Solo

I think you are mistaking my sympathy for Paul's predicament with unconditional support for his solution to the manic's dilemma (everyone believes I am insane except for the handful who acknowledge the genius that sends me)...at any rate, I have dealt with this here before.

Best,
Jiri

bacht

Yes, unless Jesus attracted attention he could easily be missed in a city the size of Jerusalem. Maybe Paul wasn't in town during Passion week, when Jesus supposedly made a public disturbance in the temple precincts and was publicly crucified.

But the second issue remains: after Paul's conversion he shows no interest in Jesus' life on earth, his teachings, his miracles etc.

DCHindley

I was one of those crazy few who went out and located a circulating copy of Robert Eisler's Messiah Jesus and John the Baptist (1931), photocopied the whole 706 pages, studied it like a madman (this was a while ago), photocopied the "principal additions" that Kirsopp Lake put in the endnotes of one of the Loeb volumes of Josephus' works and pasted them into my copy of Wm Whistons' translation of the works of Josephus.

I scrupulously studied through the end notes on the subject in John P Meier's first volume of A Marginal Jew, then followed up on as many of the journal articles I could get access to, I felt that the almost universal condemnation of the Slavonic seemed so "knee jerk" and reactionary. In fact, one of the key critics of it (Solomon Zeitlin) is the same scholar who was convinced that the DSS were faked (in 1950, challenges "The Alleged Antiquity of the Scrolls" & claims they were forgeries). Similarly, Zeitlin thinks the Slavonic Josephus was simply a "Hoax" ("The Hoax of the 'Slavonic Josephus,"' JQR 39 [1948-49] 171-80, which concludes: "All the Jesus passages are interpolations based on Christian literature." These are said to be the Church Fathers and the Acts of Pilate).
http://artfuljesus.0catch.com/meier2.html

I was fairly convinced of the distinct possibility that they came from some lost early version of Josephus' account of the capture of Jerusalem ... until I read this book. The 105 page introduction explained in detail their analysis of the text and comparison to similar Russian and Slavonic stories of battles and politics and alternate versions of these same events derived from a Slavonic translation of the Jewish Josippon or the Latin account of the Jewish War by "(Pseudo) Hegesippus" (not the author spoken of by Eusebius). So, I have had to let it go, although not without a fight. :feelucky:

DCH

ApostateAbe

Cool. In my opinion, there is a significant difference between "no interest" and "little interest." "No interest" allows for the possibility that Paul may have thought Jesus was only a spiritual entity, and "little interest" does not allow for that possibility, except of course with interpolation or unintuitive interpretations. Paul shows little interest, not no interest, in Jesus' Earthly life. That means, at the least, the mythicist propositions about Paul remain unlikely, especially if other more fitting explanations are available. If you would like to see a list of such passages where Paul mentions the Earthly life (and death) of Jesus, then please let me know.

Because the evidence indicates that Paul never met Jesus, and his rivals did, I believe that we can find a ready answer to the puzzle. Start by putting yourself in Paul's shoes. It would be considerably more difficult for Paul to make himself an authority on the Earthly life of Jesus. His rivals, who were closely involved with Jesus' Earthly ministry, would be the authorities on that matter. If Paul were brave enough to quote Jesus in order to make a controversial point, then his rivals would challenge the argument and easily win the challenge. So, in order to compete, he made himself a spiritual authority. He claimed to have communed with Jesus in the spirit realm. He was converted through the spirit, and he continued his dialogue with Jesus through the spirit, hearing teachings that were never given to Peter, John and James. And, of course this allowed him to have greater creative control over the religion that he taught, making himself an apostle to the gentiles and throwing away old Judaic rules.

Toto

What is the evidence that Paul's rivals knew Jesus?

maryhelena

You obviously have done your homework here! I don't know enough about the whole package in which Slavonic Josephus is bound up. I would think that 'war' issues are pretty standard ie. the ins and outs of killing people would be part of any culture - so any translator wanting to add a bit of local colour to war stories would have easy access to data. I'm, obviously, wanting to focus on the gospel related stories in Slavonic Josephus. And it is these stories that I doubt that a Russian translator would have had the wherewithal to wholesale make up. Perhaps he/she was lucky and just, with a blindfolded on, put the pin in the donkey's tail - in relation to picking the 15th year of Herod the Great as being relevant to the star storyline. The basic storyline, even with this 15th year of Herod, is the same storyline in the gospels of John, Mark and Matthew. The John the Baptist storyline dated to 6 ce also fits these gospels, or rather does not contradict these gospels. It is only the gospel of Luke that throws a spanner in the works - of both the other gospels and Slavonic Josephus - but so does Antiquities! Put Antiquities and Luke on the shelve, so to speak, and there is a very different storyline that can be read from Slavonic Josephus and the gospels of John, Mark and Matthew. It is these works, Antiquities and Luke, that have muddied the waters re a re-creation of early christian origins.

