Solo

Thanks to both: Ben and spin. Indeed, my query was about whether this Greek turn of phrase, which appears cultic and idiomatic would not look, strange to a messianist trained in Hebrew.

Jiri

Solo

I don't think there were any 'outside' people. The letter transparently broils against the missionaries from Jerusalem.


True but the charges against 'flesh' are being made in the context of polemic against those who would make 'good showing' in the flesh (6:12)

I am not mixing anything, spin. Cephas, and/or his mission were active in both places. I would grant you that the Corinth Jesus folks would have been wilder.

I also understand there is a legion of scholars who think as you do, and I imagine that it is because they were taught there is no other way to look at Paul's opposition in the two places.

So, round and round we go: Paul calls the Galatian renegades foolish because they believe what:

a) Jesus was not crucified;

b) Jesus was crucified but it does not enter into the discussion of 'torah adherence'

Choose one....

...and only one !

The only evidence that I have for tradition of James having messianic dignity is GThomas (12)

The preacher, evidently.

Looking forward to seeing the arguments. :wave:

Jiri

Amaleq13

Not as you are misusing the word here but that is what I am trying to correct.

You have offered nothing to support the notion that a soldier volunteering to sacrifice his life for a cause is somehow significantly different from Jesus allowing himself to be executed for a cause.

The distinction you wish to create is, as I've already pointed out, entirely artificial.

spin

By "outside" I was referring to views from the Pauline position. To Paul who saw Galatia as his territory, then those disturbing Paul's Galatians whether they were from Jerusalem or from Ulan Bator were outside people.

The movement from general to specific.

I think you are conflating backgrounds and that would be inappropriate. And you'd be laboring over Cephas to try to flatten those backgrounds. Paul has already sold us that Cephas was slack.

I tend not to read scholars in this sort of field I'd rather reinvent the wheel or come up with an untainted analysis.

Paul equates torah observance as nullifying Jesus's crucificion, eg Gal 2:21. This was not a good attempt to create a strawman and a false dichotomy on your part.

I guess we need to mine Eisenman.

What evidence?

The evidence from Paul says that he didn't need any prior real Jesus.

What seems so blatantly plain to me from the evidence in Galatians is a mystery to many. Paul didn't get Jesus information from any other person, ie no real Jesus necessary.


spin

fatpie42

I am not assuming anything. I am asking for a reason to believe one rather than the other interpretation. At the moment it feels counter-intuitive to me that Paul's term "received" meant 'receiving information from nowhere' rather than a receiving personal revelation of a spiritual truth which had previously eluded them.

Perhaps I wasn't clear. You asked:
What in Galatians makes you think that Paul got any ideas from anyone else about Jesus?

I have simply reformed the question to:
What in the epistles of Peter or James makes you think they got any ideas from anyone else about Jesus?

My point is that when we are making a positive claim that Paul originated what is now the Jesus myth, we need some positive evidence. A lack of evidence to the contrary is not enough when there are other potential originators of the myth.

That's the problem. I don't think he cites revelation as a source of information in the sense you are suggesting. To give a naff analogy, the story of Archimedes where he shouts 'Eureka!' doesn't involve him receiving any new information per se, but rather having a revelation concerning the information he already posessed. Now perhaps my interpretation is wrong, but it currently feels like the more obvious interpretation of the text. If there are more reasons to dismiss my interpretation in favour of your own I'd love to hear them. You have an interesting theory, but I think you are relying too much on a couple of verses as it currently stands.

I didn't doubt that. The story as we have it today is mythical, no matter how Paul saw it at the time. The gospel accounts most certainly use myth a great deal. (I think Bultmann considered Paul to have been making an early attempt at demythologisation, but your theory would suggest that it actually worked the other way around. That later writers made the story more mythical.)

I would go with Bultmann's definition of myth:
My issue was whether the whole story was originated by Paul rather than from another or multiple other sources.

Amaleq13

I suspect that is because they do not join you in assuming that Paul meant "everything I know about Jesus" when he claimed that the "good news" he preached did not come from any man.

Instead, they conclude from the primary subject of the letter that Paul is referring to the specific and disputed "good news" that faith in Christ was sufficient and rendered torah observance unnecessary for salvation.

Why do you change what Paul actually claims? Paul claims he didn't get the good news he preached to the Galatians from any other person. He also tells his readers that his good news that the opposition to his good news took the form of requiring his Galatian converts to follow the Law.

