-
In the beginning was the Word. And the Word was with God and the Word was God. Everything was created in six days and on the seventh God rested. Oh and also Adam and Eve sinned near this time because of Satan who was in the form of a snake. -
The Pyramids were not, in fact, built by the aliens. The first one was built by Imhotep, as a huge grave. Pyramids don't really have booby traps, but they do have a bunch of different passages. The dead buried there have different things with them, ranging from food to cats to slaves.
-
Babylon has a lot of things to its name, like the Tower of Babel and the Jews' exile there. It was founded by the peoples of Southern Mesopotamia and was made into a great war empire by Hammurabi, who also built walls around it, while Nebuchadnezzar II made these walls larger (so large, in fact, that you could hold a chariot race on them). -
Abraham. Abram. Same guy. Basically, the guy was (most likely) originally a polytheist, believing the stuff everybody around him believed until one day, God was like "Hey. I exist. Your descendants will be very numerous." And so, Abraham was a very faithful guy and he almost even sacrificed his own kid for God. That's how faithful he was. Of course, his wife, Sarah, did take matters into her own hands once or twice, which wasn't okay, but it was okay because everything worked out in the end. -
There was once a guy named Job. The Bible has the book between Esther and Psalms, but most people believe it happened before even Moses. So that's fun. Job had a good life until God decided He would test him, so he killed off most of his family except for his wife and took most everything from him and sent his own friends upon him to nag him to death. Job ends up questioning God, repenting of this questioning, and having more stuff than before plus more kids than before. -
There were ten plagues in Egypt. They happened because the pharaoh's heart was hardened and he wouldn't let Moses and the Jews leave. Mean, I know. Anyways, ten plagues (bloody water, frogs, lice, flies, livestock death, boils, hail, locusts, darkness, and the death of firstborns) were sent and pharaoh's kid died so Pharaoh let them go bu then changed his mind and probably died because of the water rushing over him and the armor being too heavy and he probably drowned. -
Joshua is the guy that succeeded Moses. He saw a lot of the things that Moses did, and he was the guy who led the Israelites into Canaan. He sent out the twelve spies and he also marched around Jericho seven times, which probably wasn't fun. Also, he saw a bunch of miracles and was at Moses' side when he died.
-
The parallels between Ruth, Naomi, and Boaz's and Jesus' story are incredible. We start with Naomi being from Bethlehem, and of the tribe of Judah-- Jesus was born in Bethlehem and of the tribe of Judah. Her children married people who weren't Israelites. Jesus' children (that is, people) married sin (sort of). Ruth (she's kind of like the children, I guess) marries Boaz, who is the kinsman redeemer (KR), a KR being similar to what Jesus did for us. Plus, Boaz and Ruth are related to Jesus. -
Saul looked like a king. David did not. Solomon looked like a king because his dad was David. Saul basically was really tall and really good at fighting but was also sort of vain. David wasn't vain, he was a man after God's own heart and didn't look like a king when he was chosen. He killed Goliath. Then he went on the run from Saul for years and had a son, Solomon, by Bathsheeba. Solomon was really wise, but in his end years was more like Pharaoh than like his dad, David.
