Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Toto · 07-07-2007, 06:29 PM

James Tabor, Chair of the Department of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina and author of The Jesus Dynasty (or via: amazon.co.uk) has blogged on the question of whether Jesus was married. He says that he long held that there was no evidence that Jesus might have been married, but now he has changed his mind. The reason?

Paul speaks often of marriage and the superiority of celibacy, and uses himself as the standard.

Quote:

Earlier in this same letter Paul had mounted a vigorous defense of celibacy or remaining “unmarried.” Although he does not require it of his followers, he asserts that he lives the single non-sexual life and he strongly recommends it as the most practical as well as the most spiritually devoted lifestyle. He writes, in this regard, “I wish that all were as I myself am,” and “To the unmarried and the widows, I say it is well for them to remain single as I do” (1 Corinthians 7:7-8).

In this section of the letter Paul takes up a number of related topics, particularly whether divorce/separation is allowed and under what circumstances, but he is quite careful to explicitly state whether he has specific sanction from “the Lord.” It is quite important to him to bring in the authority and teaching of Jesus when he can to back up and lend weight to what he is saying.

I think one can conclude that if Paul had known Jesus to have been single or unmarried, living a celibate life, he would have mentioned it prominently. In fact it would have been one of his main points. It would have been irresistible. He mounts every possible defense of celibacy, but in the end is only able to appeal to his own example. Imagine how much more rigorously he could have argued had he been able to say, “follow me here, as I follow Christ.” In this particular case I think his silence is “deafening.”

Tabor is, of course, assuming that Paul learned about Jesus from the pillars of the Jerusalem Church. He also notes that marriage was the norm, and that the brothers of the Lord took their wives with them when the traveled. So if Paul knew anything about Jesus, he must have known whether he was married or not, and if he had known that Jesus was not married, he would have surely used that argument for celibacy.

Sparrow · 07-07-2007, 07:45 PM

Interesting. If Paul knew of Christ only as a vision and knew nothing of him as a human, then Paul would have another reason to use himself as the example instead of Christ.

gurugeorge · 07-07-2007, 09:00 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Toto

Tabor is, of course, assuming that Paul learned about Jesus from the pillars of the Jerusalem Church. He also notes that marriage was the norm, and that the brothers of the Lord took their wives with them when the traveled. So if Paul knew anything about Jesus, he must have known whether he was married or not, and if he had known that Jesus was not married, he would have surely used that argument for celibacy.

Sauce for the goose ...

gnosis92 · 07-07-2007, 10:57 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Toto

James Tabor, Chair of the Department of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina and author of The Jesus Dynasty (or via: amazon.co.uk) has blogged on the question of whether Jesus was married. He says that he long held that there was no evidence that Jesus might have been married, but now he has changed his mind. The reason?

Paul speaks often of marriage and the superiority of celibacy, and uses himself as the standard.

Quote:

Earlier in this same letter Paul had mounted a vigorous defense of celibacy or remaining “unmarried.” Although he does not require it of his followers, he asserts that he lives the single non-sexual life and he strongly recommends it as the most practical as well as the most spiritually devoted lifestyle. He writes, in this regard, “I wish that all were as I myself am,” and “To the unmarried and the widows, I say it is well for them to remain single as I do” (1 Corinthians 7:7-8).

In this section of the letter Paul takes up a number of related topics, particularly whether divorce/separation is allowed and under what circumstances, but he is quite careful to explicitly state whether he has specific sanction from “the Lord.” It is quite important to him to bring in the authority and teaching of Jesus when he can to back up and lend weight to what he is saying.

I think one can conclude that if Paul had known Jesus to have been single or unmarried, living a celibate life, he would have mentioned it prominently. In fact it would have been one of his main points. It would have been irresistible. He mounts every possible defense of celibacy, but in the end is only able to appeal to his own example. Imagine how much more rigorously he could have argued had he been able to say, “follow me here, as I follow Christ.” In this particular case I think his silence is “deafening.”

