stephan huller

I didn't have a clue about Christianity until I was about eighteen years old. One of the first passages in the New Testament that seemed corrupt to me when I began to read the Christian Bible was 1 Thessalonians 4:17:

Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord

I can't explain what struck me as odd about this passage. Perhaps it is the idea of Christians rising from the dead and flying up to see Jesus. Then when I was reading Clement of Alexandria tonight and I was struck by how absolutely at odds Clement's use of the passage is. It is as if he doesn't know Paul is speaking of something that is supposed to happen to us at the Second Coming. Instead Clement seems to think 'we meet Jesus' in the hear and now:

I want to remind my readers that our canon makes it seem the 'meeting with Jesus' and becoming one happens in the hereafter:

I can't believe that Clement could take a passage that foretells the events at the Second Coming and then reuse them for a symbolic association with the presbytery. Is it too much to suppose that Clement's text simply spoke about 'meeting Jesus' in the here and now.

avi

Thank you Stephan, for another interesting thread.

I don't know the answer to your question.

I do have an observation, based upon the clarity provided by DCHindley's outstanding research, as well as Philosopher Jay's and MaryHelena's thoughtful comments, regarding one of the passages in Corinthians.

First, I am going to copy Thessalonians 4: 14, 15, 16, and 17, highlighting just a couple of words, for emphasis.

14: ei gar pisteuomen oti ihsouV apeqanen kai anesth outwV kai o qeoV touV koimhqentaV dia tou ihsou axei sun autw

15: touto gar umin legomen en logw kuriou oti hmeiV oi zwnteV oi perileipomenoi eiV thn parousian tou kuriou ou mh fqaswmen touV koimhqentaV

16: oti autoV o kurioV en keleusmati en fwnh arcaggelou kai en salpiggi qeou katabhsetai ap ouranou kai oi nekroi en cristw anasthsontai prwton

17: epeita hmeiV oi zwnteV oi perileipomenoi ama sun autoiV arpaghsomeqa en nefelaiV eiV apanthsin tou kuriou eiV aera kai outwV pantote sun kuriw esomeqa

My hypothesis is that this chapter of Paul's letter to the Thessalonians, four, has been altered, from the original. I think it was changed at least once, maybe twice.

1. Is it Jesus, or "lord", or "Christ"? Christ, here, and elsewhere in Paul's letters, looks to me like an interpolation.
Question:
What happens to the logic, theology, and language, if one omits the phrase highlighted in green, in verse 16?
"and those dead in Christ (whatever that means???) will rise first.

I deny that any change occurs. The text remains a message of comfort to those who have lost a loved one through death. The business about those who die, presumably believing in the divinity of Jesus, ascending first to Heaven, after Jesus descends to Earth, is full of contradictions, and could reasonably represent two hours of discussion, all by itself, but, the main point, from my perspective, is that omission of this whole phrase does not change Paul's message of compassion. This phrase, highlighted in green, appears to my eyes, as a simple marketing gimmick, inserted simply to gain more cash from the bereaved, one or more centuries after Paul's original text. The text, in my opinion, reads exactly the same, without that phrase highlighted in green.

2. Arcangel????
Wow.
So, not the son of god. Just another angel, albeit a lofty one.

Notice the juxtaposition of theos (god) with kuriou (Jesus). Seems awfully clear to me, that Paul does not regard Jesus as equal to, or a part of God--the three headed deity. Why does Jesus descend with "God's trumpet", not his own trumpet? Answer: he is not YHWH. If he were, then, why would his voice correspond to the SHOUT emanating from a mere ANGEL, rather than from YHWH himself? "God's trumpet", is a kind of talisman, a source of authority, indicating Jesus' secure stature within the hierarchy of deities. He was a messenger, a prophet, but not God, himself.

Why would Jesus need to shout? Perhaps the Christian message was unable to reach the ears of non-believers, over the din of competing sects?

With regard to Clement's Stromata, written at the start of the third century CE, one worries about interpolation on a grand scale.....Was he a Platonist? a Gnostic? follower of Epicurus? a stoicist? What about Docetism? It looks like a potpourri. If you don't like what is written on page 17, turn to page 27, and you will find something entirely different.

We have too few manuscripts to know for sure what he actually wrote, and what had been added later, for political expediency.

avi

aa5874

Well, do we have a lot of manuscripts from Plutarch, Suetonius, Tacitus and Josephus, Lucian, etc...... to know for sure what they actually wrote?

It is virtually IMPOSSIBLE to know who wrote every word in any extant text.

We have the Pauline writings and it simply cannot be shown that the Pauline writers were INCAPABLE of writing Thessalonians 4.17 when it cannot even be established when any of the Pauline writings were ACTUALLY composed.