00:17What's happening is that I have written a book again, and this one is a little different

00:23though.

00:24This is not an academic tome.

00:26This is what's called a trade book, meaning it is written for a general audience and there's

00:30actually money behind publicity.

00:34So this book is called The Bible Says So.

00:39What we get right and wrong about Scripture's most controversial issues, and this is something

00:44I've been working on for a while now, I'm very, very happy to have this almost ready

00:48to go.

00:49I'm very excited for people to see this.

00:52It's a collection of, the first chapter is kind of a bird's eye view of how scholars

00:56think the Bible came together and then we've got 18 chapters, each one addressing a different

01:00claim that begins with The Bible Says and then it's homosexuality is an abomination, abortion

01:08is murder.

01:09Jesus is God, you should beat your kids that sinners are going to be punished forever in

01:16hell.

01:17So I'm going to be addressing a bunch of different things that we hear every day on social media

01:21about the Bible saying so.

01:23And it comes out April 29th, 2025, and it is available for pre-order now.

01:29I think we'll probably put in the show notes, the link to the landing page and we really

01:36hope that you'll do put in your pre-orders because it helps stand out a lot and it'll

01:41help them get to the top of the charts, to the tops of the pops and then and that will

01:48make it so that we can get to your area and do like lectures or book signings or things

01:54like that.

01:55The publisher is very eager to get us out there provided there's an indication that the

02:01book is highly desired.

02:03Yeah, we're currently talking about doing live shows all over the country, that sort

02:08of thing.

02:09So if you want to help make all of that happen, putting in a pre-order is a great way to do

02:14it.

02:15That would be an audiobook that I will be narrating as well.

02:18So if that's how you prefer to consume your literature, that'll be available.

02:25They have ePub as well, you can get it on Kindle, you can do the hardcover, all that's

02:29available for pre-order now.

02:31Sweet.

02:33Let's keep doing this show.

02:35Okay.

02:36You know, it's funny that they were working so hard to try and get Elijah to show up because

02:41I went to the Jewish community center for preschool and there was one day every year

02:48when they would leave the door open and pour a glass of wine for Elijah and then we would

02:53all go out and play in the playground.

02:56And when we came back, he had been there and drank that glass of wine.

03:00So and our teacher was a little happier.

03:04So I think it's pretty easy to summon if you're careful.

03:13Hey everybody.

03:14I'm Dan McClellan.

03:15And I'm Dan Beecher.

03:16And you're listening to the Data Over Dogma podcast where we increase public access to

03:21the academic study of the Bible and religion and combat the spread of misinformation about

03:26the same.

03:27How are things, Dan?

03:28Good.

03:29Getting over some jet lag, but everything's great.

03:32Accent has not come back to too much shifted toward the, toward the bank.

03:38Yeah, man.

03:39I understood was, was kind of influential on you.

03:43Yeah.

03:44I, if I, if I felt at all comfortable doing a Merseyside accent, you know, my favorite,

03:52my favorite example of a, of a manchester accent is, is it fair across the Mersey?

03:59No, no, no, it's, it's, um, do you remember on, uh, Ted Lasso, the character Jamie Tartt,

04:07I think is from Manchester and he keeps, he keeps saying that things are poopy, everything.

04:16That's poopy.

04:17And I love how he says that.

04:19Anyway.

04:20Uh, but yes, I had a lovely time in, in England, I think I'm going to, I'm going to just tease

04:26and listen, reach out to us if this interests you.

04:29I think you and I are going to lead a tour to England because it is awesome.

04:35And we can find some really cool stuff for us to show you guys and talk about.

04:39And I'm pretty sure that, uh, the Da Vinci Code is real and we can show you the middle

04:47temple, uh, cathedral or church where you can, where you can see the night's Templar and

04:53all that sort of stuff.

04:54I figured it all out for you, man.

04:56Yeah.

04:57Uh, so if that interests you at all, uh, feel free to reach out to us, contact at data over

05:02dogma pod.com and let us know.

05:04We'll, uh, we'll keep you on the list.

05:07Uh, we got a show coming up.

05:09We're doing a show here.

05:10Um, we're going to start with a chapter and verse.

05:16And I believe this is our first Psalm focused chapter and verse.

05:21Is that?

05:22Well, we did Psalm 82.

05:23Uh, oh, a while ago, but, but yeah, it's, uh, we, we have not done a bunch of them.

05:29So there's a lot of Psalms aren't there?

05:32And there are even more.

05:33If you go outside of the Protestant Bible, how dare you?

05:36What?

05:37Yeah.

05:38And they're even more at Kumran.

05:40So, um, yeah, it's, uh, the Psalmist was more prolific than, than, uh, I don't know,

05:49than a prolific author today.

05:51Yeah.

05:52So I was, I was looking for a songwriter cause at least today's Psalm seems to be in the

05:56form of a song.

05:58Uh, I don't know if they're all that or if they're, if they're all meant to be sung or

06:02if they, what, what's the deal with Psalms?

06:05We will talk about it.

06:06We'll get it.

06:07Uh, and then at the end of the show, uh, we're going to do an artifact and fiction.

06:11Uh, and we're going to be talking about where Jesus was absolutely definitely buried.

06:18For sure.

06:20No questions.

06:21And where the arc of the covenant, uh, was, was even briefly spotted.

06:25Oh, really?

06:26Oh, that's right.

06:27Yes.

06:28That's right.

06:29Yes.

06:30I remember, uh, a, a certain tick talker making a video about that at some point.

06:34Yeah.

06:35Well, all right.

06:36Let's just dive right in with our chapter and verse.

06:40So we're here in Psalm, what, 22, Psalm 22.

06:46Yes.

06:47Now, if you're reading in your Septuagint, that's going to be, I think we all have everyone

06:53get out your copy of the Septuagint.

06:55That's going to be a Psalm 21, but, uh, for everyone following the Masoretic tradition,

07:02which is most English translations, we're going to be in Psalm 22.