Elijah

I’m not misusing the word. But words aren’t a strength of mine so if you find a word that you think is more accurate to what I am suggesting then let me know. Maybe after you understand what I am saying you’ll be the one to articulate it to everyone else since I can’t seem to.
A soldier doesn’t volunteer to sacrifice their lives. They fight till the death and hope they never see their own.

The death of a solider has little impact beyond the family and their response is to just grieve. Now Jesus gathered some followers and said do as I do and you will receive eternal life and then sacrificed himself. This act is later imitated by his immediate followers to help create conviction in the message behind the original sacrifice. The soldier’s way of dying in battle may have not been anything unusual to see in the Coliseum but someone martyring themselves because they believed their sacrifice would be rewarded would catch the audience's attention on just what belief had given them that type of conviction helping fuel its popularity/spread. Do you see the difference between the sacrifice of Jesus and a regular soldier’s sacrifice now?

fatpie42

I don't know how to answer this. If you are seriously asking whether Jesus had anything to do with the salvation for Paul that would suggest that you haven't read any of Paul's writings. You cannot possibly be serious.

What interpretation is that? Do you even know the argument you are opposing here? My point is pretty uncontroversial here. That stories have been told about someone doesn't mean that they existed. I have no idea why you are bringing in 'salvation' here. Salvation is a complete non-sequitur to my argument.

So you have no knowledge of Christian theology? Pretty much every Christian in the entire world will tell you that the resurrection is a vital part of Christian salvation. If you don't understand this, you really ought to do some research. Try here for starters:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resurrection_of_Jesus

Oh ffs! Next you will be telling me that Samson was a real person.

Er... how is committing a murder in an insurrection 'not quite a murder'?

There's no evidence that it was a Jewish tradition to release 'notorious prisoners'. If they need to ask permission from the Roman government to use capital punishment, what makes you think they can release those who sought to overthrow the Roman occupiers by themselves?

I'm sorry, but if the only reference to Jesus in Josephus is a later addition that sounds pretty silent.

No other Jewish historians of the time mention Jesus either.

Elijah

So you have no understanding at all of the salvation or nature of the salvation involved, but you think it’s just like other pagan god’s salvation that you don’t understand the nature of.
Your interpretation, whatever that may be, you seem unwilling to clarify. It can’t be supported with other religious figures that you don’t have the evidence/texts to support your particular interpretation of.

For clarity, what is your argument here?
You could have just said, I don’t know how any of these things relate to salvation, but I understand they are part of the theology.
That doesn’t answer my question; do you think it was a belief of the coming king of the Jews to be understood as a pagan god?
When it’s in battle they aren't releasing a murderer but a soldier.
There is no evidence that they didn’t have the tradition at the time. You are just making assumption that you just can’t possible have enough data to support.
You don’t know if it’s a later edition or just edited to sound more Christian. That’s why it is of no use to you at all in this argument.
You mean we have no other Jewish historians of the time that could have mentioned Jesus. So the whole absence of evidence argument is worthless.

Solo

He told us Cephas "stood condemned" in Antioch...but I observe you would not be first to trivialize the dispute.

Toot, toot ! And yet you cannot help to read the document as Paul expoding in anger over banal issues of circumcision and observance, which he at the end denies have any importance in his scheme of things (6:15).

So why don't you suggest something else ?! Where do you think the foolishness is ?' If the law-mongers do not preach some mythical messiah of their own who was not executed, or not executed by the very law they preach but not follow, why is Paul invoking his crucified messiah against them ? How does he hope to win back his converts, if what he says does not intersect some information they have and which can be weighed ?
And again where does the idea that Jesus was executed "lawlessly" (Acts 2:23) come from ? Paul certainly did not preach that !

And when Paul says that God chose what appears foolish and lowly and despised in the world (even if it is not !) to shame and disarm the wise and mighty (1 Cr 1:26-29), who on earth was he talking about ?

No luck: I heard, he lost his GPS and disappeared in Ulan Bator.

The foxes have holes and the birds have nests but the son of man has nowhere to lay his head.

That's where you are sadly wrong. In the absence of other plausible scenario he needed that reference to make his points to protect and reclaim his flock.

How about an "unreal" one, a mythical Jesus ? Would it not have been necessary for Paul to have some previously circulated figment to elaborate on to make make himself understood ? Or was Paul's Lord Jesus Christ, entirely self-referencing, and self-evident holy relic ? Or is that another 'false dichotomy' to you ?

Jiri