Tool Beta
The Ancient World Behind the Text
Pick a passage anywhere in the New Testament. See the customs and ideas a first reader knew without being told.
Matthew 13:53-58, No honor in Nazareth
Teaching in his hometown synagogue, Jesus is dismissed as the carpenter's son whose family everyone knows, and he says a prophet is not without honor except at home.
Matthew 13:53-58, in every translation this tool compares.
Jesus teaches in the synagogue at Nazareth, and the people are astonished but take offense. They know his father's trade, his mother Mary, his brothers and his sisters. Jesus answers that a prophet is honored everywhere except in his hometown and his own house, and he does few mighty works there because of their unbelief.
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/judeans-and-galileans\/","n":"Galilee and the Galileans","s":"Small farming and fishing villages, ringed by Greek cities, with two new royal towns that the Gospels never say Jesus entered. Most of Jesus' story happens in places of a few hundred to a few thousand people.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/prophets-rejected\/","n":"Prophets rejected and killed","s":"Israel's memory of prophets mocked, beaten and killed by their own people. By Jesus' day tradition had lengthened the list of martyred prophets.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/family-first\/","n":"The family's name","s":"Families lived, worked and stood together. Walking out of the family business or putting kin second was a public offense.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/synagogue\/","n":"The synagogue","s":"The local gathering place where Jews met on the Sabbath to pray and study Scripture. It was also a community center, run by people of standing.","r":""}
Sepphoris, about four miles from Nazareth, had been burned and its people enslaved when Jesus was a child; Antipas rebuilt it, and carpenters, who worked stone as well as wood, would have found work there (Keener). Mary was the most common Jewish woman's name of the period, and the brothers' names were common too (Keener's notes). Antipas rebuilt Sepphoris between 3 BC and AD 10 as his first capital, the largest city in Galilee (the Zondervan Atlas). Estimates of Nazareth's size differ: Wilkins gives about five hundred people, Garland 150 to 200.
- Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, on Matthew 13:53-58
- NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, notes on Matthew 13:55 and 13:57
- ESV Study Bible, study note on Matthew 13:57
- Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews 17.10.9 and 18.2.1, trans. William Whiston
- Carl G. Rasmussen, Zondervan Atlas of the Bible, The Life of Christ
- Michael J. Wilkins, Matthew, in Zondervan Illustrated Bible Backgrounds Commentary, ed. Clinton E. Arnold, on Matthew 2:23
- David E. Garland, Mark, in Zondervan Illustrated Bible Backgrounds Commentary, ed. Clinton E. Arnold, on Mark 6:1