07:05Okay.

07:06Interesting.

07:07And we, we had, what accounts for that?

07:08Does someone add in a Psalm?

07:10Yes.

07:11Yes.

07:12I said there are more Psalms and the, the Septuagint has 151.

07:16Okay.

07:17So we, we've got an extra Psalm, um, and so the, but there, yeah, the, the, um, the numbering

07:23is a little, um, skewed there.

07:25Uh, so yeah, we have Psalm 22 verse one, verse zero in the English translations, but verse

07:31one in, in the Hebrew says that it is to the, uh, the leader, the chief musician, something

07:37like that.

07:38According to, and then we have this wonderful phrase, uh, Ayyelet Hasachar, which means the

07:46deer of the dawn.

07:48Okay.

07:49Um, this may be like a tune, it's like, uh, all right, everybody, this is too, uh, amazing

07:56grace.

07:57And right here, we have the deer of the dawn or the dough of the dawn, the morning dough.

08:02Um, if, if you're nasty and, um, the morning dough, it does, it does remind me of a different

08:10phrase that I won't say on the air.

08:12Anyway.

08:13Yeah.

08:14When I first looked at this, I was like, I saw the, the instruction and you know, in

08:20the NRS VUE, you're looking at it's in bold and as you say, verse zero, it's before verse

08:29one.

08:30And it just says to the leader colon, according to deer of, to the deer of the dawn, a psalm

08:36of David.

08:37And I was like, I don't know what any of that is.

08:40I don't know what I'm looking at.

08:42But so are you saying that it means that according to the deer of the dawn is like, as sung to

08:48the tune of the deer of the dawn?

08:50That's what some scholars think.

08:52We don't have a really good idea.

08:53Like people all the time are like, what does Selah mean?

08:57And the best I got is, um, I mean, Stella, it might be, it might be a pause.

09:04It might be, uh, dance break, uh, like we're not, we're not sure exactly what's going

09:08on there.

09:09And then, and then, I think it means something similar to cuckoo, cuckoo, chew.

09:15Yeah, it could mean, uh, this is where you scat, you know, dealer's choice.

09:21Uh, now, and then at the very end, a psalm of David means more that of Eid, uh, in Hebrew,

09:27uh, which could mean a song, uh, about David, it could mean, uh, a song belonging to David.

09:33It could be a song for David, like there are a bunch of different ways we could interpret

09:37this. Uh, but the, the traditional notion that David wrote all the Psalms or any of the

09:43Psalms is not considered to be historical by scholars.

09:47So, um, so when, when folks try to talk to me about Psalm 22, they're like, David said,

09:52David said, David said, no, a psalmist writing well after David was dead and gone, said

09:58these things.

09:59Uh, and yeah, this is, this was not written by David.

10:03Remind me, do we think that there was a historical David?

10:07I, I would say there are some who think there was no historical David.

10:10I think it's probably more likely than not that there was a warlord, uh, named David

10:18who managed to conquer Jerusalem, um, and set up a chieftain and set up a dynasty because

10:26we have the, the tell Dan Steely, um, and, and this is unrelated to Steely Dan as much

10:31as I wish there was a connection. It's unrelated, um, but it mentions, uh, and this inscription

10:38was written by an era man named Hazayel, who was talking about all the people he beat

10:43up. And he says he, um, he took out the kings of Israel and then so and so of the house

10:49of David, which is seems to refer to David's, whatever is not yet a kingdom, but just a

10:56dynasty that was probably set up in the south, um, had quartered at Jerusalem. So I think

11:02it's more likely than not there was somebody, but the David who had this, this gigantic

11:07kingdom that, that spread far and wide, absolutely not. The on ride dynasty is when Israel was

11:14first put on the map and that was after the house of David, um, was likely established.

11:20Great. So, uh, not David wrote this probably song. Yeah. Um, and it's a way, it's an interesting

11:32one. Yeah. It is, it is a bummer. I'm going to just put that out there. Yeah. It is, it

11:37is. When we, when we first, uh, we're talking about this before we hit record, you were

11:41like, it is bleak. And, um, yeah. And this is what's called a lament, an individual lament

11:49and then we can narrow it down, um, to an even more specific genre called the God complaint

11:55where, and you see a bunch of Psalms of this style. There are communal ones and there are

12:00individual ones where they're basically just shaking their fist at God going, why are you

12:06doing this to me or to us? Um, and it follows a pattern. It starts off with a complaint

12:14and it usually starts with, uh, the, the, uh, Hebrew word lemma, which means why or sometimes

12:21we have Admatai, which means how long. Um, so Psalm 82, for instance, uh, begins, how

12:27long are you going to judge unjustly? Um, salah, uh, whatever that means. And so here

12:34we have, uh, Ellie, Ellie, llama, uh, how, why have you forsaken me? And this is going to

12:41sound familiar to a lot of folks who have read the New Testament, uh, because we have,

12:45uh, the transliteration into Aramaic in the gospels of Mark and Matthew, where Jesus on

12:52the cross says, uh, Elowee or Ellie, uh, Elowee or Ellie, llama sabak, then he, why have you

12:59forsaken me? Yeah, I think it's interesting. Okay. So what, can I just go down a brief rabbit

13:05hole just about to do it really quickly? Because I looked at that and when I did the, what

13:13I see in many of the translations though, not all is that the, uh, that quote doesn't

13:19quite match from Mark to Matthew. Correct. Like it's a, like one is Ellie and one is

13:27Elowee, uh, and one is, and, and one is lemma and one is llama and I don't know. So, so,

13:36so talk, talk, what are we looking at? Well, I don't even know what language that's supposed

13:40to be. So Aramaic, it's a transliteration into Greek from Aramaic. Okay. Um, and so in the,

13:49in the Hebrew, it's actually a different word. It's not sabakthani, uh, toward the end there.

