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The Historical Jesus and later theological constructs

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  • #16
    Originally posted by rogue06 View Post
    It is apparent you cannot justify your earlier remarks.
    "It ain't necessarily so
    The things that you're liable
    To read in the Bible
    It ain't necessarily so
    ."

    Sportin' Life
    Porgy & Bess, DuBose Heyward, George & Ira Gershwin

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    • #17
      Originally posted by Machinist View Post
      The theory is that no one (the disciples and apostles) would have risked their lives spreading news that they witnessed the resurrected Jesus given the cultural mores of the collectivist society at that time.
      The Jewish historian Josephus, writing in about 75AD gives a really detailed account of the activities of different factions in Jerusalem in the period leading up to the war against the Romans in 66-73AD. It's pretty clear from his accounts that Christians did not comprise any meaningful percentage of the population of Jerusalem at this time. Perhaps 1% at most. Nobody was particularly interested in them.

      In other words, the people at the time in Jerusalem didn't view the witness of the disciples and apostles as particularly compelling. If they weren't convinced, why should we 2000 years later believe someone who says "oh, their witness was totally convincing given the social norms of the time"? The people who lived in those social norms weren't convinced.

      It was the people furthest away from the actual events who became Christians in large numbers in the first few centuries - people across the Roman Empire who were distant from from Jerusalem and the disciples. The people who were nearest the apostles and disciples - Jews in Jerusalem - didn't generally find their testimony compelling. Those who were in the best position to judge their credibility, didn't find them credible. Only the gullible in distant lands believed.
      "I hate him passionately", he's "a demonic force" - Tucker Carlson, in private, on Donald Trump
      "Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism" - George Orwell
      "[Capitalism] as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of evils. I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy" - Albert Einstein

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      • #18
        Also worth noting that in light of complete-lack-of-mention in Josephus' writings, it's pretty clear that the large-scale resurrection claimed in Matthew 27:52-54, absolutely didn't happen. Nor can there even have been serious claims of it happening circulating in the populace, or else he would have discussed an alleged public event of this magnitude at length:

        Matthew 27: 52 and the tombs broke open. The bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life. 53 They came out of the tombs after Jesus’ resurrection and went into the holy city and appeared to many people.


        Once you accept that the gospel writer of Matthew feels free to wholesale fabricate widespread resurrections, why trust anything at all he says? Even Trump didn't claim that the resurrected dead were seen walking and rigging the ballot boxes against him - some lies are too absurd even for him, yet the writer of Matthew was at that level of insane lie.
        "I hate him passionately", he's "a demonic force" - Tucker Carlson, in private, on Donald Trump
        "Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism" - George Orwell
        "[Capitalism] as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of evils. I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy" - Albert Einstein

        Comment


        • #19
          People waking from the grave and walking around in the city always struck me as questionable. I mean it's a great story and I love the story, but when I start thinking about what really happened and thinking logically about it, there are some things in the Bible that I question.

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          • #20
            The miracles of Jesus, I don't really question though. I love the story of Jesus, the entire story. And I don't really question the part about the dead rising from their graves, it's just that it's weird to me that no one wrote about it. I mean yeah people didn't commonly write things down back then and it was mostly oral tradition, but it would seem that this would have seized the entire population with wonder.

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            • #21
              Originally posted by Hypatia_Alexandria View Post
              Christianity was created by Paul as a separate cult that was premised on his own soteriological beliefs. He achieved this by merging existing Judaic and Hellenistic concepts into a powerful and all embracing system, this being, by its nature, both intelligible and acceptable to contemporary Graeco-Roman society.
              Paul's central message was Jesus Christ crucified. There is no sugar coating which would make that "acceptable to contemporary Graeco-Roman society."
              Enter the Church and wash away your sins. For here there is a hospital and not a court of law. Do not be ashamed to enter the Church; be ashamed when you sin, but not when you repent. – St. John Chrysostom

              Veritas vos Liberabit<>< Learn Greek <>< Look here for an Orthodox Church in America<><Ancient Faith Radio
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              I recommend you do not try too hard and ...research as little as possible. Such weighty things give me a headache. - Shunyadragon, Baha'i apologist

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              • #22
                Originally posted by One Bad Pig View Post
                Paul's central message was Jesus Christ crucified. There is no sugar coating which would make that "acceptable to contemporary Graeco-Roman society."
                Who do you think were the "archontes" in I Corinthians 2.8? And why is a Galilean Jew being described as the "Lord of glory"?
                "It ain't necessarily so
                The things that you're liable
                To read in the Bible
                It ain't necessarily so
                ."

                Sportin' Life
                Porgy & Bess, DuBose Heyward, George & Ira Gershwin

                Comment


                • #23
                  Moved to a more appropriate thread.

                  Originally posted by One Bad Pig View Post
                  You do realize that you're relying on material written centuries after the time in question by the descendants of one view of Judaism current at the time of Christ who are just spitballing, yes?
                  Given that the author of the article in the link [David Ariel] cites the Jerusalem and Babylonian Talmud [respectively c.350 CE and c. 500 CE] I wonder if you also dismiss your Christian Patristic writers with the contemptuous notion that they too were “spitballing”?

                  Originally posted by One Bad Pig View Post
                  That you have to cherry-pick and even then qualify your examples speaks volumes.
                  I offered a few examples of academics who, while holding religious beliefs, held to the view that Paul founded a new religious cult. Other academics of various shades of opinion hold to a similar view.

                  Originally posted by One Bad Pig View Post
                  I'd be interested to know just what basis you have for asserting that Jesus of Nazareth and his disciples practiced a Palestinian Judaism not propounded by Paul, then. Sources other than the canonical gospels are much later and farther from Palestinian Judaism (as far as we can discern it) than they are.
                  Originally posted by One Bad Pig View Post
                  Such a construct is a very long way from Paul's teachings, too. Paul wrote rather more than 1 Corinthians 2.6-8. Taking a distorted view of Paul's teachings and using that to filter out "Pauline" influences on the gospels isn't going to result in a very accurate picture of the teachings of Jesus.
                  Paul rejected Judaism. This is quite clear in his letters concerning dietary laws and circumcision. I would also recommend you read Paul’s authentic letters and Acts dispassionately and critically and compare them. For Paul the law, as he perceived it had become, was abrogated. He emphasised that believers were free from it and needed to stand firm in that freedom. For Paul Gentiles who placed themselves under the law were alienated and fell from grace. Galatians 3.13-14 and Galatians 4: 4-6 both comment on the need for the Jewish people to be redeemed from under the law and its curse in order for them to receive the gift of the Spirit. No Jew regarded the law as curse. It was both then, and now, a blessing.

                  You are reading Jesus’ teachings” through the filter of Pauline Christianity. Not within the context of known Palestinian Judaism. As you ignored my question in my previous reply, let me ask it again.

                  Who do you think were the "archontes" in I Corinthians 2.8? And why is Paul referring to a Galilean Jew as the "Lord of glory"?

                  Originally posted by One Bad Pig View Post
                  I'm well aware of that. Crucifixion was the method used for executing slaves.
                  And in Judaea for those who were acclaimed as, or claimed to be the Jewish Messiah.

                  Originally posted by One Bad Pig View Post
                  Interesting that you felt the need to break my argument up in order to attack it. No self-respecting Greco-Roman was going to follow someone executed as a slave. He was dead! Everybody knows that dead people don't come back to life. This was, after all, a culture in which a popular epitaph was "Non fui, fui, non sum, non curo".
                  You need to remember that in its early decades Christianity was a cult popular with the lower orders, slaves, and also women. Nor was the notion of a resurrected individual/divine being exactly unknown in the ancient world.
                  "It ain't necessarily so
                  The things that you're liable
                  To read in the Bible
                  It ain't necessarily so
                  ."

                  Sportin' Life
                  Porgy & Bess, DuBose Heyward, George & Ira Gershwin

                  Comment

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