Steven Carr

What exactly is there in Matthew 23 for the Corinthians and Thessalonians to take the words of Jesus and take them to mean that the dead are lost?

I don't see why.

Didn't Christians think the oral tradition of Jesus teaching about a resurrection was worth spreading?

How then did it spread to the author of Matthew , if we can't be sure that it reached even a major figure like Paul?

Ben C Smith

I am not certain what Matthew 23, a list of invectives against the scribes and Pharisees, has to do with the resurrection.

The text in question is Didache 16. That is the text that Garrow thinks Paul delivered to the Thessalonians. Didache 16.7 is the line that Carlson, modifying Garrow, thinks the Thessalonians misunderstood. Once the Thessalonians had illegitimately restricted the resurrection to the patriarchs and prophets of yore, there was nothing to be done but to point out the error, which Paul does (on this hypothesis) by emphasizing that the dead in Christ would be raised.

You do not see why a particular tradition may have reached one person or group but not another? What model of transmission are you thinking of?

I am sure they did.

Perhaps it would help if you would narrow down which resurrection sayings in Matthew (or Mark, or Luke) Paul (A) should have known and (B) should have used to correct the Thessalonian misunderstanding as Garrow has sketched it out.

Ben.

Steven Carr

That was a typo. I meant Matthew 24.

As for the rest of your questions, assuming that you genuinely don't know the answers, it simply illustrates the bankruptcy of historical Jesus research, as there is no way of knowing what stories about Jesus were circulating, or why major figures like Paul did or did not know any given story about an historical Jesus.

Clivedurdle

May we keep this simple please!

Are we saying Paul, using Didache, corrected a belief about resurrection from the dead? Please do not assume a human Jesus, this is causing real confusion!

Assume Jesus is in the heavens and has carried out actions that enable resurrection to occur for everyone, not a few as in the older story. Because Jesus has done this in the heavens - death where is thy sting - xians dying does raise a little problem cos death is meant to have stopped, requiring a new theological solution.

And what is this solution?

That the Christ must become as a man and suffer and die as we do, and the rest is history!

We are looking in these verses at the creation of the myth of the human Jesus!

Ben C Smith

Ah, so you must specifically have been referring to the resurrection part of Matthew 24, which would be... what?

I myself see resurrection imagery in Matthew 24.31:

And he will send forth his angels with a great trumpet and they will gather together his elect from the four winds, fron one end of heaven to the other.

But only a close familiarity with the Hebrew scriptures would tag this as a resurrection verse. Without such familiarity, how would the Thessalonians know to apply the elect to their own dead? The very content of their mistake, according to Garrow and Carlson, was that they had understood the resurrection to apply only to the patriarchs and prophets!

Paul (on his founding visit): There will be a resurrection, but not of all; as it is said: The Lord will come, and all his holy ones with him (as per Didache 16.7).

Thessalonians (after a saint or two has died): Oh, no! We thought Jesus was going to return before any of us died, and that the resurrection was for the departed saints of yore. What will happen to the dead in Christ? Are they lost for good?

Paul (in his first letter): You misunderstood what I passed on to you. I have it on good authority (a word of the Lord) that the dead in Christ will participate in the resurrection, too.

That last line is what Paul actually says in 1 Thessalonians. Imagine him referring to Matthew 24.31 instead:

Paul (alternate letter): Well, Jesus said that he will send forth the angels to gather the elect.

How would that particular dominical saying help the Thessalonians out if they have already misinterpreted the holy ones (in this verse, the elect) as dead patriarchs and prophets?

Or consider another dominical resurrection saying:

Paul (alternate letter): Well, Jesus said that those who rise from the dead will neither marry nor be given in marriage, and that God is the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

Again, how would that particular dominical saying help the Thessalonians out? Indeed, the mention of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob would only reinforce their impression that the resurrection applied to dead patriarchs and prophets!

That is correct. I genuinely do not know which dominical resurrection saying(s) you have in mind that Paul could have used to correct the Thessalonian misunderstanding according to Garrow as modified by Carlson.

Come, come.

The problems of which sayings and stories go back to Jesus (for instance, which if any of the son of man sayings are authentic?), how or how far they circulated (for instance, what goes back to oral traditions and what to written sources?), who knew what (for instance, did Luke know Matthew, or vice versa, or were they independent?), and the like have occupied many great minds for many years, as you well know.

But all that is quite tangential to our problem on this thread... unless you can point out at least one dominical resurrection saying that (A) Paul should have known and (B) Paul should have used to correct the Thessalonian misunderstanding of the resurrection.

Ben.

Clivedurdle

The elect idea also appears in Revelation. There is also the question who is the gospel for - the chosen people or everyone - a battle that is replayed in various ways throughout the xian canon. There are existing denominations that take opposing views on this - some of those alleged saints who have died are said to be not part of the elect for example. 144,000 was reached a long time ago!

Take Jesus out and it is a lot clearer, this continual wild goose chase of referring to Jesus just kicks up a smokescreen!

Clivedurdle

Chapter and verse please! That looks like a paraphrase! (the "Jesus said" bit!)

Ben C Smith

Matthew 22.30-32 = Mark 12.25-27 = Luke 20.34-38. And yes, it was a paraphrase (Jesus said that...).

I fear I do not understand what you have been saying on this thread (with the exception of the request for chapter and verse). I am not using the dominical resurrection sayings as some sort of proof for an historical Jesus. Rather, my claim is that understanding the Thessalonian misunderstanding of the resurrection does not depend on whether Jesus did or did not utter what the synoptics say he uttered about the resurrection (nor even on whether Jesus himself even existed). It is well known and generally agreed that, in the synoptics, Jesus is notoriously vague on the general resurrection.

Ben.

Ben C Smith

True. And in Jewish and Christian apocalyptic (and nonapocalyptic) works across the spectrum. It is a quite common concept.

Ben.

Steven Carr

Matthew 22
29Jesus replied, "You are in error because you do not know the Scriptures or the power of God. 30At the resurrection people will neither marry nor be given in marriage; they will be like the angels in heaven. 31But about the resurrection of the dead—have you not read what God said to you, 32'I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob' ? He is not the God of the dead but of the living."

33When the crowds heard this, they were astonished at his teaching.

Crowds of people heard Jesus teaching that there would be a resurrection of the dead.

They were astonished at his teaching.

Pity that these crowds of people never told Paul, or the churches in Thessalonica or Corinth that Jesus had proved there was going to be a general resurrection.

Or else there would have been no dispute, and Paul could simply have pointed to Jesus teaching.

And, of course, whole churches of converted Jesus worshippers must have been ignorant of the idea expressed in John 6:40 'Everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.'

Just think how well that could have slotted into 1 Corinthians 15!

Out of curiosity can you name one Christian who has ever written that Matthew 22:32 shows that the resurrection only applied to dead prophets and patriarchs?

Historical Jesus reasearch seems to be about taking shreds of speculation about what people might have thought, without even the tiniest bit of evidence to back it up, rather than admit the obvious - there was no historical Jesus who said those things.