13:55It's, uh, as of tani. Okay. So, uh, yeah. And, and the difference is probably just to

14:01be attributed to whatever version of, of the, um, of the Psalm the, uh, author had in front

14:09of them. Mark was the first Matthew's coming decades later. Uh, so for whatever reason

14:14they, they chose a difference, uh, version or just transliterated it differently. Cause

14:19right, um, you know, we didn't even standardize transliteration of Hebrew until the last couple

14:24hundred years. And so you, you go back to the 18, 1700s and people are transliterating Hebrew

14:30and it could sound a, it could look a dozen different ways. So, um, back then they had

14:36no real standardization either. So, um, so that accounts probably for, uh, the different

14:42readings there, but, but basically this is my God, my God, why have you forsaken me,

14:46which is the beginning of this individual lament this God's complaint or God complaint

14:51of Psalm 22? What? I, so having read, uh, the Psalm, I look at it and I, and I, it doesn't,

15:01it's not clear to me why Jesus on the cross right before he dies would quote this Psalm.

15:09Yeah. Yeah. When you're in, when you're in dire straits and you're about to die,

15:15you're not thinking, what can I quote to really put a, put some stank on the, make sure this

15:22really lands rhetorically. Like this is, this is clearly a literary creation. Yeah. But the idea

15:29is to have scripture in Jesus's mouth and to reflect his despondency. But, um, but this is, uh,

15:37a particularly, uh, famous Psalm, but to get back to the, uh, the God complaint, you start off going

15:44why or how long, and then you, you praise God. And there's a reason you praise God. You praise

15:51God in order to remind God that in the past, they have delivered Israel or they have even delivered

15:56you personally. You're, think of all the saving things that you've done. And, uh, we see this in a

16:02bunch of Psalm, Psalm, uh, 74 and 76, Psalm 82. I have argued in the Journal of Biblical Literature

16:08article is a God complaint that Adonai, um, is, uh, singing or complaining to the other gods. Oh,

16:17and, and the idea is, remember you used to do all this stuff for us and, and you're kind of, uh,

16:23trying to manipulate God. Uh, and then you, uh, come in with the petition. You say, save me,

16:30help me deliver me. And, and sometimes there are multiple cycles of this, reminding of past deeds,

16:36petition, reminding of past deeds, petition. Uh, and so the, the point is the Psalmist is,

16:42is kind of engaged in a bit of a speech act. It's an act of worship while at the same time going,

16:47come on, dude, why don't you help me? So, uh, so that's what we have going on here in Psalm 22.

16:53Uh, and, and, and it's interesting. You have in the four gospels, all four gospels represent, uh,

17:01Psalm 22 around the crucifixion, but in two different ways because yeah, Mark and Matthew have Jesus

17:10say, why have you forsaken me on the cross? Right. Luke and John have nothing about why have you

17:16forsaken me on the cross, but Luke and John then have the Roman soldiers casting lots for, uh,

17:24Jesus's clothing. And that's actually verse 18. Right. We divide my clothes among themselves

17:29and for my clothing, they cast lots. So, so, Psalm 22 is in the background of all four crucifixion

17:37accounts, but it's verse one in the first two and it's verse 18 in the second two oddly enough.

17:43Yeah. And then, uh, obviously, and this is, this is what we're shooting towards.

17:49Uh, then there's verse 16. There's verse 16, uh, which is used, I think, by a lot of people

17:59to, as a sort of proof text that this Psalm was a, a prophecy about the crucifixion itself.

18:10Yes. Yes.

18:11Uh, let's talk about why.

18:14First of all, okay, let me go to, uh, I'm, I'm in the NRSVUE, but I don't think that's going to be

18:24helpful for for this point. No, for this point. So I'm going to, I'm going to switch to the KJV.

18:30Yeah, do it. If I can find it. All right. There we go. KJV heading down to verse 16.

18:37And it says, and this is in the midst of all of these complaints, uh, and boy, you know, I think you,

18:44I think it gave short shrift to the amount of complaining before there's the reminding God

18:54that he's supposed to be helping us sort of thing, because it is many verses of like,

19:00everything in my life is terrible. I, I, my teacher beat me at school and like,

19:09like it ran away. Yeah. It's, it's, yeah. Country songs have nothing on this.

19:16Yeah. Um, as you said, it's bleak.

19:19And then, uh, verse 16 says, for dogs have encompassed me, the assembly of the wicked

19:25have enclosed me. They pierced my hands and feet. That's what the KJV says. Right. Uh, what,

19:34you know, I, the dogs part, I suppose you could say that that would be a metaphor for bad people

19:41or whatever. And it does say the assembly of the wicked have enclosed me. I can see how you would

19:46look at that and think that that is a prefiguring of the Jesus, uh, crucifixion story.

19:52Well, why, why are you then? Uh, why, why are we talking about it now then?

19:58We're talking about it because that's actually, uh, you mentioned the, the NRSVUE is not really

20:05going to help that claim. And that's because they don't, they don't translate it that way,

20:09because what they translate there is, uh, they bound my hands and feet. And even this is only a

20:15guess. And the reason is that in the Hebrew, we don't really have a, a, a, a sensical reading.

20:25If we go into the Masoretic text, what we have is like a lion, my hands and my feet.

20:32Oh, and so we have, uh, this clause that doesn't make a whole bunch of sense. You can, you can

20:43take this as a verbless clause. My hands and my feet are like a lion. Rower. Um, yeah. You know,

20:49but that, and, and you could force that into the context. You could find a way for that to make

20:54sense, but it doesn't really feel quite right. And so nothing about the rest of, of these

21:02verses is saying anything about, I'm doing okay. I've got powerful hands and feet. Like, like,

21:08you know, there is nothing like a comparison from the self to a lion for sure. But it does shock me

21:16now that you say that, that none of the versions that I read use the word lion.

21:22Yeah, because most of them come up with some kind of reconstruction that makes better sense.

