gurugeorge

I think I am reading it afresh. I don't think the extremely simple way I put it above is how it is often read. If "gospel" simply means "good news of a victory won", as (AFAIK) it meant in Greek before Christianity (did it? I'm sure you will know much more in depth about this), then we are under no obligation to associate anything traditionally associated by Christians with the word "gospel" with what Paul was talking about - no "narrative" is implied other than a narrative of some sort of Messianic battle and some sort of Messianic victory, for example.

But a coming battle and victory are the meat and potatoes of the Messiah idea, right?

So how come this victory has already been won? I mean, whatever the Jerusalem crowd were banging on about, we can be sure it was also a victory in the past, otherwise they wouldn't have been preaching "another gospel" would they? IOW, how could the Jerusalem people have been Messianists in the traditional sense if they, too, were messengers of good news of a victory already won? It seems to me that they couldn't have been Messianists in the traditional sense unless they were indeed apostles of a human Jesus they had known personally, who, for some reason, they had pegged as the Messiah in the traditional sense.

But since we have no reason to believe, from anything Paul says (not even if 1 Cor 15:3-11 is genuine, far less if it's an interpolation), that any of them knew personally, and were messengers of, a once-living, traditional style Messiah claimant called Jesus, it seems to me the only option we have is that they were messengers of a revised concept of the Messiah (i.e that "the Messiah" is not someone to come, but someone who has been), and bringers of the good news that, contrary to everyone's expectations, and contrary to how it seems, he has already won his victory.

Don't you have to claim a fair bit of interpolation to say that? (I'm having a vague flashback to some of those epic, "tennis neck"-inducing discussions you've had with Amaleq13 ).

Only in that the idea opens up the options of who Paul might have been talking about re. the Jerusalem people, and what they might have believed. It means we aren't necessarily restricted to people who must have believed in a Messiah as that was traditionally conceived (i.e. as an entity hoped-for, an entity to come).

spin

Perhaps it's fresh for you.

The cross.

You've read a little about John the Baptist's messianism, haven't you?

JtB introduced the idea of getting ready for the messiah who is to come by self-purification, but it was a single act of washing -- as an initiation --, unlike anything before (in contrast to the DSS daily washing ritual for example). JtB started a movement which had nothing directly to do with christians, a movement which I think has survived in the middle until today -- the Mandaeans (unless they've been decimated by the Iraq adventure). Even Acts acknowledges the movement when it says that Apollos knew of the baptism of JtB and Apollos "knew the way of the lord" and "taught accurately the things concerning Jesus" but he only "knew the baptism of John"! He had to be taken aside and told "more accurately" about the way of god. This sounds like Apollos knew about the coming messiah, who the writer of Acts or his source believed was about Jesus and interpreted it so.

You mean Amaleq13 knows what the people before him said?

Still, got any evidence for people before Paul who believed that the messiah had already been??


spin

rlogan

Gibberish. Learn to state arguments in the positive. It forces coherency.

I may not have the right word, but this is like a chiasm preachers use to make silly talk sound wise. A kind of poetry. If the argument from silence is argued, then the silence of argument is silenced. Therefore Jesus was historical.

Joe six pack is saying "yeah I can kinda see what you are saying".

With all due respect, if you have a decent point it can be stated in the positive.

Example for you to model:

If we find contemporary historical records of Jesus, the argument from silence fails.


If you remove six letters they cannot be used for an argument from silence. Well they couldn't be used for any argument. So what.

In the first place, that isn't quite true, actually. What exactly do we mean by "removing" them? They were written, and need explaining. They are part of the record we are evaluating. We don't just say "these do not exist". But leaving that aside for the moment:

Does removing those six letters or whichever conjure up some historical detail previously nonexistant in the remainder? No. Does it affect at all the complete absence of extrabiblical contemporaneous note? No. Does it change the basic nature of Christian history being from an allegorical Jesus to a detailed historical one? No.

gurugeorge

Well, my quiver is exhausted and I know when I'm outmatched

But, to sum up: by Paul's own words, there were people preaching "another gospel" and he went to visit some of them in Jerusalem.

If Paul is accurately reporting that they were, like him, preachers of a "gospel", of good news of a victory won, that bars them from having been traditional Messianists (who believed in one to come) unless they were fans of some specific Messiah claimant who had died (but who they yet thought had somehow won a victory by his death).

We have no evidence that they knew some specific human Messiah claimant.