Tabor is, of course, assuming that Paul learned about Jesus from the pillars of the Jerusalem Church. He also notes that marriage was the norm, and that the brothers of the Lord took their wives with them when the traveled. So if Paul knew anything about Jesus, he must have known whether he was married or not, and if he had known that Jesus was not married, he would have surely used that argument for celibacy.

That is interesting.

Let's suppose Jesus was maried. Were there be theological reasons for the Gospels to fail to mention this?

GakuseiDon · 07-07-2007, 11:26 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sparrow

Interesting. If Paul knew of Christ only as a vision and knew nothing of him as a human, then Paul would have another reason to use himself as the example instead of Christ.

I wonder then if we can say that Paul assumed that the spiritual Jesus was single? Zeus and Osiris were married, from memory...

Sparrow · 07-08-2007, 07:46 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by GakuseiDon

I wonder then if we can say that Paul assumed that the spiritual Jesus was single? Zeus and Osiris were married, from memory...

Apparently the subject never arose while Christ was appearing to Paul in his vision. I assume that if Paul had multiple visions/ revelations / opportunities to converse with the dead christ, that eventually the discussion might have gotten around to more mundane biographical matters. So perhaps the visions were of a very limited duration. Or possibly there was no biographical information to communicate. Or maybe Paul is not writing about reality. Or maybe there was no Paul anyway. So much of antiquity has been lost I doubt we'll ever know.

A modern writer can easily research a historical setting and place fictional characters accurately in that setting. Or they could do a sloppy job and get some details right and others wrong (they may even do it intentionally for dramatic effect - is it such a leap to think t could be done for theological reason?). This latter case is how the early Christian writings appear to me - written long after the time of the events they discuss, written as theological propaganda and written from a position of faith rather than reason and evidence. It seems to me that we have insufficient evidence to establish an accurate history of the time and place of Jesus' life.

Vorkosigan · 07-08-2007, 08:00 AM

This "silence" is simply another one showing that Paul knew nothing about any historical Jesus. For he could not have made an argument on marriage and celibacy without referencing Jesus one way or the other.

Imagine that you are Paul and you sit down to write. You pen...

"Now, celibacy beats marriage any day...."

Pause.

Oh shit....Was Jesus married or not?

There is no way that you can write on marriage as a topic without reference to the "historical" founder either way. If Jesus wasn't married, of course you marshal that fact, as Tabor correctly identifies. But the converse is also true -- if Jesus was married, you have to deal with the fact of him happily boinking the nights away with his wife. Either way there is no way that Paul simply ignores the truth.

Because he can't. Because what's the explanation for the silences? That everyone knew the story. Well, if everyone knew the story, then everyone knew whether Jesus was married or not!! So Paul would have been forced to either argue away or use that fact.

There's no getting around it. Mayhap Tabor has identified the smoking gun. LOL.

Vorkosigan

Minimalist · 07-08-2007, 10:18 AM

Tabor also supports Simcha Jacobovici's "Jesus Tomb" story. His credibility is taking a lot of hits lately.

stuart shepherd · 07-08-2007, 10:22 AM

There is an interesting passage in john's Gospel which may be relevant to this topic.
John 19:25-27 (King James Version)
25Now there stood by the cross of Jesus his mother, and his mother's sister, Mary the wife of Cleophas, and Mary Magdalene.

26When Jesus therefore saw his mother, and the disciple standing by, whom he loved, he saith unto his mother, Woman, behold thy son!

27Then saith he to the disciple, Behold thy mother! And from that hour that disciple took her unto his own home.

The first thing that seems unusual about this passage is that Jesus' mother, Mary, has a sister, Mary the wife of Cleophas, who is also named Mary. It seems unusual to me to have two sisters named Mary, but when I have showed this to Christians they don't think that there is anything strange about two sisters named Mary.
The next unusual thing about this passage is that Jesus passes the care of his mother on to his disciple who he loved rather than to his brothers. Jesus' brother, James, would certainly seem competent to take care of his mother, so why did Jesus violate the tradition of Jewish society by making a disciple his mother's caretaker rather than his brother.
I think that this passage was edited to eliminate a wife whose care was passed on to a disciple although by the Torah his brother should have also married his wife, unless there were children to continue his name.