21:30Now what we have, uh, when we go, one of the things that we do if we're, when we're trying

21:35to translate and we run up against something and we're kind of like, yeah, uh, we'll go to the

21:40Septuagint and we'll see how the Septuagint translated. And this was the scriptures for early

21:47Christians. Yeah. The first multiple centuries, Christians read the Septuagint. Even the gospel

21:52authors are reading the Septuagint are quoting from the Septuagint. Just remind everybody what

21:57the Septuagint is. Septuagint is the ancient Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible. This was done

22:02in like the third, second century BCE where each book, uh, was separately translated into ancient

22:10Greek. And one of the reasons that is fascinating is there are a lot of differences between that

22:15and our medieval Masoretic text, which is the traditional source text for the Hebrew Bible.

22:20And there are, and you know, you can have several reasons for this because they had a variant source

22:26text or maybe they interpreted it differently or a bunch of different reasons. Um, and so when we

22:32look in the Septuagint of this, what we have is, um, they, they dig out my hands and feet.

22:40And this is a bit of a head scratcher. Um, it's, it's a verb. Um, or so, which means to dig or to dig

22:48out. And the semantic focus here is on removing material in order to make use of the space that

22:57remains or to create something out of the material that had parts removed. So this is, um, this is

23:04used to talk about, uh, digging, uh, ditches and rivers and canoes and things like that.

23:12Now, and so that, that is peculiar as well. Um, you know, we've got dogs are around me and, uh,

23:18surrounding me. And so maybe they're gnawing at hands and feet, something like that.

23:23And at Kumran, we have, um, what could be a variant reading. It could be like a lion. Um,

23:32but it could also be the final letter instead of being a yod, could be a vav, which at Kumran

23:38among the Dead Sea Scrolls, they often were indistinguishable from each other. Um, and so if

23:44it is a vav, then we could have a misspelling of the verbal route, kara, uh, kafresh, hey,

23:53which would also mean to dig out in the sense of dig out a canoe, dig out a river, dig out a canal,

24:01or there's one passage that says, you've dug out my ears so I can hear. Okay. And so,

24:09that's a possible reconstruction. It seems like the translator of the Septuagint might have had

24:14something like that in front of them. Right. And so, um, translated it with this verb, oriso.

24:20And so when we get to, uh, the English translations, we've had several centuries for people to get

24:29comfortable with thinking about Psalm 22 as a prophecy. They've dug out my hands and feet.

24:38This sounds an awful lot like they pierced my hands and my feet. And, and this goes back to, uh,

24:44the Patristic authors, there are some Patristic authors that talk about make reference to verse 16

24:49as a prophecy of, of Jesus's crucifixion. But, and, and I've made this point a number of times,

24:55the semantic, um, package of the verbs that we find both in the reconstructed Hebrew and in the

25:04Septuagint, do not match the concept of piercing someone hand, someone's hands and feet in order

25:11to crucify them. Because that is driving a sharp instrument through material in order to secure it

25:19to something. That is not digging out in order to make use of the space, uh, like there, but it's

25:27close enough that if people squint hard enough, they can make the edges blur and overlap. And

25:33suddenly we're there. We have reached our desired goal. And so, um, ever since like the coverdale

25:41Bible way back in 1535 rendered pierced my hands and my feet, the Geneva Bible, the bishops Bible,

25:47the great Bible, the Matthews Bible, um, they all say, um, they have pierced my hands and feet. And

25:53so the King James version obviously, uh, does the same. And this is then understood as a prophecy

26:01about the crucifixion. And it would, if it were that, it would be particularly, um, uh,

26:08miraculous because the author of Psalm 22 knew nothing about the practice of crucifixion. Right.

26:15That, that is a Roman innovation that's coming, um, on another part of, in another part of the

26:22world, uh, shortly after that. So, um, yeah, it would be pretty, uh, pretty miraculous, um,

26:28prophecy. If you could make a plausible argument that that's what was meant, but it was clearly not

26:35what was meant. Um, but there, there have been a bunch of other, um, ideas as well. In fact,

26:41there's a, uh, there's a scholar named, uh, Michael Flowers, who has, uh, published a paper where he

26:47reviews a bunch of different, uh, proposals about how to reconstruct this. I think he has 13

26:53different proposals. Uh, the like a lion, my hands and my feet, like a lion, they circumscribed

26:59my hands and my feet, suggesting that something dropped out. And so scholars have said, well,

27:03let's put it back in. They have dug my hands and feet. They have made my hands and my feet

27:08repugnant. They have bound my hands and my feet. And I think that's what the NRSVUE has.

27:13Yeah. Yes. They have bound my hands and my feet. Um, they, uh, my hands and my feet have been torn.

27:20So this makes sense of the dogs encircling me. My hands and my feet are wasted away.

27:24My hands and my feet hurt or are pained, uh, because they picked clean or as if to rip apart

27:31my hands and my feet. Um, because they picked clean and like a lion, my hands and my feet,

27:36my hands and my feet are shriveled up, gone lame, contracted, like a bunch of different ways scholars

27:42have tried to reconstruct something that makes better sense than what we have in the text.

27:46Right. But obviously if you're a Christian and, and you think that this thing that originally was just

27:51a God complaint and was not a prophecy about anything in the future, this is talking about

27:55somebody's own struggles. If you think this is a prophecy about the crucifixion, just intuitively,

28:01you are, you are going to be gravitationally pulled toward recognizing this as they pierced

28:08my hands and my feet. Well, especially if every single one of the, uh, of the gospels makes mention

28:17of this Psalm, it only makes sense to, to then read this Psalm in that, you know, with that context

28:26in mind, with that idea in mind, like I totally understand that. Yeah. Yeah. It makes, it makes

28:31perfect sense. I mean, it just kind of fills out this notion that, uh, that the crucifixion was this

28:39you know, big canon event within, uh, the life of Jesus and that Psalm 22 is, is this, uh, big

28:47kind of interpretive lens for understanding what's going on here and for how to think about it and

28:53how to understand, uh, Jesus's, uh, prophetic presence within the Hebrew Bible. Other than the fact that

29:02like the, the rest of the content of the Psalm doesn't feel like it comports with Jesus' attitude,

29:09anywhere else at all. Yeah. Like the, like Jesus is not a, a complainer about himself. Matter of,

29:18it's, it's, to the point where it actually has always bothered me, the, even when I was a believer,

29:25like the, I, the thought of Jesus on the cross despairing and saying why has thou forsaken me?

