 Good morning, everyone. Welcome to the course on New Testament Survey. This session has been recorded. So I hope everyone had a good break. You can unmute and speak. I hope you all had a good break. Am I audible? Yes, ma'am. Okay, great. Thank you. Thank you. So I hope you guys had a good break. Did you all? Okay. So I am excited to study after a long time, after a month break back to the classes. So we are going to study on the New Testament Survey. So what we would be covering before that, where you are able to download your notes. Great. Okay. Yes. So we would be covering on, you know, the New Testament, the books of the New Testament, and completely from the book of Matthew to the Revelation. And this course is designed to give an overview of each and every book from our New Testament. We won't be going deep like worst to worst study. Yes, we would be doing it at the later part. That is in your third year. Those students who are studying the bachelor's in theology may get to study on the episodes of the book, you know, verse by verse. But then what we would be doing now in this New Testament Survey is we will be serving each and every book and overview. Over with an introduction to the author, the date, the date when it was written and the very purpose of each and every book. Why was it written and what was the theme in that book. And also we may also study cover on the key verses and the few chapters from that book. And we'll also go through the outline with the view of Christ in the book. And yes, this study will also help the students to know about the covenant which God has made with man. And through which we have the salvation in Jesus Christ. We'll also be studying on the covenant of grace. And overall, the study would help us to understand the life and ministry of Jesus Christ and how it applies to his life. With this, we also have two recommended books. Okay, I'll just post it, the recommended books on the chat. Jensen Survey of the New Testament by Jensen. And the second book is the history of the Bible lands in the interbiblical period. These are the two books which we recommend. I'm just trying to get the book name. Just give me a second. I'll post it on the chat. These are the two books which would be helpful for us to go through in a minute. Okay, I'll just type it for you. And the other is a history of the Bible. History of the Bible lands in the biblical. These are the two books. One is Jensen Survey on the New Testament by Jensen. And the second book would be a history of the Bible lands in the interbiblical period by Kate. So these are the two recommended books. These are the two books that we recommend. So with this, we will move on to the introduction to the New Testament. And we'll see what is the background from the book of Malachi to the New Testament. To the start of the New Testament, what happened? There's a 400-period gap. And what happened in that 400-period gap? So just a little bit of background of what we studied in the Old Testament. I will just cover this in the session. And then later in each class, we can study on each book from the New Testament. So with that, we will move on to our New Testament, to the introduction of the New Testament. So when we look at the background of the New Testament, we see that in the time of Jesus, the social, the religious and the political condition of Israel were very different. It was not the same as it was in the Old Testament time. Many of the changes took place in the period between the close of the Old Testament. That is, during the time of Malachi, and then the beginning of the New Testament. However, the origin or the changes goes back to the national life of Israel during the time of the Old Testament monarchy. So we'll see a brief survey of the events and the developments of Israel, which help towards a better understanding of the life. And I will just put it across in a story format so that we can understand it better of what happened then. So we see how did these Hebrews, we know how did the Hebrews come? So as they journeyed from time to time, and they were under the rule of judges, and then they moved on to the rule of the kings. And about 1,000 years, even before Jesus could come, we had the rule of David, you know, right? Saul was the first king and after Saul, David was the king that God raised. And David established Jerusalem. Under his rule, David established Jerusalem to be the dynasty through which God promised to bring forth the universal king who was the Messiah. And then we see after David, his son Solomon took over and Solomon was the king. And after Solomon, the kingdom of Israel was divided. So it was divided into two. What are the two kingdoms? Can anyone remember from what we studied in the Old Testament? Ma'am, the kingdom of Judah and the kingdom of Israel. Yes, good, good. So there were two kingdoms, northern kingdom and southern kingdom. Well, the northern kingdom was named, called itself as Israel. And the capital of the northern kingdom was Judah. And the southern kingdom was Samaria. And the southern kingdom was called as Judah because of the leading tribe. There were large number of the tribe of Judah was there. So they called itself as Judah. The southern kingdom was called as Judah and the capital city of Judah was Jerusalem. Okay, so there's a northern kingdom. There's a southern kingdom. Northern kingdom was