Therefore, they must have been believers in a revised concept of the Messiah that placed him in the past instead of the future - that's the only way they could have been preaching a gospel.

IOW, the evidence (that there were people before Paul who believed the Messiah had already been) is implicit in Paul's use of the term "gospel" to describe what these people were preaching, along with his claim that these people existed and that he knew them, plus the fact that there is nothing in Paul that shows they knew a specific person in the flesh.

Unless I'm in error about the meaning of "gospel" prior to Christianity, and/or unless there were known traditional Messianists who (for some reason) did use the term "gospel" and thought of themselves as "messengers" of it, despite the term's reference to victory past, the logic of the above seems irrefragible to me - if you can see a flaw in this argument, please do point it out, I want to know!

Doug Shaver

Oh, it does? "Naturally"? Suppose that in a commentary about Condoleezza Rice I were to say, inter alia, "even though I once regarded Condi from a male point of view . . . ."

Yeah, looks that way to me.

I'd have to re-read the whole section, paying really close attention, in order to come up with my own exegesis and see whether it coincides with that one. However, I do not remember Paul ever saying anything about Christ being a criminal or about Christ being accused, rightly or wrongly, of being a criminal. All he says is that Christ was crucified and that the perpetrators were "the rulers of this age."

I'm afraid that is not obvious to me.

spin

Are you sure? Where does he acknowledge the people in Jerusalem as having proclaimed a gospel? Let's assume he did:

Where did you get the bit about a gospel entailing "good news of a victory won"?

Sorry, I don't see how you get any of that.

The word that Paul uses for "preach" (khrussw) when talking about the gospel in 2 Cor 11:4 means to do what a herald does, which is to proclaim a message. You can find the word evangelion in the LXX (eg 2 Kgs 7:9). Joseph uses it in BJ 2.420 (2.17.4 regarding Florus). I think you're leaning too hard on Paul's use of the term.


spin

DCHindley

Doug,

I see you have your own website that explains your POV, so I'll assume you put a certain amount of thought into your opinions. That's good!

But Condi is a real human being. You could even call her by her title, Secretary of State (to corresponding with "Christ"), but she is still a very real person.

It is not just 2 Cor 5:16. There are numerous places in the undisputed letters where Paul admits that "Christ" is a "stumbling block" or "folly" to outsiders.

Obviously ...

Here's my point. The title "Christ" is linked strongly to "cross," especially in Galatians. This is not a symbolic cross like an a special burden we must carry, as Paul expressly mentions physical crucifixion in connection with it.

The objection he seems to be getting from Greeks is that his "Christ crucified" path to salvation does not embody "wisdom." It is a bit unclear what he means by that term. In 1 Cor 1:17 he suggests that it is not expounded with the level of rhetorical sophistication they expected from a life philosophy that could compete with the likes of Platonism, Stoicism or Epicureanism. But what Greeks couldn't get over is also the "cross of Christ" part of it.

I sincerely doubt that the average sophisticated Greek could imagine a way of philosophizing around the crucifixion issue. Crucifixion had nothing but bad associated with it in the average person's mind. In their minds, Paul might as well have been preaching the benefits of pissing against the wind. You cannot make a silk purse out of a sows ear, as we say today. He was playing with fire.

To go at this from your angle, you have to base your conclusion on 1 Cor 2:9-16. Here Paul seems to be arguing that his gospel of "Christ crucified" is based on God's wisdom, which is not human wisdom. But like those Greeks, I think this is only his attempt to divert the argument, not overthrow it, by passing his gospel off as divinely inspired, and not reasoned out.

DCH (relevant passages below).

1 Corinthians 1:17-18 17 For Christ did not send me to baptize but to preach the gospel, and not with eloquent wisdom, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power. 18 For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.

1 Corinthians 1:21-23 21 For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe. 22 For Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom, 23 but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles,

1 Corinthians 2:9-16 9 But, as it is written, "What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man conceived, what God has prepared for those who love him," 10 God has revealed to us through the Spirit. For the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God. 11 For what person knows a man's thoughts except the spirit of the man which is in him? So also no one comprehends the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. 12 Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is from God, that we might understand the gifts bestowed on us by God. 13 And we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who possess the Spirit. 14 The unspiritual man does not receive the gifts of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. 15 The spiritual man judges all things, but is himself to be judged by no one. 16 "For who has known the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?" But we have the mind of Christ.

