Toto

I have always thought that identifying Chrestus with Jesus Christ was possible, but hardly probable. I don't think that dating the gospels much later than 70 CE would be necessary.

Amaleq13

No, but I also don't assume that the author has fabricated every detail. That approach seems rather simplistic.

Noting that a story appears to promote a specific view doesn't really tell me anything about the reliability of any history it appears contain. Hence, my question about the contrast you were offering which seemed to suggest otherwise.

gurugeorge

This prompts me to give another version of my "potted" argument for what really happened (I'm always trying to refine it a bit, and happy to see it criticised):-

I think it's more likely to be the other way round - it's the proto-orthodoxy who attempted to co-opt Paul to their vision of Christianity via the fabrication of Acts. The Gnostic (and Marcionite) self-understanding as being descended from Paul is totally genuine.

Judging from his visionary experience and mysticism, and his use of some mysteries terms and (what later became) key gnostic terms, I think Paul (probably actually the Samaritan "Simon Magus", whose image is somewhat, though not wholly distorted in the surviving "genuine letters) was in fact partly proto-gnostic, partly apocalyptic (these being somewhat connected), and his line of teaching, when it developed "purely", developed into Gnosticism, particularly in the East (e.g. Syria), while also in other parts of the empire parallel forms of Gnosticism also developed from Judaism (e.g. Sethianism).

Meanwhile, a line of transmission he had started in Rome eventually mutated into more of a political machine that, in order to create a very Roman, tightly organised and lucrative kind of Church, invented the idea of "Apostolic Succession", and to this end worked in tandem with post-70 CE Jewish Christians in Rome (who because of the Diaspora had little remembrance of how their branch of the movement actually started) to "harden" the historicity of their version of Joshua Messiah (who was, in the Jerusalem Church and in Paul, basically a revisionist idea of the Messiah, reversing many of its traditional tropes, partly visionary, party drawn from scripture) in order to give the impression that their lineage was stronger than the merely visionary Pauline lineages of the then-majority proto-Gnostic, turning-into-Gnostic, forms of Christianity that proto-orthodoxy had to battle against (cf. Walter Bauer).

Because of this Roman Pauline rump's connection with Jewish Christians from the Diaspora (represented by "Peter") they could claim a lineage going directly back to The Man Himself. The main tool for this is the schizophrenic splitting, in Acts, of the real man behind "Paul", and the real man who kick started the whole thing as a "global" movement, into a "good" version ("Paul"), who shakes hands with "Peter" (representing the "Apostolic Succession") and a "bad" version ("Simon Magus") who remains recalcitrantly Gnostic. (Note: Acts probably has snippets of true history cobbled together on this basic framework). This gave a way for proto-Gnostics (turning into Gnostics) who wished come into the Catholic fold a way to do so to, as they could have a version of their founder who conformed to the orthodoxy; while those unwilling to come into the Catholic fold (who in fact had the same founder) were condemned to have the "bad" version of this great man as their founder.

The gospels are probably based on a basic "framework" that coalesced in oral transmission, not from any actual reminiscences of historical events, but from natural attempts to "fill in" details of what was initially only a sketchy, and sketchily historical idea of the Messiah. An "ur-Luke", something like a sketchy version of the Luke we have , was floating around in the proto-Gnostic churches (hence the slightly later idea that the Gnostics' favoured gospel was Luke), and was fleshed out by Marcion, and later became Luke (as it was fleshed out into an orthodox gospel by the author of the Acts fabrication). Meanwhile another literary product, the somewhat bitter and somewhat disillusioned "Mark", using the same basic skeleton story, was written, probably a bit before Marcion and independently, and went on to form the basis for Matthew (in which the disillusionment was removed). John is a later product that welcomes the (by now) fully Catholicised remnants of Gnosticism into the fold. These absorbed remnants of Gnosticism, and of the original forms of Christianity, are what we now know as "Docetism".

This is the only story that makes sense to me in view of the fact that there's not a shred of evidence that any of the Jerusalem people knew personally a human being called Joshua who they thought was the Messiah, and that all the early Christian stuff is about a mainly spiritual entity with no more unambiguously "historical" aspects than your average mythological entity.

Try it on for size, to me it makes much more sense of the evidence, and without requiring ad hoc claims of interpolation (i.e. leaving a fair amount of orthodox HJ scholarship intact, i.e. about an Ehrman's-worth).

In this scenario, a post 70 CE start is unlikely, it's too short a time IMHO between 70 CE and Justin Martyr for something like the orthodox story to develop. There have to have been roots going a bit further into the past than that. Also, it explains the "excuses for failed apocalyptic predictions" peppered throughout the post-70 CE Christian material (there would otherwise be no reason for them; also, AFAIK apocalypticism seems to have flourished more before 70 CE).

This is all against a Thomas L Thompson/Margart-Barker-like vision (as explained by Robert Price) of what Jewish religion was like before 70 CE - more variegated than we imagine from the gospel narrative, a bit wilder, with quite a few odd elements. Christianity was but one version of Messianism (a Samaritan-tinged one, based on a reversal of some of the traditional Messiah tropes). Apocalypticism, merkabah and angel mysticism, polytheistically tinged proto-gnosticism - all part of the melting pot that produced "Paul".

aa5874

Assuming them not to be true, using your reasonning, as part of an argument from silence may also beg the question.

It is has not been shown that the word "Christians" or "Christianity" must mean followers of Jesus of Nazareth or doctrine related to the teachings of this Jesus.

Justin Martyr wrote that there were "Christians", who were not followers of Jesus of Nazareth or his doctrine, during the days of Claudius Caesar when they worshipped Simon the Holy God, and based on population estimates, these "Christians" would probably number over a hundred thousand. See "First Apology".

"First Apology" 26 Also, it has not been shown that "Christus" must mean Jesus of Nazareth. Philo of Alexandria did not make note of any "Christus" believed to be the Messiah, or Christ or son of the God of the Jews.

And further, Eusebius in Church History implied that the Synoptics were written first before the epistles, possible during the time of Claudius but most likely long before the death of Nero, yet biblical scholars put the Synoptics well after the death of Nero, giving an indication that the concept of Jesus as the son of God of the Jews, or the Messiah was developped very late and that the "Christians" in Tacitus and Suetonius may not have been followers of this Jesus of Nazareth.

There is a very strong case for the concept of Jesus of Nazareth to have been developped after 70CE.

Clivedurdle

Review of The Gnostic Paul by Pagels

neilgodfrey

..

neilgodfrey

Pagels further uses our canonical text of Paul -- no allowance appears to be made for the possibility of pastoral and other interpolations and what might have been the texts used by the Valentinians. But no matter, since the alleogorical code applied by Pagels can be used to "Valentinize" just about any text -- canonical or Marcionite or Homeric or Jewish.

Newton's Cat

Simon of Cyrene had two sons, Alexander & Rufus

Simon bar Kochba had a son called Rufus.

The 130s revolt had its origins in Cyrene in 116 ad.

What evidence is there for the existence of Christianity before the 130s ad?

It seems to me that maybe someone wrote a story and set it 100 years in the past.

I read somewhere that the earliest actual reference to Christians is a Hebrew text dated to the late 130s ad.

spamandham

What about Tacitus?

neilgodfrey

Can I be lazy and ask you for the source for Rufus being bar Kochba's son?

(And btw Cyrene (Kyrenaios) is punned with the Place of the Skull (kraniou), the place where the messiah was demised.)

And how might the intro of James as one of the top triumvirate be explained in the context of a 130's starting date?

And can you recall anything more about that "earliest actual reference to Chrsitians"?

Ta muchly,
Neil