Steven Carr

Matthew 1
21She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins."

Did the name 'Jesus' have symbolic importance for the first generation of Christians?

Is that why the name 'Jesus' was chosen by Christians as the best name for their Saviour?

Solitary Man

More likely, if we follow Krister Stendahl (requiescat in pace) that Matthew utilized the pesher technique (School of Saint Matthew, sorry I don't have the page number), then it is more logical to assume, since neither Mark nor Luke emphasize Jesus' name as being particular to salvific symbolism, that Mt. 1.21 is the author of Matthew's own interpretation taken from the text instead of borrowed from a long and aboriginal tradition.

aa5874

From reading the writings of Josephus, it would appear that the name Jesus was extremely common.

Josephus mentioned persons called Jesus who were robbers, declared to be a madman, and high priest.

There are Jesus the son of Sie, Jesus the son Thebutus, Jesus the son of Ananus, Jesus the son of Sapphias, Jesus the son of Gamalas, Jesus the son of Gamaliel, and Jesus the son of Damneus.

In addition, Josephus, in his Antiquities of the Jews, did not mention any tradition at all for any man or God/man called Jesus. Even when Josephus expounds on the prophets including Isaiah, and Daniel, there is no mention of any person called Jesus who was prophesied to be the begotten son of God.

Casper

Is there a connection between the hebrew and the greek?

I mean in anglophone terms I've heard the substuitutes of Yeshua, Joshuah, Jesus, Iseous, and I think one that I forget. Are these really just guesses?

Solitary Man

The Greek is merely a transliteration of the Hebrew. The original Hebrew was Yehoshua, and that later was shortened to Yeshua or Yeshu. In Greek, the transliteration for both was Ιησους, and thence came the Latin transcription of the Greek, which was Iesus. In the middle ages, the consonantal I in Latin became J, and thus Jesus.

Equinox

OK, most of us are quite familiar with Ish 7:14, and the fact that it's fulfilled a couple chapters later, and is about a current situation, not about a future messiah.

Plus, it's clear that 7:14 uses the name "Immanuel", and we never hear about Immanuel Christ, only Jesus Christ. So is there some way that "Immanuel"="Jesus", that is based on evidence and not on apologetics? I'm sure that there is some standard apologetic line (and OK, we can discuss that), but is it just an ad hoc construction, or does it hold water? Or is it just a way that the Gospel writer tried to smooth over an obvious problem, trying to make an OT verse become a prophecy?

I tried some searches on this on this board and didn't find anything, though I'm sure this has been discussed before.

Thanks-

Equinox

neilgodfrey

Well if I was sceptical I'd wonder about this, but we all know how common the names were . . . .

So as Joseph Campbell pointed out long ago, the fact that John the Baptist bears the same name and practices the same rite as Ea (= Oannes, Ionnes, Johannes, Yohanan) the water god, we must put down to coincidence.

Coincidence, too, for the name Capernaum meaning city of comfort, and just happening to be the centre of the ministry of Jesus.

Also coincidence is the prominence of Bethsaida, the House of the Fishermen, where Jesus was directing his followers who he had promised to be fishers of men.

And that Levi the son of Alphaeus should happen to be a tax collector for Romans yet bear a Jewish priestly name and introduce a story about superseding Jewish laws and the unclean is obviously coincidental too.

And equally coincidental is the name of Alphaeus as the father first of Levi who was called but did not make it into the Twelve, and also of another who did, -- the name Alphaeus meaning, coincidentally, "the Designation Given to a Child Thought of As a Substitute for One Lost".

And that the name Jairus means something like Awakened should be the father of the girl said to be sleeping but who was resurrected is also coincidence.

And that Bartimaeus has been interpreted as having a couple of different meanings and that both are used for symbolic commentary on his recovery from his visionary blindness is another coincidence of names.

And that Judas should be the betrayer of Jesus, just as Judah betrayed Joseph, and just as the Jews were said to be the primary culprits in the betrayal and execution of Jesus, is another of a long list of monotonous coincidences.

This list is by no means complete. But just one more . . .

That the leader of the faith that replaced that of Moses should bear the name of the one who, well, replaced Moses and fulfilled the promises of Moses, Jesus, well . . . .

But we must remember how common all these names were. All quite coincidental, of course. (There were probably even lots of Capernaums and Bethsaidas, too!)

Neil

mountainman

Jesus was not a name used by name in the beginning. Originally at its most ancient chronological place it was a simply and only - in the textual record - a nomina sacra abbreviation. In fact the same abbreviation as used to represent name Joshua. Someone got control of the old nomina sacra by the old switcheroo. It was a symbol of power in the written greek, and particularly the greek LXX at the time.

The name "Jesus" was chosen because one could generate from the name a nomina sacra abbreviation that generations before had been written. The old form of "Joshua" had some sort of "public authenticity" which was then somewhat bent by the new political authors of "not the old but the new" testament.


IMO.

Best wishes,



Pete

Toto

Jesus is just the Greek form of Joshua. It is used in the Septuagint wherever Joshua is used in the Hebrew Scriptures, and not as a nomina sacra.

gstafleu

Jesus=Yoshua/Yeshua, and that means something like "God saves." Plus, Yoshua was the one who led the Jews to the promised land. So, yes, "Jesus" did have significance for the early Christians = Jews.

Gerard Stafleu