The Eternal Life Series offers a look at eternal life based on John 17:3 and related New Testament scriptures.
Most or all of the New Testament was written in Greek, so Bible students often dissect scripture by minutely examining Greek words and philosophies. This is natural for Americans because the American education and culture is based on Greek ways of thought.
However, Jesus probably taught mostly in Hebrew, with some of his teachings in Aramaic. Jesus and his followers were well educated in the Hebrew Old Testament. For the first couple of decades after his death, the followers of Jesus were mostly practicing Jews. It seems likely that a better understanding of the teachings of Jesus can be attained by looking at them through a Jewish cultural viewpoint and a better understanding of Hebrew words.
The impetus for this series were some of the episodes of the Bema Discipleship podcast, along with personal study times with Hebrew experts Elle Grove Fricks and Brad H. Young. Working with them, we developed a dictionary of some Hebrew words that you can find in Reference 7 of the Reference section of this website.
Although each episode in this series can be approached individually, the Eternal Life Series is written for viewers to watch all of the episodes in the order in which they are presented.
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The story of the Good Samaritan is told by Jesus in Luke 10:29-37. The set up for the story is in Verse 25 when an expert in the law asks Jesus the provocative question, “What must I do to inherit eternal life.” The presumption in the question is that eternal life can be obtained by doing something. So, eternal life in this case does not mean going to heaven after death.
The response of Jesus follows a common rabbinical teaching technique. Jesus sets the stage by asking which law or laws are the most important to use in order to come to the best conclusion. They agree the most important law is, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.” (Deuteronomy 6:5) They also agree the second most important law is, “Love your neighbor as yourself.” (Leviticus 19:18). With this agreement, Jesus tells the man to follow these two commandments and he will live.
The expert is acutely aware of the difficulties in following these commandments, so he strives to get a little wiggle room by asking Jesus to give him an exact definition of a neighbor. This question was not an original question, but was one which had long been discussed and argued by the legal experts.
