Ep 127: The Indiana Jones Episode!

00:00- Did the Red Hulk ever lift Thor's hammer in?

00:04I guess he was.

00:05- Now we're crossing the streams.

00:08We're crossing the streams.

00:09- And you know you can't cross streams.

00:11It's just don't cross the streams.

00:14(upbeat music)

00:17- Hey everybody, I'm Dan McClellan.

00:20- And I'm Dan Beacher.

00:22- And you're listening to the Data Over Dogma podcast

00:25where we increase public access

00:26to the academic study of the Bible in religion

00:29because why not?

00:30And we combat the spread of misinformation

00:34about the same because we all know why.

00:37How are things today Dan?

00:39- I'm, things are great.

00:41Today's gonna be fun.

00:42This is a, we're going, we're going cinematic.

00:47- On this one.

00:49- Okay, yes.

00:50- Because we are taking a trip down Indiana way.

00:54We're gonna go down the Indiana Jones Trail, if you will.

00:58- Well, that was the name of the dog,

01:00not the road that he grew up on.

01:03- I don't know, I didn't, yeah.

01:04Anyway, moving on.

01:05- Moving on.

01:06- Yeah, we're, so we're gonna start

01:09as one does on one's Indiana Jones special

01:12with the arc of the covenant.

01:15- The arc of the covenant, yeah.

01:17- We will, we will not be doing any raiding per se,

01:21but we will be talking.

01:22- That would be unethical of us

01:24as Indiana Jones was frequently.

01:27- Yeah, he, oh yeah, he wasn't tremendously concerned

01:30about ethics, unless he was.

01:32And then it was like, why are you even bothering with that?

01:35And then, for our second thing, we're gonna do,

01:40we're gonna do the grail, the holy grail, yes.

01:45- A grail, grail.

01:47- We're gonna skip right over the middle one,

01:50the one that my wife hates,

01:52but I was like, why did we pay for the three movie set

01:56if you refused to have that movie on in this movie?

01:58- There's no temples of doom in the Bible.

02:01- Yeah, we're gonna unrelated.

02:03- And we're gonna, I'm numb she by right by that one.

02:07- And if we have time at the end,

02:09we'll talk about a crystal skull.

02:11We'll see.

02:12But for now, let's dive in with the arc of the covenant.

02:18(upbeat music)

02:22All right, so, we've all heard of the arc

02:25of the covenant.

02:26It is a very famous thing, but what the heck is it?

02:31It seems, it's funny because, you know,

02:36it is very much in pop culture,

02:37not just in Indiana Jones movies, but in other things.

02:42We all know that it is now resting comfortably

02:44in a U.S. government warehouse.

02:47- Yes, and it's evidently magnetic or something, I don't know.

02:54- Burns holes and stuff.

02:56But yeah, what's funny is the Bible has two arcs.

03:00And people, and this is two different Hebrew words,

03:04like they're not the same word,

03:05but they get translated as arc.

03:08- Okay, so one is a giant boat,

03:11an enormous, un-plausibly,

03:14- Un-plausibly, yes,

03:16- Un-plausibly large boats.

03:19- Me fail English.

03:22- And then the other is a box.

03:24- Yes, and they're both kind of box-ish,

03:27like the Hebrew word for Noah's arc

03:29is a chest, a casket, something like that.

03:32And the Hebrew word for the arc of the covenant,

03:35Aron is a, same thing, it just means a box.

03:39And this Hebrew word is used in places

03:41to refer to the sarcophagus,

03:44into which Joseph's corpse was placed in Genesis.

03:48Jehoedah placed an Aron next to the altar

03:51for the collection of money for the temple.

03:55We have a few different uses of this,

03:57and then we also have the phrase,

03:59well, we have several phrases,

04:00there's several titles for this thing.

04:02We have arc of the testimony in Exodus 25,

04:05we have arc of the covenant in Joshua 3.6,

04:07arc of the Adonai in Joshua 3,

04:10arc of the God, first Samuel 3.

04:14So it's got a bunch of different names,

04:15but essentially-

04:16- These are all referring to the arc of the covenant.

04:18- To the same arc.

04:19- As far as we know, yeah.

04:21- To the same box.

04:22- Yes.

04:23And so- - Let me ask you this.

04:24If you're translating this,

04:26because no one says arc in any context,

04:29other than the Bible context.

04:32- Yeah.

04:33- So if you were translating this,

04:34would you be tempted to use the word box?

04:37(laughing)

04:37The box of the, I don't know.

04:39We gotta come up with something other than arc.

04:42- Yeah, I wonder if the common,

04:43what the common English Bible uses there,

04:46because that's intended for like folks who are,

04:50like where English is a second language or something like that,

04:53it's intended for folks who don't understand it

04:58on as high a level.

05:02So at some point, I'm gonna have to look up

05:04and see what they call Jan Box-

05:09- The chest of the covenant.

05:12- Oh, they do say chest.

05:13- Oh, okay.

05:14- Yeah, the souls of the priest's feet

05:15who are carrying the chest of the Lord.

05:18- Okay.

05:18- Ruler of the whole earth.

05:20So chest also works.

05:22And this is all describing the same thing.

05:24- It's a box.

05:24It's a box.

05:25- Yeah.

05:26- It's a box.

05:27And it is a box that is described in Exodus.

05:29So before we get to stories about the box,

05:33maybe I'll just go through quickly

05:34and describe this thing.

05:38It is made, so apparently it is,

05:42in Exodus 25, we have how God is commanding

05:46this should be made.

05:48It's made of acacia wood,

05:52but I don't wanna call it acacia wood.

05:54I wanna call it what the King James version calls it,

05:57which is, oh, I've forgotten, hang on.

