Almost Heretical

How did the early church think about the Levitical system and sacrifices after Jesus? Nate and Tim discuss this common and problematic question while seeking to avoid antisemitic supersessionism and find a more sensible understanding of things. Thoughts, questions, stories? Please email almostheretical@gmail.com Become a member and get: 1. Bonus episodes of Utterly Heretical (our private podcast) every month 2. All full-length episodes 3. Access to our private community of 350+ listeners Become a member: almostheretical.com/subscribe Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Is baptism really just a bath? Does God really only forgive ignorant people? What is the order of operations related to atonement? Nate and Tim respond to a few more listener questions. Thoughts, questions, stories? Please email almostheretical@gmail.com Become a member and get: 1. Bonus episodes of Utterly Heretical (our private podcast) every month 2. All full-length episodes 3. Access to our private community of 350+ listeners Become a member: almostheretical.com/subscribe Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Nate and Tim respond to a few listener questions, discussing how forgiveness itself is tied to liberation as well as why universal atonement isn’t just a possibility but a necessity. Thoughts, questions, stories? Please email almostheretical@gmail.com Become a member and get: 1. Bonus episodes of Utterly Heretical (our private podcast) every month 2. All full-length episodes 3. Access to our private community of 350+ listeners Become a member: almostheretical.com/subscribe Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What does holiness and chemical atonement have to do with liberation and ransom? Did Jesus pay a ransom price, and if so, to who? And how might we better synthesize these various ways of describing what Jesus accomplished? (We even get into The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe and how C.S. Lewis portrays the ransom theory in Narnia.) Thoughts, questions, stories? Please email almostheretical@gmail.com Become a member and get: 1. Bonus episodes of Utterly Heretical (our private podcast) every month 2. All full-length episodes 3. Access to our private community of 350+ listeners Become a member: almostheretical.com/subscribe Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What do ancient science, the “scapegoat” of Yom Kippur, and holy tree branches have to do with Jesus’ death? And what does resurrection have to do with everything? Nate and Tim continue discussing how the contagious nature of holiness undergirds much of the New Testament theology about Jesus and discover some fascinating ideas along the way. Thoughts, questions, stories? Please email almostheretical@gmail.com Become a member and get: 1. Bonus episodes of Utterly Heretical (our private podcast) every month 2. All full-length episodes 3. Access to our private community of 350+ listeners Become a member: almostheretical.com/subscribe Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Did Jesus have to die, or is that not even how we should think about it? And why is blood both a source of holiness and defilement? Also, what do menstruation, “nocturnal emissions” and masturbation have to do with each other in Leviticus? Nate and Tim discuss a few listener questions as well as some of their own. Thoughts, questions, stories? Please email almostheretical@gmail.com Become a member and get: 1. Bonus episodes of Utterly Heretical (our private podcast) every month 2. All full-length episodes 3. Access to our private community of 350+ listeners Become a member: almostheretical.com/subscribe Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Holiness and purity were two of the central concerns of the entire Levitical system. Neither were moral categories, but rather had to do with something like chemical states. In this episode, Nate and Tim discuss the idea of holiness and how the New Testament authors believed the gospel was that Jesus had made the world holy. Thoughts, questions, stories? Please email almostheretical@gmail.com Become a member and get: 1. Bonus episodes of Utterly Heretical (our private podcast) every month 2. All full-length episodes 3. Access to our private community of 350+ listeners Become a member: almostheretical.com/subscribe Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Many of us are rethinking faith and leaving old beliefs behind, but how do we get healthy? Nate and Tim talk with Dr. Hillary McBride about what it actually takes to build new community, how to deal with the trauma our bodies carry, why maintaining relationships with people from our past can be so hard, and much more. Thoughts, questions, stories? Please email almostheretical@gmail.com Become a member and get: 1. Bonus episodes of Utterly Heretical (our private podcast) every month 2. All full-length episodes 3. Access to our private community of 350+ listeners Become a member: almostheretical.com/subscribe Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Why all the blood in the Old Testament? There is actually an important bit of ancient science underlying the whole idea of sacrifice and atonement. Also, what happens if we just can’t believe that science? Thoughts, questions, stories? Please email almostheretical@gmail.com Become a member and get: 1. Bonus episodes of Utterly Heretical (our private podcast) every month 2. All full-length episodes 3. Access to our private community of 350+ listeners Become a member: almostheretical.com/subscribe Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Why sacrifice animals? Why send some people outside the camp? Why all the rules? Nate and Tim discuss how the threat of viral contagion is the primary principal underlying the Levitical system, and how that is why the Torah talks so much about separation and mixture. When anything comes into contact with something “unclean”, the defilement spreads. Therefore, prevention, quarantine and cleansing are the name of the game. But is it possible there’s even more going on? Is it possible something could be so holy that it cannot be defiled? And what if that is precisely how the gospels depict Jesus? Thoughts, questions, stories? Please email almostheretical@gmail.com Become a member and get: 1. Bonus episodes of Utterly Heretical (our private podcast) every month 2. All full-length episodes 3. Access to our private community of 350+ listeners Become a member: almostheretical.com/subscribe Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What all is required in order