dog-on

"Leaving it at that" means I try not to read things into the text that are not there.

In my view, whatever Paul's meaning happened to be, no where was he referring to the actual specific location of the crucifixion of Jesus. If Paul did, indeed, make such a specific reference, there would be nothing to discuss regarding this matter. You are repeatedly trying to extract this location through your interpretation, but you must accept the fact that it's not, in actuality, there.

The stumbling stone of Paul's message was that the Jews no longer needed to follow the Law of Moses. The Law which was laid down in Zion (heaven) by "God" (and, in my opinion, betrays Paul's belief to be more in-line with the beliefs of the proto-gnostics/marcionites regarding the demiurge than to those of the proto-orthodox, or indeed, to the beliefs ascribed to Paul by later editors and writers). The Jews, (in Paul's mind), may have viewed his "Good News" as simply another test, to which Yahweh had, on so many occasions previously, subjected his chosen people.

post tenebras lux

If the writer of Paul thought that Jesus was physically crucified outside Jerusalem, isn't it rather odd that he makes no mention of it* when he's talking of his trip to Jerusalem?

* Nor of the tomb from whence Jesus rose up, the room where he broke bread for the last time, the place where he was held, tried, whipped and mocked, etc.

Chris Weimer

Why do you think its odd? What would you expect Paul to say? Maybe, just maybe, we should believe Paul when he denigrates the flesh and exaults the spirit. Life of Jesus? Not as important to him as the new life of Jesus.

dog-on

Considering normal human nature, if Paul had know of such things, we definitely would have heard about it.

Gamera

He makes no mention of it in his epistles, which are "arts", the application of Christian principles to the lives of 1st century Christians. So, no, it isn't odd that he doesn't mention the Jesus narrative there.

He seems to have done nothing but mention the Jesus narrative in his actual preaching of the gospel, as 1 Cor. 15 indicates. But the epistles do not record the gospel preaching of Paul in any detail. They just mention that he did preach the Jesus narrative, and tradition confirms it. It really isn't in dispute.

Hence:

Romans 6:6 - We know that our old self was crucified with him so that the sinful body might be destroyed, and we might no longer be enslaved to sin.

Corinthians 1:13 - Is Christ divided? Was Paul crucified for you? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul?

Corinthians 1:23 - but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles,

1 Corinthians 2:2 - For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.

1 Corinthians 2:8 - None of the rulers of this age understood this; for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.

2 Corinthians 13:4 - For he was crucified in weakness, but lives by the power of God. For we are weak in him, but in dealing with you we shall live with him by the power of God.

Galatians 2:20 - I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me; and the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

Galatians 3:1 - O foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you, before whose eyes Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed as crucified?

Galatians 5:24 - And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.

Galatians 6:14 - But far be it from me to glory except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.

GakuseiDon

Ah, maybe Simon Magus. I see. Were those changes put in by historicists, to show that Paul believed in a historical Jesus, IYO? If so, why did they do such a poor job? Why didn't they put in Gospel details? If not, who put the changes in, and why?

I think there are two questions here:
1. If we take Paul's letters as we have them today, does Paul appear to believe in a historical Jesus?
2. If we look into Paul's letters to try to recover the "original Paul", does Paul appear to believe in a historical Jesus?

But (2) would be dependent on how much "Paul" is in Paul's epistles. You said originally that there would be no point debating since you would be claiming interpolation, and I disagreed since identifying which ones you considered as interpolations in effect shows agreement that there are "historicist-like" statements in Paul (otherwise why put in the interpolations?) It then came down to whether interpolation was a reasonable stance for those passages or not. But your comment "maybe Simon Magus" moves this out of my comfort zone. I know that you aren't claiming this yourself, but that you float it in the first place is interesting. As I wrote, it all sounds pretty adhoc. You may well be right, but it doesn't sound like you have a cohesive case at the moment. I'd be interested to read that case in the future. Thanks dog-on.

Minimalist

Fine, let's use The Iliad instead. Greek gods playing with men as if involved in some sort of game. Schliemann felt there was enough history in it to go digging in Turkey. He found a series of Bronze Age towns piled upon one another and made all sorts of conclusions on that basis. Does that make the Iliad 'history?' Troy VIIA shows signs of destruction near the end of the Late Bronze Age but in no way have the identities of the attackers been established. In fact, in roughly that time period the entire Eastern Mediterranean was ravaged by the Sea People, as the Egyptians called them. Some were doubtlessly Hellenic in origin as the Philistines who ended up on the Canaanite coast around 1150 BC employed Hellenic-style pottery. Yet the Sea Peoples seem to have taken out the Mycenean centers at roughly the same time as 'Troy' and Crete and Cyrus and the Hittites, etc. So is it history or etiology? No one can know what was in Homer's mind when he wrote the tale. The same can be said of gospel writers or "Paul" if he even existed.