06:00I'm gonna click over to King James.

06:02- Just because. - Just shit him.

06:03- Shit him wood.

06:04- Shit him wood, yes.

06:06- That is my favorite thing in the world.

06:08(laughing)

06:10Okay, 'cause I'm not saying anything dirty.

06:12I promise, that's what the arc is made of.

06:14It's made of shit him wood.

06:17And like the other arc, we have measurements in qubits.

06:23So two qubits and a half is the length.

06:27And a qubit and a half is the width

06:31and a qubit and a half is the height.

06:33So a nice, you know, nice rectangular box.

06:37- Yeah, and there are a few different ways

06:40to measure what a qubit is.

06:42So it's not exactly clear what the exact dimensions are

06:46of this box, but it is something that is made of wood,

06:50but then covered, overlaid with precious metals,

06:54gold and the like of which, go ahead.

06:58- Well, we were talking last week

07:00about the letter of Jeremiah.

07:03Is that who it was that we were talking about?

07:05And how he mocked the gods of the Babylonians

07:10because they were just wood with gold overlaid over them.

07:13And then this week I come here and I read all about this thing

07:18that is basically there of wood and overlaid.

07:22- There's constructed of wood

07:24with gold and silver overlaid over it.

07:26And I was like, come on, you guys, this seems to be

07:29the thing that you do.

07:30- Yeah, this is a little on the nose.

07:33But, and you know what?

07:34There is so much more to it than that

07:36because there are a bunch of ways

07:38that the Ark of the Covenant is functioning

07:40and in form and function, it is a divine image.

07:44- Right.

07:45And this is something that scholars have noted

07:46for a long time, for instance, we have,

07:51and I think there's a little nuance to it,

07:53but for instance, you have things that are being placed

07:57before Adonai, Leafnae, Adonai,

08:00or it is set before the testimony,

08:04which would be what the Ark of the Covenant is carrying.

08:07So if you can imagine this box up there

08:10on a pedestal or something like that,

08:13and somebody comes and bows down and places

08:17and offering in front of the box.

08:20- Right.

08:20- It's like, mm, this is, the vibes here are,

08:24it's giving divine image is what my 13 year old would say.

08:28She would say, look, chat, it's giving divine image.

08:33And she will not stop addressing the chat

08:37in our living room when no one else is around,

08:40I don't understand this line, but.

08:42- And this, it's fine, it's fine.

08:46People have their own thing.

08:47- Yeah, this closely parallels conventions

08:51from ancient West Asia where treaties and things like that

08:56are placed at the feet of or before the divine image.

09:00- Right.

09:01- And so you have some places in the Hebrew Bible

09:04where it says they place these things in the Ark,

09:08and then you have other places

09:09where it says they put things before the Ark.

09:12And one scholar has argued,

09:14this is probably a diachronic change

09:16where initially it was replacing things before the Ark,

09:19which is using the Ark as a divine image.

09:22And later on they were like,

09:23what if we said they put it in the Ark?

09:26Then it sounds less like a divine image.

09:30- Well, we're gonna get to,

09:32we know what happens when you open the Ark.

09:35- Yeah, you get hemorrhoids.

09:36- Well, that's right, we talked about the hemorrhoids.

09:39- It progresses to the face melting.

09:41- Eventually, if you're a Nazi,

09:43your face is gonna melt off.

09:44That's just how that's gonna work.

09:45But yeah, and we're gonna get to more ways

09:49in which this is seen as a divine image

09:52when we get to first Samuel,

09:53but we're still in Exodus right now,

09:55'cause I wanna describe the rest of it.

09:57So we've got a wooden box.

10:00Made of shit 'em.

10:01And then we've got gold and silver overlaid over it.

10:04Oh, no, is it just gold?

10:07It may just be gold.

10:08Yes, pure gold, inside and outside.

10:12You shall overlay it.

10:13You shall make a molding of gold upon it all around.

10:18And then you got four rings of gold

10:21that you can put two sticks through

10:23for holding it.

10:26So that's good that you got a way to transport it.

10:29That's always useful.

10:30Yep, gotta be mobile.

10:32And then you got a lid.

10:38And the lid or the cover is pure gold with,

10:44and it's, I don't know why it feels like

10:48it has to specify the length and width of that.

10:51Just make it the same as the box.

10:54But it does, it says the same as the box.

10:56Yes.

10:57And then two cherubim of gold,

11:00which everyone interprets to be angels,

11:02but you know, whatever a cherubim,

11:05whatever cherubim are.

11:07Yeah, like not angels.

11:09There's no part of the Bible that calls them angels.

11:12So just, but like divine critters of some sort.

11:16And these critters are, I think,

11:20comparable to the Lamassu from Babylon.

11:24So they're like guardian hybrid creatures

11:28that have wings, but they have the body of a horse

11:32and they have the, you know, the head of an eagle

11:36or a lion or something like that.

11:37Within the Bible, they seem to have more humanoid heads.

11:42And here's something interesting.

11:45There was a, what's called a closed shrine model,

11:50which is a little miniature shrine

11:54and closed because it's enclosed.

11:56It's not an open model that was discovered at Megito

12:01in Israel and it's very, very old.

12:03It's very fragmentary, but it is a box

12:08that you would have put stuff in

12:10and it has what looked like cherubim at the corners

12:15of this box.

12:17But it clearly was not intended to hide stuff

12:21because it has windows in it

12:22that you're supposed to be able to see through.

12:25And a shrine model was basically a way

12:28to miniaturize the temple.

12:31- Yeah.

12:32- And then you would put miniature divine images

12:34on the inside and we've found-

12:36- I was really hoping you were gonna say

12:38you put miniature people inside

12:39and you're like, oh, I met the temple.