Surely, for NT academics to deny Slavonic Josephus any relevance in the development of the christian story is short-sighted. Even if, for the sake of argument, 90% of Slavonic Josephus is interpolation or the translators imagination - there could still well be gold there among the dross....Perhaps a truly lucky find that is simply being overlooked because of preconceived ideas re early christian origins.

My own theory - that Jesus of Nazareth is mythological ie not historical - but that there was, prior to the creation of the Jesus storyboard, a historical man (Philip the Tetrarch - born around the 15th year of Herod the Great) that was seen as inspirational by those interested in OT prophetic interpretations. (I've been working around this idea for well over 25 years.....so when recently I came across the star passages in Slavonic Josephus, and its connection to this year, my interest was considerable....). Some luck coming my way? Who knows - but Slavonic Josephus sure does fit my theory regarding Philip - and Josephus, to a T...

ApostateAbe

All of the Christian gospels say that James, Peter and John were core disciples of Jesus. Those are Paul's rivals, whom he describes as reputed pillars. I can see why this point seems objectionable from a critic's and a skeptic's perspective, who is accustomed to pointing how unreliable the Christian gospels are, but it pays to realize that the Christian gospels got some things right (not many things). The existence of the otherwise-unknown town of Nazareth is one of them. So is the existence and doctrines of the Pharisees. So is the existence of John the Baptist and Pontius Pilate. To know for certain which elements are historical, then we look for corroboration outside of the texts in question, and we find such corroboration in Paul calling those three people reputed pillars and apostles to the Jews. It isn't absolutely certain corroboration, but I take it to be corroboration enough. Supposing that Peter's, James' and John's association with Jesus was just a myth, then it is likely to be a myth that Paul also accepted.

aa5874

James, Peter and John are most likely fictitious characters.

James, Peter and John witnessed and participated in FICTITIOUS events.

1. James, Peter and John witnessed the fictitious transfiguration of Jesus and witnessed dead prophets, Moses and Elias come back to life.. See Mark 9.22-23

2. Peter and the disciples witnessed the fiction when Jesus walked on the sea during a storm and Peter was fictitiously saved from drowning by Jesus the water walker. See Matthew 14.

It is clear that James, Peter and John are fiction characters.

maryhelena

Abe, try out this idea. The NT storyline is a prophetic take, an interpretation, an evaluation, of actual history. The storyline is not itself history. The history that it takes its inspiration from is the bottom layer, so to speak. The top layer, the actual NT storyboard, will have elements within it that echo, reflect back, to the history that inspired the story. Reflection is not reality, the shadow is not the whole. For that, for the actual history, we need a history book. To go back, as it were, using clues if possible from the interpretative storyboard, to act as roadsigns back to the historical events.

To confuse these two layers is to find oneself in a maze of contradictions and no way out. Yes, the storyboard tells us that Paul knew others who came before him. Rather than insist that these others were personally followers of the Jesus of the storyboard and thus 'prove' the historicity of Jesus, betrays an inability to recognize the dual layers of that storyboard. A storyboard that is not unlike the sort of storyboard that can be seen within the OT - which is, after all is said and done, a record of prophetic interpretations of Jewish history, interpretations of historical realities seen through a prophetic lens, salvation history, if you will.

If one recognizes the two layers, history and its interpretation, then statements such as Paul's - that others were before him - need to be seen as having relevance not only to the Jesus storyboard but more importantly to the history that underlies that storyboard. The storyboard reflects and interprets the historical events but it does not supplant that history. A real history ( not a pseudo-history, an interpretative history) which has its own non-salvation identity....

Toto

Paul does not say that James, Peter, or John knew Jesus personally. The gospels do not indicate that this trio would be the pillars of the church

There is no independent evidence of Nazareth, is there? There may or may not be some archaeological evidence of habitation around the area that later was called Nazareth, but no proof that it was known as Nazareth.

Are you claiming that the gospels give an accurate portrayal of the Pharisees?

Are you saying that either of these characters is portrayed accurately in the gospels?

Whoa there, you just listed a long of things that have no corroboration outside the gospels...

What exactly are you claiming is corroborated?