The Traditions of Jesus in Their Greco-Roman Ch4 Test Bank

Chapter 4

Test Bank

Type: multiple choice question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 01

1. Jesus died around _____.

a. 20 CE

b. 30 CE

c. 50 CE

d. 70 CE

Type: multiple choice question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 02

2. Who is the earliest of the New Testament writers?

a. the author of the Gospel of John

b. the author of Hebrews

c. the author of the Gospel of Matthew

d. Paul

Type: multiple choice question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 03

3. Which of the following languages was Jesus’ native language?

a. Coptic

b. Aramaic

c. Latin

d. Greek

Type: multiple choice question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 04

4. In what language were the New Testament Gospels written?

a. Hebrew

b. Aramaic

c. Greek

d. Coptic

Type: multiple choice question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 05

5. The Gospel of Mark was probably written around _____.

a. 30 CE

b. 50 CE

c. 70 CE

d. 90 CE

Type: multiple choice question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 06

6. Matthew and Luke were probably written around _____.

a. 40 CE

b. 50 CE

c. 80 CE

d. 100 CE

Type: multiple choice question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 07

7. The Gospel of John was probably written around _____.

a. 30 CE

b. 60 CE

c. 70 CE

d. 90 CE

Type: multiple choice question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 08

8. Which canonical Gospel was probably written last?

a. Matthew

b. Mark

c. Luke

d. John

Type: multiple choice question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 09

9. The early Christian mission was conducted primarily _____.

a. through public preaching to large numbers of people

b. through private interactions

c. in revivals

d. by distributing copies of the New Testament

Type: multiple choice question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 10

10. By the beginning of the second century, Christianity had spread _____.

a. only within Galilee

b. only within Palestine

c. only within Palestine and Egypt

d. around the Mediterranean, as far as Italy

Type: multiple choice question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 11

11. The literacy rate in antiquity is thought to have been between _____.

a. 1–5%

b. 10–15%

c. 20–25%

d. 40–45%

Type: multiple choice question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 12

12. Which of the following Gospels was written during Jesus’ lifetime?

a. The Gospel of Mark

b. The Gospel of Matthew

c. The Gospel of Thomas

d. none

Type: multiple choice question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 13

13. Oral traditions about Jesus were spread throughout the Mediterranean primarily through _____.

a. the original eleven disciples

b. eyewitnesses to Jesus’ ministry

c. Christian converts who were not eyewitnesses to Jesus’ ministry

d. Jews

Type: multiple choice question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 14

14. Oral cultures tend to _____.

a. maintain verbal accuracy of stories

b. understand stories as changeable

c. produce accurate historical writings

d. have a high literacy rate

Type: multiple choice question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 15

15. In the Greco-Roman world, stories about a god having the power to heal _____.

a. were unique to Christianity

b. were unique among Jews and Christians

c. were relatively common

d. were forbidden

Type: multiple choice question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 16

16. The term “moral truth” describes _____.

a. something that is true but did not happen

b. an historical event that is morally correct

c. a rule in Greco-Roman society

d. a Jewish Passover tradition

Type: multiple choice question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 17

17. Evidence suggests that the early Christians did all of the following except _____.

a. create stories about Jesus

b. change stories about Jesus

c. write down stories about Jesus

d. use accounts written by Jesus’ original disciples

Type: multiple choice question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 18

18. The circulation of oral traditions about Jesus _____.

a. maintained accurate, eyewitness reports

b. occurred only within Palestine

c. was tightly controlled

d. produced many differences in the stories

Type: multiple choice question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 19

19. According to Jewish reckoning, when does a new day begin?

a. at sunrise

b. at sunset

c. at noon

d. at midnight

Type: multiple choice question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 20

20. What is commemorated by the Jewish festival of Passover?

a. the exodus from Egypt

b. the crucifixion of Jesus

c. the building of the Temple

d. the giving of the Law to Moses

Type: multiple choice question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 21

21. In Jesus’ time, the Passover festival drew pilgrims to which city?

a. Alexandria

b. Jerusalem

c. Caesarea

d. Rome

Type: multiple choice question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 22

22. Which of the following is not traditionally consumed at Passover?

a. wine

b. lamb

c. unleavened bread

d. fish

Type: multiple choice question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 23

23. According to the Gospel of John, Jesus died _____.

a. the day before the Passover meal

b. the week before Passover

c. the day after the Passover meal

d. the week after Passover

Type: multiple choice question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 24

24. According to the Gospel of Mark, Jesus died _____.

a. the day before the Passover meal

b. the week before Passover

c. the day after the Passover meal

d. the week after Passover

Type: multiple choice question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 25

25. Which of the New Testament Gospels begins with a mention of its sources?

a. Mark

b. Matthew

c. Luke

d. John

Type: multiple choice question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 26

26. Why did God instruct Moses to have every Israelite family sacrifice a lamb and paint their doorframes with its blood?