12:42- Oh, me too.

12:42- No, that's an Egypt.

12:44- It's an Egypt where you have the burials

12:47where there are hundreds of little miniature people

12:50and this is supposed to disreplace the subsidiary burials.

12:55So if you were in really early Egypt

12:58and you were like one of the Pharaoh's assistants,

13:00you really didn't want the Pharaoh to die

13:03'cause you had to go with them?

13:05- You had to go with them.

13:06Everybody went with them and you did not, yeah.

13:10It was unpleasant.

13:11After a while, they were like, this is really inconvenient

13:15and kind of ruins things for the next guy.

13:18So then they started making these models

13:21and so you had models of the person who made the bread.

13:24Models of the people who were the scribes.

13:26You had models of the people who made the bricks

13:29and then they were kind of reified

13:33as these souls in the afterlife for the Pharaoh

13:36instead of dispatching your entire administration

13:42but you've got the air to the throne going,

13:46I really like Dad's bread maker.

13:49I would like to keep that guy if I can.

13:52- You know what, make a model, make a model of that guy.

13:56We'll just throw that in there.

13:58- Yeah, just put the blanket over him.

14:00He's like, that doesn't look like the real one.

14:02It's the real one.

14:02That's the real one.

14:03- Just trust him.

14:04- He's not moving.

14:05He's already there.

14:06- All right, so we've got a box with gold.

14:08We've got cherubs on either end facing each other

14:13with their wings over covering the box itself.

14:18- Yeah, and the idea here is do not touch.

14:24So these are the protective entities

14:27that are kind of guarding.

14:29The entry to what I think is probably supposed

14:32to be a shrine model.

14:34In other words, a miniature version of the temple.

14:37- And it does say like verse 22 says,

14:41there I will meet with you.

14:43And from above the cover,

14:45from between the two cherubim

14:47that are on the Ark of the Covenant,

14:50I will tell you all that I am commanding you

14:52for the Israelites.

14:53- Yeah.

14:54- So is there gonna be a little,

14:56just a little God that's like right in the middle.

15:00It's like talking to you, like his mouth appears.

15:03- That's it, that's the Lord.

15:05- Pay no attention to the guy behind the curtain sort of thing.

15:08- No, I think one thing to note is this part of Exodus

15:12is coming, is being written much later.

15:14In fact, the Ark probably didn't exist anymore.

15:17That part of Exodus was written.

15:19They're kind of like, make it gold, make it this length.

15:23Give it polls, remember it has to have polls.

15:25And so they're probably reconstructing

15:29what they wanted the Ark to be.

15:32And they have the sense that this is supposed

15:35to be reifying God's presence.

15:38And so they kind of describe it more as a throne.

15:41Like God is enthroned between the cherubim.

15:44That's one way that the language there is commonly interpreted.

15:49And so, and that's why they call the lid the mercy seat.

15:55It's the seat of the throne on which God is sitting,

16:01although not really.

16:02- That is really hard to, like all I can do is picture

16:06this tiny little God that's just like, ha, ha.

16:10I will give you commands.

16:12- Well, I don't think that's what's intended.

16:16- No, but if you look at, there's an ivory plaque

16:20that is also from, I believe it was found in Miquito,

16:24but the motifs are all Egyptian,

16:26but there's a ruler sitting on a throne

16:29and the armrests are cherubs, cherubim.

16:34And so like the idea of cherubim flanking a throne

16:37on which the ruler sits is something

16:40that was in circulation back then.

16:43And so I think we've got, this imagery is kind of coming

16:46together and they're like, well, let's make it seem

16:50like the throne, I think in earlier time periods,

16:53it was probably more like, this is the miniature temple

16:56that we can cart around so that our deity,

17:00whose presence is inside the temple, can go with us

17:04where we need to go.

17:06(upbeat music)

17:08- Well, since you mentioned that,

17:13let's jump ahead to Joshua and talk a little bit about Jericho

17:18because this is one of the places that we know

17:24the ark plays a big role because they march the ark

17:29around the city and they march the ark through the river

17:35and all of this stuff, which I find to be really interesting.

17:38It becomes this, it's a war palladium kind of.

17:43It is their banner, it is what they kind of rally around

17:50because it represents the presence of God.

17:52And that's what makes the waters of the Jordan River stop.

17:56That's what allows them to march across.

17:59This is God's presence.

18:00The waters are all going to stop.

18:02- It's a pretty solid trick right there.

18:02And then they--

18:05- Yeah, it's hard to duplicate.

18:07Penn and Teller would have no chance figuring out

18:11what's going on there.

18:12But, and then they march it around the city seven times

18:16and then blow the trumpets and legend tells

18:22that the walls came a tumbling down.

18:24- Yeah.

18:25- And, yeah, that was, that's the presence of God,

18:28God there doing the miracles for them.

18:31So, fighting on this one.

18:32- Yeah, like it definitely is a magic box.

18:37Like this is not, this box in and of itself has,

18:43I mean, it is imbued with God's power in some very strong way.

18:52- There's a, I don't know if you look these verses up,

18:57but if you go to numbers 10,

19:01did you happen to look at numbers 10?

19:03- Oh, no, I don't have numbers 10.

19:04That's not what I've got. - Okay.

19:05So, verses 35 and 36.

19:08They're talking about the cloud during the day

19:12and the fire during the night and all this.

19:14And then it says, "Whenever the arks set out,

19:17Moses would say, "Arise, Adonai, enemies be scattered

19:22and your foes flee before you.

19:24And whenever it came to rest, he would say,

19:26return, Adonai, thousands, thousands of Israel."

