Bernard Muller

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stephan huller

That's very nice but I don't see what that has to do with getting to the right answer as I - and most other people - don't think that either of you are right about things. Let's start with the - INCREDIBLE - assumption that neither of you are one hundred percent correct in your interpretations, how is the fact that the gnostics understood the Logos as never having come to earth not relevant to the discussion?

This is what has always been wrong with the study of the New Testament. First the religious people were 'all about being right' and then the modern secular scholars (and pseudo-scholars) have followed suit. It's not about choosing between Muller and Doherty but getting at the truth. As such the fact that the gnostics - dating back to the Nicolaus - are understood to have interpreted the material in such a way that rescues at least part of Doherty's exegesis is worth examining.

No reasonable person could think that one man is right about everything. I thought it was interesting. Sorry for getting in the way of you guys hitting each other over the head with hammers.

EarlDoherty

Bernard has finally gotten off the grammatical pot. Since he has come up with something new, I will respond.

Did I not say “somewhat indirectly—consider the NEB translation”? I am well aware, and made the point, that the literal Greek does not say the sacrifice was eternal. But the NEB puts it that way. And why? Because the sacrifice has an eternal effect. This is one of his main points of contrast with the earthly sacrifices, as in 7:27. Whereas they must be repeated time after time, year after year, Jesus’ sacrifice had an eternal effect, it never needed to be repeated. Ergo, the sacrifice was eternal as opposed to the earthly priests sacrifices being temporary.

No doubt this is why the NEB put the verse that way. Because they (unlike anyone else here who hasn’t actually read and absorbed Hebrews and its meanings) could recognize what the writer is saying, that Jesus’ sacrifice was an eternal sacrifice in the way that I have just described. What, otherwise, would “through the eternal Spirit” signify? Is there anything else in the epistle that speaks of the Holy Spirit being instrumental in making the blood of Christ have the effects outlined? And just because translations capitalize “Spirit” does not mean that it must be a reference to the Holy Spirit, as Bernard would have it. The writer in fact does not even use the definite article. So we have good reason to think that the word “spirit” refers in some way to Christ himself. And while the reference is obscure (I’d hate to enumerate all the obscure references in the NT record!), apparently the NEB translators decided that they could penetrate the obscurity and offer an intended meaning, seconded by other statements in the epistle that the sacrifice was eternal. I agree with them.

And by the way, if Carrier declares me wrong and “muddled” he would also have to attribute the same to the NEB. Does he do that, and did he take the NEB translation into consideration? Also, exactly when was this comment of his made and under what circumstances? Is Bernard concealing the particulars? I think we can be sure that if the question was put to Carrier, it was not supplied with the context I have just outlined. Naturally, Carrier would say that the literal Greek did not spell out that translation. I have not denied that.

Bernard is the one who is muddled. There is no doubt that the sacrifice, as the writer defines it, occurred in heaven. The sacrifice, as I have spelled out countless times, is the offering of the blood in the heavenly sanctuary. The writer makes that crystal clear. But is this human blood which Christ carried up into heaven from Calvary? What a bizarre idea! What container did he use? Why did the observers at Calvary not notice this blood being scooped up? (One modern scholar fussed over the idea that there might not have been enough blood shed from the cross to serve for the offering in heaven!) Do you think that the writer could have imagined such a ludicrous scenario without making the slightest effort to explain it? Was earthly blood able to enter the heavenly sanctuary? Is earthly human blood going to cleanse heavenly things (in reference to 9:23)? Did Christ have to stop on the way up to convert the human blood to a spiritual equivalent? (“Get your blood transformed right here at bargain-basement prices!”)

(Sigh!) As I said before, the heavens have their layers and spheres. (I know Bernard has in the past denied this.) The heavenly sanctuary is located in the highest (God’s) heaven. If one is in a lower layer of the heavens, then he is “outside” this highest heaven. (One might capitalize it, Heaven, to signify that it refers to that highest one—I suggested earlier that this is what the writer was conveying by the words “heaven itself”; he had no capital letter to use.), Jesus can “enter” it coming from a lower heaven where he was crucified, to reach the heavenly sanctuary where he offers his blood. The blood in both cases is spiritual. It is never specified as earthly or human. (Remember that in 2:14, Jesus takes on only the "semblance" of blood and flesh.)