29:32Felt wrong. Yeah. He knew this was coming. He was, you know, he, he was resigned to it. He was,

29:39like, so it, so even that part felt, um, out of character to me. But surely it feel, it,

29:48it must feel a lot of character as you read, you know, you don't want to think of like,

29:53uh, as Jesus just whimpering about how bad his life is and everything. Uh, you know,

30:02I can count all my bones. They stare and gloat over me. They divide my clothes among themselves.

30:09You know, I just, like all of this stuff that feels, it just doesn't feel like Jesus to me.

30:17Yeah. Yeah. And, and when people go in and look at the, the God complaint and the laments,

30:23you know, you don't see a lot of people preaching on, um, on complaining to God.

30:28Right. Usually it's don't complain to God. Just praise God nonstop and be happy for it.

30:35Be happy that you have dogs encircling you and they are, they're doing something to your hands

30:41and feet that's unspeakable. Um, but the, but it's honest, but it might be lion-like. So that

30:46could be cool. But the, the psalmist are very much like, Hey, hey, what's going on over here, man?

30:54Why are you letting this happen to us? You're supposed to be the dude who did all these things,

30:59but you're letting us suffer. You're letting the enemy come into your house. You're letting

31:04them trample us. You're letting them burn down, uh, the, the holy city. You're doing all this stuff.

31:10So the, the, the psalmist is very much a complainer and in a bunch of places. And, uh,

31:16and a lot of people want to overlook that, but, but yeah, the, you have Jesus doing the same thing

31:21on the, on the cross. And I don't remember if it happens in Mark, in Matthew,

31:26he says, Ellie, Ellie Lamasabachthany and everybody hearing says he's calling for Elijah.

31:33And yeah. And so that means what does that mean? So, um, so the end of Malachi says, uh, you know,

31:42Elijah, uh, will come before that, uh, great and dreadful day. Turn the heart to the

31:47father, the children, the children, the father, the less that it's we burn it. And, um, and so

31:52there are the messianic hope that was developing in Greco-Roman period Judaism, frequently focused

31:59on Elijah, that Elijah was going to be the one who was going to come back and restore things.

32:05And this is why we have, uh, when, um, John, the Baptist sends people to Jesus, uh, you know,

32:12they're asking, are you, uh, the one who was to come? And I, I think one of them says, are you Elijah?

32:17Um, and when Jesus asked the people at Caesarea Philippi who say, uh, men that I am, some say you

32:24are Elijah, they're expecting Elijah to come back. And so some people miss here Jesus on the cross

32:30and say, Oh, Ellie, Ellie, maybe that's Ellie Yahoo. Ellie Yahoo. Maybe that's, uh, what Jesus is

32:37doing. And if, if Mark is doing the same thing, let me see. Yeah. Mark does the same thing.

32:44And some of them that stood by when they heard it as the King James version said,

32:47behold, he call it Elias, which is just a Greek transliteration of Elijah. So, um, that, it could

32:54be playing that literary function there. He, they could be like, he should say something that sounds

33:00like Elijah. Oh, what about Psalm 22? Ooh, I love it. Let's do it. And, um, and maybe the, the fact that

33:08it's representing Jesus as suddenly losing confidence and faith in God and being abandoned by God,

33:14maybe like, eh, we can, we can deal with that. We can hold our breath through that. And so even

33:19people today when they're like, Oh, I read this and, and it sounds like, you know, Jesus is complaining,

33:24but then I learned that it was a quotation of Psalm 22. And suddenly it's like, we can look past

33:31that. Right. We can, we can say, Oh, it's, it's, um, it's performing a different rhetorical function.

33:37And then you also have, uh, and part, I know this is particularly common among Latter-day Saints,

33:42some kind of, uh, they work it into kind of a systematic theology of the crucifixion,

33:49where it's like, Oh God had to abandon Jesus so that Jesus could go through this without God's aid

33:54or something like that. Because the, the atonement wouldn't be adequate if God were there supporting

33:59Jesus. And so he had to go through it alone and he complained, why, why have you forsaken me?

34:05So there, there are a bunch of different ways to negotiate with the text to make it fit the

34:10presuppositions you're bringing to it. Um, and, and many of them are fascinating and, and creative,

34:15but I'm most fascinated by whatever the authors were trying to do. That's the, that's the one I'm

34:20interested in. Yeah. We should ask them. Yeah. One day. You know, it's funny that they were, uh,

34:29working so hard to try and get Elijah to show up because I can verify that he's actually pretty

34:35easy to summon because I went to the Jewish community center for preschool and there was one day every

34:45year when they would leave the door open for a glass of wine for Elijah. And then we would all go

34:54out and play in the playground. And when we came back, he had been there and drank that glass of

34:59wine. So, uh, and our teacher was a little happier. So I think, uh, I think it's pretty easy to, to

35:07summon if you're, I'm getting some, some hints of Bell and the dragon there. Oh, that's a, that's a

35:16good way to make kids feel bad about wanting to play. Be like, Oh, you just missed them. You know,

35:21if you just stayed in here, you would have seen Elijah that we've been waiting for thousands of

35:26years, uh, to come back. I mean, I guess I, you know what, as someone who, uh, who had believed in

35:33both the tooth fairy and, uh, Santa Claus, I was used to magical beings showing up when I wasn't

35:39looking. So you said, get used to disappointment. And you said, Hey, that's a quote. I know what

35:48you're doing. I wait, what does that from? Get used to disappointment. That's, uh, that's from, uh,

35:55the, the most quoted film on the BYU campus. Um, princess. Oh, okay. Okay. There you go.