19:31And so, the movement of the ark

19:35represented the movement of God.

19:37And where the ark was, God was.

19:39And so, yeah, this is manifesting the presence of God.

19:44And he's saying, "God, to this box."

19:49- We don't have any stage direction here.

19:52We don't know exactly what direction he's pointed,

19:56but yeah, it seems to be,

19:58if he is not speaking to the ark as if it is Adonai,

20:02he is speaking about the movement of the ark

20:05as if it is Adonai's movement.

20:08So, they're very closely entangled.

20:11And I think that makes the story of the ark narrative

20:16that much more significant.

20:19And this is, unless you wanted to stay in Joshua

20:22for a little bit longer.

20:23- No, I'm fine.

20:25Eventually, we gotta get to Samuel anyway.

20:27So, I'm not in any, we don't have to stick around

20:31'cause we've talked about the story of Joshua,

20:33and I just think it's interesting how they use it,

20:36because in the Joshua story,

20:40it's basically all of the Israelites, is that right?

20:43They're just, they're traveling together,

20:45and then they'll pitch a tent and make a sort of makeshift

20:49temple and put the ark in the middle of it.

20:51- Yeah, the tabernacle is the traveling temple

20:55that they have, and then they have camps

20:57that are supposed to be on all four sides.

21:01Which, by the way, if you see anybody say that the camp,

21:05when it's laid out in the wilderness, looks like a cross,

21:09that's totally made up.

21:11It does not look like a cross.

21:13- If it's on all four sides, Dan,

21:15I don't know what it looks like, an X?

21:17Come on, man, what are you trying to do?

21:19- Oh, gosh.

21:21- Yeah, so, yeah, they're traveling around,

21:23and the tabernacle with the ark in the holy of holies,

21:28that's representative of God's presence.

21:30And by the way, I think, and this is just a little aside,

21:35they talk about the fire at night,

21:38the pillar of fire at night, and the cloud during the day

21:42that followed Israel around.

21:44What I think this is doing is using the temple imagery,

21:49because the idea is that signified God's presence.

21:53But let's say you've got a temple that's operating day

21:56and night, you've got sacrifices being burnt

21:59and everything like that.

22:00During the day, what's going to be hovering

22:02over the top of that space?

22:04A bunch of smoke, a big cloud.

22:08What is it going to look like at night

22:11when they've got all these fires going?

22:12And it's going to light all of that up.

22:15It's going to look like there's some kind of concert

22:20or football game going on there.

22:23And it's going to be comforting.

22:24- It's burning, man, it's just burning.

22:25(laughs)

22:27- It's going to be comparable to fire.

22:30So I think these stories are supposed to make people think,

22:34oh, that's like what I see when I look at the temple,

22:37and there's a cloud over it during the day,

22:39and it looks all fiery at night.

22:42So that must mean that God's presence is there

22:44at the temple.

22:45I think personally, I think that's what those stories,

22:49that imagery is supposed to be communicating to an audience

22:52that is operating much later down the road.

22:55- Right.

22:56- But anyway, yes, you've got all Israel walking along.

23:00- Let's scurry on to the story of,

23:04because in Joshua, we've got the arc operating

23:09as a sort of a powerful instrument of war,

23:14because they go and they defeat things.

23:16What happens if the arc runs out of war juice is what,

23:21and we get to, for Samuel,

23:25when the Philistines come in to make war?

23:29- So we've got the situation,

23:32and there are a couple of storylines that are converging here,

23:35because you got Eli, who's the high priest,

23:38but his sons are kind of worthless,

23:42and they're not doing a great job at the temple.

23:46But in 1 Samuel 4-1, word of Samuel came to Israel,

23:50and those days, the Philistines mustered for war against Israel,

23:54and Israel went out to battle against them.

23:56They encamped at Ebenezer,

23:58and the Philistines encamped at Afeck.

24:01And they dropped lines, the battle was joined,

24:03Israel was defeated by the Philistines,

24:06who killed about 4,000 men on the field of battle.

24:09The elders of Israel go,

24:10why has the Lord put us to route today

24:12before the Philistines?

24:13Let us bring the arc of the covenant of the Lord here

24:15from Shiloh, so that he may come among us

24:20and save us from the power of our enemies.

24:23So we've got the story of Jericho,

24:26we know this is like a war palladium,

24:28this is supposed to be God's presence among the people,

24:31and God will fight our battles for us.

24:33So let's go get the arc,

24:35and just bring it next time we go to battle.

24:36- Yeah.

24:37- And then Bing Bang Boom.

24:39- It's a pretty effective tool at the beginning.

24:43- Yes.

24:44- Because the Philistines, they look at it,

24:46and they are terrified.

24:48- Yes, there's a big shout when somebody shows up,

24:52we got the arc!

24:53And they bring it out before the army

24:57and all everybody's shouting, huzzah.

25:00And then the Philistines hear the noise of the shouting,

25:03they said, "What does this great shouting in the camp

25:04"of the Hebrews mean?"

25:06When they learned that the arc of the covenant of,

25:08or the arc of the Lord had come to the camp,

25:11the Philistines were afraid for they said,

25:14"Gods have come into the camp."

25:17- Yeah.

25:18- And so the Philistines at least understand this thing

25:20to be functioning as the divine image,

25:22which bears the presence of the deity,

25:25and so they're like, "Oh crap, God's with them."

25:28- They understand it to be multiple deities.

25:31- Yes, multiple times, they say, "Gods."

25:33- Yes, and he'll go to us, "Who can deliver us

25:35"from the power of these mighty gods?"

25:37- Yes, and then they sing the praises of this God.