a. so the angel of death would not visit those houses

b. so the Pharaoh would be afraid to send his soldiers to those houses for fear of infection

c. to show the world how the Jews suffer

d. as a symbolic offering to the Pharaoh

Type: multiple choice question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 27

27. Ancient biographies are most concerned with which of the following?

a. recording complete factual data

b. inner development of the subject

c. portraying essential character traits

d. using only written sources

Type: multiple choice question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 28

28. The New Testament Gospels are _____.

a. anonymous

b. eyewitness accounts

c. written by Paul

d. written in Aramaic

Type: multiple choice question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 29

29. When were the names Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John attached to the New Testament Gospels?

a. when they were originally composed

b. first century CE

c. second century CE

d. third century CE

Type: multiple choice question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 30

30. Who was the Roman governor who ordered Jesus crucified?

a. Hanina ben Dosa

b. Pontius Pilate

c. Julius Caesar

d. Alexander the Great

Type: essay/short answer question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 01

1. Discuss how stories about Jesus spread throughout the Empire and how the retelling of Jesus traditions worked to convert people. What effect did this storytelling have on the traditions about Jesus?

Feedback: Students should discuss the nature of oral traditions: Why were stories about Jesus told? Who told stories and to whom? How did these stories function in the process of conversion? Were Christians most interested in preserving Jesus’ exact words or did they invent stories as they passed them along? In addition, students could discuss the transition from oral to written traditions about Jesus.

Type: essay/short answer question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 02

2. Using a specific example from the New Testament Gospels, discuss the evidence that Christians changed stories about Jesus. Why might early Christians have changed and created traditions about Jesus?

Feedback: Because students (presumably) have not read the Gospels yet, they might choose to discuss the example from the textbook: the day of Jesus’ death in the Gospels of Mark and John. One reason early Christians changed stories was to convey their theological perspectives.

Type: essay/short answer question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 03

3. Discuss the symbolism of the Passover foods, both from the perspective of the Jewish tradition and from the perspective of the Christian tradition. What additions did Jesus make, and why did he make them? Be sure to point out the direct analogy Jesus made between the wine and his blood and the bread and his body?

Feedback: Jesus used the Passover story as an analogy to suggest that its meaning would be fulfilled by him. Passover commemorates the exodus of the Israelites from Egyptian bondage. The meal is highly symbolic to aid memories of the event down through the generations. The unleavened bread symbolized the need to eat quickly in preparation for escape, and the wine symbolized the blood of the lamb that was to be used to paint the doorframes so that the angel of death would pass over that house and not kill the firstborn humans and animals inside. The bread was likened to the body of Jesus and the wine to his blood. He became the sacrificial lamb that would save his followers from death and liberate them from oppression.

Type: essay/short answer question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 04

4. Why do scholars think that the disciples, Matthew and John, and associates of the apostles, Mark and Luke, did not write the Gospels attributed to them?

Feedback: Some of the most important arguments against the authorial attributions of the Gospels are as follows. The texts themselves do not make these claims; the disciples were most likely illiterate; Jesus and his disciples spoke Aramaic, but the Gospels were written in Greek; the Gospels seem to record traditions that circulated orally for some time; and, finally, one of the Gospel writers, Luke, states that he used both written and oral sources.

Type: essay/short answer question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 01

1. What does it mean to speak about the oral traditions behind the Gospels?

Type: essay/short answer question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 02

2. What important events happened between the time of Jesus’ death and the writing of the New Testament Gospels? In what contexts did people tell stories about what Jesus said and did? Who would be telling these stories? What might they emphasize in the stories as they told them?

Type: essay/short answer question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 03

3. Does it seem possible to you that some of the stories about Jesus were modified as they were told and retold? Why would they have been? What kind of changes might have been made?

Type: essay/short answer question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 04

4. Is there any evidence that the stories recorded in our Gospels are ones that had been changed in the process of retelling? How convincing is this evidence to you? What other kinds of evidence would you look for?

Type: essay/short answer question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 05

5. Why do scholars question the traditional view that the four New Testament Gospels were written by persons named Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John?

Type: essay/short answer question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 06

6. Why is it important to recognize the genre of a text?

Type: essay/short answer question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 07

7. What are the chief characteristics of Greco-Roman biography as a genre?

Type: essay/short answer question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 08

8. In what ways are the Gospels like Greco-Roman biographies? Why would understanding the Gospels as Greco-Roman biographies help us to interpret them?

Type: essay/short answer question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 09

9. Taking into account the role of religion in the Greco-Roman world (see chapter 2), what missionary tactics do you think would be most effective for early Christians?

Type: essay/short answer question

Title: Chapter 04 Question 10

10. How many people in the Roman Empire were literate? What does it mean to “read” a book in antiquity? How do scholars understand the relationship between oral culture and history?