36:03I must know, get used to disappointment. Oh, right, right, right. Now I remember. Yeah.

36:08When I first came, when I first moved to Utah, people were like, you know what the most quoted

36:11movie of BYU is, right? I was like, catishack. And they were like, what's that? I was like,

36:16what have I done? Who am I here? This is not, these are not my people. All right. Well,

36:23I mean, you could do worse than princess bride. Um, still looking. All right. Well,

36:28is there more or is that, is that like there could always be more? But I, I think, uh, I think

36:34we've covered the basics of what we wanted to talk about with, uh, with this passage.

36:39I think that's a good place to, to finish that off with. And now we'll move on to our next segment,

36:45artifacts and fiction. Whoo.

36:48All right. So now since we've been on the topic of Jesus,

36:58and his, uh, unfortunate away passing, uh, there is unaliving as the kids say,

37:06as, as, as everyone who's trying to avoid getting their videos taken down from TikTok says,

37:11yes, the unaliving of Jesus, uh, and then realiving actually. So he, he's the only one that got that

37:18privilege. You, you brought up, uh, the idea of us talking about a thing called the garden tomb

37:27in Jerusalem. Uh, now my, this surprised me when you brought this up to me as a, as a thing,

37:34because I had always heard about the church of the Holy Sepulcher as being the, the, uh, the sort of

37:43locus of, uh, attention in terms of the tomb of Jesus Christ.

37:52Yes. Um, it, it has for a very long time held the distinction of sort of claiming that that's what

37:58it was. Yes. Um, since, uh, early three hundreds. So yeah, that's, I mean, that's far sooner after

38:06than now for, uh, but me, I, I don't know how strong their claim is. I've done no archaeology

38:15whatsoever. Um, but there's also this other place. Uh, why don't you talk to us a little bit

38:22about it? Yeah. So, uh, just north of, uh, Jerusalem, um, by Nablus Road, there is a place you can go,

38:36uh, to this day, uh, it is a, a very well curated and kept location, very quiet. And I'm actually

38:44going to get into why that is relevant. Um, but there is a, there's a place called the garden tomb

38:51where they have two different locations, one of them's inside the property and the other's

38:57outside the property. There's a, uh, kind of a rocky cliff face that's right next to a bus depot

39:03and on the top of the house was Jesus going to get there. He needed to take the bus. Yeah.

39:10This is all, you know, downtown you got to get to the bus. Um, and then there's, um, there are, uh,

39:17burials, graves, uh, um, on the top of the cliff face. But way back in the 19th century,

39:23there were a lot of Germans who were spending, um, time in and around Jerusalem, uh, particularly

39:30military men, but other scholars, and there was one in 1842 by the name of Otto Tenius.

39:35And as the story goes, he was, uh, just in his hotel room, looking out the window and noticed a

39:43rocky outcropping and was like, Hey, that kind of reminds me of a skull. That's weird and thought of

39:53the story of the crucifixion with Golgotha, which means place of the skull and the wheels started

39:59turning and, um, it, cause it's this rocky outcropping and it looks like it has a couple of, um, of

40:06little indentations that could be eyes. And then one looks like they could be the bottom of a jar

40:11or something like that. And, um, so Germans started poking around there suggesting that this was

40:16the location of Golgotha. And then there was this major general named Charles Gordon, the very model

40:22of a modern major general. I hope you saw that coming. Um, about 40 years later, he was in Jerusalem,

40:30and he came up with this, uh, with this idea that you could kind of overlay a skeleton on

40:37Jerusalem. And the, uh, the dome of the rock is right where the pelvis is. And then the city of

40:43David is this little, um, uh, kind of, uh, the legs sticking out from the south. And then the pool of

40:51soloam is the foot is the feet of the skeleton. And then at the very top north of Jerusalem,

40:56this rocky cliff face that looks kind of like a skull from a certain angle would be the skeleton

41:02skull. And so this is all feeling very Dan Brown. Yeah. This was Dan Brown before there was

41:07Dan Brown. Yeah. Um, and but I got to say, making the, uh, what was the pelvis thing making the, the

41:14dome of the rock dome of the rock into the, into the penis of this thing seems. Well, it wasn't an

41:21obelisk. If it was an obelisk that would be a little more on the nose, but, um, but he came up

41:27with this idea and, and, and he kind of is the main popularizer of the notion that this is, uh,

41:34this is Golgotha. In fact, it is frequently referred to as Gordon's, um, Calvary

41:42by, uh, a lot of folks these day, these days and nearby couple hundred feet away,

41:48there is a tomb that is carved into another cliff face, uh, a related but separate cliff face.

41:56And you can go visit it to this day and, and there are an awful lot of people who think this is where

42:01Jesus was buried. And, um, so the Garden Tomb Association is this German Protestant organization

42:08that curates this space. It's gorgeous. There are places to sit. There are places to have little

42:16meetings. Uh, there are, uh, they have seating right next to the bus depot where they give

42:22a little presentation and you look out over the buses at, um, the, the, uh, the cliff face. Oh,

42:28beautiful. And, and well, here's the thing. Um, a lot of Protestants. I don't know if you know

42:34anybody who's ever been to the church or the Holy Sepulcher. It is, uh, a cacophony. Like you go

42:41in there are people everywhere. There are noises. There are smells. There are smoke. There are a

42:45bunch of different, um, people in different religious garb. You have to wait in line if you

42:52want to go up and, uh, see the, uh, the Golgotha cliff face and there's gold everywhere. There are

42:59images everywhere. There are things, uh, swinging. There are things flapping in the breeze. There

43:04are things reflecting things everywhere. Um, you know, it's you, you smell sweat. Um, and people are

43:12weeping. Uh, when you first walk in, there's a slab, a stone slab that is traditionally identified

43:18with where Jesus's body was prepared for burial. And so there are people weeping over this stone

43:25slab. Like it is an experience, but for a lot of Protestants who are a little more stiff upper lip,

43:31this is, um, disconcerting. It's, they feel uncomfortable in a place like this. This is not

43:39the quiet dignity that they expect for a location like this. And, and there have been,

43:44uh, outbreaks of violence and things like that that take place. It's a fascinating location. And, um,

43:51and I hope people who are interested in this kind of stuff at some point have an opportunity

43:56to go visit it. It's quite an experience. But if you go to the garden tomb association,

44:00you're basically in a little, a literal garden, just walking around, listening to birds chirping

44:06and people are whispering to each other. And it just feels a lot more serene and a lot more

44:12solemn. And so, um, to, to put it in, uh, terms, Gen Z can understand the garden tomb passes the

44:20vibe check for the place where something as solemn and serious as Jesus's resurrection took place.