25:41These are the gods who struck the Egyptians

25:44with every sort of plague in the wilderness.

25:47Kind of doing the work of the narrator for him,

25:51so he doesn't have to boast about his own people, yes.

25:54- Is there any chance that the author of First Samuel

25:59actually had the idea that,

26:05like I get that it's easy to just say

26:08that this was from the Philistines' mouths,

26:12and so they didn't understand that it was not multiple gods,

26:16but is there any chance actually that at one point

26:20they were thinking that it encapsulated multiple gods?

26:25- There is certainly a possibility,

26:27and there are a few different theories

26:30that bear on that question,

26:32because there's stuff that's going into the ark.

26:36The ark is containing things,

26:38and we all know about the tablets of the law,

26:41and here's something interesting,

26:42the tablets of the law are basically

26:45two little mini-standing stones with the law

26:48written on them, and we already have stories

26:50with Moses and Joshua,

26:53where God says set up standing stones,

26:55write the law on them, and then worship,

26:58and so those are divine images,

27:00and the law is being written on them,

27:02and if the ark is a shrine model,

27:04it's a miniature temple.

27:06What do you put in the miniature temple?

27:07Miniature divine images.

27:08What's a miniature standing stone

27:10with the law written on it?

27:12Couple of little tablets with the law written on it,

27:15so it's, this is like mini-divine images

27:18going into the model of the temple,

27:22and then we also have Aaron's rod

27:24that is supposed to have butted,

27:27and there's a scholar named Ron and Eichler,

27:32who published a paper arguing that it's possible

27:35this story is intended to obscure the fact

27:39that an ash or a pole would have been

27:42in the ark of the covenant.

27:44In other words, another deity's divine image

27:47is in the ark. That's what I was wondering.

27:49Yes, it was in the ark.

27:50The gods that have shown up are the tetragrammaton

27:54and ashra.

27:55Yeah, so this is, the timeline and everything

28:00is very, very muddled because these stories

28:02are being written down long after any such historical event

28:07could have taken place, but maybe reflect some kind

28:12of hazy social memory about what actually happened.

28:16But yeah, certainly it's within the realm of plausibility

28:20that the ark would have been the miniature temple

28:24for the mini-divine images of more than one deity.

28:29I mean, certainly the author of this,

28:32of this, of 1st Samuel doesn't rebuke this idea

28:38that there are gods contained.

28:41Well, no, but, and I think that by the time

28:43this is being written, they're probably representing

28:46the Philistines as just pagans who don't know

28:48what's really going on.

28:50That's another way to read what's going on here.

28:52Absolutely, and that makes sense too.

28:54But it does also, but it doesn't seem like

28:58anyone's fighting this idea anyway.

29:00No, but here's the interesting thing.

29:03Yeah, they bring out the ark, they cheer,

29:05they give each other the slaps on the butt

29:08as their rounding third, and then they lose the battle.

29:11Right.

29:12And there was a very great slaughter, 30,000 foot soldiers

29:16fell of Israel, the ark of God was captured,

29:19and the two sons of Eli, Houghni and Phineas died.

29:24And so there's a scholar named Ben Summer,

29:28a wonderful scholar, I spent almost two weeks,

29:31no, I spent a week with him in Italy,

29:34last two months ago, at a conference on--

29:37Did you call that your Ben Summer?

29:40The Summer of Ben?

29:43It was the Summer of My Discontent,

29:45because there was a heat wave going on in Italy,

29:48and it was in the high 90s, low 100s, it was awful.

29:52But anyway, he published a very influential book

29:56called The Bodies of God in the World of Ancient Israel,

29:59and his theory is that this story is intended

30:02to be a rebuking of the idea that the ark

30:05actually contained the divine presence, because they lose.

30:09So his theory is the author is going--

30:12And then they lose, because it was never God's presence,

30:17it never housed God's presence, it was not a divine image.

30:20Tell that to Joshua, man.

30:22Now, in my book, I actually disagree with Ben,

30:26and I argue that this is not about the ark,

30:31not actually being a divine image,

30:33it is about the unauthorized use of the ark,

30:36because every other time that the ark represents God's presence

30:41and facilitates a military victory,

30:44it is because the prophet went and inquired of God,

30:48and said, do we do this thing?

30:50And God says, I give you my blessing, and yeah, thumbs up.

30:55God gives it the old thumbs up, okay, you can do it.

31:00And we have absolutely no hint of that here.

31:04And so in our last episode,

31:07we talked about how the deity will abandon the divine image

31:11when it needs to, if the people are doing things wrong

31:15and everything.

31:16Or at very least, that's the way you--

31:19That's you, you rationalize, yes.

31:21When you lose, and you're supposed to have won

31:23because your God was supposed to fix it for you.

31:25Right, that's the retconning that goes on.

31:28And so I argue that this is actually,

31:31it understands the ark of the covenant as a divine image,

31:34but they didn't get Adonai's permission to go

31:37up against the Philistines to battle.

31:40And so Adonai was like, you're on your own?

31:43Sorry, I'm abandoning my ark for the time being.

31:48And then the Philistines take it back

31:50and they do what you do with a captured divine image.

31:53They put it in their temple next to their own divine image

31:58of their deity, and the text represents their deity

32:01as Daegon, but that wasn't a Philistine deity.

32:04And then we have--

32:07Well, there you go.

32:08Then we have the battle of the divine images

32:10where the next day they show up at the temple,

32:12they come in and go, let's get you some breakfast Daegon.

32:16Oh, you're on the ground.

32:19Which just means that like, their rock tipped over, right?

32:22Yeah, yeah, basically.

32:24And then they set Daegon back up, they dust him off.

