Bible Questions Answered:
“Pastor our tuesday night Bible club
met and we were talking about kids going back to school, and we
wondered just what schooling Jesus had.....?”
Karen/ Denver, Colorado U.S.A.
Bible Answer:
Bible Texts:
The Bible does not contain a history of
the early education of Jesus. Even so this is true, it hardly goes
without saying that He had a religious training.
With little doubt Joseph (Christ's step
father), would have taught his children of the Old Testament.
Matthew 13:55,56 KJV
55 Is not this The Carpenter's Son?
is not His mother called Mary? and His brethren, James, and
Joses (Joseph), and Simon, and Judas?
56 And His sisters, are they
not all with us?..."
No doubt the first
thing he taught them was The Shema, The Creed Of Israel.
Deuteronomy
6:4-9 KJV
4 Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God
is one Lord:
5 And thou shalt love The Lord thy
God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy
might.
6 And these words, which I command
thee this day, shall be in thine heart:
7 And thou shalt teach them
diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou
sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when
thou liest down, and when thou risest up.
8 And thou shalt bind them for a
sign upon thine hand, and they shall be as frontlets between thine
eyes.
9 And thou shalt write them upon the
posts of thy house, and on thy gates.
Deuteronomy 7:7
KJV
The Lord did not set His love upon
you, nor choose you, because ye were more in number than any people;
for ye were the fewest of all people:
Deuteronomy
11:13-21 KJV
13 And it shall come to pass, if ye
shall hearken diligently unto my commandments which I command you
this day, to love The Lord your God, and to serve Him with all your
heart and with all your soul,
14 That I will give you the rain of
your land in his due season, the first rain and the latter rain, that
thou mayest gather in thy corn, and thy wine, and thine oil.
15 And I will send grass in thy
fields for thy cattle, that thou mayest eat and be full.
16 Take heed to yourselves, that
your heart be not deceived, and ye turn aside, and serve other gods,
and worship them;
17 And then The Lord's wrath be
kindled against you, and He shut up the heaven, that there be no
rain, and that the land yield not her fruit; and lest ye perish
quickly from off the good land which The Lord giveth you.
18 Therefore shall ye lay up these
My words in your heart and in your soul, and bind them for a sign
upon your hand, that they may be as frontlets between your eyes.
19 And ye shall teach them your
children, speaking of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when
thou walkest by the way, when thou liest down, and when thou risest
up.
20 And thou shalt write them upon
the door posts of thine house, and upon thy gates:
21 That your days may be multiplied,
and the days of your children, in the land which The Lord sware unto
your fathers to give them, as the days of heaven upon the earth.
Numbers 15:37-41
KJV
37 And The Lord spake unto Moses,
saying,
38 Speak unto the children of
Israel, and bid them that they make them fringes in the borders of
their garments throughout their generations, and that they put upon
the fringe of the borders a ribband of blue:
39 And it shall be unto you for a
fringe, that ye may look upon it, and remember all the commandments
of The Lord, and do them ; and that ye seek not after your own heart
and your own eyes, after which ye use to go a whoring:
40 That ye may remember, and do all
My commandments, and be holy unto your God.
41 I am The Lord your God, which
brought you out of the land of Egypt, to be your God: I am The Lord
your God.
And every synagogue (The synagogue of
Nazareth.) had what was called the (Bet ha-Sefer) “school of the
book”, and every boy of age six or seven, was sent to synagogue
school.
At synagogue school, Jesus learned to
read and write Hebrew, and to study Hebrew law.
Jesus spoke Aramaic, yet He was
schooled to read Hebrew and maybe a smattering of Greek.
The synagogue teacher sat on the floor,
his students circled around him, listening to him reading stories
from the Old Testament.
His recreation, like all small boys,
running, playing, climbing, animals etc.
Bar Mitzvah:
a ceremony and celebration for a Jewish
boy on his 13th birthday when he takes on the religious duties and
responsibilities of an adult; also : a boy for whom a bar mitzvah is
held
Merriam-Webster
At 12 years of age, going on 13, Jesus
traveled some 70 miles from Nazareth to Jerusalem to attend Passover.
Luke tells us the following concerning
the young boy Jesus:
Luke 2:52 KJV
And Jesus increased in wisdom and
stature, and in favor with God and man.
Besides synagogue school, Jesus also
learned from His step father, the art of carpentry, and was a helper
to His (step) father, for the Jewish idiom of the day was, “he who
does not teach his child a trade, teaches him to steal.”
I Timothy 3:16 KJV
And without controversy great is the
mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh, justified in The
Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in
the world, received up into glory.
John 1:1-5,10-18 KJV
1 In the beginning was The Word, and
The word was with God, and The Word was God.
2 The same was in the beginning with
God.
3 All things were made by Him; and
without Him was not any thing made that was made.
4 In Him was Life; and the Life was
the Light of men.
5 And The Light shineth in darkness;
and the darkness comprehended it not.
10 He was in the world, and the
world was made by him, and the world knew him not.
11 He came unto His own, and His own
received Him not.
12 But as many as received Him, to
them gave He power to become the sons of God, even to them that
believe on His name:
13 Which were born, not of blood,
nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.
14 And The Word was made flesh,
and dwelt among us, (and we beheld His glory, the glory as of
The Only Begotten Of The Father,)
full of Grace and Truth.
15 John bare witness of Him, and
cried, saying, This was He of whom I spake, He that cometh after me
is preferred before me: for He was before me.
16 And of His fulness have all we
received, and grace for grace.
17 For the law was given by Moses,
but Grace and Truth came by Jesus Christ.
18 No man hath seen God at any time,
The Only Begotten Son, which is in the bosom of The Father, He hath
declared Him.
