Freethought & Rationalism Archive

John Kesler · 12-19-2006, 05:52 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by skinumb

...any help in linking any of Matthew's account to the OT would be appreciated.

A few of Jesus' sayings which have affinities with the OT or Apocrypha (not exhaustive):

Quote:

Matthew 5:3
Blessed are the poor in spirit...

Psalm 34:18
Yahweh is near to the brokenhearted, and saves the crushed in spirit.

Quote:

Matthew 5:5
Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.

Psalm 37:11
But the meek shall inherit the land...

Quote:

Matthew 5:8
Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.

Psalm 24:3-4
Who shall ascend the hill of Yahweh? And who shall stand in his holy place? 4 Those who have clean hands and pure hearts...

Quote:

Matthew 5:38-39
You have heard that it was said, 'An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.' 39 But I say to you do not resist an evildoer...

Proverbs 24:29
Do not say, "I will do to others as they have done to me; I will pay them back for what they have done."

Quote:

Matthew 5:44
But I say to you, Love your enemies...

Proverbs 25:21
If your enemies are hungry, give them bread to eat; and if they are thirsty, give them water to drink;

Quote:

Matthew 6:12
And forgive us our debts, as we have forgiven our debtors.

Sirach 28:2
Forgive your neighbor the wrong he has done, and then your sins will be pardoned when you pray.

Gamera · 12-19-2006, 07:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mountainman

Many of the sayings in the gospel on the mount
have come from descriptions of the Essenic tradition
(which is largely Buddhist in outlook and organisation)
as reported by the writings of Philo of Alexandria (who
BTW never once mentions "jesus")

Here is a tabulation of the (purported) sayings of Jesus
with about 60 references back to the Essenes, the
most which pre-date Jesus.

Pete

None of this goes to the Sermon on the Mount, whose teachings are unique. Jesus utterly transforms OT law, taking legal requirements and transforming them into spiritual, emotional conditions.

Jesus point is that it's not enough to do good; one must BE good, and that is impossible without becoming a "new creation" as Paul calls this transformation.

This is the essense of Christianity, and it has no historical precedents (as shown by the fact that nobody in this thread can cite one)

To give an example, the law teaches to love ones neighbor (which probably means something like treat them ethically). Jesus requires us to love our enemies, an absolutely crazy idea to a first century Jew or Pagan. Utterly unique.

The Law teaches not to kill. Jesus claims that if you have anger in your heart, you're as bad as a murderer. Again utterly unique.

skinumb · 12-19-2006, 07:12 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mountainman

Many of the sayings in the gospel on the mount
have come from descriptions of the Essenic tradition
(which is largely Buddhist in outlook and organisation)
as reported by the writings of Philo of Alexandria (who
BTW never once mentions "jesus")

Here is a tabulation of the (purported) sayings of Jesus
with about 60 references back to the Essenes, the
most which pre-date Jesus.

Pete

Thanks Pete.Just the type of source I'm looking for. I've been sitting in the Jesus Myth camp since studying for RK 'O' Level back in the '60's. I'm now trying to cram a lot of 'education' into a short space of time - leeching off of other's research - in order to hold my own in some debate with xian fundamentalists.

Rich

rlogan · 12-19-2006, 07:55 PM

Add Isaiah 51:7 and 61:1-2.To John Kesler's list.

Righteousness though - do we really need to even think of this as an innovation in the HB even? I'd rather think this goes back to the dawn of man.

And the meek getting their day in the sun? The mourning receive comfort?

Like this is all unique?

Quote:

Jesus requires us to love our enemies, an absolutely crazy idea to a first century Jew or Pagan. Utterly unique

I guess you didn't read John kessler's citation of Proverbs above.

Really, one should not fly in the blind.

John Kesler · 12-19-2006, 08:51 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gamera

None of this goes to the Sermon on the Mount, whose teachings are unique. Jesus utterly transforms OT law, taking legal requirements and transforming them into spiritual, emotional conditions.

Above I posted some OT antecedents for Jesus' teachings, so I'll just add here that, contrary to some people's opinion, the OT also stressed one's "emotional conditions," not just actions, as indicated for example in Leviticus 19:17-18:

Quote:

17 You shall not hate in your heart anyone of your kin; you shall reprove your neighbor, or you will incur guilt yourself. 18 You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against any of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am Yahweh.

mountainman · 12-19-2006, 09:54 PM

The Essenic tradition is extant BCE.
That is, to put it simply, nothing about
the wisdom of Jesus is unique.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gamera

To give an example, the law teaches to love ones neighbor (which probably means something like treat them ethically). Jesus requires us to love our enemies, an absolutely crazy idea to a first century Jew or Pagan. Utterly unique.

