spin

The pedantry was worth it, wasn't it?

This sort of contentlessness is a waste of your time. If you have trouble reading Paul's description of his coming to his religion through a revelation, don't try to take it out on me.

This is something that I find hard to understand for anyone reading Galatians 1. Paul is explicit:

1:11. For I want you to know, brothers, that the gospel that was proclaimed by me is not of human origin; 12. for I did not receive it from a human source, nor was I taught it, but I received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ.

I've seen people hedge and hum and ha and retroject Acts into his statement, rewrite it, and however else obfuscate or change it, but his statement is plain. No he wasn't taught his gospel from other people; he got it through divine means. God revealed his son to Paul. It was three years after his revelation before he came into contact with the Jerusalemite messianists. Paul contradicts all the claims about him getting this gospel of Jesus from others.

If one doesn't attempt to read Galatians without dragging in the baggage of prejudices gathered from all one's learnt traditions from later times, the text will remain unfathomed. The assumption that we know what Paul is talking about and what he meant because we have read other things is a veil which stops us reading what Paul actually says.


spin

Sheshbazzar

It is interesting and revealing how often Paul's alleged theological teachings are presented as being at odds with the views held by The "Jerusalem Pillars", whom allegedly were the close personal acquaintances of, and the ones specifically chosen and designated as representatives of Jesus, being taught and trained directly by him for a period of over three years, "ALL things"(Mar. 4:34, 13:23 and John 14:26, 15:15) and whom, out of all men, should have been the ones most familiar with His teachings.
How extraordinary that these twelve Apostles, Jesus's closest acquaintances and co-workers in His earthly ministry, who were present when He fed the multitudes, and when He healed the sick, and unto whom He had explained "All Things", were left in an almost total ignorance concerning such things as a Gospel to the Gentiles, the abrogating of The Law's strict requirements of circumcision, the relaxing, and removal of all of the kosher requirements, and many other doctrines and ideas that are peculiarly to be found only within Paul's writings.
What? DID Jesus just happen to just totally forget mentioning these things all the while He was teaching His chosen Apostles "ALL Things"?
And then years latter add on like a sorry post script;
Ooops! I forgot to mention a few important "All things" so here is my brand new "Super Apostle" to correct and teach you Apostles ALL the things that I just plumb forgot to teach you!

What a mess! Paul admits that there are those before him that are The Pillars of The Faith, who had walked and talked with Jesus, but he had a "vision" a "revelation" that doesn't agree with their opinions, and so overrules, and essentially replaces their now obsolete Gospel.
The Paulinian NT tries to put a nice spin on it, but essentially The Jerusalem Pillars, and the faithful, upon hearing that load he was attempting to foist upon them, told him to piss-off and go peddle his insane crap somewhere else.

Jeffrey Gibson

Where specifically does Paul do this?

Jeffrey

aa5874

So, essentially, you (some people) believe that the Jesus of the NT is fundamentally not true and are now proposing a different Jesus that satisfies their faith or imagination, which may also be not true.

Based on your post, you (some people) believe the following:

• The conception of NT Jesus is not true.
• The baptism of NT Jesus is not true.
• The temptation of NT Jesus is not true.
• The miracles of NT Jesus is not true.
• The transfiguration of NT Jesus is not true.
• The resurrection of NT Jesus is not true.
• The ascension of NT Jesus is not true.

Therefore, in effect, you (some people) are in agreement with me that the Jesus of the NT is fundamentally fiction, but in addition, you (some people) have fabricated another Jesus which cannot be confirmed to be true and is not found in the books of history.

Doug Shaver

I thought that was likely. Someone still has to look out for the lurkers' interests, though

Solo

And that, you propose, vouches for the opinion that Jesus, who Paul was informed, was anointed in heaven after a sorry end on earth, was not Paul's near-contemporary. Right ?

Why would you be opposed to the idea that in modern terms, Paul was essentially a psycho, who knew everybody was wrong about Jesus, because he (Paul) was in third-heaven where he got the gospel info about the real Jesus written up in his body ?

And if you are not opposed to it, then Paul's argument with Jerusalem "pillars" about the truth of the gospel could very well have been about someone who was crucified recently and whom Cephas and John (and, if I am right the third "pillar" James) knew personally and from whom they principally derived their own authority among the converts.

Paul of course did not accept this authority. They knew Jesus "in flesh" and tried to hide the fact that in legal terms Jesus was an executed criminal (Gal 5:12). Paul "knew" the gospel of the Spirit, who told him it was all pre-arranged by God, for Paul to show God used his son Jesus to nip sin in the bud, and that if you are good and abstain from sex (well, ok, if you burn with passion, he'd give you a grudging pass) you are going into the heavens of Jesus (as Christ) that Paul visited.

