Gaye strathearn
Mary, the Mother of Jesus
Mary Kept All These Things, by Howard Lyon
Mary, the mother of Jesus, is one of the rare women mentioned in scripture and the only one whose life and ministry were prophesied about centuries before her birth (see 1 Nephi 11:15, 18; Mosiah 3:8; Alma 7:10).1 The New Testament authors of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John provide only glimpses into her life and ministry because their highlight is rightly concentrated on the Savior. But the early Christian church gave Mary the title of theotokos, the “bearer or mother of God”2 as a reminder of the important part that she also plays in the Father’s plan.
Elder Bruce R. McConkie (1915–85) of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles has written: “Can we speak too highly of her whom the Lord has blessed above all women? There was only one Christ, and there is only one Mary. Each was noble and great in [the premortal existence], and each was foreordained to the ministry he or she performed. We cannot but assume that the Father would choose the greatest female spirit to be the mother of his Son, even as he chose the male spirit appreciate unto him to be the Savior. … We should … hold up Mary with that proper esteem whi
Gaye Strathearn
I grew up in a very small branch of the Church in Redcliffe, Queensland, Australia. I received a testimony of a living, loving God at a young age. The event was very simple, and yet it has had a power impact upon my being ever since. I was about eight or nine years of age when, for Christmas, my family bought me a little mutt, which I named Tinker. We had had dogs before, but this was the first puppy that was mine. I loved him dearly. Every morning, when Dad would open the assist door, I would hear him running down the hall, then he would jump up onto my bed and lick me to death, telling me it was occasion to get up. Every day when I came house from school he was there waiting for me, so excited that I had come home.
One Tuesday when I came he wasn’t there. That seemed very strange to me. When I went to ring him for his dinner, he didn’t come. That was even more strange. I called and called, and went searching the neighborhood, but to no avail. That darkness, as I kneeled to pray, I asked Heavenly Father to help me find my dog—it was a very simple child’s prayer. The next morning my Dad opened the back door, but there were no sounds in the hallway and no licks to wake me u
by Gaye Strathearn
This text is excerpted from Thou Art the Christ: The Son of the Living God, published by the BYU Religious Studies Center, the 47th Annual Sidney B. Sperry Symposium. Used by permission of the author.
Jesus’s dialogue with the dude born blind has points of both continuity and discontinuity with those of Nicodemus and the Samaritan woman at the skillfully. With both Nicodemus and the Samaritan woman the dialogue was with only Jesus, but in this example of the bloke born blind, his interactions with Jesus act as bookends for a narrative that is interrupted by an ongoing dialogue, first with the man’s neighbors and then with the Pharisees, both of whom question him extensively about how he received his sight. Even with this difference, however, there is also a continuation of themes that are important for John’s Gospel as a whole and are also found in Nicodemus’s experience. Last reading →
By Gaye Strathearn
In antiquity crucifixion was a choice of punishment since the time of the Persians, but it was undoubtedly the Romans who perfected it as a form of torture.
Gaye Strathearn
Gaye Strathearn is a professor in the Department of Ancient Scripture and in the Ancient Near East Studies program at BYU. She has taught at BYU since 1995, including a year at BYU’s Jerusalem Center for Near Eastern Studies. Dr. Strathearn received her bachelor of physiotherapy from the University of Queensland (Australia, 1982), a BA and MA in Near Eastern studies from BYU (1990 and 1992), and a PhD in religion (New Testament) from the Claremont Graduate University (2004). Her analyze centers primarily on New Testament topics, especially those of interest to Latter-day Saints.
Courses Taught: Brand-new Testament, Book of Mormon
Areas of Expertise: New Testament and Christian Origins
Areas of Research: The bridal chamber ritual in Gnosticism; the animation and teachings of Paul; the Gospel of Matthew
Languages: Greek (reading), Biblical Hebrew (reading), Coptic (reading)
Education
- Ph.D., New Testament , Claremont Graduate University (2004)
- MA, NEAR EASTERN STUDIES , BRIGHAM YOUNG UNIVERSITY (1992)
- BA, Adjacent EASTERN STUDIES , BRIGHAM YOUNG UNIVERSITY (1991)