"The Essenes enjoined the loving of enemies." (Philo.)
So did Christ say, "Love your enemies," &c.

Quote:

The Law teaches not to kill. Jesus claims that if you have anger in your heart, you're as bad as a murderer. Again utterly unique.

The Essenes enjoined,
"Doing unto others as
you would have them do unto you."
The Confucian golden rule,
as taught by Christ.

Pete

rlogan · 12-20-2006, 01:18 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gamera

None of this goes to the Sermon on the Mount, whose teachings are unique.

There's at least four of them in there. Meek, Poor, Peacemakers, enemies...

But I'm pretty well certain we can rummage around in many cultures and find similar, and either predating or independently derived ideas.

Now the idea that I am held to blame for God specifically engineering an ancestor to be imperfect, and that he'll "forgive" me for that if I allow him to kill himself in place of me.

That's original LSD-25 material right there.

dzim77 · 12-20-2006, 08:00 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by hatsoff

To be sure, *anything* is possible. However, it is incredibly improbable. The likelihood of the differences between Matthew and Luke's sermon material being representative of historical variations between Jesus' actual preaching are too enormously far-fetched to be taken seriously without some very strong external evidence to back it up.

I'm not understanding your use of the terms "incredibly improbable" and "enormously far-fetched" here.

If you were to follow an itinerant preacher around -even in today's context- you would hear the same stories repeated over and over again, most likely with slight variations. You would hear formulaic teachings and 'catchphrases' repeated frequently. IOW, you would hear the same teachings repeated in different locations and contexts, with variations in the exact wording. How is it so "incredibly improbable" that this was the case with Jesus, and that he indeed gave a similar sermon both 'on the mount' and 'on the plain'? Afterall, that is what we have in Matt and Luke. Note that in Luke we also have the pronouncement of woes and other additional material not in Matthew.

Why is this scenario any less likely than Matt or Luke making up a false context in which Jesus gave the sermon?

CalUWxBill · 12-20-2006, 08:11 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by dzim77

I'm not understanding your use of the terms "incredibly improbable" and "enormously far-fetched" here.

If you were to follow an itinerant preacher around -even in today's context- you would hear the same stories repeated over and over again, most likely with slight variations. You would hear formulaic teachings and 'catchphrases' repeated frequently. IOW, you would hear the same teachings repeated in different locations and contexts, with variations in the exact wording. How is it so "incredibly improbable" that this was the case with Jesus, and that he indeed gave a similar sermon both 'on the mount' and 'on the plain'? Afterall, that is what we have in Matt and Luke. Note that in Luke we also have the pronouncement of woes and other additional material not in Matthew.

Why is this scenario any less likely than Matt or Luke making up a false context in which Jesus gave the sermon?

I haven't done the analysis so I can't speak strongly to the similarities myself. However I think what he is saying is that the textual similarity of the two make it much more probable that it was textually copied or amended rather than a passed on story of the sermon being translated so similarly from two different accounts by different people. See the Gospels are kind of awkward. While there are contradictions among the narratives that I don't think a perfect word of God would allow, the similarities from a natural perspective are most easily understood from a literary perspective rather than one based purely on word of mouth or even parallel accounts of a direct testimony to hearing such a sermon.

dzim77 · 12-20-2006, 08:28 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by CalUWxBill

I haven't done the analysis so I can't speak strongly to the similarities myself. However I think what he is saying is that the textual similarity of the two make it much more probable that it was textually copied or amended rather than a passed on story of the sermon being translated so similarly from two different accounts by different people. See the Gospels are kind of awkward. While there are contradictions among the narratives that I don't think a perfect word of God would allow, the similarities from a natural perspective are most easily understood from a literary perspective rather than one based purely on word of mouth or even parallel accounts of a direct testimony to hearing such a sermon.

Thanks CalUWxBill,

I do understand his point, but I disagree. First off, I don't think that the idea of Jesus reusing material in different contexts is any less likely.

Secondly, there are as many differences as there are similarities in the Mt. and Lk. material.

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