PhilosopherJay

Hi Julian,

The book will only be available at the publishers (Xlibris) until May, then you'll be able to get it at booksites like Amazon and Barnes and Nobles.

This is the URL for it https://www2.xlibris.com/bookstore/b...p?bookid=29224

They say it takes 15-20 business days, but most people have gotten the book in about one week after ordering it.

Warmly,

Philosopher Jay

Clivedurdle

Jay, what are your views on this alleged play?

http://www.nazarenus.com/

Clivedurdle

Isn't it the Gospel of Thomas has Jesus killing a child and turning model birds into real birds?

A discussion of magic and Jesus (ihe) should take into account all stories, and then discuss what weight should be given to them.

It sounds like the purpose of the story is very important.

Julian

The Infancy Gospel of Thomas, here:

II 3 And a certain Jew when he saw what Jesus did, playing upon the Sabbath day, departed straightway and told his father Joseph: Lo, thy child is at the brook, and he hath taken clay and fashioned twelve little birds, and hath polluted the Sabbath day. 4 And Joseph came to the place and saw: and cried out to him, saying: Wherefore doest thou these things on the Sabbath, which it is not lawful to do? But Jesus clapped his hands together and cried out to the sparrows and said to them: Go! and the sparrows took their flight and went away chirping. 5 And when the Jews saw it they were amazed, and departed and told their chief men that which they had seen Jesus do.

IV. 1 After that again he went through the village, and a child ran and dashed against his shoulder. And Jesus was provoked and said unto him: Thou shalt not finish thy course (lit. go all thy way). And immediately he fell down and died. But certain when they saw what was done said: Whence was this young child born, for that every word of his is an accomplished work? And the parents of him that was dead came unto Joseph, and blamed him, saying: Thou that hast such a child canst not dwell with us in the village: or do thou teach him to bless and not to curse: for he slayeth our children.

PhilosopherJay

Hi Thomas II,

Let's take the signs as the writer/editor of John orders them. The second sign is in John 4:46-54:

46: So he came again to Cana in Galilee, where he had made the water wine. And at Caper'na-um there was an official whose son was ill.
47: When he heard that Jesus had come from Judea to Galilee, he went and begged him to come down and heal his son, for he was at the point of death.
48: Jesus therefore said to him, "Unless you see signs and wonders you will not believe."
49: The official said to him, "Sir, come down before my child dies."
50: Jesus said to him, "Go; your son will live." The man believed the word that Jesus spoke to him and went his way.
51: As he was going down, his servants met him and told him that his son was living.
52: So he asked them the hour when he began to mend, and they said to him, "Yesterday at the seventh hour the fever left him."
53: The father knew that was the hour when Jesus had said to him, "Your son will live"; and he himself believed, and all his household.
54: This was now the second sign that Jesus did when he had come from Judea to Galilee.


Again, we see no miracle or magic performed by Jesus. He does not go to the child and perform any ritual and he does not say any magic words. Jesus simply predicts the child will get better. Because the child does get better, the father believes that Jesus has supernatural powers. But the father is a superstitious fool. As Jesus tells him, ""Unless you see signs and wonders you will not believe." In other words, Jesus is saying that the father is not a man of reason. The important fact here is that Jesus said the son would get better and the son did get better at seven o'clock. This makes Jesus seem a very good physician who can diagnose symptoms correctly and predict how long they will last. The text does not give Jesus credit for the healing, but simply suggests that the irrational father did give Jesus credit for it. Jesus is a wise-man here, but not a miracle worker or magician.

The third sign, directly after this, also involves no magic on Jesus' part.

1: After this there was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.
2: Now there is in Jerusalem by the Sheep Gate a pool, in Hebrew called Beth-za'tha, which has five porticoes.
3: In these lay a multitude of invalids, blind, lame, paralyzed.
1 5: One man was there, who had been ill for thirty-eight years.
6: When Jesus saw him and knew that he had been lying there a long time, he said to him, "Do you want to be healed?"
7: The sick man answered him, "Sir, I have no man to put me into the pool when the water is troubled, and while I am going another steps down before me."
8: Jesus said to him, "Rise, take up your pallet, and walk."
9: And at once the man was healed, and he took up his pallet and walked. Now that day was the sabbath.
10: So the Jews said to the man who was cured, "It is the sabbath, it is not lawful for you to carry your pallet."
11: But he answered them, "The man who healed me said to me, `Take up your pallet, and walk.'"
12: They asked him, "Who is the man who said to you, `Take up your pallet, and walk'?"
13: Now the man who had been healed did not know who it was, for Jesus had withdrawn, as there was a crowd in the place.
14: Afterward, Jesus found him in the temple, and said to him, "See, you are well! Sin no more, that nothing worse befall you."
15: The man went away and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had healed him.
16: And this was why the Jews persecuted Jesus, because he did this on the sabbath.