-
Solomon had a good idea, and when David died, he did it. He asked God for wisdom and was rewarded with that... and more! He also got rich, had a bunch of ladies, and he built the temple, which his dad, David couldn't do because he had too much blood on his hands. Anyways, he asked for wisdom which was good because he was going to need it. He instilled the idea of slavery, plus he wasn't as great as David, so therefore he was more like Pharaoh than his dad, David. -
Asa was good in the eyes of the Lord and he did a bunch of things. He cut down the Ashera poles, worshiped God, destroyed the foreign alters, and killed off the high places (that is, not God's synagogues and/or temple). Also, Asa built a bunch of fortified cities, which was nice. All in all, Asa was a good guy. -
Basically, Elijah really, really, didn't like King Ahab and Queen Jezebel, his Canaanite wife. Which was good because God didn't like them either and Elijah was God's prophet. Anyway, Elijah prayed for drought because he wanted to show Ahab that God was boss. In James, it mentions that he prayed fervently for no rain to come, and it didn't come. There can be miracles when you pray. Especially when you're Elijah. -
Elisha was in his parents' field, plowing with the oxen when Elijah first showed up. Anyways, Elisha was like "Wait, let me give mom and dad a kiss and tell them bye and then I'll follow you." So Elisha killed the oxen and made some food and they ate and then Elisha went with Elijah. -
Basically, Greece was a bunch of little city-states. Each city-state had their own patron god-- for Athens, it was Athena and so on-- that they really liked and worshiped. Each city-state had a couple things in common, two of which are their similar language and their gods (they had a patron god that was highly worshiped in each city then there were the normal gods-- those were worshiped too). -
Jonah was a prophet, and he is the protagonist of the minor prophet book titled "Jonah". A surprise to me, too. Anyway, he was disobedient to God because when God told him to go to Nineveh, Jonah headed in the opposite direction, trying to escape God. He was swallowed by a huge fish (it never says it's a whale) and spent his time there for three days praying. When he was finally spat out of the fish, he went to Nineveh and preached that the Ninevites shouldn't be doing what they were doing. -
According to legend, Romulus and Remus were raised by a she-wolf. Evidently, they were the result of a princess and the war god, Mars. An interesting combination. Anyway, the two brothers, who were twins, decided that they'd build the city where they had been raised but they had a fight and Romulus killed Remus (sound familiar? Cane and Abel, anyone?) so Rome is called Rome after Romulus. -
Josiah was eight years old when he became king. He was the grandson of Manasseh, the evilest king of Judah. Anyways, he found this scroll in the temple, and started reading it, got convicted, and tried to convict the rest of Israel, too. He evidently was alright in the eyes of God because he repented. -
Once upon a time there was this king who had a child, and this child was predicted to be a renouncer (that is, someone who would renounce luxuries). To prevent this, the king kept the kid in the palace, not letting him out and instead giving him a bunch of luxuries. Long story short, the kid, whose name was Sidhartha, saw a bunch of sad-looking people who were sick, and therefore felt bad for him and decided to help them out and became "the Buddha" or simply "Buddha". -
So, essentially, Jerusalem was in the South. And that means that it was ruled by those who were descendants of David. Basically, it fell apart because it was a punishment from God. God was mad that they had disrespected Him and that they had abandoned Him, so he handed them over to Babylon. That is where Mishael, Hannaniah, and Azariah come into play, better known as Meschach, Shadrach, and Abednego.
-
So, there was this huge statue that was built by Nebuchadnezzar, and it was made of gold. Right? Right. So, Shadrach, Meschach, and Abednego would not worship it and ended up being thrown into the fiery furnace. This would've been extremely painful and extremely the end if it weren't those three, but they didn't die. Because there was another, an angel, in the fire with them. -
Basically, there was this guy called Belshazzar. He was the king of the Babylonian empire place, and basically was having this huge party and he was using the cups from the temple. That's a big no-no. Suddenly, wham, bam, pow, a hand appeared and began to write the words "mene, mene, tekel upharsin" and in summary it meant that God was mad and was going to destroy the king's kingdom. Turns out, Daniel, who read it, was right about that. -
So. You're wondering why there's quotes around the word "queen". The reason is that this wasn't the year Esther was born (Xerxes would've married an infant), but it was the approximate year Esther was crowned queen when Vashti was kicked out. Long story short, Esther's cousin convinced her to tell the king that the Jews were all going to die and that she was going to die (she was a Jew) and she ended up saving all the Jews. -
Finally the time came. The Israelites were to be sent back to Israel. Finally. Nehemiah was the cup bearer to Artaxerxes and ended up being pretty great. Anyway, he was sent back with all the materials he needed and the Israelites began to construct the temple and the walls. It was fun. There were a couple hardships along the way, like Sanballat, but Nehemiah was dead-set on building that wall. -
Alexander's dad basically was assasinated and he came to power. First, he killed off his enemies at home because why not and then he went bigger. He killed off a lot of people and made a huge empire. In fact, it was so huge that when he died, it wasn't able to be held together by one person. -
Jesus was born of a virgin. That's right. Basically, there was this lady named Mary who was supposed to marry a guy called Joseph. Well, Mary was told that she was going to have a child who was born by the spirit and for a bit Joseph didn't believe that, but then he was visited by an angel and he believed. Then they went to Bethlehem because of a census and Mary gave birth there. And, by the way, Jesus is the Son of God, so he's preeeetty important.