called as Israel with a capital as capital city as Samaria. And the southern kingdom was called as Judah and the capital city of Judah was Jerusalem. So there are two kingdoms. Now what happened later in the period in the time when the northern kingdom was called captured by the Assyrians. Now, Assyrians had this practice. They used to capture the people and take them into captive into different countries where they went. So when they went like that, we saw how they took the Israelites as a captive and they went along. At the same time, even the southern kingdom was captured, was conquered by the Babylonians. Was captured by the Babylonians. And as the time went, there was a king, a Persian king who came, came a conquest of the Babylon. And at the time of Persian king of Cyrus, Cyrus released these captives from Babylon. And he said, y'all can return back to your homeland. He said, Israelites, y'all can return back to your homeland. So we see under the two leadership, under the two leadership, that is the leadership of Ezra and in the leadership of Nehemiah, they came in batch wise. They came back to Jerusalem. Now, when they came back to Jerusalem and they returned back, what they did, they rebuilt the temple. They started to rebuild the temple. They also started to rebuild the wall of Jerusalem under the leadership of Ezra and Nehemiah. So we also see there were two types of people. Now, when they returned back, we see that there are two types of people. We see the one group set of Jews and the other group is Samaritans. Now, who are these Samaritans? Can anyone tell from the class who are these Samaritans? We know who are Jews. But who are Samaritans? From where did they come? It would be nice to keep our sessions interactive. So please feel free, just unmute and feel free to answer. Yes, Sid, Jeff Lynn, Jeffina, sorry. Please feel free to answer who are these Samaritans. We see many instances, even in the New Testament, like there's always a hatred, a heated argument between the Samaritans and the Jews. They hate them so much that, you know, they won't even pass through the Samaritans. The Jews won't pass through the same roads or the same path of the Samaritans. They used to, you know, go around about the city to move on to a different place. They won't pass through the Samaritans' place. So why was so much of an argument between them or hatred between them? Who are these Samaritans? What is the background of these people? Yes, you're right. You can unmute and give a brief about it, please. Lubega, yes, brother, please go ahead. I also see Lubega raising his hand. I think the Samaritans were a mixed race of the Jews who would not go into captivity with those other tribes around there that stayed during the captivity of Judah. So they looked at them as an impure race. Number two, they even took up the gods of the heavens, so they were not basically still true to the monotheism or to the God of Israel. So that was one of the major points, why they would look at each other with eyes looking at the other side. Thank you, Pastor. Yes, thank you. Thank you, brother Lubega. Yes, brother Subashish, you would like to add on? Okay, okay, your network is not good. Fine, good, no problem, no problem. Thank you. I'm just adding on to what brother Lubega said. Well, yes, so we remember this northern kingdom and when the Assyrians captured the northern kingdom, they took some of the Israelites along with them as capital and they moved on to different countries. And some Israelites were left as settlers in the northern kingdom. Now there's Assyrians and there are Israelites. So what happened? These settlers, you know, you know, try to avoid the punishment from God of Israel or Yahweh. So what they did is they combined the worship of Jehovah God and them, the heathen religion together. They also intermarried with Israelite people with some of them who were left in the land. So this resulted into a new racial group called Samaritans. And by the time the Jewish returned back from the Capetive to Jerusalem, they saw these Samaritans grew in larger number and they were well established and settled in the land. The Jews came back from the Capetive and they started to rebuild the wall of Jerusalem and its temple. So the Samaritans with a very good motto, they came to offer help to the Jewish people. Now the Jewish leaders knowing the mixed culture or intermarriage relationship with the others and worshiping the pagan God. The leaders rejected the help of Samaritans. And when the Samaritans saw all this, even they rebelled against the Jewish. And the complete, you know, they rebelled in such a way that this relationship between the Jews and the Samaritans were very bitter and they developed a hatred between them. So what the Samaritans did is because the Jews rejected their help nor they wanted to have any kind of communication or relationship with the Samaritans, they completely rejected them. So the Samaritans reacted bitterly and opposed the work of Jews. You know, throughout the building program of the wall of Jerusalem or the temple, Samaritans kept troubling the Jews constantly. And then later they were, after a few years, eventually they were driven away from the city in disgrace and they formed their own place as the Samaria and they left them. So as a result, the Jews, as Jews kept rejecting them. And now the Samaritans do not