44:27And so a lot of Protestants tend to gravitate toward the garden tomb as the location. But in

44:34addition to the fact that there are absolutely no archaeological or other data that would indicate

44:41this cliff face was Golgotha, the tomb itself is definitely not where Jesus was buried.

44:48Okay. That's, that's a strong claim, my friend. Strong claim indeed. Yes. Now if you go there,

44:54it's, um, it's a pretty flat cliff face and there's a little door size opening. And then there's a

45:00little, uh, track kind of in front of the door. And they say, Oh, that was held the round stone

45:08that was rolled over the door. And then you can even see that there's kind of a big semi-circular,

45:14um, carve out that goes around the door, uh, and then kind of stops and, and is flat for a few more

45:23feet. And, and you know, that's, that's when you look at it, that's the vibe you get. But archaeologists

45:31have said, well, okay, problems. One, most of this dates to the crusader era. Two, this is not a

45:39track to hold a stone. This is a watering trough. And three, this, uh, carve out area held a roof

45:47when this was an animal pen during the crusader area era. Uh, and so just the outside of the tomb

45:54doesn't fit at all. The, the things that kind of, um, evoke notions of this being Jesus's burial

46:03place on the outside are actually from over a thousand years later inside. The problems are

46:09even more significant because this is a rock cut bench tomb, which means that, uh, you have a

46:17couple of benches that were hollowed out underneath and bodies would be laid on these benches and

46:23tell the decompose to the point that it was just bones. And then the bones would be gathered and then

46:30dumped, um, more ceremoniously than I'm making it sound into the cavities below. And, and you know,

46:40you would get a mountain of bones underneath. And, and there's a, there's an argument to make that

46:46this is what it means to be gathered to your ancestors is your body has decomposed, your bones

46:50are all gathered together and you are dumped into the pile of your ancestors. You are deposited

46:57into the ancestral dump. I get it. Okay. Yeah. Sure. And so that's how they did things in the

47:02Iron Age. This is this tomb dates to the eighth or seventh century BCE. Oh wow. Now when you look

47:09in the New Testament, Joseph of Arimathea's tomb was a brand new tomb in which no one had ever been

47:16laid. So this doesn't fit. And at the same time, the style of tombs were different because you

47:24would have benches where the bodies would be laid. But when they were, when they were decomposed,

47:29the bones were not just dumped into a hole underneath. They were put into an ossuary, a bone box,

47:36a little, you know, it's a little higher than than a Nike box. But but that's basically what

47:41you're talking about. A box that the bones would go in, it's scratch your name on the side sometimes.

47:47And then you were deposited in a little cubby hole that was carved in the rock. And so they had a

47:54different style of rock cuts burial tomb in the first century CE. And this is not that. This is

48:02an eighth or seventh century BCE rock cut bench tomb. And so it does not fit the description of

48:10the tomb in which Jesus was buried. And that's all we have to go on for identifying where Jesus

48:16was buried. And so it is not that. So the case for this being Jesus' tomb is is phenomenally weak.

48:24It is disqualified by several of the features both outside and more strongly inside the tomb.

48:33So that's this is not like it's and here's the thing I when I led a tour in Israel and Palestine

48:40last year, I kept saying to people, look, a lot of people think there's something metaphysical,

48:46something special about being able to identify the exact spot. But most people are not here because

48:52they think it's the exact spot. They're here because they want to experience something that

48:58gives them kind of a visceral phenomenological connection to the idea, right? Not necessarily

49:05the exact place itself because you can go there and you can have a wonderful experience and you can

49:11contemplate what Jesus is death and resurrection means to you. And you can be in a location that

49:18is very close to where this all happened and is very similar to what it would have been like.

49:25It's not the exact place, but you can still get that experience and you can still make

49:30connection with that part of the world and with with all those feelings. And I think that's

49:36the most valuable part of that kind of stuff. So I tell people, hey, this is not it, but this is

49:43about as close as you're going to get to actually seeing it until they invent time travel without

49:49without fights breaking out. Yeah. But this is and that's a and I think a lot of people appreciate

49:57knowingly going into that situation like that saying we're going to have an experience,

50:03we're going to enjoy it, we're going to drink deep from it. But we know it's not the actual

50:08place where it happened. Well, and it's not like it's archaeologically not interesting.

50:13Oh, it's it's archaeological. I think it's fascinating.

50:15I think it's really interesting. I mean, it's not that thing, but it's still a seventh or eighth

50:21century BCE burial place. And that's that in and of itself is really cool to visit.

50:29Absolutely. And you're you're just down the street from the temple mount and it's a phenomenal

50:36place. And in that in Jerusalem to have a little area that's quiet and peaceful like that,

50:42that's that's a that's pretty cool in and of itself. Yeah, that sounds like gold.

50:47So I've every time I've been there, I've gone to the garden tomb and I have sat there and done,

50:53you know, my little personal style of meditation and I have enjoyed it immensely. I have wonderful

51:00memories about that place, but it's not where Jesus was buried. And it's not where Jesus was

51:05crucified. I guess I do want to go back and check in with since we mentioned it, the church of the

51:14Holy Sepulchre. Yeah, because as you said, that has a much longer claim to to to being the actual

51:24burial play. What are what are our thoughts on that?