to camp out with God? And what is holiness anyway? Nate and Tim discuss all this and more, including why there are so many long lists of detailed instructions in the Torah and how to read them. Also, what do the golden calf, Nadab and Abihu, and the tragedy of Uzzah and the cart all have in common? Thoughts, questions, stories? Please email almostheretical@gmail.com Become a member and get: 1. Bonus episodes of Utterly Heretical (our private podcast) every month 2. All full-length episodes 3. Access to our private community of 350+ listeners Become a member: almostheretical.com/subscribe Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On the 1-year anniversary of the Tree of Life Synagogue massacre in Pittsburgh, we sit down with Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg. What constitutes a good apology? How do we appreciate both forgiveness and justice at the same time? And what can we learn from the Jewish tradition about how to disagree, change our minds, and embrace both the old and the new? Also, we get into how Jesus might have actually been a Pharisee. Thoughts, questions, stories? Please email almostheretical@gmail.com Become a member and get: 1. Bonus episodes of Utterly Heretical (our private podcast) every month 2. All full-length episodes 3. Access to our private community of 350+ listeners Become a member: almostheretical.com/subscribe Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Did you know that Adam and Eve worked as security guards in the Garden of Eden? And what does it mean to be a priest? And once again, why is there a snake in the garden? Nate and Tim discuss the role of priests and how Genesis 2 depicts Adam as a priest representing Israel. Get the SECOND PART of this episode on Utterly Heretical, just for supporters of the show. You can listen to that here! Thoughts, questions, stories? Please email almostheretical@gmail.com Become a member and get: 1. Bonus episodes of Utterly Heretical (our private podcast) every month 2. All full-length episodes 3. Access to our private community of 350+ listeners Become a member: almostheretical.com/subscribe Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Are we supposed to be afraid of God? Why did the ancient Israelites fear the Lord? What was it that scared them exactly? Nate and Tim discuss how we may have gotten this all very wrong for a long time and maybe we shouldn’t be so scared after all. Thoughts, questions, stories? Please email almostheretical@gmail.com Become a member and get: 1. Bonus episodes of Utterly Heretical (our private podcast) every month 2. All full-length episodes 3. Access to our private community of 350+ listeners Become a member: almostheretical.com/subscribe Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The New Testament claims Jesus is helping reconcile humanity and God, but why were they ever separated in the first place? Does God want to separate from us because we’re awful, or is there something entirely different going on? Nate and Tim discuss the biblical authors’ surprising assumptions about why God is so distant and what is actually required to bridge the gap. Thoughts, questions, stories? Please email almostheretical@gmail.com Become a member and get: 1. Bonus episodes of Utterly Heretical (our private podcast) every month 2. All full-length episodes 3. Access to our private community of 350+ listeners Become a member: almostheretical.com/subscribe Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What were the sacrifices for? What did blood do? What is the main problem which the tabernacle and temple and then Jesus were trying to solve? Nate and Tim introduce a new series on Leviticus, atonement, and the crazy idea of blood as a kind of cosmic insulation. In this first part, they highlight some of the big ideas soon to be discussed and reflect on why it matters. Thoughts, questions, stories? Please email almostheretical@gmail.com Become a member and get: 1. Bonus episodes of Utterly Heretical (our private podcast) every month 2. All full-length episodes 3. Access to our private community of 350+ listeners Become a member: almostheretical.com/subscribe Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is an episode of Utterly Heretical, Nate and Tim’s second podcast for Patreon supporters. They have a candid conversation about the emotionally complicated topic of going to church. Thoughts, questions, stories? Please email almostheretical@gmail.com Become a member and get: 1. Bonus episodes of Utterly Heretical (our private podcast) every month 2. All full-length episodes 3. Access to our private community of 350+ listeners Become a member: almostheretical.com/subscribe Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Did Jesus really call a Canaanite woman a dog? Was this as heartless and mean as it sounds, or is something else going on? Nate and Tim discuss this startling passage in Matthew 15 and more. Thoughts, questions, stories? Please email almostheretical@gmail.com Become a member and get: 1. Bonus episodes of Utterly Heretical (our private podcast) every month 2. All full-length episodes 3. Access to our private community of 350+ listeners Become a member: almostheretical.com/subscribe Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

If the Bible is clearly sufficient for all our needs and sufficiently clear so that we can understand it, why doesn’t it feel that way? Nate and Tim discuss the history of these ideas, the role they’ve played, and whether or not they’re still helpful today. Once again it all seems to come down to power - who has it? Or, as they ask in this episode, “Who is the pope?” (More) Thoughts, questions, stories? Please email almostheretical@gmail.com Become a member and get: 1. Bonus episodes of Utterly Heretical (our private podcast) every month 2. All full-length episodes 3. Access to our private community of 350+ listeners Become a member: almostheretical.com/subscribe Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

When we say, “The Bible says,” what do we really mean? Who exactly are we talking about? Nate and Tim try to answer that question and more as they discuss the relationship between the people who wrote the Bible and our own modern ethics. (More) Thoughts, questions, stories? Please email almostheretical@gmail.com Become a member and get: 1. Bonus episodes of Utterly Heretical (our private podcast) every month 2. All full-length episodes 3. Access to our private community of 350+ listeners Become a member: almostheretical.com/subscribe Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices