Mythra

In Robert Price's Deconstructing Jesus, he cites scholars such as Burton Mack, Leif E. Vaage, and F. Gerald Downing in presenting a case that the initial layering of sayings in the gospels (Q1) are highly reminiscent of the Cynics, the group founded by Antisthenes and Diogenes in the generation after Socrates.

A couple of the examples in Price's book:

Blessed are the poor, for theirs is the kingdom of God.
We should not get rid of poverty, but only of our opinion of it. Then we shall have plenty. (Epictetus)

I say to you, love your enemies. Bless those who curse you. Pray for those who mistreat you.
How shall I defend myself against my enemy? By being good and kind to him, replied Diogenes. (Gnomologium Vaticanum)

Price then goes on in the next 9 pages, to show a large number of similar examples of Q1 / Cynic commonalities.

From my persepective, we have one of two possibilities here. Either the gospel writers put words into Jesus' mouth that they knew would appeal to a greek audience, or Jesus really spoke them, and he was terribly unoriginal in his thinking.

If the gospels are nothing more than literary creations, I wonder if greek philosophical thought didn't contribute almost as much as the Septuagint.

Is the cynicism connection overstated? In looking at the summarized principles of this school of thought, they certainly bear a striking resembance to a number of ideas presented in the gospels.

Zeichman

Almost all Q scholars think the Cynic parallels are not the best way to approach Q1. The point of the cynic parallels is analogy: the Q1 people were more like Cynics than X were like Y. Arnal notes that this is not the way Cynic-hypothesis advocates have argued, despite the fact that they claim so. Positing direct dependence on cynicism has numerous problems, not least of which is the lack of evidence for Cynics in Galilee, let alone around the time Jesus is said to have lived.

This is also built off of a selective version of Q1, ignoring work that Kloppenborg has done on Q's stratification since his Nomos and Ethos. Vaage, for example, makes numerous changes to Q's stratification that actually undermine the principles on which the hypothesis is built. Mack makes similar, but fewer changes, while Price has not kept up to date on Kloppenborg's work, as Price published in 2000, but does not acknowledge work done in 1995 by Kloppenborg that is hazardous to his hypothesis.

I'm with Koester and Kloppenborg who believe that the image of Jesus "most accessible" through the earliest layer of Q is an eschatological Jesus.

gstafleu

Isn't the real issue the lack or presence of Cynics in the place(s) the gospels were written?

Gerard Stafleu

Clivedurdle

But why would this be important if the gospels were written for different purposes? For example to tell a story about a Jewish hero one of whose characteristics was to be up to date with thinking?

Are we looking at the convergence of different strands, a godman in the heavens saviour with a latter developmen t of the story by constructing a human character who as a god on earth should be able to make some philosophical statements.

Is this not actually evidence that the intended audience was actually Grrek - might Judaism been used as a place to locate the story?

Mythra

This seems to be a very valid point.

It wouldn't have mattered if there was a cynic presence in Galilee. What would have been important was whether the gospel writers (at some phase of the process) were well versed in cynic (and even stoic to some degree) schools of thought.

It's not that I'm saying that Jesus is just cynic philosophy warmed over (or that there was a literal Jesus who was a cynic).

It's that there is a definite presence of greek philosophical thought blended in with apocalyptic expectations, jewish ideas of sacrifice for sins, and the ideas that Yahweh's laws and precepts needed to be followed to the letter.

Religious syncretism seems to me to be every bit as plausible an explanation for the development of the gospels as the straight mythicist theory as presented by Doherty.

Zeichman

Not really, it only matters IF one posits genetic dependence on cynics, which Vaage, Mack and Crossan do not, but Price absolutely does and Doherty seems open to. The cynic hypothesis is one of ANALOGY, not of genealogy. All of the straw men placed against Mack and Crossan (from Tuckett, Wright, etc.) become problematic when one shifts the language to one of dependence.

Mythra

You're obviously well read on the subject. And I appreciate your comments. I do understand the problems once we make a definitive statement about borrowing or dependence.

We see the same thing when speaking of Philo and GJohn concerning the logos concepts.

Sometimes it seems the best we will ever get is an argument to the best explanation.

Lógos Sokratikós

Therefore, Mythra's second possibility is the right choice ("Jesus [...] was terribly unoriginal in his thinking"), from an eminently logical point of view. That is what I conclde from your post, Zeichman.

Zeichman

If one affirms the cynic hypothesis, then yes. Keep in mind that it is fairly controversial and has met resistance from both the far right and the far left. Though unoriginal thinking option could and does apply to essentially all portraits of the historical Jesus. I plan to write a criticism of Doherty's use of Kloppenborg's hypothesis by the end of the semester, so I'll save the particulars for later.

Mythra:
I could recommend reading if you've got access to ATLA, but if not, getting ahold of these things could be expensive.

Definitely the best, neutral, assessment of the cynic hypothesis is Kloppenborg's "A Dog among Pigeons: the Cynic hypothesis as a Theological Problem," where he takes apologists and conservatives like those mentioned above to task, but also takes some time to look at a few problems with particular versions of the cynic hypothesis. I can give you a list of good articles and books on the topic if you want, but you'll need to interlibrary loan a lot of stuff if you want.

Zeichman
...is doing an independent study class this semester on this topic.

The Bishop

I think one thing here is that you slightly exaggerate the downside, ie that Jesus was necessarily "terribly unoriginal" in his thinking. The Diogenes quote is a typical Cynical "turning the received wisdom on its head". Jesus talks about "loving", "blessing", "praying for". It strikes me that Diogenes was being contradictory at least partly for the comic effect, whereas Jesus put his idea using what might well be termed typical "Jesus rhetoric". I think it's the rhetoric that Jesus used that helped gain him followers from the earliest days right up to the present day. Even if the basic idea pre-existed, Jesus's way of putting it is what makes it "original". Clearly many people follow and worship Jesus, and nobody worships or follows Diogenes.

All I know of the Cynic theory is that Mack promoted it (in Q The Lost Gospel) and decided that in addition to what he said, Jesus had a Cynic lifestyle. From reading this thread, and highlighting the basic difference between what Diogenes actually said and what Jesus actually said, I see that the Cynic theory does begin to dissolve. Maybe he got some ideas from the Cynics, but could not be described as a Cynic himself.