So, even if this is only a conter-hypothesis, it fits the texts (plus ou moins), so I say, you've got nothing to conclude on to say Jesus was not living near Paul's time.


This is Catholic deconstructionism with the underwear inside out.
The Church says one cannot make sense of what Paul is talking about because you do not have the Holy Spirit which is the Church property. You say one cannot make sense of what Paul is talking about because what you don't have his signature on it.

So the best you can say is that the text is "unfathomed" but of course that would not prevent you to "conclude" that Jesus was (or was not) a near contemporary of Paul. Whether you go one way or the other would then depend largely on where your jesuitic predilections are schooled.

Jiri

spin

By headhunting Paul are you going to change anything?

What exactly do you know about the pillars going on Paul's letter? Does Paul tell you what they thought about the messiah? Was their messiah that which Paul had a revelation about? Was their messiah even called Jesus? You just don't know. You still retroject Acts.

Naturally.

?

Gal 5:12 I wish those who unsettle you would castrate themselves.

This doesn't seem to change anything about Paul receiving his information about Jesus purely by revelation. There need be nothing real before the event at all. I don't see what you are trying to say.

It's simple literary theory. To understand a text, you have to read it first (especially in the reference to any prior context).

If you read Wuthering Heights, given the traditions of it being a young girl's book, you will never understand it, but in the context of the inheritance laws prior to its writings and it will be an enlightening experience. Read Gulliver's Travels, given the later traditions and you'll find it, not the nasty satire that it is, but a rather old fashioned children's book. If you don't start with the text minus the later encrustations, you'll never understand it.


spin

2-J

That any Jesus let alone 'the Jesus of the NT' cannot be found in the NT, is not necessarily a bar to the 'historical core' thesis being most prominent.

Of course a lot depends on one's view of the origin of the Church. Many people believe there are good reasons for believing in a community of Christian believers by the turn of the first-second century. Maybe a 'historical core' type Jesus then becomes the postulate with the most explanatory power. Against this, are the various myth accounts. But my point to you aa5874 is simply that just because this 'other Jesus' cannot be found in the books of history, that alone does not disbar his existence being 'confirmed to be true' by the standards of history.

aa5874

The "core" of the NT Jesus is fiction as I have already pointed out. There is no history of Jesus in the 1st century, as I have already elaborated.

What "historical core" are you talking about? The one you imagine or have fabricated? What independent source of antiquity supports your imagined "core"?

I am not into faith-based imaginations. What are "good reasons", you mean "belief without evidence"?

Maybe? Maybe what?

Maybe Jesus was from China and crucified Pilate.

All we know is that Jesus cannot be accounted for in the 1st century by any credible non-apologetic source and that the NT Jesus is fundamentally fiction.

2-J

This reply assumes what I am calling into question. The assumption you're making here is 'if no non-apologetic independent source from antiquity supports the idea that the gospel stories have at their core an historical jesus, then we are not justified in believing in an historical jesus'.

That's quite wrong. Believing in an historical jesus could be justified even if (1) the New Testament contains much fiction and (2) if no non-apologetic source from antiquity mentions Jesus.

How could this be? Or, as you ask:-

An outline case would go something like this. Leaving aside for the moment the question of whether Jesus actually existed, a Church of some kind (i.e. people believing in Jesus) or other does exist now and came into existence at some point in the past. People even differ about when the absolute latest this could have come about is. Mountainman on here of course argues that a 4th century date is convincing. Most find this wildly speculative.

If, for the sake of argument, one dates the existence of the Church fairly early (on the basis of, e.g. accepting datings for early christian writings, fragments of manuscripts from the second century, archaeological evidence from 3rd century+ etc), then the basic question arises: how could the church have come to be, so early in the first century, unless there was a basic historical core to it?

Don't think I'm not aware that there are competing theses to the historical core one. Of course I know about some of the Jesus myth ideas.

But the point is YOU aa5874 are inferring too much in one go. You absolutely cannot make the inference

" 'no non-apologetic source from antiquity mentions jesus, and the NT contains a lot of fiction' therefore, 'there is no historical core to the gospel narrative' "

Because it does not follow. You must supplement your observations about the NT and about the dearth of non-apologetic sources from antiquity, with a theory about when the church came into existence and how that could have been possible without a historical core, and this account must be more convincing than the historical core explanation.