spamandham

It doesn't matter. The author's position isn't "mainstream", therefor he's a crank and we can safely ignore him. Using this process, we can ensure that only mild variations of the Gospel Jesus will ever be "mainstream".

Jayrok

Are you guys saying that Justin thought of Jesus as myth, similar to the sons of Jupiter?

Justin believed Jesus was historical and was executed by Pilate. What does him saying "we propound nothing different about Jesus" have to do with Jesus being a myth?

DCHindley

Stephen Goranson, while a really smart guy, is a librarian at Duke, not a professor. He also has a lot invested in the argument over whether the DSS and Qumran relate to Essenes or not (Goranson advocates the Essene position, and this article is his attempt to put it in historical perspective).

Maybe Goranson has too much invested in the Essene hypothesis. For a while he electronically stalked Greg Doudna to disparage him and his scholarship whenever and wherever Doudna happened to post his views - ANE, Crosstalk2, Orion, etc - when Doudna proposed dates for the key figures in the 1st century BCE rather than the 2nd century BCE, figures that did not involve the Essenes.

DCH

show_no_mercy

Are you saying that Justin thought that the sons of Jupiter were a myth?

Jayrok

I don't know if he considered them myth or not, but it seems he considered them false gods and things that were said about them were invented by devils.

aa5874

In antiquity people believe their Gods existed. People believed Devils or a Devil did existed.

But, entities that are described as wholly or fundamentally Gods, Devils, angels, and Holy Ghosts are all mythological. The mythological status of an entity is irrelevant to belief once it is described as Divine without any historical support.

Loomis

If you are only focused on debunking the claims of a believer - and if you lack the motivation to go beyond that – then you’re absolutely right. A Jesus 100 years before Pilate is not the Gospel Jesus. But why should an atheist bible enthusiast stop there?

Do we have the right to consider the question of what do the gospels mean and why were they written?

Of course we do.

Matthew 27:28-29
They stripped him and put a scarlet robe on him, and then twisted together a crown of thorns and set it on his head.

The inspiration for the ‘crown of thorns’ thing is this passage in Zechariah.

Zechariah 3:5-6
Take away the filthy raiment from him … and clothe ye him with a long robe, and place a pure mitre upon his head

The bad guys in Matthew (and they are just characters in a story so get over it) did what they did because of what was written in Zechariah.

In Zechariah the Jesus/Joshua character strips and gets a new wardrobe – including a crown.

In Matthew the Jesus/Joshua character strips and gets a new wardrobe – including a crown.

To me that raises an interesting question: Was the author of Matthew aware of the two messiahs in Zechariah?

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q...&aq=f&aqi=&oq=

If so then that could be considered a link between the Gospel Jesus and the DSS – because there are also two messiahs in the DSS.

Sorry if you are having trouble with that.

Loomis

Sure it is.

Sirach 46:1 (150 BC)
Jesus the son a Nave was valiant in the wars, and was the successor of Moses in prophecies, who according to his name was made great for the saving of the elect of God, and taking vengeance of the enemies that rose up against them, that he might set Israel in their inheritance.

Hebrews 3:3
For he has come to deserve greater glory than Moses …

If you get over the fact that it’s fiction - and that Jesus is just a character in Jewish folklore, it becomes readily apparent that the Gospel Jesus goes way, way back – long before Pilate.

Here’s an early hint of Jesus worship …

Deuteronomy 18:18-19
“I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their brothers; I will put my words in his mouth, and he will tell them everything I command him. If anyone does not listen to my words that the prophet speaks in my name, I myself will call him to account.”

Compare …

John 7:40
On hearing his words, some of the people said, "Surely this man is the Prophet."

John 10:25-26
Jesus answered, "I did tell you, but you do not believe. The miracles I do in my Father's name speak for me, but you do not believe because you are not my sheep.”

See?

It’s the same shit.

It’s the same Jesus.

It’s obvious.

At least to me.

spamandham

It's obvious that the gospels writers constructed their version of Jesus from scripture with theological motives, but that doesn't necessitate that there was no historical Jesus. The same type of ex post facto scripture mining went on for other historical characters as well, and still goes on today in cults everywhere.

That said, the degree of such scripture mining in regard to Jesus seems to me to be fundamental rather than a window dressing. When combined with the esoteric Jesus of Paul and several other historical oddities, the myth becomes more apparent.

PhilosopherJay

Hi MaryHelena,

Good point. It does strengthen the case if we make the point that most historicists don't try to find the historical person that might have inspired the texts, but assume that the text reveals him.

Here is the corrected best argument: