Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Vinnie · 01-26-2007, 10:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by motorhead

I have questions for anyone who's read Crossan's book, The Historical Jesus (or via: amazon.co.uk).

How does Crossan justify what sources he's including in his first stratum? He has sources like the Gospel of Thomas and the Gospel of Hebrews, along with something called the Apocalyptic Scenario. The first stratum represents material from 30 to 60 CE. I know in the Appendix for this material he gives a brief explanation but that hardly suffices to justify his including it in this first stratum. Is there some decent level of agreement among scholars that these sources are from 30 to 60CE? Shouldn't part of his argument include justifying these sources are from this period?

Most texts like Thomas can only be date with a grain of salt. There are a few good reasons for viewing some of Thomas as early but the problem is that they are not conclusive. Thus, when recontstructing Jesus either you have to use it or not. To say I don't know is of course to not use it. Crossan seems to thinks its early and uses it. I doubt he has any real certainty on Thomas. Just thinks it more probable than not that the layer he uses is early.

I suggest scholars reconstruct a family tree Jesus: If this data is early I reconstruct Jesus a, if it is not I am left with Jesus b and so on and so on for most of the more controversial sources. For example, if John is independent I have Jesus 7d and if not we have Jesus 7e and so on...

Or maybe history should just stick with the most rudimentary, basic Jesus it can reonstruct with relatively minor controversy. Though that would kill all the fun.....and book sales (I didn't say that).

Vinnie

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