32:28You know, they rub the dust off of the gold

32:32as the letter of Jeremiah mocked.

32:37And then the day after that, they come in and oh no,

32:41his hands and his head are cut off.

32:44And so it's basically the battle of the divine images

32:48and obviously Adonai wins even in another deity's territory.

32:55In another deity's temple, no less.

32:57Yes, yeah, so not just they come into our house.

33:02They're gonna come into our house and beat us.

33:05Yes, Adonai is gonna do that.

33:06And so I think this is the story is where Adonai is like,

33:11wait till they get a load of me.

33:13You know, they've abandoned the divine image

33:16and now it's in the temple and Adonai is like zoop,

33:18right back in there, and then defeats Daegon.

33:22And then as we discussed previously afflicts the Philistines

33:26with awful hemorrhoids.

33:27Yes.

33:28And certainly UTIs were a part of it.

33:30I have no doubt that there was a lot of cranberry juice

33:34being passed back and forth after all the things

33:39in the undercarriage were out of sorts.

33:44But sorely afflicted as you must say.

33:46Yes, sorely afflicted, yeah.

33:48As the great poet once said.

33:52And so I think this is a story

33:54about the arc being abandoned by God,

33:57God re-entering the arc in order to show forth signs

34:01and wonders and tickle the Philistines perinium

34:06as it is correctly pronounced.

34:11Or what was the-

34:12Perinium, it's pink.

34:14Or your, taint, there we go.

34:15Taint!

34:16And then-

34:18There's two episodes in a row I get to say.

34:20I'm happy.

34:22Yes.

34:23And then the Philistines put it on a cart attached

34:27to some cows and go, "Yeah!"

34:29And the cows march off to Israel

34:32and walk right up to Beit Chemish.

34:34And the people go, "What's that?"

34:36They look in the arc and that's when we get

34:40the face melter according to the story.

34:42So yeah, dangerous box this year.

34:45Yeah, it's just not just any old box.

34:48No, no, no, no, no.

34:50(upbeat music)

34:53But then we have, you got to skip over

34:57the rest of first Samuel

34:59and get to second Samuel six.

35:01And what happens is Beit Chemish is like,

35:04get this out of here.

35:05We don't want this around here.

35:07And it goes to another city.

35:12And there's a guy there who is like,

35:16"I'll watch your arc for you."

35:18And I imagine that now I'm...

35:23Daniel, I've forgotten the actor's name.

35:27In the Italian job, who is handsome Dan?

35:30Oh, was it handsome Dan or handsome Rob?

35:34I mean, we're handsome Dan.

35:36Right, well yeah.

35:37But Seth Green is like, "I'm on some Dan."

35:40Yes. I forget his name.

35:42That's who I imagined saying that.

35:43I'll watch your arc for you.

35:45But, and then David comes and brings it to Jerusalem.

35:50So the arc is not in Jerusalem until second Samuel six

35:54when David is like, "Why don't we, let's bring the arc."

35:57Let's bring the arc to Jerusalem.

35:59And so goes in and takes the arc

36:02from the house of this fella who's watching after it.

36:07Play by Jason Statham.

36:10I'm awful with names.

36:12This is why I didn't make it on jumping.

36:14Googling, okay.

36:16I knew exactly who you were talking about

36:18and I also couldn't think of his name.

36:20I used to, when I used to shave my hair pretty low,

36:25I used to get a lot of Jason Statham from folks

36:28and on TikTok it's all Woody Harrelson.

36:32So, yeah, okay.

36:33But yeah, so this is the story of how the arc comes

36:38into Jerusalem during the time period of David,

36:42even though it was lost along before

36:45and as run a rocky path to get back to Jerusalem.

36:50And this is, it's called the arc of God

36:56and this is where Uza, it's on the way to Jerusalem.

36:59And you know, the cart that it is on is rocked

37:02and Uza is like, "Whoa," and reaches out to steady it

37:06and he gets zapped.

37:09And then, so mean, he's just trying to help.

37:13Yeah, and thus was, and the worst part of it was

37:17that then results in the phrase studying the arc

37:21which bad faith people use to try to tell people

37:25you're not allowed to correct ecclesiastical leadership

37:29because that's studying the arc and you might get zapped.

37:33You'll get zapped.

37:34Yeah, all right, so don't do that.

37:37I think that does it for the first Indiana Jones movie.

37:40That's a fascinating thing.

37:43So far we have no evidence that any Nazis

37:45actually came anywhere near this thing.

37:47Wasn't buried in Egypt, not in the right place

37:50or the wrong place they were digging.

37:52Certainly--

37:53That we know about.

37:54Certainly not in a warehouse in DC.

37:56And who knows, maybe that's what the folks

37:59taking over DC are on the hunt for.

38:01Right, yes, exactly.

38:02This is all a cover to go find the arc.

38:06So, but somebody can take over the world.

38:10But speaking of being on the hunt,

38:13there is no greater, more hunted thing

38:18than our next segment, "The Grail."

38:21"The Grail."

38:22(upbeat music)

38:25So, okay, if you are looking for the biblical references

38:30to the Holy Grail, Dan, where should people,

38:35what book in the Bible should we turn to

38:38to find the reference to the Holy Grail?

38:41You should not waste your time

38:44because it's not there.

38:46You are better off looking in the da Vinci Code

38:50because there is no reference to "The Grail."

38:55The Grail grows out of traditions associated

38:58with the Last Supper, where Jesus has the Passover meal

39:01with his followers.

39:03Can I say that I was genuinely shocked

39:05when I started researching this

39:08and discovered that it--

39:09It's not in the Bible?

39:10A biblical thing.

39:12I was like, come on, there's gotta be something

39:15about a cup or something.

