During the period between the first and second Jewish returns from Babylonian captivity (536 and 457 B.C.), many Hebrews remained in Persia. At that time, a dreadful plot to exterminate the Jews wa...

Ethics concerns the system or code by which attitudes or actions are determined to be right or wrong. Only two sources can serve as the basis for ethical conduct: ethical conduct is either regulate...

The term "evangelist" is an Anglicized form of the Greek euanglistes, derived from eu ("well") and angelos ("messenger").  An evangelist is someone who proclaims the good news, serving as a gospel...

The ancient Greeks taught a rudimentary form of the theory of evolution. It was popularized in modern times by the publication of Charles Darwin's The Origin of Species (1859). The evolutionary t...

The word "exegesis" means "to lead out." It is a part of the larger science of interpretation known as "hermeneutics." A form of the original word appears in John 1:18, where the apostle affirmed...

Expediency is sometimes defined as the method by which a determined goal is achieved, regardless of the moral consequences. This is not the biblical concept of expediency. In Bible parlance, a me...

Ezekiel was a prophet during the Babylonian captivity; his ministry lasted more than twenty years. Jeremiah had foretold that the captivity would last seventy years (Jer. 25:11), but false prophets...

Faith is the willingness to trust and obey God without ever having seen him. It is not a gullible "leap in the dark," as existential "faith" postulates. Instead, it rests on evidence that allows u...

The Book of Galatians was one of Paul's letters to several churches in Galatia, written about A.D. 48. A Jewish element in these churches taught that one must be obedient to the law of Moses and th...

A genealogy is a registry of names of the ancestors or descendants of a particular people. A number of genealogical lists are recorded in the Bible -- for example in Genesis, Chronicles, Matthew, a...

The opening book of the Bible is a document of "beginnings." Written by Moses some 1,500 years before Christ, it introduces the beginning of: the Universe, life, mankind, the home, sin, the plan of...

Some seventeen different words are found in the Greek N.T. that represent, in one way or another, the concept of "giving." (a) While God does not "need" anything from man (Acts 17:25), he has alway...

The gods of the biblical era were profuse. They were the inventions of the human mind in a world that had rejected the true God and his sovereignty over humanity.  The Old Testament prophets denie...

"Good" in the Bible is expressed in a variety of ways. It can have reference to that which is perfect in design, flawless. Such was the state of the earth at the conclusion of the creation week (Ge...

"Gospel" derives from the Greek euangelion, literally "good tidings" (see Lk. 2:10 where it is fully translated). The gospel (mentioned more than 75 times in the N.T.) is the good news of a plan of...

The term "grace" occurs about 155 times in the N.T. The word relates to a Greek term, chairo, meaning "to rejoice," and grace itself comes to mean favor, gratification, or gratitude -- depending up...

The New Testament was written originally is what is known as Koine Greek. Koine is to be distinguished from Attic Greek, the latter being predominately the language of the ancient classics, e.g., A...

Sometime before the fall of Jerusalem to the Babylonians (586 B.C.), the prophet Habakkuk wonders why God appears to have ignored Judah's sins. The Lord informs the bewildered prophet that he is pl...

This word comes directly from Greek into English, letter-for-letter. W.E. Vine noted that some derive the term from the negative prefix a ("not") and eido ("seen"), hence "the unseen," though he fe...

After Judah's initial return from Babylonian captivity (536 B.C.), God's people had begun the work of rebuilding the temple. Then, due to opposition from certain enemies, the Hebrews became discour...