Paul Backholer
Articles by Paul Backholer
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Second Temple Construction in Jerusalem, Materials & Methods Revealed
The textbooks say the Romans burned the Second Temple down, but the real mystery is how they helped build it first. Long before the legions marched on Jerusalem, Rome’s money, power and political masterminds orchestrated one of the greatest construction marvels of the ancient world. But how?
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Beyond the Council of Jerusalem, The Unresolved Crisis of the Gentile Jewish Church, Paul in Athens
“What has Athens to do with Jerusalem?” This famous question, posed by the early Church Father Tertullian, captures the ultimate identity crisis of the early Church. In this episode, we travel to Athens, the intellectual capital of the ancient world, where the Apostle Paul stepped directly into a philosophical crossfire. While Paul masterfully used Greek ideas to speak to the Gentiles on the Areopagus, he was soon fighting a desperate battle to keep this burgeoning global movement tethered to its spiritual home of Jerusalem.
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The Lord of the Rings & the Bible, Frodo’s Journey, JRR Tolkien & CS Lewis Podcast
Did you know that J.R.R. Tolkien was a devout Christian who carefully embedded profound Christian themes into The Lord of the Rings? Throughout his epic tale of Middle-earth, Tolkien wove in ideas of moral choice, temptation and resilience, mercy, redemption, providence, and the quiet triumph of good over evil, without overt allegory. These themes shine especially clearly in the journey of Frodo Baggins, the ordinary hobbit who shoulders an extraordinary burden.
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Is Ramesses II the Exodus Pharaoh?
For centuries, popular imagination has cast one man as the hard-hearted ruler who defied Moses: Ramesses II, the longest-reigning and most self-promoting pharaoh in Egyptian history. Hollywood loves him. Documentaries love him. Yet the evidence—biblical, chronological and archaeological—quietly but firmly shows he is the wrong man; let’s discover why.
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The Kings of England and the Mystery of their Graves: Why are they Buried in so many Places?
On my tours of ancient English churches, cathedrals and monasteries, I stumbled on something momentous. You turn a corner in a religious building and suddenly there is it, an effigy of a King of England with the statement: Here lies…King of England. I’ve visited the sites of the burials of forty-two kings of England (or Wessex) and each location tells a story about England or Britain, in that period of time.
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Mount Sinai in Saudi Arabia, Jabal al-Lawz, Fake or True?
For centuries, pilgrims and scholars have sought the sacred peak where Moses received the Ten Commandments. But the very location of Mount Sinai remains shrouded in mystery, sparking a fierce debate: does the holy mountain rise from the familiar sands of Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, or does it stand hidden amongst the rugged terrain of Saudi Arabia, a claim that challenges long-held traditions and archaeological interpretations?