have a place to worship the God. So what they did is they came up with a sacred place. They came up with their own sacred writing. So what they did, the Samaritans came together, they formed the organization and they had their own religion. So they built a temple for themselves on Mount Gerasim, which is near Samaria. And they said this is the only place that, you know, where God is truly there. And they also selected few books from the Book of Moses and they said these are the only scriptures that we have. And also, yeah, they also formed, they have a chief leader and this leader said that, you know, this is the place where we have to worship the Lord. And they set certain rules and regulations for themselves by following only the law of Moses and Moses is the only prophet they have. And yeah, whereas the Jews, whereas the Jews on the other hand, they had many sacred writings. They had many sacred writings and yes, they had the temple built in Jerusalem. And so that's how the Jews have this 39 books of the Old Testament, which is called as the Jewish Bible now. So when we when we talk about the Jews, the Jews also started to teach the law to the people. So they started forming a group of people to teach. When we see when we read the Book of Nehemiah, we see that how the walls were built, the temple was built. Now when the temple was built, they started restoring the sacrifices, the ritual started been restored. There was worship, there was sacrifice and there was also teaching of the book of the law. So when they started to teach, they were not doing it in the temple. The book of the law was taught outside. There were a formation. So they eventually formed, formed that place as the synagogue. Synagogue is a symbol building consisting of a main meeting room and you enter it through the porch. We would have seen this, how a synagogue looks in some of the Christian movies like the Passion of Christ or even recently we would have seen from the series of the chosen. In different episodes where we see a synagogue, a main porch, it has a main meeting room and then you enter it from the porch and there's an open court outside. Where we also see the men and women sitting on opposite sides, men on one side, women on one side and there's a chief leader along with him. There's other leaders who are sitting on the main facing the audience and to conduct the synagogue service, they need about 10 adults. And the synagogue was a place where they used to teach on the book of the law. Every Sabbath, at least every Sabbath they used to meet and teach on the book of the law. They used to keep, maintain these books in separate boxes in a unique or special box they used to take. It would be a leader. He will take and read the scroll and then address what they read about it. Okay. And yes, Mr. Abu Bakr, please go ahead. I see you have raised your hand. Yes, please. Can you hear me? Am I audible? Yes, ma'am, you are audible. Yes, Mr. Abu Bakr, I see you have raised your hand. Is there anything that you would like to say? I think it was by mistake. Okay. So we were talking about the synagogue practices where we see the men and women and the main leader will come open the scroll, he'll read a portion of it and address on that portion. And they also had an elder. So these Jews had an elder and among the elder there was a leader and he was called as the ruler. And the elder and the ruler had certain power that they carried the carried. And also we see that the Roman, even in the time of Romans or even in the time of Jesus, when we read through the gospel, we see, we see that these rulers or these elders carried certain power where they can also fog people or, you know, they can, they had certain power that they carried to imprison them, imprison the Jews or imprison the people who do not follow the law or do not keep the Sabbath. So they had certain power that they carried with them. So we see that even the Roman government had given certain power to the Jewish leaders to manage and handle the Jewish people. Yeah. Anything that you would like to add or share any questions? Okay. Okay. So synagogue and we also see, you know, an early time when Ezra was there, he formed a group of elders and judges had been appointed to administer the Jewish affairs. They were the practices was followed in the local synagogue committee. But then these committees grew in power, as I said, they were more rigid system of the Jewish rule that was developed by these leaders, by these leaders and this group which had the power to control and they had kind of developed a Jewish rule and they had, they started to meet in a place and this place was known as the Sanhedrin. And although they were local Jewish council and these council established wherever the Jewish people settled, they had a synagogue and they also had a Sanhedrin where they used to meet for different councils or different meeting used to happen here with the higher officials of these Jewish leaders. So the Jerusalem council consisted a minimum of about 70 members, excluding the high priest, which acted as its president and composing a change from time to time. And even in the New Testament time, it consists of scribes, elders, priests and other respected citizens where they're as part of the Sanhedrin and the Sanhedrin and the authority to arrest or judge and punish people. Relating to any kind of certain