Who really knows how the original read and why it was edited as it seems to be.

stuart shepherd

S.C.Carlson · 07-08-2007, 10:34 AM

The argument from silence can made to cut the other way. In 1 Cor 7:9, Paul recommends marriage for those who cannot practice self-control. I doubt that Paul would have made this argument knowing that Jesus was married.

I had blogged about Tabor's argument in more detail at Paul's Silence on Jesus's Marital Status (May 1, 2007).

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07-07-2007, 07:45 PM	#2
Sparrow Veteran Member Join Date: Dec 2003 Location: Atlanta Posts: 1,077	Interesting. If Paul knew of Christ only as a vision and knew nothing of him as a human, then Paul would have another reason to use himself as the example instead of Christ.

07-08-2007, 08:00 AM	#7
Vorkosigan Contributor Join Date: Jan 2001 Location: Barrayar Posts: 11,866	This "silence" is simply another one showing that Paul knew nothing about any historical Jesus. For he could not have made an argument on marriage and celibacy without referencing Jesus one way or the other. Imagine that you are Paul and you sit down to write. You pen... "Now, celibacy beats marriage any day...." Pause. Oh shit....Was Jesus married or not? There is no way that you can write on marriage as a topic without reference to the "historical" founder either way. If Jesus wasn't married, of course you marshal that fact, as Tabor correctly identifies. But the converse is also true -- if Jesus was married, you have to deal with the fact of him happily boinking the nights away with his wife. Either way there is no way that Paul simply ignores the truth. Because he can't. Because what's the explanation for the silences? That everyone knew the story. Well, if everyone knew the story, then everyone knew whether Jesus was married or not!! So Paul would have been forced to either argue away or use that fact. There's no getting around it. Mayhap Tabor has identified the smoking gun. LOL. Vorkosigan

07-08-2007, 10:18 AM	#8
Minimalist Veteran Member Join Date: May 2007 Location: Arizona Posts: 1,808	Tabor also supports Simcha Jacobovici's "Jesus Tomb" story. His credibility is taking a lot of hits lately.

07-08-2007, 10:22 AM	#9
stuart shepherd Regular Member Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: Florida Posts: 315	There is an interesting passage in john's Gospel which may be relevant to this topic. John 19:25-27 (King James Version) 25Now there stood by the cross of Jesus his mother, and his mother's sister, Mary the wife of Cleophas, and Mary Magdalene. 26When Jesus therefore saw his mother, and the disciple standing by, whom he loved, he saith unto his mother, Woman, behold thy son! 27Then saith he to the disciple, Behold thy mother! And from that hour that disciple took her unto his own home. The first thing that seems unusual about this passage is that Jesus' mother, Mary, has a sister, Mary the wife of Cleophas, who is also named Mary. It seems unusual to me to have two sisters named Mary, but when I have showed this to Christians they don't think that there is anything strange about two sisters named Mary. The next unusual thing about this passage is that Jesus passes the care of his mother on to his disciple who he loved rather than to his brothers. Jesus' brother, James, would certainly seem competent to take care of his mother, so why did Jesus violate the tradition of Jewish society by making a disciple his mother's caretaker rather than his brother. I think that this passage was edited to eliminate a wife whose care was passed on to a disciple although by the Torah his brother should have also married his wife, unless there were children to continue his name. Who really knows how the original read and why it was edited as it seems to be. stuart shepherd

07-08-2007, 10:34 AM	#10
S.C.Carlson Veteran Member Join Date: Jan 2005 Location: USA Posts: 1,307	The argument from silence can made to cut the other way. In 1 Cor 7:9, Paul recommends marriage for those who cannot practice self-control. I doubt that Paul would have made this argument knowing that Jesus was married. I had blogged about Tabor's argument in more detail at Paul's Silence on Jesus's Marital Status (May 1, 2007).

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