I will offer this point: the mythic, heavenly Christ, crucified in a non-earthly setting and rising to offer his spiritual blood in the heavenly sanctuary to establish a new superior covenant, is always consistent with what is actually said in the text itself. OTOH, as Bernard, Jake and Ted have consistently shown, to arrive at some other meaning requires a contortion of the text, a reading into it of ideas which are not evidently there, a denial of ambiguities which allow for my interpretation, and an assortment of other contraventions of logic and deduction and permissible methodology. Vork’s use of the word “shallow” was perfectly apt. (Though I have to make a correction on his use of terms in his posting.)

Earl Doherty

EarlDoherty

Ted has somewhat corrected this, but I think what Vork meant to say is that "Christ wasn't crucified in Heaven," with the capitalization here signifying, as I suggested, God's highest heaven.

The fact that Vork slipped into saying "sacrificed" instead of "crucified" only illustrates how much a crucifixion on earth would have imposed upon the writer, and his readers, the necessity of making Calvary part of the sacrifice, which would have required a complete recasting of his scenario. In fact, it would have made it unworkable from the get-go.

Earl Doherty

TedM

I just addressed this in another post (above). I don't see the basis for saying that the offering of the blood IS the sacrifice. Rather in the tabernacle sacrifice which has already occurred is offered. The phrase is 'offered the sacrifice'. I see no reason to say that the sacrificial death WAS NOT the actual sacrifice, which was OFFERED shortly thereafter up to God. Different time (a bit later), and a different place (in the heavenly tabernacle).

How is that any more bizarre than Jesus carrying his own blood by passing from a lower heaven to an upper heaven? I don't see any difference. The author already said that his blood and flesh is the same as that of humans 'in every respect' (also a bizarre idea if it was in some heavenly level), so why his earthly blood any different than blood from the 'lower heavens'?


He did say that it was accepted by God because it was unblemished, perfect, or something quite close to that, didn't he? (I'd have to look closer but not up to it at the moment)

I assume the 'conversion' of his blood occurred when his body changed to be spiritual. The Gospel Jesus had wounds still in his resurrected side, so apparently people were able to imagine all kinds of things back then. And, how is this any more difficult to imagine than a parallel universe, Earl ?!

stephan huller

But don't we have to decide whether Jesus was the Logos before we move on to debate all these annoying details that you guys get into. In particular there are a number of passages in Philo in which he refers to the Logos as "high priest" or even "great high priest." Philo more than once says that in Old Testament passages describing the Jewish high priest and his work the high priest represents the Logos. He then, of course, proceeds to extract his Logos doctrine from these passages by means of allegorical interpretation. Does anyone doubt that Philo's conception of the Logos was passed on to the author of Hebrews? But does anyone really believe that this high priest's name was Jesus? How then can we be sure that the heavenly high priest was so conceived by the author of Hebrews?

TedM

I'm not sure what you are trying to establish. These ideas may well have influenced how an actual historical Jesus was perceived by early Christians, OR they may have somehow influenced the creation of a human Jesus myth. In both cases there is a pre-existing being in the heavens who somehow comes to earth, becomes human, and is then transformed back to the same being in the heavens, right? Do you see an indication that one was more likely than the other?

stephan huller

But we're moving on to attack one another when we haven't even established how the concepts related to each other. For instance, the Valentinians say that there was the Logos in heaven who never leaves heaven and then Jesus - something that was created by special dispensation by the Father to save the human race. Under this scenario presumably, the Logos is still the heavenly high priest as he always was but Jesus is like Melchizedek or perhaps - is Melchizedek - a manifestation or effluence or perhaps better yet a representation of the Logos but not the Logos itself.

Is there any reason for us to assume that Hebrews didn't have the same conception - i.e. that Jesus wasn't the Logos the heavenly high priest per se but a figure related to him?

Sheshbazzar

One thing about virtually all of these 'Logos' writings is they do not require any specific name and title to make their theological arguments. All of those 'Iesus Christos' and 'Christos Iesus's' our Lords' could easily have been inserted into these text at a latter date, Likely originally only in the form of nomina sacra notations as being simple indicators of whom the latter church believed these texts were identifying, and only latter Fathers such as Irenaeus replacing the nomina sacra indicator notations with what had became the 'catholic' fully spelled out name and title, which thereafter would have been read as being a part of the original composition.

stephan huller

Just look at the way Philo conceives of the Logos, the heavenly high priest as a signet ring (σφραγίς):

I think this is what Jesus was originally conceived as - a representation of the heavenly high priest or the 'onlyborn' - his 'glory' - not the high priest himself. Jesus was certainly on the earth but not the divine Logos. A similar conception has been identified by Photius as being present in the writings of Clement. As such this was a widely held view.