No Robots

For me, it is the directness, poignancy, profundity and power of what he says that makes it original. Look, Mozart used the same harmonic scale as everybody else, but what he did with it makes him an original genius. The same is true of Christ. For more on this, see here. And quit throwing out the god-man b.s.. I am talking about A MAN.

andrewcriddle

I think one has to distinguish certain senses of 'Historical Jesus' here.

What I mean by the 'Historical Jesus' is the Jesus that can be established with reasonable confidence by the normal methods of historical inquiry to the satisfaction of the consensus of open minded enquirers.

It is surely obvious that assuming that there was a 'real Jesus' at all there must have been much much more about him than can be established as part of this 'Historical Jesus'. Most on this forum would accept a historical John the Baptist but there must have been much more about him than modern historical research can establish. (Similarly for Pontius Pilate)

There is a question as to whether and on what basis one can make justified claims today about the 'real Jesus'. But, irrespective of how far the 'real Jesus' is knowable today, the 'real Jesus' must have included much more than we can say about the 'Historical Jesus'.

There is a useful discussion of this at the beginning of book I of Meier's A Marginal Jew

Andrew Criddle

gurugeorge

This is true, and an excellent point, but on the other hand, if nothing very detailed or interesting can be said about that person (or at least nothing as detailed and interesting as we have about the God-man), on what basis ought he to be worshipped?

gurugeorge

It may be bullshit but it's what millions of people have sincerely believed, and still sincerely believe.

But for the rest, I have no problem with what you say: the fact that you prefer this "voicing" of God is what makes you a Christian. De gustibus and all that. I mostly prefer other utterances of this divine world, but I do recognise the profundity of some of "Christ"'s sayings, and some I deeply love.

post tenebras lux

Why does it have to be someone who said it, rather than the collected sayings of many different people that were adopted, adapted, edited together and then placed into so-called 'letters' and pseudo-histories of a single 'Christ' by the early christians mentioned by gurugeorge?

motorhead

I don't get why people find anything valuable in the teachings of Jesus. They all presuppose the existence of the Jewish God, and they were taught in the context that the world was ending very soon. Even out of this context, there's just nothing worthwhile in his teachings. There's been many, many other teachers, philosophers, etc. in history much greater than Jesus. If there wasn't a world religion around Jesus, the teachings we have in the canonical gospels would be largely ignored.

No Robots

That you find it valueless, unoriginal and uninspiring comes as no surprise. I will stand with the unanimous opinion of all persons of insight against anonymous internet screed. Likewise for the single genius behind the Gospel sayings. As Klausner states:

Besides the parables, there are the striking proverbs of Jesus. They are short, sharp and shrewd, hitting their mark like pointed darts, and, in the manner of homely epigrams and proverbs, impossible to be forgotten. Herein lies the secret why his disciples could preserve the bulk of his proverbs, almost unchanged, precisely as he uttered them. Almost all are stamped with the seal of one great, single personality, the seal of Jesus, and not the several seals of many and various disciples.

gurugeorge

Erm, isn't that a bit rich coming from someone with a "handle" himself?

Some people feel that way, to others it seems like a bunch of sayings from different hands in different times, and of varying quality from the profound to the carping. De gustibus non est disputandum, as I said, so please stop disputanding!

Non-Christians too - I'd say it would be pretty hard not to come up with some sayings of "Jesus" that match the sublimity of Gotama Siddhartha, Jnaneshwar, Ibn Arabi, or "Laozi". How about "Split wood, I am there. Lift up a rock, you will find me there."? Oooh it gives me the shivers even to quote it - extraordinarily, deeply mystical, yet so thunderously direct and simple. Let us allow, what many religions won't allow of others, that there are great peaks of thought in all religions, as well as troughs, otherwise they wouldn't have held the attention of so many evidently intelligent people through the centuries. Christianity is no exception. I often feel that atheists and agnostics go too far when they make everything about Christianity out to be crap. There are crap elements and there are good elements - you won't get Christians to ditch the crap elements by hinting that they're wankers because they believe in something that's total crap, they'll only circle the wagons. Human nature.

Anyway I digress, part of my human nature. As you were!

No Robots

Check my profile. It's all there.

I was disputing against ptl and motorhead. I think you and I are pretty much in agreement, or at least that there exists the possibility of mutual understanding and goodwill.

post tenebras lux

:huh: So you're not disagreeing that these 'sayings of the Christ' could be