aa5874

Suppose I said "popgoestheweasel" is my brother and that he baptised me in the river Jordan.

Would you admit that my "popgoestheweasel" is a result of fiction?

charles

In a sense many of these names at this site are 'fictions.' You are not aa5874 any more than many of the crazy names at this site. But I think your point is that the Christian author is lying about any association between Christianity and the John the Baptist who is a historical figure who is accurately reported in Josephus? Is that correct?

aa5874

I mean that names were chosen for the Jesus story characters and one of the names they chose to use was John the Baptist.

The character called John the Baptist could have been called Paul or Saul. We would just have stories where Saul/Paul baptised Jesus and Judas, or any name they chose, could have written gMark.

Chili

It's all fiction and you can tell by the letter J that runs from Joseph as the greedy human being throught John and Jesus as bosum buddies in the pupa stage and John again as the mature adult.

Chili

Notice please that in the pupa stage one must die for the other to continue which then is why they were bosom buddies and the rest is all decoration of this victorious event.

Jabu Khan

I always thought it would be odd at the time to baptise Jews isnt that part of a conversion ceremony usually. Also i always wondered if John the Baptist could have been taken from John Hyrcanus. He baptised conquered people into Judaism and this didn't sit well with many Jews. The story of John the Baptist may have been lending support to peoples who converted to the faith and weren't considered to be true Jews by other groups.

spin

The apocalyptic context should make clear the logic of Johannine ablution. The early christian logic was to accept Jesus as the savior to overcome your condemnation under the law. Johannine, was to accept baptism as a method to overcome the condemnation, baptism to separate the wheat from the chaff (is Mt 3 preserves some real tradition) in the day of the lord. In such it would be a conversion. It was not sufficient to be a son of Abraham -- god could turn stones into sons of Abraham. John offered baptism to prepare believers for the coming end.


spin

Chili

But I totally disagree that anybody could have baptized Jesus and propose that they named him John to identify his lineage with Jesus. In this we should think of him as "a rose is a rose is a rose, but only that which is called rose is rose" to say that John was the wherewithal of Jesus (that which makes a rose a rose) and so the portable incarnate quality that made Christ the Man as the 'created image of God' that remained after Jesus died. Note that this is how and why the mythology increases and decreases 'the essense of God' who so becomes portable and really is the efficient cause behind the rise and fall of the civilization that is guided by its mythology = the current God value as made known in artistic expression.

It factually is the very essence of Christ wherein Jesus had 'aboriginal heritage' with God (if I may use that term), for which he had to die so it can be set free as the 'ideal' in Christendom. So now, once isolated and identified as the essence of God it becomes 'sacred water' to be blessed (sic) so it may increase the God value in stature and wisdom retained and so increase the luminous of God wherein we potentially are Lord after enlightenment comes to us.

So really, baptism is essentially wherein we have communion with the saints in heaven wherein we so are the continuity of God among men to validate the Catholic claim "Christ with us." In other words, it does not stop at David of Jesus (God forbid) but goes right back to God.

Chili

That would follow since to accept John the Baptist is to accept the essence of Christ that is confirmed later with: "mother there is your son, son there is your mother."

So the difference between Judaism and Catholicism is that 'you' have the prophetic word whereby you are mesmerized and we can go fishing and even swimming in the celestial sea of abundance.

maryhelena

spin - is there any historical evidence for this war between Aretas IV and Herod Antipas? Is all we have the Josephan account? An account that slots this war conveniently around the time of the death of Tiberius.

As you know, I've been after Josephus for some time...
To my mind, Josephus is the roadblock to finding out the early origins of Christianity. I do think, from earlier quotes from two books that deal with Josephus in his prophetic role, here and here, that this aspect of Josephus does need to be taken into account.

In the present case: Josephus could simply be replaying the historical tape of 37 bc. - albeit with a bit of a twist with fresh faces. The war/siege of Jerusalem with Herod the Great, Antigonus, Mariamne and Doris. And, of course, with this war Josephus (or whoever is writing under that name) is, very neatly closing off a 7 year time slot from the gospel of Luke and its 15th year of Tiberius in 29/30 ce. In both these cases a Herodian divorces his first wife for a wife with a Hasmonean bloodline. The twist is that in the later story the Herodian gets his comeuppance - a punishment from god as the story goes...

I think we would be shortchanging Josephus - and ourselves - if we were to insist that his work is only to be considered as history - rather than, and particularly in regard to the gospel story - a prophetic history, a prophetic interpretation or evaluation of 'salvation' history....