religious or civil matters. And we also see that, you know, the Roman government had given them some kind of power to carry it and handle their people. Yeah, with that we finished with and we also see the Sadducees and Pharisees. There were two groups again in the Jews, there were two groups. One was Sadducees and the other was Pharisees. Now who were Sadducees and who were Pharisees? Can any of you all explain that? Ma'am, I think they were the scholars of the Law of Moses. Yes, who was that? Sadducees or Pharisees? Ma'am, maybe Pharisees. They were the scholars of the Law of Moses. Okay. Anyone would like to add on to what Sid said? Yes, please. Yeah, Mr. Abubaka, please go ahead. I see you have raised your hand. I believe Pharisees were involved in priesthood. Yes, yes, yes, Jafina. Okay, Abubaka, I think there's some problem. We are not able to hear you if you're speaking. We see your mic has been muted. Okay, well, they were the two major parties in the Jewish culture. One was the Sadducees and the other was the Pharisees. They were political priests and leaders who were wealthy, powerful and favored by the Maccabin rulers. And so they were called as Sadducees. And on the other side, they were anti-political and very traditionalist and they were very poor, powerless and favored by the common people. And they were Pharisees. So the difference between these two parties increased each other to develop their own belief and practices. We also see the Pharisees' chief aim was to keep the law in all its detail and so much that the law of Moses, but the law which was developed was not by the teachers of the law or the scribes. They were particularly strict in keeping the rules relating to their religious observance such as like fasting or when it came to tithing or keeping up the Sabbath and the ritual uncleanness. We see so much they tried to keep the law even in the time of Jesus. They started, you know, opposing Jesus with many of these ritual practices. Yes. So we see that the Pharisees felt like they are the separated ones or very close to God. They are the true people who have kept themselves and they become unclean with among others. Or, you know, if they don't keep the law, it is against God. You know, the Pharisees were the party of the scribes and the Sadducees were the party of the priest. And the name possibly came from Zadok. Zadok, the Sadducees' name came from the people came Zadok. Now, who are these Zadok? Have you heard anyone by the name, the background from Zadok? Who are these people? It's a group of people. Zadok, a priest of Solomon's time whose descendants were regarded as the only legitimate priest. And the Sadducees' chief concern was to use the religious and political structure of the Jewish society to gain power for themselves. So these are the two peoples where they tried controlling the people and they had two parties and they had their own followers following them. And later part, we also see the Jews for the first time had to pay the taxes under the Roman government. So the Roman took over. Now the Jews have to pay the taxes instead of paying to the Herodian ruler. Now they have to pay to the Roman ruler the taxes. And what happened here? So when the Roman conducted a census to access the taxes, a group of Jews led by a man named Judas the Galilean rebelled against this wrongdoing of the Roman collecting the taxes. So what happened? And this group who rebelled against them under the leadership of Judas the Galilean was known as zealots. So they had their own party formed in and who actually where a group wants to oppose the Roman rule. And they were prepared to fight against the Roman government with related to this taxation to stop the taxation. And they did fight but they were not succeeded. They were not taken. They were conquered by them. And then because of that the Roman government burned the temple. There were many bloodsheds there in Jerusalem and they burned the temple. They broke the wall and the Roman conquered the Jewish nation so badly left in ruins and they literally said that Jerusalem is over. Jerusalem is finished and they left out. We also see in from this group of people zealots God chose a man called Simon the zealot as one of his disciples. We will also be studying about him later part. So with that we complete an introduction to the New Testament just an overview. So the next part is the inter-testamental period where I request you all to please go through this inter-testamental period where we see that the 400 silent period. What are the what are the rulers where they're like we had Persia, Alexandria and Egypt and Syrian. I could be in the Roman rule. So I request you all to read on these so that we will have a background knowledge about what happened in that 400 silent period. So it is about three pages I request you all to please go through it in your books in detail so that we can move on to our books from the New Testament. So next class we would be covering on the introduction to the four Gospels of Jesus Christ and then we can start studying on the book of Matthew. So with that we end with our introduction to our New Testament and I open it to our class to share on your learning your discussion. How helpful was the Old Testament class in the last semester and what is your expectation of the New Testament and how would you like to be taught because it's more of