Originally Posted by stephan huller

But we should flesh this out a little better as this is becoming a mythicist forum. The Church Fathers beginning with Justin didn't make the connection between the man 'Joshua' and the man 'Jesus' but rather - once again using the LXX - the idea that the name 'Iesous' was a supernatural being who transformed Oshea into the Savior and presumably did the same with an individual in the gospel narrative (= adoptionalism). This is very important to make sense of the material because it has to be noted that there is absolutely no precedent for the Joshua-Jesus connection as generally put forth (Kraft's book embarrassingly misrepresents the actual Samaritan position).

Originally Posted by stephan huller

...Couldn't the gospel have been a 'myth' (God I hate using that term) which - in its original Marcionite form - could be unlocked through applying the standard idea of Moses making the sign of the Cross and Joshua being 'adopted' by the name Jesus?

Originally Posted by sotto voce

All this stuff and nonsense! What the hell are you people farting about, eh? Unless you're all concealed Jesuits, which is quite probable, come to think of it!

Originally Posted by jakejonesiv

....But, with that being said, yes the figure of gospel Jesus is almost all derived from reading the Septuagint in an allegorical manner, and the clues point to an Alexandrian origin. But you knew that.

Jake

Originally Posted by EarlDoherty

Appendix 4
Dating Hebrews and the Authenticity of the Postscript
[page 214, 247, n.4]
__________________________________________________ ______
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A possible argument ruling out a late provenance for Hebrews is an apparent quoting from its first chapter in 1 Clement. In 36:1-6 one finds several cases of language in parallel with that in the first chapter of Hebrews. But this raises a separate question which is of some significance: is it in fact necessary to see 1 Clement as familiar with Hebrews itself? The author does not cite it by name, as he does the Pauline epistles elsewhere. Attridge has suggested (op.cit., p.6-7) that Hebrews’ author, in his scriptural citations in chapter 1, is drawing on an existing catena of biblical proof texts which may have served certain early Christian communities as demonstrating the exaltation of the Son in heaven. But if so, that collocation could be the source of 1 Clement’s own listing. Indeed, Clement’s different order may reflect the order of the catena, an order which the Hebrews author might have altered in the interests of fashioning a much larger argument. Even Clement’s reference to the comparison of the Son with the angels (and it has distinctive anomalies in wording from that of Hebrews) could conceivably be part of such a catena document, since it serves to make the point about the Son’s superior status in heaven, even if it is not a scriptural citation.

It is true that Clement in 36:1 refers to Christ as “high priest,” perhaps the strongest indicator of a knowledge of the Hebrews christology and the document itself. And yet, 1 Clement in its great length nowhere applies this idea of Jesus as high priest in the distinctive manner of Hebrews, a high priest conducting a heavenly sanctuary sacrifice. If he knew and subscribed to this document as a whole, it is certainly a matter for curiosity that he would not draw on or reflect some of its powerful and distinctive christology. Nor do we see any sign in 1 Clement of the negative attitude toward the Temple cult which is so prominent in Hebrews.

There is thus ample reason to doubt that 1 Clement is anywhere dependent on or even has knowledge of the Epistle to the Hebrews, but is merely drawing on common traditions and sources. This would preserve Hebrews’ independence and isolation from other cultic Christ expressions, something the document itself more than suggests. As for sharing the term “high priest” for Jesus, a designation found nowhere else in early Christian writings, 1 Clement might have derived it from other circles which have left no record; or it may have been a concept with some currency in Jewish intermediary Son philosophy, drawn on by the Hebrews community as well. Philo also refers to the Logos or first-born of God as a “high priest” (On Dreams 1.215, On Flight and Finding 108), though not with the same degree of personification as is found in Hebrews and 1 Clement.

Originally Posted by aa5874

I am also of the view that the Jesus story was likely to originate in Alexandria.

1. The Septuagint was composed in Alexandria.

2. In early Canonised stories, Jesus left Egypt then came to Nazareth.

3. The version of Isaiah 7.14 for the birth of Jesus came from the Septuagint.

4. Celsus, in "Against Celsus" claimed Jesus left Egypt as a magician.

5. In "Church History" the author of the earliest Jesus story, Mark, preached and started Churches in Alexandria.

Amazingly, an Apologetic writer associates the author of the earliest Jesus story in Alexandria as the FIRST story and to have established the First Churches.

Church History 2.1.

Originally Posted by jakejonesiv

OMG, our cover is blown!! :hysterical:

Originally Posted by sotto voce

Ιδού, in shameless display, the modern, technicolor, authentic Constantinian confession of guilt, now that democracy is here.

Originally Posted by jakejonesiv

Woops, you might have the wrong guy. I don't think Constantine was a Christian.

Jake

Originally Posted by jakejonesiv

Woops, you might have the wrong guy. I don't think Constantine was a Christian.

Jake