Diogenes the Cynic

You're conflating your prophecies. Matthew 23:36 is talking about the destruction of the Temple, not the end of the world or the Parousia. It was an event which had already occurred relative to when Matthew wrote his Gospel and had happened within the "generation" Matthew has Jesus speaking to.
Mark is quoting from Daniel. He is having Jesus claim to be the Messiah but even if there was an HJ, this exchange is entirely fiction. In fact, the entire trial before the Sanhedrin is one of the most obvious fictions in Mark.

Incidentally, in this verse, the Greek word for "you shall see" (opsesthe) is spoken in the second person plural, so it's addressed to the Sanhedrin collectively, not just the High Priest.

Vorkosigan

AA, imagine if you are sitting in an audience listening to this, and the reader reads out Jesus' words ("there are some standing here...."). Ancient texts were meant to be read aloud, and all writers knew that. The writer is sending a message to his own time.

The meanings of words in ancient literary texts are subject to multiple interpretations even by their writers, never mind the various audiences that listened to them. Whatever makes you confuse "Occam" with "a 21st century literal reading?" I have some discussion of this passage on my website

http://users2.ev1.net/%7Eturton/GMar...html#13.p.1.31

...but essentially, unless you want to believe that Jesus in 33 really knew about false christs and persecuted Churches, the story in this passage must be literary in origin and function.

Vorkosigan





Vorkosigan

mikem

This verse reads more like a threat than a promise. Since the gospels originally came without chapter and verse divisions, this verse looks like it is the conclusion to the previous group of sayings about not being ashamed of the Son of Man at his coming. If Mark had created this saying for his readers/hearers he seemed to be doing it to scare the living daylights out of them.

Alternatively of course, Jesus was warning his hearers about the danger of complacency in view of the imminent coming of the kingdom, a message reinforced throughout the gospels in Jesus teaching proclamation of the kingdom

jjramsey

Judging from Mark 13, it looks like Jesus is expecting the end to come shortly after the temple's destruction.

jjramsey

It does not follow from this that the audience does not understand that it is still hearing an account of Jesus addressing Jesus' audience, and that they are not being talked to directly.

It's not as if Jesus was the only messianic claimant, and in Mark 13:11, I see a references to persecuted disciples, not persecuted churches.

Amaleq13

I was not aware that all allegories have hints within them that are even apparent to readers two thousand years later. Wherever did you learn that?

Vorkosigan

Apostate Abe has made claims about authorial intention based on a very narrow understanding of the text. I am simply offering him other ways to read the text, some of which are found commonly in the literature.

Oh please. A distinction without a difference (difference between Church and body of believers thereof, for the purposes of this discussion?). Relevant fact: Jesus appears to have knowledge of the future.

Vorkosigan

jjramsey

Revelation is in large part allegorical (or at least symbolic), and there are hints, for example, pointing to the beast as representing the Roman empire. The same can be said for Daniel. Pieces of the Gospels, like the talk of the Good Shepherd are also allegorical, and it is fairly clear what the referents in that allegory are.

You were trying to say that Christian scholars were committed to a historical Jesus but there was a wide variation among non-Christian scholars. The problem is that the first statement is dubious because nominally Christian scholars have thrown away stuff that based on their religious bent, they should have been committed to, such as the Resurrection. The second statement is simply false. If it were true, one would tend to see the Jesus-myth as a respected minority position in, say, the SBL, much as Q-skepticism is a respected minority position. This is not the case, though.

To be fair, yes, I am. Hovind is putting up $250,000 to anyone who can disprove him, but it's a rigged bargain. The $5,000 is only payment for a stage of debate. What both have in common is that when the money in question isn't taken, it is taken as a vindication for those putting up the money.

One can argue that he was a mere mortal, and that he didn't resurrect, and be accepted as a scholar as well. Given that biblical scholars argue for so many things that contradict mainstream Christianity, the idea that a mythical Jesus is somehow too scary for scholars to countenance doesn't wash.

I like the "coward" bit. It's a cute attempt at intimidation. My knowledge is certain at a layman's level, and I won't deny that. Ben C. Smith or S.C. Carlson, for example, could probably do much better in a debate than I. No, I am not interested in a debate; IIDB is already more of a time sink for me than it should be, a fun time sink at times, but a time sink nonetheless. If you want to show that the Jesus-myth stuff is credible, then start a thread showing that it is a more parsimonious explanation than Jesus the mortal apocalyptic prophet.

You are reading "body" into the text.

Relevant fact: Jesus' predictions are easy extrapolations of the current circumstances and his apocalyptic beliefs.

Diogenes the Cynic

So what?

jjramsey

Remember that AA was pointed Matt. 23:36 as an upper limit on when the end would come to pass. You replied that the passage was about the destruction of the Temple, not the end of the world per se. If Jesus expects the end to come shortly after the Temple's destruction, then the worst one can say is that AA cited secondary evidence for this upper limit that is better supported elsewhere, like Mark 9:1.