Gamera

In response I might paraphrase what the unethical prosecutor said: "I know the accused didn't do it, but he sure looks suspicious, so let's convict him anyway."

Ted Hoffman

Carrier has written his review of MacDonald's. I would like to see Malachi write his own review instead of trashing MacDonald's book with void claims.

Ben C Smith

You and I are apparently talking about different things. The borrowing of the NT authors from the LXX extends to far more than structure. Often lines are quoted almost verbatim, key words are echoed in key places, and the themes seem to follow nicely. But one does not find these patches of verbal identity or keyword repetition by tallying up all the differences between the passages.

I suspect that the differences you are talking about are differences within the alleged parallel itself, differences that call that parallel into question on its own terms. I am talking about differences to one side or the other of a true parallel.

Ben.

gstafleu

Everywhere in the NT Jesus is referred to as the son of god, I'm sure I don't have to provide tons of references here. Are all these interpolations or later additions? Even if so, that doesn't change my argument: at some fairly early stage the sacrifice of god, or his immediate family, was incorporated into Christianity, and that does not easily derive from the OT. Or perhaps "Son of God" doesn't mean what it says? In that case you have to be careful not to go question begging.
All you have provided here is an example where there is an interaction between a normal mortal son and God. Nowhere here is there a son of the god himself. Sons were even in those ancient days not an unusual phenomenon .
Again, no son of god in sight. Son of Man, sure. But in the Jewish view man emphatically is not god!

There is no difference between the two, at least not the kind of difference you imply: ritual is myth incarnate. I know there is a tendency these days to see ritual as some sort of meaningless activity, but that misunderstands ritual. What ritual does is reproduce an event from the mythical realm into the worldly realm. So if the ritual has "bread=body, eat it," then the myth has a counterpart of that.

But even if, as you say, it was adopted qua form but not qua content, my argument still stands: it is an important bit (it is after all the central element of the mass, and the mass is the central form of worship, at least it was that for a long time), and that important bit does not derive from the OT. And as to later addition, again both the gospels and Paul (be it in one place, possibly an interpolation) make the equation bread=body, the synoptics do that quite clearly. So it was there in the early stages.

As a general remark, be careful that, when you define "early" Christianity, you don't make the same mistake some HJers make with their historical core: i.e. to define away inconvenient elements until you have left some skeleton that at least doesn't contradict you central hypothesis.

Gerard Stafleu

jakejonesiv

Why should Christianity be exempt from studies of comparative religion?

Here is Robert Price's scathing review of N.T. Wright's The Resurrection of the Son of God.

Malachi151

You misunderstood what I was saying. I was saying that in early documents such as Didache he is referred to as a messenger. By Paul and in the Gospels as Lord or Son of God or Son of Man, and only after the Gospels did people say definitely that he WAS God. Most of the titles applied to "him" by the way, come from long before "him", well, really all of them did.

Malachi151

It shouldn't be excluded, but there are a lot of erroneous claims floating about, such as many by Acharya S, etc. If there isn't some "house keeping" the field can fall further into disrepute, which I have already seen, because when the JM issue is brought up people immediately talk about how so many claims have shown to be false, and they trot out things like The Jesus Mysteries: Was the "Original Jesus" a Pagan God?, which has been trashed because it contains so many bogus claims, etc.

aa5874

Jesus is referred to as the 'son of man' or the 'son of david' almost exclusively in the Gospels, in general only Peter, the Devil, and evil spirits called him the 'Son of God', and as a matter of fact, acccording to the Gospels, Jesus warned his disciples not to let anyone know that he was the 'Son of God'.

And Jesus asked,....... 'Whom do men say that I the son of man am.
And they said, Some say thou art John the Baptist: some Elias; and others, Jeremias, or one of the prophets.' (Matt 16:13-14)

And at the crucifixtion trial it is evident that Jesus was not known as the Son of God.

'But Jesus held his peace. And the high priest answered and said unto him, I adjure thee by the living God, that thou tell us whether thou be the Christ, the Son of God.'

Jesus saith unto him, Thou hast said: nevertheless I say unto you, Hereafter shall ye see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of power, and coming in the clouds in heaven.( Matt 26:63-64).

Also, in the NT, only the person called Saul/Paul and John referred to Jesus as the Son of God, and that is after Jesus died and was supposed to be sitting on the right hand of power.

Where did you get your 'tons of references' from?

Ben C Smith

And the centurion. And Jesus himself in Mark 14.62 (his I am responds to the question a verse earlier: Are you the son of the blessed?) and Luke 22.70. And the passersby at the crucifixion understood Jesus to have claimed to be the son of God.

And the author of the epistle to the Hebrews. And 2 Peter 1.17. And I doubt very much that Revelation was written by the same fellow who wrote the gospel of John (see Revelation 2.18 for another son of God reference).

Ben.

gstafleu

Let's start with Mark 1:1 "The beginning of the gospel about Jesus Christ, the Son of God." Then let's hop to Luke 1:35 "The angel answered, "The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God." Then we have Matthew 27:54 "When the centurion and those with him who were guarding Jesus saw the earthquake and all that had happened, they were terrified, and exclaimed, "Surely he was the Son of God!"" I don't particularly care if Jesus called himself SoG or if his surroundings did so: in the gospels he is repeatedly portrayed as the SoG.

Gerard Stafleu