The ill man is at the healing bath and asks Jesus to help him to get into the water. He says that other people get in before him. We may assume that by saying "Take up your Pallet and walk," Jesus is agreeing to help the man get into the pool. Since the man has attempted to get into the pool, it is obvious that he can walk. Note that Jesus says no magic words nor does he perform any magic ritual.

Therefore we may assume that the statement "Take up your Pallet and walk" is not curing the man. Rather it is the pool that is curing the man. We may assume that the phrases "And at once the man was healed," and "and he took up his pallet and walked." have been switched by an editor. The original read. "Jesus said to him, 'Rise, take up your pallet, and walk.' and he took up his pallet and walked. And at once the man was healed."

Jesus simply does the favor of clearing a path for the man so he can get into the water and be healed. He is also, we may assume, helping the man to carry his pallet.

Notice the charge against the man: "It is the sabbath, it is not lawful for you to carry your pallet." Being cured on the Sabbath is not the violation of the law, carrying a pallet is the violation of the law.

The accusation against Jesus is not that he performed Magic, but simply that he helped him carry his pallet. Any form of work was forbidden and carrying a pallet would be considered a form of work.

Again, we do not have Jesus performing Magic. We are five chapters into John's Gospel, 1/4 of the way through John's gospel and there is no case of Jesus performing any magic.


Warmly,

Philosopher Jay

PhilosopherJay

Hi Clivedurdle,

Livio C. Stecchini and Jan Sammer make some excellent points regarding the original play that formed the basis for the canonical gospels. In my book I offer a number of different proofs from the ones they use. These should be seen as complimentary to their proofs.

I vigorously disagree with their hypothesis regarding the author. In the book, I propose that the author was a woman, and that most likely her name was Mary. Exactly how much of what she is relating is factual and how much is coming from her fabulous imagination is the really difficult question.


Warmly,

Philosopher Jay

Thomas II

I can't wait until we get to the fig tree story... but regarding these two events, Jesus predicts the future of the child. There is no magic there, I agree, simply foretelling the future,or fortune telling.... Thre are psychics who apparently can do that. It is an act of PRECOGNITION.
We could argue about how Jesus "received" the knowledge that the child would get better...In some cases psychics allege that a spirit helper "tells" them, while in other cases the psychic gets it by intuition. In other cases it's by "reading" natural signs,etc,etc. Each one has his/her own method...

In the next event of the man by the pool we are not told what exactly is the condition of the man except that he was ill and apparently could not move. Was it psychosomatic? We are not told.
What we ARE told is that Jesus issues a COMMAND. It is not "Listen, if you want you may try to walk a little now,ok?". It is a clear message to the man's mind "RISE!..." Then a second command
"Get your pallet" and then a third command "WALK!". Those are ORDERS to the subconscious.
Careful though,the pool DOES NOT HEAL the man...What heals him is a mental slap issued by Jesus!
While not a miracle, it is more MENTALISM than anything else. But it works! It got the job done.

Ok, next...

Clivedurdle

Doesn't Caesar's Messiah posit a significant Mary, and what was all that about it not being a Jewish name?

Amaleq13

Annie's smilie-filled initial post and the reply to it have found a new home Elsewhere

PhilosopherJay

Hi Thomas II,

I am analyzing the text and what the writer meant. I am not suggesting what Jesus did or did not do. I am not proposing what powers Jesus actually had, I am saying what the writer of the original text intended the audience to get.

In the case of sign 1, the text tells us that Jesus gave water instead of wine at a wedding and people mistook this for his extraordinary cleverness in saving the best wine for last.

In the case of sign 2, the audience would have been familiar with physicians and wisemen who could predict when an illness would break. They would also be familiar with superstitious people who attribute this to the power of the Gods. The texts seems to be saying that people attributed supernatural powers to Jesus. We may take it that the original text does not go along with this and attributes Jesus' prediction to his wisdom rather than his power as we would expect Jesus to pronounce magic words, perform some gesture or rush to the aid of the dying child (as he does in Mark's Gospel) if the readers were meant to attribute the cure to his supernatural powers. The text is telling us how Jesus got a reputation for supernatural powers, not that he had them.

In the case of sign 3, the man is not lame but ill. The fact that he has attempted to enter the water and has been too slow (people stepped in front of him) is the problem. Jesus simply helps the man enter the water and thus gets credit for the curing of the man.
If in the narrative, Jesus had the power to cure people with a simple command, and he was in a crowded room with hundreds of desperately ill people, it would be absurd for him to pick one person at random, cure him for no apparent reason and go on his way, leaving hundreds of other people to suffer.
The criticism of the man was that he carried his pallet (bed) on the Sabbath. The man when accused of illegally carrying his pallet, blames Jesus because Jesus ordered him to carry it. There is no magic here, except for the magic in the Sheep Gate Pool itself that cured the man. That certain water had this power was an accepted fact and would not have seemed unusual to the writer or readers of the time. Jesus is being accused of breaking a Sabbath law, not practicing magic. Again, there are no magical words or actions in the scene at all.

This brings us to Sign #4, the bread and fish meal.