history. It's more of lecture knowledge. So how interesting what was good in the Old Testament and how we can apply it in studying in the New Testament. So open to class please go ahead and share. Before sharing can I ask a question. Yes, Jeffina. I just want to know how the Romans got into the Jews. I mean how they entered into the Jews. Okay. See that when you study the inter-testamental period you will get to know there were many, many people who conquered the Northern Kingdom and the Southern Kingdom. They were the Persian came and conquered. Then we see the Alexandrian role and then we see the Egyptian and then we see the Syrian. And if you see the final the Roman period, the Roman conquered. So when the Roman government came, they started imposing the people with the heavy taxation and heavy rule. So when Jesus lived, he lived in the time of the Romans. There were Romans everywhere. So there were taxation and there were many other rules that they were imposing on the Jewish people to keep them under their control. The political power was Romans. So you will get to know in detail when you read through each and every period. You will get to know. Thank you. Yes, Jeffina. Yes, nice to see you have joined back. Yes, master. Thank you. So you accessed it through the link or through the class code? Through the class code, master. Okay, great. That's nice. That's nice. Thanks. Thanks, Sid, for helping out the students who are not able to join in, who had some technical glitches in the morning. Yes, I see, brother Lubega raised your hand. Yes. I think when we look at the inter-testimony period, there are two things as the scholars of the Bible or as students of the Bible. We have to emphasize according to my own opinion. Number one, we need to see two groups of people. There were so many, but there's two most important groups of people. Others were by the ways. The most two important group of people we need to focus on. Number one, we are the Greeks. The Greeks because they were able to give us the language of the New Testament coin a Greek. Yes. And number two are the Romans. And the most important thing I can talk about the Romans. Is there peace? Pax Romana. So if we look at those two things, because the gospel, when Jesus Christ was going to come, there must have been a common language that the entire empire would understand. And that was brought in by Alexander the Great coin a language. I think he did not bring coin a language. He did not bring coin a Greek, but he brought classical Greek, but then the common Greek developed along the way as we shall learn later. So that language was very important. Yes. And when we look at how the gospel spread, there were supposed to be no words for the gospel to be spread very well. And that was brought in by the Romans. That's why they call it the Pax Romana. That's what is my contribution pastor. Thank you. Thank you. Very helpful. Thank you. Anyone would like to add on? John. Rosalind. Zellie. Please feel free to share on your learning. On the history of the New Testament. Okay, we can have a discussion on this even in our next class. So I request y'all to please go through this inter testimony period have your research is done and we will discuss in detail in the next class along with introduction to the introduction to the four gospels. So with that, we will end the session and I request one of our students to please end this class with a word of prayer please. Dear Heavenly Father, we come to another name of Jesus. Thank you for this beautiful day and for the beautiful class that we had. Holy Bible is the most precious thing that we have got and it is a great praise and it's amazing to learn it as your children's and their students. So that you're acuping as you're developing as you're helping us to learn a lot of things through our pastor. We thank you so much for that. We thank you for coming down for us and for everything that you did for us. We thank you deep from our hearts. So as we learn as we start learning the New Testament that the Holy Spirit guide us each and every day. God, you take care of the conditions of our body and our spiritual mind and everything you take care of our body, soul and spirit. God, you help us to learn a lot. Help us to understand a lot. Help us to open the eyes that can look into the treasures of the world, Scott. God, you help us, you lead us. I praise everyone, everyone of my friends in your hands. I pray that they learn a lot and they live as a testimony to you. They live the life that you have promised down here on this earth and they will glorify you in everything that they do. We thank you so much. We thank you beyond words, Jesus, whatever you have done. We cannot thank you for everything, but we still want to thank you. God, as we learn, help us to grow in your words. Help us to grow in your knowledge. Help us to have the mind of Christ and help us to proclaim the gospel more boldly in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. Thank you. Thank you. So you all have any questions related to the New Testament, related to your assignments? You all can clarify it. If you'll have any questions. Okay. No questions. We can end the session. Thank you, Jeffina, for praying. Thank you, each one for joining in today's session. God bless. See you all next week, Monday. Yeah. Thank you. God bless. Thank you, Mom. Thank you. God bless.