Galatians 5:11 11 But if I, brethren, still preach circumcision, why am I still persecuted? In that case the stumbling block of the cross has been removed.

Galatians 6:12 & 14 12 It is those who want to make a good showing in the flesh that would compel you to be circumcised, and only in order that they may not be persecuted for the cross of Christ. ... 14 But far be it from me to glory except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.

DCHindley

Spin,

I wasn't aware of mixing apples (Acts) with oranges (Pauline letters) or even messianism for that matter.

Where'd the Mormon thingy come from? Actually, I do know something about them, but only because a local historic site (Kirtland, Ohio) was one of their settlements as they started their move west, and we had a local family murdered by a nut case self-designated Prophet loosely associated with the RLDS, plus I worked with one of the cult members who had not participated in the murders. I just read a lot.

Anyhow, messianism as we understand it wasn't as pervasive then as we like to think, except in certain apocalyptic circles. However, lots of folks wanted a fully autonomous Jewish kingdom to be revived, and weren't always eager to let the Romans pick a prince for them (like they did with Herod and later Agrippa). At best, this kingdom would rule the world by overcoming the Romans. At worst, it would assume power under conditions in which the Romans would have to grudgingly accept the self-declaration of the Jewish king (as the Nabatean prince Aretas IV had done before - he was just too far away for the Romans to kick his ass, so they said "well OK ... this time").

As you may know, I have a misguided and clearly wrong hypothesis about what Paul stated (Jews should consider faithful gentiles to be part of the Israel of God by means of their faith only, without circumcision) and what one or more redactor added (basically, Christ doctrine). So yes, I have read the Christ doctrine inside and out, all without any recourse to Acts. Acts is, as you say, a retelling of a story that smooths out all the wrinkles and inconsistencies in the traditions that were floating around in Christian circles. That Christ doctrine is not systematically presented in any sense of the term, and sometimes statements conflict. Whether this mess does represent the position of one or more Christian redactors, or it is somehow the muddled thoughts of Paul himself, it was not yet so mature that it could have been assumed without being stated, as in the Gospels and Acts.

I think that taken together, Paul (or his reactor) basically "explained away" the origins of their community by Jesus "Christ" by transforming him from something bad (a failed pretender to kingship or at best a promoter of Jewish national autonomy without Roman meddling) to something metaphysical.

DCH

gurugeorge

Well isn't that what the word originally meant - you know, in ancient times, before newspapers and telly, you'd have messengers running around the towns giving the folks back home fantastic news that the the big battle they'd anxiously been waiting to hear about had been won? Isn't that the original context? (It's been a long time since I checked this out and filed it away in my mind, so I might be wrong, but I'm pretty sure I'm right.)



Traditional Messiah concept = future-oriented, looking forward to a military (primarily)/spiritual (secondarily) victory to come.

"Gospel" = good news of a victory won, or by extension, some kind of success just occurred = past-oriented.

There are only two ways these fit together: if we have Messianists proclaiming good news of some kind of victory, then either we are dealing with traditional Messianists who thought they had found a flesh-and-blood Messiah, and were proclaiming his victory; or we are dealing with a novel version of the Messiah myth itself, one in which the Messiah is no longer someone to be expected, but someone who has been, and has been victorious (in which case he has some historical aspect, but it doesn't need to be too precise, especially if the main tenor of the idea is that it was a spiritual victory rather than a military one).

The first option is made less likely by there being nothing in Paul that shows these people were the followers of a human being whom they had personally known, whom they were touting as someone who had fulfilled the traditional Messiah role. (Christians think there is, but they're only reading into the text something that's not plainly there. It's a possible reading, but if there were no Christianity and you just found Paul's letters in a jar in the desert, it's not a reading conclusively generated by the text alone.)

Therefore, the more likely option is the second: we are dealing with a "revaluation of values" of the traditional Messiah myth.

Even better! Yup, that's what a herald would do - herald, messenger, those terms fit with the idea of someone telling folks the good news about a great success or victory.

I don't think Paul has any different of a usage - glad tidings, good news of a victory won in Kings, Florus' gleefully hearing of something that brings his plans closer to fruition in Josephus (the news Florus hears means the game he is playing is going well for him - obviously a metaphorical extension of the original meaning, but it still refers to something that has happened that bodes well, and it still has a military tinge).