1: After this Jesus went to the other side of the Sea of Galilee, which is the Sea of Tiber'i-as.
2: And a multitude followed him, because they saw the signs which he did on those who were diseased.
3: Jesus went up on the mountain, and there sat down with his disciples.
4: Now the Passover, the feast of the Jews, was at hand.
5: Lifting up his eyes, then, and seeing that a multitude was coming to him, Jesus said to Philip, "How are we to buy bread, so that these people may eat?"
6: This he said to test him, for he himself knew what he would do.
7: Philip answered him, "Two hundred denarii would not buy enough bread for each of them to get a little."
8: One of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, said to him,
9: "There is a lad here who has five barley loaves and two fish; but what are they among so many?"
10: Jesus said, "Make the people sit down." Now there was much grass in the place; so the men sat down, in number about five thousand.
11: Jesus then took the loaves, and when he had given thanks, he distributed them to those who were seated; so also the fish, as much as they wanted.
12: And when they had eaten their fill, he told his disciples, "Gather up the fragments left over, that nothing may be lost."
13: So they gathered them up and filled twelve baskets with fragments from the five barley loaves, left by those who had eaten.
14: When the people saw the sign which he had done, they said, "This is indeed the prophet who is to come into the world!"

The miracle here is quite perplexing. First it should be noted that once again there are no magical words and no magical actions described. Then we should note that there is nothing about the number of the breads being multiplied or the fish being mulitiplied to feed the 5,000. So one is confused about the nature of the miracle. Did each of the 5,000 just eat 1/1000 of a loaf of bread and 1/2,500 of a fish and were satisfied, or did the number of the loaves of bread mulitiply?

Fortunately we have two sources that tell us that the answer is neither.

Mark 8:13-21
The disciples had forgotten to bring bread, except for one loaf they had with them in the boat. “Be careful,” Jesus warned them. “Watch out for the yeast of the Pharisees and that of Herod.”
They discussed this with one another and said, “It is because we have no bread.”
Aware of their discussion, Jesus asked them: “Why are you talking about having no bread? Do you still not see or understand? Are your hearts hardened? Do you have eyes but fail to see, and ears but fail to hear? And don’t you remember? When I broke the five loaves for the five thousand, how many basketfuls of pieces did you pick up?”
“Twelve,” they replied.
“And when I broke the seven loaves for the four thousand, how many basketfuls of pieces did you pick up?”
They answered, “Seven.”
He said to them, “Do you still not understand?”

The phrases "broke the five loaves for the five thousand" and "broke the seven loaves for the four thousand" are key here. Jesus does not say that he fed the five thousand or the four thousand. He simply says that he broke loaves for them. It is apparent that the breaking of the loaves was a symbolic
gesture. The breaking of the five loaves was meant to represent or be symbolic of the feeding of the five thousand and the breaking of the seven loaves was meant to represent the feeding ot the four thousand.

This interpretation gains power when we example the differences between the manuscripts. The later manuscripts say that Jesus gave the broken bread to the disciples and the disciples gave it to the ones seated. But the Alexandrian manuscipt says that Jesus gave it to the ones seated.

It is difficult to believe that scribes would leave out the fact that Jesus gave the bread to the disciples and the disciples gave it to the ones seated and have Jesus give the bread directly to the ones seated. On the other hand, it is equally improbable that the scribes would add the fact that Jesus would hand the bread to the disciples directly when the original text had him handing them to the seated people. We may therefore suggest that in the original text we had Jesus handing the broken bread to the disciples who were seated. It would have appeared immediately obvious that Jesus had fed his disciples the five loaves of bread and the two fish and that he had not fed the 5,000. The scribes who copied this had to change it. Some of them changed the original text to say that Jesus had given the bread to the scribes and the scribes gave it to the seated ones, and some of them said that Jesus had given it directly to the seated ones. The two contradictorary errors cancel out and we are left with the fact that Jesus gave the five loaves and two fish to his seated disciples to feast while the 5,000 sat down on the grass and chilled.


We thus have Jesus, not performing a miracle, but simply feeding his disciples who are eating for/instead of the masses in the scene.

This is Jesus' solution to the problem that he presents to Philip at the beginning of the text. Philip can't figure out how to feed the 5,000 followers because it would cost more than 200 denari (approximately $10,000). Jesus' solution is to have the 5 disciples eat for them. (The 7 loaves of the replicant story probably represent the 5 disciples plus Jesus and Mary Magdalene). The original text probably said that the 12 leftover baskets represented the 12 tribes of Israel. Later anti-semitic editors cut out the meaning of the 12 baskets.

The fact that the masses think of him as a prophet after the feeding sign instead of a magician or an angel indicates also that no magic has taken place.

So there was no feeding miracle in the original text, rather it was simply another demonstration of Jesus' cleverness in handling a difficult problem. We have gone through 4 of the 7 miracles in John and have no hint that Jesus was a magician or that he performed any miracles.

Warmly,

Philosopher Jay