avi

Thanks Clive. Appreciate your response.

I was attempting to dispute Philospher Jay's learned discourse on why the presumptive execution of a supposed historical Jesus made no sense during the Passover Religious Ceremony. I am not sure that my argument was persuasive. In that vein, I had suggested that Roman tolerance for Jewish Religious fetes and customs may have been considerably less that what we are accustomed to, living twenty centuries later. I was not then, and am not now, suggesting that Roman Governors never permitted local religious practices, including construction of large temples in which to worship local gods, to take place. On the contrary, I suppose that local customs were tolerated, so long as the wheat, olives, citrus, and timber were shipped to Rome.

avi

I find this Wiki article succinct, and to the point, re: Bar-Kochba revolt: 132-136CE:
So, Clive, I guess I have to disagree with your assessment. I think there is at least some opinion out there, in print so to speak, expressing a perspective not too dissimilar from the one I have espoused.

avi

Yeah, you are correct, and I err. I was trying to suggest that the authors of the four gospels, all Greeks, were writing about a fictional character, named Jesus, who was a Greek speaking Jew. I was trying to suggest, that otherwise, i.e. if Jesus did not comprehend spoken Greek, the clarification offered in Mark 7:26, explicitly pointing out that this Syrian-Phoenician female spoke Greek, makes no sense, not that any part of the Gospels is necessarily logical, I agree....

Craigart14

Don't fight, guys. I think there may well have been a historical Jesus--an itinerant rabbi named Yeshua--but there were, I expect, many Jewish men named Yeshua and many itinerant rabbis. And the Romans crucified several shiploads of people. I don't believe, though, that the Jesus described in the Gospels was real, nor do I believe that he healed lepers, cast out demons, and resurrected the dead. I don't believe he was born of a virgin any more than I believe that Achilles' mother was a sea-nymph or that Zeus impregnated Leda while in the form of a giant swan. I don't believe Jesus was resurrected in the flesh. Paul's visions do not assert that he was, though the Gospel writers go to great lengths to "prove" that he was. A vision is an hallucination, a waking dream, and just about anything can happen in a dream. Real Jesus, maybe; real miracles, um, no. But there's no reason to fuss too much over terminology.

Craig

Craigart14

I'll buy this. The Romans actually were pretty tolerant of other religions, but they also expected everyone to worship their gods as well, lest a god be angered by less than perfect attendance at the festival or sacrifice and rain down disaster, like the Wickersham Brothers on Whoville. For Jews and Christians, it would be blasphemy to take part in a sacrifice to Saturn or Jupiter. Jews wouldn't even allow Roman coins with the emperor's likeness into the temple area. (I guess that's why they needed money changers.) I've wondered idly if Christmas was pegged to Dec. 25 so the Christians would appear to be celebrating Saturnalia along with all the other Romans. It's probably a good thing that Nero (I think it was Nero) died while his statue was in transit toward Jerusalem. What doesn't pass the smell test, though, is the idea that the Sanhedrin would meet at night on Passover, or that they would insist the Romans crucify a Jew on the holiest weekend of the year.

Craig

aa5874

So, the HJ is senselesss.

No-one can recover Jesus of the NT. A writer called Paul claimed he was an apostle of Jesus, not of man or by men.

Trying to claim some other Jesus existed is just a waste time without any evidence or information

"Maybe some other person named Jesus existed" has no rational value, since no-one knows where the evidence of that Jesus can be found or which century to look for this Jesus or what was the nature of this other Jesus.

Maybe the other Jesus was born deaf, dumb and blind and they just made up stuff about him, maybe he was from Egypt, Rome or India . Who knows? Who cares?

The HJ IS SENSELESS.

steve_bnk

Far from senseless on a secular basis. The region was a hotbed of Jewish resistance and nationalism along with the Jewish power elite in bed with the Romans, or at least more concerned with personal wealth and power than Jewish nationalism. Servicing the temple and the Jewish rituals for the vistors was a major business.

JC would have been one of many claiming to be the Jewish messiah. Crucifixtion was the rule rather than the exception for the Romans, it was routine for those given the death penalty.

What IMO from the NT is unsual is that the Romans would execute someone who said things like give to Ceasar what is Ceasar's and to god what is god's. IAW make peace with Rome and practice the faith. He was no threat to Rome, at least based on the NT.

avi

From whose perspective, Steve? The fictional character, (or real human being,) Jesus of Nazareth, (or Capernaum, or wherever,) claimed (according to scripture) to be "king of the Jews"....Right???? Yes???

That particular utterance ("I am the king of the Jews") would have usurped Roman authority, for only the Roman Emperor appointed the king of the Jews, not wandering itinerant preachers, and penniless self proclaimed "messiahs".

So, if this guy had his own little merry band following him, ten or fifty, or a thousand people, he would have been perceived as challenging the authority of the Roman Governor, who, in my opinion, would have ordered him dispatched from planet earth tout de suite.

Life in those days, in my opinion, was not a bowl of cherries. Slavery was common, even normal, public executions were regular, and I think, maybe in error, that the Romans wielded power with diligence, and without remorse for a few benign casualties here and there, among the local populace. Killing one or another self proclaimed "king", or "messiah", was as trivial and banal to them, as executions in USA today for various crimes.

avi

I seem to recall a thread on this very topic, not that many months ago....Isn't this one of the famous group of a dozen odd serious contradictions within the four gospels--contradictions supporting the main contention of this thread, i.e. that the notion of a historical Jesus is a "most senseless proposition"? Don't one or more of the four documents, in Greek, suggest that it was the Romans, not the Jews, who wanted his execution? Perhaps I am wrong on this...

steve_bnk

No he did not proclaim himself 'King Of The Jews', however to the Jews he was a serious blasphemer claiming a reltionship with god, or being in essense the son of god. Blasphemy could carry the death penalty regradless of the Romans.

The gist of the story is the Jews he ridculed and spoke against were the power elite of his day, think Pat Robertson or Jerry Falwell with the political power to execute you for blaspheming against Chrtianity. Initialy the Romans turned him loose as their were no grounds under Roman law to hold him.

It would appear the Jews he pissed off managed to get the Romans to do their dirty work. It seems like he pissed them off knowing full well what the response would be. He had a habit, at least as recorded in the NT, of calling the Jews he was against hypocrites.

Imagine a partictulataly scandlalous Jay Leno monolgue....

Historicaly he would have been one of many claiming to fulfil the Jewish prohesy of a messiah.