bacht

You're going with the idea that the first believers were philosophers, or at least Jesus himself, which is not apparent to me. No-one disputes that philosophical ideas became attached to Christianity by the 2nd C or later.

But before the revolt the person of Christ seems to have been an actor rather than a teacher: the Son who died and rose again. There is very little material in the epistles that can be described as the words or teachings of Jesus. His most important feature was his imminent arrival at the end of the age, at which time all teachings would become irrelevant.

No Robots

No, I'm saying he is mystic, which is quite different from a philosopher. There are three forms in which spiritual creativity manifests itself: art, philosophy and mysticism. The ultimate foundation is the same in each form, but the actual creative expression is quite different in each.

He was a mystic. Mysticism is quite alien to our contemporary society, much to our loss.

True. But I don't understand why the testimony of the Gospels is dismissed so cavalierly around here. There seems to be a fixation here on what was written down first, ie. the epistles, with no attempt to consider the nature of the society which produced the Gospels. The Gospels were the product of an oral society which placed a high value on the accurate transmission of the sayings of its sages.

It is fashionable in some scholarly circles to categorize Christ as an apocalyptic prophet. I don't think this view can stand up to careful scrutiny. There may be a certain element of apocalyptism in his rhetoric, but this is pretty standard fare in prophetic discourse.

bacht

Every epistle* mentions the coming end of the age. The gospels do not emphasize this theme so much, which would be logical if they were written after the original witnesses were gone, and the kingdom of Heaven seemed far off. There seems no doubt that the letter writers were apocalypticists.

Whether Jesus was a philosopher or mystic is not critical to the problem of proving his existence in the flesh. If the epistles were the earliest writings, nearly contemporary with the earthly ministry of Jesus, then their testimony is the closest we can get to reconstructing the pre-revolt situtation. The gospels may have useful information, but they are not as close in time to the events being reported.

*the short ones have other concerns

Elijah

I personally feel that John is by faaaaaaaar the superior gospel. I don’t know what the deal with the synoptic gospels is; if they were written for the uneducated or by it. And no doubt the male witnesses were uneducated but Jesus and Paul and almost everyone else whose writings remain were incorporating the philosophy of the time into the religion.

I freely admit that any of the early disciples that were educated on fishing boats could have had any type of supernatural understanding. Which for me the story of Jesus looks like; boy goes out gets educated comes back and no one can understand the words coming out of his mouth about god and think he is saying he is god.
Agree the philosophers of the time recognized Christ as one of their own. The Jews were already synthesizing the religion at the time of Christ and I think looking at the fully attempted amalgamations of the Christian religion and philosophy as the beginning of the influence is looking past the philosophical influence on Christ himself.
If they aren’t familiar with mysticism why not just associate him with a philosopher which they are familiar with? I don’t think there is that much difference, especially for the basic level of conversation we are at. I really wish you didn’t have that by Judaism only thing with Christ, you could help me out here.
That would be some pretty major degradation to get into supernaturalism. I think that’s more of a case in understanding than in teaching.

aa5874

You claim has no support from the Gospels.

The Gospels cleary state or imply Jesus was the son of the God of the Jews with supernatural powers.

The Gospels do not state anywhere that Jesus was a mystic.

bacht

Yes, but apparently we're supposed to be reading between-the-lines, so anything goes

No Robots

If people don't like mysticism, then they can very easily stick to philosophy. The summit of mysticism is identical in its essence to the summit of philosophy. In this regard, Spinoza and Christ are two sides of a single coin.

bacht

There is "philosophical" material from Q in the Gospels, specifically of a Cynic nature. If Jesus were a philosopher or mystic wouldn't the whole Gospel story be full of this sort of teaching? Where do the miracles fit into this? Why would a mystic be executed for sedition, don't they usually avoid politics?

No Robots

Christ the Cynic is another fashionable take that I do not think withstands close scrutiny.

The Gospels are indeed full of Christ's mysticism.

This is somewhat complicated. First, as a prophet, he had to do wonders; otherwise, he would have been ignored. To some extent, these were just magic tricks. Second, he really did have an impact on people's minds, which in turn had an impact on their health. Finally, some of the miracles attributed to him serve his interpreters' purposes.

First, the real charge was blasphemy. Second, the prophets, who are all mystics, were all involved in politics, which is usually what got them into trouble. Christ is unique in the prophetic stream in that he had no political agenda.

bacht

It's a pretty picture, but there is still the problem of explaining why no-one took notice of this apolitical mystical prophet until the Gospels presented this marvellous character, probably at least forty years or more after his death.

It's always the same problem with HJ reconstructions: the more unusual you make Jesus to be, the more difficult it is to explain why he was ignored by his contemporaries. If Jesus was not unusual, then how did he become elevated to divinity? And how does either of these scenarios correlate with the early witnesses (epistles) who talk only of a spiritual Christ?