51:26Um, it of all the candidates, that's the one that makes the most sense, but we'll never know for sure.

51:33But I would point out that, um, so a couple of things, uh, as it exists today, a ton of stuff has

51:40been has been carved away and carted out and changed. So the landscape is different. And that's

51:48without all of the architecture that has been built over it. Um, and so you're not experiencing

51:55the landscape the way it was because this was a part of a quarry in the first century CE. And

52:01this kind of makes sense for where they would have a bunch of, uh, people being crucified and then

52:06where they would bury them. But if, if you find yourself in the, in the church of the Holy Sepulchre,

52:11you, you like go up some stairs and then you wait in line and you get to pass in front of, uh, the

52:17rocky outcropping that they identify as Golgotha. Only it's covered by a ton of stuff. And you

52:23actually only look at it indirectly for the most part. You have a few little pieces of glass that

52:29allow you to look into it, but there are icons and drapery and things everywhere. And you can look

52:34at the back of it because they've got a little mirror held up at an angle. They'll let you see

52:39the back of it. But once you're done, if you go down the stairs and then instead of turning left

52:44to go to the, uh, the crypt, you turn right. There's actually a, uh, a larger, um, glass portion that

52:53nobody ever goes by where you can see a larger chunk of that cliff face. But the, the actual place

52:59that they identify with, uh, with the burial, you've got to wait in line. No pictures inside the

53:03little building. It's a building inside a building. But again, if you go past it and then go to the

53:10wall on the other side, they actually have preserved some, uh, first century CE, uh, a tomb.

53:18That is what you would expect for Jesus's tomb, where you have the bench and then you have the,

53:26uh, the little cubby holes carved into the rock where the ausuaries would have been, um, placed

53:33after the, the bodies had decomposed. And so you get, uh, a sense of what the tomb would have looked

53:40like. Uh, if you go there, now you have, you can have the whole experience. You can wait in line.

53:45You can go inside the building. You can look at that. You can touch the, the place where they, um,

53:51they think he was buried. Uh, it's, it's quite the experience, but there are also other things

53:57that allow you to get a little closer to what it probably would have been like, uh, in the ancient

54:02world. But there was, um, there was a Roman temple built over that spot shortly after,

54:09after they destroyed Jerusalem. And, uh, after the Barcoqueva revolt, they came back in. They,

54:14they renamed it Iolia capitalina. They built this temple. And then in the 300s when you had, uh,

54:20Constantine and his mother kind of trying to come, come back and be like, is that the cross? Where

54:25the, where's this? Where's that? Where's the other thing? This is the rock that Jesus gave Peter the

54:30fish on and all that kind of stuff. And, and they identified that spot as where Jesus was crucified

54:36and buried. And so they tore down the, um, the Roman temple and built a little shrine there. And

54:43over the years that his, um, it has been added to and supplemented and grown. Um, but yeah, you can,

54:49you can still go there today. And so I would say if you want to get a sense for something

54:53that it's a little closer to what it would have been like, even though it has been significantly

54:59changed. Um, the, uh, the church of the Holy Sepulchor has that. And if you want to go sit there and

55:06meditate and pray and be in the peace in the quiet and the serene nature, um, next to a tomb,

55:14you, there is that at the garden tomb. So a little bit for everybody. There you go. I think that those

55:20are great tips. Uh, and I, and a fascinating look at the things. I think that one of the things

55:26that's so interesting and I love that. I love your take on it, which is that it's not the point

55:33doesn't have to be, is this the real place? Cause you can't know, uh, for a lot of these things. You

55:39can't know for sure. There's no way. Uh, so yeah, you go with the idea of like trying to

55:46just get a sense of what it might have been like and to contemplate the, the story itself. And

55:53that's, that's valuable in and of itself. I like that a lot. And maybe you get to see a fight.

55:58Hopefully you don't see a fight. Um, but the one more thing to add, Ron Wyatt thought that, uh,

56:08that he thought that was a place where Jesus was crucified and he talked. Which one, the garden

56:12tomb? Garden tomb. Okay. He talked, he talked them into allowing him to excavate, to go into some,

56:18some caves and things underneath, even though he's, he's not an actual archaeologist. He had no

56:23certification or anything like that. And they were like, yeah, sure, whatever. And, um, he claims that

56:29under the garden, under the Golgotha, um, so, um, by the bus depot that he saw the arc of the covenant.

56:38And that it was directly under the place where Jesus was crucified and that he saw dried blood

56:45that had spilled upon the arc of the covenant. And he claims that he took it to a lab and they

56:51tested it and came back and said, where did you get this? It's still alive. And it only has 23

56:56chromosomes. And, um, of course, produced zero evidence for any of this. Um, but if you go to the

57:03garden tomb today, you can go up and say, Hey, can I see your Ron Wyatt letter? Because he, he went

57:10out and publicized these claims and people came to the garden tomb and they were like, is this for

57:14real? And they, uh, wrote a letter that is still, they will give it to you if you go and ask for it.

57:20That says the Council of the Garden Tomb Association London totally refutes the claim of Wyatt to

57:25have discovered the original arc of the covenant or any other biblical artifacts within the boundaries

57:29of the area known as the Garden Tomb Jerusalem. Though Wyatt was allowed to dig within this privately

57:36owned garden on a number of occasions, the last occasion being the summer of 1991,

57:40staff members of the association observed his progress and entered his excavated shaft.

57:46As far as we are aware, nothing was ever discovered to support his claims, nor have we seen any evidence

57:53of biblical artifacts or temple treasures. So this Protestant group that runs the Garden Tomb

57:59Association was like, yeah, totally a hoax. We didn't find Jack. We should not have let that

58:05guy dig. That was a bad, that was our bad. We made mistakes. I'm sorry. Well, there you go. I think

58:12that that's fascinating. Uh, and Ron, Ron Wyatt was a crackpot. All right. Uh, if you, dear friends

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