Good news, glad tidings - it has to be something in the past. How can traditional Messianists be touting some kind of Messianic success in the past? They can't be - not unless, as I said, they thought they'd found one, or they had a new idea of what the Messiah is.

Think of the psychological context: a "gospel" is something that comes to people who are waiting for it. That's the thing that makes people whoop and punch their hands in the air (so to speak). It's the breaking of tension because something favourable has happened, that people were anxious about the outcome of.

*******

OK, another way of putting it:-

Suppose, hypothetically, that some guy had arisen in Palestine who was a great military leader, a scion of David, and an all-round good guy, who led the Jews to military victory over the Romans, and made Jewish civilisation a beacon to the world. Then traditionalist Messianists would have joyfully proclaimed the "gospel" of his victory, correct? They would then be claiming that something in the recent past was "glad tidings" in that traditional sense.

Now a composite standard HJ idea (also a hypothesis at this stage) would be that there were some Messianists who thought they had found such a fellow - they knew him personally. He died ignominiously, but somehow they thought he had won his victory after all, in some spiritual way. In that case, such Messianists would have been within their linguistic rights to proclaim a "gospel" too, right?

But wait! There's nothing in Paul that suggests there was some special Messianic person known to any of these "gospel"-proclaiming Messianists that Paul is talking about.

So the only logical option, if there wasn't a fellow known personally to those Messianists, is that the Messianists Paul knew, who were apparently proclaiming some kind of "gospel" (something about some kind of Messianic success or victory in the past), were referring to a notionally different kind of victory (note: this idea is shared with the HJ interpretation) won by a notionally different kind of Messiah (note: this idea is not - the HJ Messiah is a traditional-Messiah-title claimant, someone fulfilling the traditional expectation of someone to come, only he was thought to have arrived).

i.e. they were (as it were, and I paraphrase what I'm thinking must be the logic behind this) proclaiming to the world, "You guys have got it all wrong, the Messiah isn't to be found in any of these penny-ante claimants pullulating around Palestine at the moment, nor will he ever be found in any claimant to come. You're expecting him from the wrong place; you're expecting him in the future, when Scripture tells us that he's already been, and won his great victory, not in a military sense (though that will come [and here the idea of an apocalyptic Second Coming would fit]) but in a spiritual sense!"

It's like a "big idea", a "revaluation of values" of the traditional Messiah concept. Now that's "good news", if you kind of squint at it and look at it in a more spiritual and mystical light. Picture it: certain Jews anxiously awaiting some kind of end to the occupation, and the Jews coming out on top again. The Messiah idea crystallizes those hopes. What would fulfil those hopes? Either the appearance of the manly, Kingly Messiah or, for some gentler, more mystically inclined types, a spiritual Messiah. Either would break the tension for them. Suppose someone told them what I hypothesized they would say above - it would work for the mystically-inclined types, it would seem like joyful news to them.

It's a gestalt switch in the very concept of the Messiah myth itself. Duck-past-Messiah appears in Rabbit-future-Messiah. Both equally mythical.

spin

Have a look at the way the term was used at the time. That's why I pointed you to the LXX and a reference in Josephus. You are trying to get meaning that isn't usually found in the term. Did you look at the two citations of the word I provided?

I suppose you still use "gay" to mean "bright and cheerful". The word "nice" previously meant "foolish, stupid". (You get a Doh!)

Cutting linguistic argument as dysfunctional.

Umm, heralds did more than proclaim victories. Working on your idea here, in a lot of kingdoms heralds must have done a lot of nothing.

You're trying to weasel, because of your a priori commitment to your preferred meaning of evangelion. What exactly is the good news in 1 Kgs 1:42? The verbal form is used in Ps 96:2, "proclaim his salvation..." and in Isa 40:9, "you that herald good news". Yes, Florus isn't receiving news of some victory won and no, it isn't metaphorical: you're just missing the meaning of evangelion.

Stop joking. You're pushing far too hard here. Don't you think an announcement of a coming wedding or alliance (or the coming of the messiah) is good news??

You're both hoping that you can use your own definition of the meaning of evangelion and that you can restrict the grammatical implications to the past.



Doh!

Erroneous conjecture.

You're looking at this ass-up. If there isn't anything "'in Paul that suggests there was some special Messianic person known to any of these "gospel"-proclaiming Messianists that Paul is talking about", then there is no reason (from Paul) to think such a thing, ie it is unrelated to the text as she is writ.

The notion of the messiah wasn't a myth to the Jews.


spin