Doug Shaver

Or it may indicate that the records of what he apparently said are so incoherent that it is trivially easy to make him seem to say anything the interpreter wants him to have said.

lpetrich

Which would not be apparent from the Gospel of John, in which he talks a *lot* about himself and his mission.

Clouseau, you've got to realize that many of your readers consider stories like this to be fiction, and self-serving fiction at that. Would you believe similar child-prodigy stories about anyone else?

Consider the case of Josephus, whom you likely consider a very reliable source about Jesus Christ. But in his autobiography, he claimed that at the age of 14, he was already clarifying details of the Law to his city's priests. That would make him almost as smart as Jesus Christ, right?

Clouseau

Talking about oneself does not necessarily entail egotism. Jesus spoke about himself in all four Gospels, but he did not, as far as is known, write about himself. His words could have been left as the inconsequential bletherings of a vainglorious dilettante, sound and fury, signifying nothing, and he never even heard of by the world at large. But other people considered him worth a book, and yet others considered the books worth copying, far more than any other books; and they still do, as it happens.

That, it seems to me, is the effortless ultimate in publicity. They say that the best products are the ones that are not advertised in the media- they sell by word of mouth.

We know that people consider them fiction when they prove them fiction. There does seem to be correspondence between the supposedly spurious nature of passages that are inconvenient to scepticism, whereas there is little doubt cast about passages that seem to be adverse to Christianity. But maybe I'm being a touch unfair there.

I don't understand why any Bible passage should be self-serving; the Christian message seems to be entirely altruistic- even of the nature of a pipe dream, it used to be said. The Christian virtues are humility, unselfishness, democracy and, indeed, thinking others better than oneself.

Is this passage about Jesus as a prodigy, or about Jesus as someone with unusual interest and focus? If it is true that Jesus was who (under interrogation) he claimed to be, I would expect nothing different. If he was not, there is nothing incredible about it. We read that Mozart wrote out a complex score of another composer from memory at the age of fourteen, and people have no difficulty in giving that story credence.

I do?

Maybe, but people don't follow Jesus because he was smart, not even smart as an adult.