39:17Yeah, new.

39:19But alas, so where did this crop up?

39:23Like where are we getting this from?

39:25So, I think the roots of it,

39:27you don't have discussion of a Grail,

39:29but in the Gospel of Nicodemus,

39:31which is a fourth century text

39:36and was Nicodemus the owl from Sword in the Stone?

39:40I don't know, I don't remember.

39:44Let's say yes.

39:46My daughter should be so disappointed in me.

39:49But this is a fourth century text, this Apocryphal Gospel,

39:53and it talks about vessels that are associated

39:57with Christ's passion, so the last week of Christ's life.

40:02So, this was probably the seeds that sprout

40:07in the 12th and 13th centuries in Europe

40:10with these French texts that are like openly

40:15fictional novels.

40:20They're just stories.

40:21They're just stories.

40:22Or rather, they're like heroic poems.

40:27Yeah, and some of them, one of them is about Joseph

40:31of Arimathea, and another one is about Percival,

40:35the Count of Gral, and they talk about

40:39this mysterious radiant vessel

40:44that is some kind of relic that becomes associated

40:49with the cup of the Last Supper,

40:51and it has mystical and magical powers in these stories.

40:54And then, it becomes part of Arthurian legend.

40:58Yeah, yeah, it's funny because I mentioned to you

41:01as we were prepping for the show that I did,

41:05look, I'm not familiar with the legends of King Arthur.

41:09I didn't read any of those things.

41:11But I kind of thought that maybe the Monty Python guys

41:16just kind of came up with that on their own

41:19and thought it would be an interesting thing to do.

41:21But no, very much, that is what the legend

41:24of King Arthur centers around, sort of.

41:28Yes, it is central to like, I think Galahad

41:33was one of the purer knights.

41:36This was the one who had to turn away all of the nuns.

41:39Yes, he had to be saved from temptation.

41:47Let me have some of the peril.

41:49I think around 1225, you have a text,

41:53the quest of the Holy Grail, which is associated with this.

41:57And then it becomes associated with chivalry,

42:02with questing, with all of this kind of stuff,

42:07with all of the legendary kind of medieval European motifs

42:13that they get recycled all the time these days

42:16into things like Shrek and Monty Python

42:21and the search for the Holy Grail and all that kind of stuff.

42:24But the idea is that there's this vessel and it was...

42:28It had a pestle?

42:29It had the brew in it, yeah, who knows, who's to say.

42:35But it was the one that Christ drank out of

42:38at the Last Supper and then maybe also Joseph of Arimathea

42:42caught his blood in it.

42:44Yes, that is the other part of the tradition

42:47that he was like, oh, don't want that to go to waste.

42:50And let's keep that.

42:52But from the Renaissance to the Enlightenment,

42:56we have a bit of a retreat to the tradition.

43:00You don't really have a lot of people caring

43:02about the Grail.

43:03After all, this is when people are getting all

43:07into rationalism and all the...

43:09Silly rationalists.

43:13Yeah, at least they weren't nihilists though.

43:16They did have a nice marmot is what I heard.

43:18But, and then in the 19th century,

43:21when you have this, the Romantic era

43:24and you have kind of a renewed antiquarian interest

43:29in medievalism, then you have these stories

43:31that bring the Grail back into focus

43:35and then which leads to our modern interpretations

43:39and masterpieces like Monty Python's.

43:44Or Dan Brown, as you mentioned earlier.

43:46Dan Brown, which, yes, is a thousand paxes.

43:51Oh, no.

43:54He's just trying to entertain the people there.

43:58He's just trying to entertain the people there.

43:58Yeah, and I cannot blame Dan Brown because like he told people,

44:02this is totally fiction.

44:04And like there was a book called "Holy Blood, Holy Grail"

44:08which was published back in 1982,

44:11which is full of these ridiculous conspiracy

44:13theories and I think most people who read that are like,

44:17yeah, this isn't real.

44:19And that's what Dan Brown did.

44:20But then was like, I'm gonna write a kickass book on this.

44:23And I'm gonna make up a job called "Symbologist".

44:26But, and even he was like, it was based on this book

44:30and those are ridiculous conspiracy theories.

44:32That's all fiction.

44:34And my book's all fiction.

44:35That conspiracy theory was, if I remember correctly,

44:38was just based on how the word "San Grail"

44:43in French, meaning "Holy Grail"

44:47sounds a lot like "Sung Royale"

44:50which is like the bloodline, which was "Sung meaning blood"

44:54and well, I mean, anyway.

44:56So like, I mean, if two words sound the same

45:00as two other words, obviously, obviously it wasn't a cup,

45:05it was a bloodline.

45:08Yes.

45:09And Jesus has relatives living in France.

45:12Right. Right.

45:14We all know, look, it's all that makes a sense, people.

45:17Yep. Married Mary Magdalene, had a daughter named Sarah.

45:22They ran away to France.

45:23They started up the, what was it?

45:27The "Maravindian Dynasty" or something like that.

45:32And all of that stuff.

45:34And yeah, even today you've got Tiktakers

45:36who are, you know, breathlessly telling you

45:39about the secrets that they kept from us.

45:43And they're just kind of blindly sharing

45:46ridiculous conspiracy theories published in books

45:50written by non-specialists.

45:51And when somebody says, this word looks an awful lot

45:55like this word, if you just squint at it a little bit

45:57and you ignore all this stuff over here

46:00and then you just imagine these connections here,

46:03that's evidence that this entire conspiracy theory is true.

46:07It's the number of idiotic conspiracy theories

46:12that are born of that kind of amateur,

46:16just parallelomania, cannot be counted.