Let's be clear about something since you don't like to have your position misstated, I feel the same way. I take the gospels as works of fiction. Period. If there is any trace of historical fact in them it is roughly the same type of 'history' that one can find in Gone With The Wind. Yes, there was a Civil War and a Robert E Lee, Jefferson Davis, Abraham Lincoln and William Sherman. However, those actual people had nothing to do with the fictional characters of Scarlett O'Hara and Rhett Butler. We have only a handful of actual facts from the period in question in the gospels and the later gospel writers would have had access to the same works. Textual criticism is fine but I find it less compelling than piecing together the handful of known facts and seeing that the gospels fail to concoct a coherent story on the basis of those facts. Call it a personal preference if you like but I find it more compelling that the gospel writers cannot agree on whenJesus' alleged birth or death happened. I do not begrudge you the intellectual stimulation of arguing about what "Paul" meant.


Historical fact is not apologetics. And some of these people are quite intelligent even if they are forced into some outrageous positions because of their belief system. One could cast aspersions about arguing about handwritten copies of copies of copies of old texts, also, but if you enjoy it, be my guest.

ALL ancient writers must be evaluated critically. Herodotus claims a Persian army of millions invaded Greece....Caesar never made a mistake or lost a battle if you listen to him. Josephus is no different and, when he is describing (or trying to excuse, if you will) his own actions he is downright laughable. Still, archaeology has confirmed much of the big picture of his history even if some of the details remain fuzzy. Where he or his Flavian patrons were not directly involved his history is invaluable. Where those conditions do apply one does need to hold one's nose. No argument there.


1- Which assertions? About Pilate being in Jerusalem at exactly the right time for the gospel writers....whatever that time may have been? Read the last chapter of the Antiquities and you see a definitive pattern emerging as things spiral out of control. The period of the Judean praefecture was relatively calm. Claudius turned the entire region over to Herod Agrippa and only after Agrippa's death did the Romans resume direct control of the area under a series of Procurators. While the terms themselves are roughly equivalent the actions of the later procurators were much more concerned with military matters. It is in this time period, leading up to the Great Revolt, when there was virtually constant conflict in the area and the Romans were, in fact, keeping an eye on Jerusalem during the Passover. Prior to Agrippa's rule, such activities are rare. The gospel writers wrote of the period with which they were most familiar.

I'm perfectly willing to consider the possibility that he disregarded it for the same reason that "Paul" seems to have disregarded it. It was not important to his purpose. But that just begs the question then of, why did it become important to "Matthew" and "Luke?"


You assume that I have not. Dangerous to assume. Who was present when Caesar was murdered? He was....and the assassins. In the main it seems reasonable to assume that few of them would have long survived the Battle of Phillipi. So what is the source for the later historians? For that matter, who is the source for the alleged records of Jesus' trial? Pilate? You see, that has to work both ways.

You miss the point, deliberately perhaps. Plutarch and Dio Cassius do not list their sources....Plutarch, as I recall merely says "some writers." We do not know what happened except on the word of these writers, writing long after the fact. Who is to say that they are not indulging in literary fantasy, as well? We have the example of ancient writers concocting speeches for their characters. Why accept everything else at face value?
...

Thanks, Amaleq, for the tip on the brackets, but I don't think I quite have the knack, yet! If you wouldn't mind straightening it out and letting me know what went wrong?

Chris Weimer

Minimalist - please fix your quote tags. I can't really understand the conversation.

dog-on

The argument you are trying to make would be, in my mind, anachronistic. I do not believe that "historicists" changed Paul to show that Paul believed in a historical Jesus. I think that the proto-Orthodoxy changed Paul in order to better conform his views to their own. At the same time (and probably more importantly), the Orthodoxy tried to show, in the minds of certain competing congregations (such as the marcionites), that Paul had agreed with the Orthodoxy all along and that it was simply due to the misunderstanding of scripture and the heretical actions of their leaders (like Marcion, etc.), that their beliefs had been led astray.


I do not believe that, taking the Paulines as a whole, a convincing case for Paul's belief in the Jesus as portrayed in the Gospel accounts (you must admit that none of these guys would buy your version of an HJ, right?) can be made without first reading the Gospel understanding back into Paul.

A very, very loud, argument from silence, if you will.

Paul believes in the deity known as Christ Jesus. He makes no reference to a "historical Jesus of Nazareth, itinerant preacher", so my answer would have to be no (at least not in the sense you mean it).

Don, I believe that "Paul" was some type of gnostic or a docetist. The interpolations I would claim, by the Orthodoxy, would be for the following purposes:

1. Attempting to show that Paul wrote of a fleshy (and not in the historical Jesus sense, please) Christ and opposed to a non-fleshy being.

2. Attempting to "Judaize" (sp?) Paul.

3. Attempting to hide the fact that Paul may have, indeed, believed in the concept of the demiurge and the unknowable god.

etc...

In my mind, when all the data is taken into account, this is where one, logically, ends up!

dog-on

Lovely quotations! The, "It really isn't in dispute.", line is simply ridiculous. Do any of these quotations actually help the HJ case? I don't see it.

For the sake of arguement, pick the strongest one and tell me why that particular statement nails HJ to a tree.