TedM

Toto, perhaps I have misunderstood your position. I thought you were saying there is no logical argument that makes sense in support of the idea that there was an initial Christian church led by James, the brother of Jesus, around 60AD. Is this your position?

Of course you can always appeal to the lack of evidence, which can be argued back and forth, but I thought you were claiming it just made no logical sense. If so, you have yet to explain why you have conclude that.

The only thing I see that seems to address this is your statement:

Why is it not reasonable to start out with a biological brother of Jesus as head of the Christian Church? Who better? Why would it be unreasonable for Christians to 'still be in Jerusalem' 30 years later if that was the original headquarters? Lastly, I'll point out that Josephus doesn't say anything about this James as a Jewish leader, or the head of the church, so your thoughts on that should not have any bearing on the validity of the passage. As to the grander claims about James being 'Just' and a Jewish leader I guess we'll have to wait for the Robert Price book for more color.


Yes, I was answering 'why else turn to the "brother" of Jesus. I don't need a Dynasty to see the logic in having his brother lead the first Church.

There are problems and mysteries regarding this James. Given multiple attestation to the biological brother idea early on it makes more sense to conclude that there was a literal brother or cousin of Jesus who rose to power than to conclude that it was all a misunderstanding, and the church traditions by Hegissipus were completely made up. Something DID happen though to alienate James in the history: His treatment in the gospels and the failure to introduce him in Acts is evidence that something was lost or deliberately hidden. It would have been far easier for the Catholics to simply remove James from the Gospels and explain the relationship as metaphorical in nature. But they didn't. Even Origen, who explains the 'brother' in terms of similar ethics doesn't deny a biological relationship.


It doesn't glorify God or Jesus or James at all though! How does that 'gloss' glorify any of them? So, this fails. The intentional deceit idea simply fails. The half-asleep idea fails. The marginal gloss fails because the changes most likely require intentional deceit.

Even if you are right somehow, you still have a great unlikelihood of introducing a 'called Christ' without further comment. I would think some passage about a person who was so influential that people used the term for Messiah and everyone knew who that was would have been required in order to justify such a brief reference. So this only works if the James passage was interpolated AFTER the Testimonium passage was written. Is that what you think? If not, how else to explain mentioning 'called Christ' without elaborating?

That's amazing. I would be very surprised to learn that anyone thinks they know what the situation was so well that they can make any kind of conclusion against its history. Does your list of 'serious scholars' include well-respected Christian scholars?

TedM

I don't read it nearly this restrictively. He was arrested because the leaders wanted to arrest him. Simple as that. A big motivating factor was his criticism of them, which included the temple incident. There is a difference between true motivation for arrest and the legal charge(s) made. The claim about rebuilding the temple was simply one charge thrown into the mix of many.

sotto voce

You have tunnel vision!

aa5874

ApostateAbe is just wasting time and it appears to be deliberate.

We have gone through this many times.

ApostateAbe claims his Jesus was ACTUALLY an Apocalyptic preacher.

In effect, he is arguing that his Jesus was NOT the Messiah--NOT Christ.

There is NO evidence whatsoever that the Jesus in Antiquities of the Jews 20.9.1 was an Apocalyptic preacher.

Now, in the Gospels, Jesus was NOT an Apocalyptic preacher--Jesus Preached GOOD NEWS.

Mark 1:14 KJV Jesus had a PRIVATE conversation with his disciples about the Fall of the Temple. See Mark 13.

1. Jesus in Antiquities 20.9.1 was NOT an Apocalyptic preacher.

2. Jesus in the Bible was NOT an Apocalyptic preacher.

There is NO sources of antiquity that mentioned Jesus an Apocalyptic preacher of Nazareth.

TedM

You speak in code!

sotto voce

You wish!

sotto voce

I see where you are going wrong.

Stop reading How To Be Top Dog by Rodrigo Borgia, and open a Bible.

Minimalist

With "christos" merely meaning "the anointed one" it probably is worthwhile mentioning that aside from the two Romans virtually everyone mentioned in that passage was a "christos" at one time or another.

The idea that Josephus usage of the word christos would mean what later xtians wanted him to mean is almost laughable.

I can see some 4th century xtian scribe running through Josephus' text ( no punctuation, no spaces between words, no capitals) and see the word "christos" and peeing in his pants with excitement. But what would a first century Jew have meant by the word.

TedM

Ok, I'll stop reading that right now. The Bible doesn't say how he became the leader, although it does say he saw the resurrected Jesus. Still trying to decipher your coding..

sotto voce

That's half the job.

The Bible says that leaders are due for roasting at > 980 000 000 K. As you would know if you had ever troubled to open one.

Don't read what the oven-ready write.