46:22The thing that surprises me,

46:26having learned that not only is there no biblical precedent

46:30for this cup, but that it didn't even arise as a story

46:35until the Middle Ages, it surprises me

46:40that there are so many cathedrals that claim to have it.

46:43(laughing)

46:44- Oh gosh, yeah, like literally the end of there's one

46:47in Seville and there's one where somewhere in Italy,

46:52Genoa, I think, like all of these,

46:56there are lots of places that have just claimed

46:59that they have this holy relic.

47:02It's like, okay, but it's not a thing, though.

47:06- What about that?

47:08- Can't let them know that.

47:12Then they're gonna start asking questions

47:13about all the other relics,

47:15like the piece of the true cross

47:18and that skull that's over there in the corner

47:21and that finger bone over there.

47:23And somebody's foreskin.

47:27- Right, Chef.

47:28- Got a collection of fore skins in the back.

47:30- We got a whole bag of 'em, the holy prepuse, yes.

47:35- Is that what it is?

47:39- Yeah, and that is, yeah, this is an outcome

47:42of a lot of these things spreading

47:44during the medieval period.

47:46And I think that brings us to my beef with

47:50the end of Indiana Jones and The Last Crusade.

47:56Because indie shows poorly.

48:00(laughing)

48:02- Well, let me set the scene

48:03and then you can explain why it's no good.

48:05- Yes.

48:06- For them, as ain't seen it, there is a--

48:10- Spoiler alert.

48:11- Yeah, spoiler alert, but you've had plenty of time.

48:14- Yes.

48:14- It ends with them finding this room full of mugs,

48:20full of chalices, you various and sundry,

48:25grails, and it's all about pick the one

48:30that is the real one, and then you dip it

48:32into the very musty water.

48:35- Yeah.

48:36- And drink out of it and then it'll help you survive

48:38or help you live forever or whatever.

48:41And the first guy does it, he picks the most lavishly,

48:46you know, gold and bedazzled with jewels one

48:50and he drinks it and then he instantly grows old and dies.

48:56And so now it's indie's turn, he has to pick the right one

48:59because his dad's dying out front and he goes

49:03and chooses one and it is, he looks at all these elaborate,

49:07beautiful things and he sees one that's just a very simple

49:10thing made of wood and he says,

49:12"That's the cup of a carpenter."

49:15- Is it, is it clearly made of wood?

49:18Is it just painted?

49:21- I always thought it was made of wood.

49:23- Yeah, I don't, 'cause I...

49:26- India, anyway, the idea is that it is a simple thing

49:31and probably made, I assumed it was made of wood.

49:37- It looks like it's supposed to have like plating

49:40of some kind around it, but so yeah,

49:42it was probably a wood interior

49:44that had some plating or something.

49:45- Or something.

49:46- Yes, or something.

49:48- So, why was this wrong?

49:51- Problem, yes, because in the first century CE,

49:56this was a period when there were a lot of concerns

50:00for ritual purity and while some people think

50:03that Jesus was like, we're doing away with all of that,

50:06he wasn't and a good Jewish Passover dinner

50:11at the time would not have used a wooden

50:17or certainly not a clay cup or something like that.

50:22In this time period, this is a time period

50:24where uniquely we have a high concentration

50:28of stone dishes and vessels that were used

50:33because the idea was that a clay

50:37or some other vessel like that impurities

50:39can be transmitted to that and they stay with it

50:42and then they impute those impurities

50:44into the things that they hold.

50:46And so, for clay, the only way to dissipate it

50:49is to break the clay, to shatter it

50:52and then the impurities go woo-hoo-hoo-hoo-hoo

50:55and rise into the sky kind of like the Ed O'Neill story

51:00about killing a man in the dead of winter

51:07and you lost me entirely, but that's okay.

51:12- Somebody's laughing their butt off.

51:14- Yeah, from Wayne's world, but anyway,

51:19they would have had these limestone carved vessels,

51:25plates, cups, bowls, things like that.

51:28And so, I would have to watch the scene again

51:31to see if they had any stone cups there.

51:34I don't remember seeing any clearly stone cups,

51:37but that would have been what would have most likely been

51:42on the table at an early first century CE Jerusalem

51:47Passover dinner.

51:50- Okay.

51:51- Would not have been what Indy ultimately goes for.

51:55And also-- - Take that Harrison Ford.

51:57- I doubt he was doing set design, but--

52:03- No. - Who knows?

52:04- Yeah.

52:05- Well, there you go, a fun little way to end the show.

52:12Get your cups right, if you're ever asked to pick

52:17a holy relic that never actually existed,

52:20but you gotta pick the correct one.

52:22- Yeah.

52:23- Go with stone every time.

52:24- And isn't that great that the end of this quest

52:29to find the divine, the guy's like, pick a suitcase.

52:33(laughing)

52:35It might have a million dollars in it, you might die.

52:38So it's a game of chance in the end, evidently.

52:42- In that universe.

52:43- No, it's a game of, are you pure enough?

52:47I submit to you, Dan, that it doesn't matter

52:50which cup Indiana Jones chooses,

52:53because it is the purity of his heart

52:55that actually is--

52:57- Renders it, yes, the transubstantiation of the cup

53:01into the body and the blood of Jesus.

53:04- Well, I don't see how it could be wrong on that.

53:09- Yeah, well, maybe he was worthy to lift the hammer.

53:12Did the Red Hulk ever lift Thor's hammer in it?

53:17I guess he was--

53:18(laughing)

53:19- Now we're crossing the streams, we're crossing the streams.

53:22- And you know you can't cross streams.

53:24It's just, don't cross the streams.

53:27- All right, friends.

53:28Well, that's it for today's show.

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