Who was Pontius Pilate?Pontius Pilate was the fifth prefect of the Roman province of Judaea, serving under Emperor Tiberius from 26-37 AD. He is best known today for adjudicating on the trial and crucifixion of Jesus. In all four gospel accounts, Pilate lobbies for Jesus to be spared his eventual fate of execution, and acquiesces only when the crowd refuses to relent. He thus seeks to avoid personal responsibility for the death of Jesus. In the Gospel of Matthew, Pilate washes his hands to show that he is not responsible for the execution of Jesus and reluctantly sends him to his death. The Gospel of Mark, depicting Jesus as innocent of plotting against the Roman Empire, portrays Pilate as reluctant to execute him. In the Gospel of Luke, Pilate not only agrees that Jesus did not conspire against Rome, but Herod Antipas, the tetrarch of Galilee, also finds nothing treasonable in Jesus' actions. In the Gospel of John, Pilate states "I find no guilt in Him [Jesus]," and he asks the Jews if Jesus should be released from custody.
Who is Mark Goodacre?Mark Goodacre (born 1967 in Leicestershire, England) is a New Testament scholar and Professor at Duke University's Department of Religion. He has written extensively on the Synoptic Problem; that is, the origins of the gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke. He has defended the Farrer hypothesis, and thus accepts Markan priority but rejects Q. Goodacre earned his M.A., M.Phil. and D.Phil. at the University of Oxford and was Senior Lecturer at the Department of Theology and Religion at the University of Birmingham until 2005.
What is Judaism?Judaism encompasses the religion, philosophy, culture and way of life of the Jewish people. Judaism is a monotheistic religion, with the Torah as its foundational text (part of the larger text known as the Tanakh or Hebrew Bible), and supplemental oral tradition represented by later texts such as the Midrash and the Talmud. Judaism is considered by religious Jews to be the expression of the covenantal relationship that God established with the Children of Israel.
Judaism includes a wide corpus of texts, practices, theological positions, and forms of organization. Within Judaism there are a variety of movements, most of which emerged from Rabbinic Judaism, which holds that God revealed his laws and commandments to Moses on Mount Sinai in the form of both the Written and Oral Torah.
The Jews are an ethnoreligious group and include those born Jewish and converts to Judaism. In 2012, the world Jewish population was estimated at about 14 million, or roughly 0.2% of the total world population. About 42% of all Jews reside in Israel and about 42% reside in the United States and Canada, with most of the remainder living in Europe.
What is Gospel?Gospel is the Old English translation of Greek evangelion, meaning "good news". It originally meant the Christian message itself, but in the 2nd century it came to be used for the books in which the message was set out. The four gospels of the New Testament: Matthew, Mark, Luke and John are the main source of information on the life of Jesus.