ApostateAbe

Yes, and my position is that uncertainty is an inescapable part of the study. A person with a modernist tendency thinks, "uncertainty --> what is most probable? --> arguments --> conclusions." A person with a postmodernist tendency thinks, "uncertainty --> no conclusions." The postmodernist could very well be correct, but I hate to see advocates of an unlikely theory fall into postmodernism instead of just abandoning the unlikely theory.

DCHindley

I am going to have to read up on Karl Kautsky. I had only seen a general comment about his position by Albert Schweitzer. [edit: can't find this in Quest or Paul & His Interpreters, so must have found it elsewhere]

I had read a book by his grandson John H. Kautsky while pursuing Crossan's "Lenski-Kautsky model" of cross cultural anthropological analysis (The Politics of Aristocratic Empires (or via: amazon.co.uk), 1982, which provides a good political analysis of agrarian societies he calls "traditional aristocratic empires" and the effects of their commercialization into modern states).

Another interesting socialist inspired historical analysis comes from G. E. M. de Ste. Croix ("Karl Marx and the History of Classical Antiquity", Arethusha 8, 1975, and The Class Struggle in the Ancient Greek World (or via: amazon.co.uk), 1981, in which Ste Croix does a brilliant job of relating classes to socio-economic factors, and takes a far more lenient view of the exploitative relationship between aristocrats and peasants than does John H. Kautsky)

DCH

Solo

I am ok with being challenged. I am an amateur in this myself, btw.

There is a great summary of all Christological titles, including 'lord', in Geza Vermes' Jesus the Jew (or via: amazon.co.uk). Vermes admits the possibility of an early Aramaic reference to Jesus as 'lord' in the sense of a 'teacher' (rabbi/rabbuni), but stresses that there is no 1st century AD evidence for it and that the 'lord' (mar) usually appears with a pronomial suffix (signifying my, thy, etc.). At any rate, Paul only trades Jesus crucified, and his usage of 'lord' is exclusively titular, transferring some of the glory and jurisdiction which was in Judaism absolutely associated with God, to an intermediary entity of Jesus Christ.

Not at all: Paul quarelled with the Jerusalem missions of the church and may not have even met the leaders of the 'poor' (evyionim=poor). The fundamental problem for Paul was the subjection of faith to law that Jerusalem apparently required: Hyam Maccoby describes the relationship here.

Regards,
Jiri

ApostateAbe

Thank you for your explanation, Jiri, I appreciate it. If Paul repeatedly refers to Jesus as "our Lord Jesus Christ" or "Christ Jesus our Lord" or simply "Lord," titular though it may be, then it seems like there is nothing unexpected about "the Lord's brother," if Paul was referring to the kin of Jesus. Because "Lord" is a title, you think maybe "Lord's brother" is also a religious title? That is probably so, it seems. The passage you cited in 1 Cor seems to indicate that the "Lord's brothers" were given special respect. Since other sources tell us that James was a literal sibling of Jesus, it tells me that all of Jesus' brothers were given a high status by Christians, so "Lord's brother" is maybe both a title and a literal kinship. Peter/Cephas is not included under that title, nor are other apostles.

Petergdi

Lord (Kurios) in Paul is two things

1) Part of the slavery metaphor by which he describes being a follower of Christ. The way he opens his letters, "Paul, a servant (doulos) of Christ Jesus" is a the flip side of "Lord Jesus Christ" This would probably be much more obvious to his original readers than it is to most modern readers because the kurios/doulos pairing was part of their daily lives.

2) Kurios is the usual stand in for the tetragrammaton. Paul plays around with the two meanings in a way that might be thought to border on blasphemy. So in the hymn in Philippians 2, which some people think predates Paul, the idea is that because Christ Jesus was obedient to the point of death on the cross, God exalted Jesus by giving him God's own Name thus making it right that we should call Jesus "kurios."

Based on my own reading about the Ebionites, Paul's Christology is essentially Ebionite. Paul's understanding of the role of Nomos/Torah/Law is offensive to the Ebionites, but Paul's understanding of the status of Jesus seems pretty close.

Peter.

Steven Carr

So why do all references to brothers of Jesus just vanish from Acts after chapter 1, and from the letters of James and Jude?

And who were the 'brothers in the Lord' that spoke out more fearlessly because of Paul's deeds?

'Because of my chains, most of the brothers in the Lord have been encouraged to speak the word of God more courageously and fearlessly.'

ApostateAbe

Your first question seems to be a good one, and I can't answer it. Josephus makes a special mention of James, the brother of Jesus, as someone who was a leader of Christians, but his name is all but absent in the epistles, playing a role in the council of Jerusalem and nowhere else.

There is a difference in prepositions between "brothers in the Lord" and "brothers of the Lord." The two prepositions are found in the original Greek (in = en and of = tou). "Brothers in the Lord" I would take to mean the metaphorical brotherhood of Christians.

Petergdi

Brothers in the Lord are people who are children of God because of Christ.

It is rather silly to confuse in and of when they have different obvious meanings.

Peter.

spin

Umm, it doesn't work that way. "tou" is a genitive form of what is in English "the". It isn't a preposition, but an article.


spin

ApostateAbe

Cool, thanks. The translation I used translated "του" to "OF-THE" as if it is both meanings. I took it as a preposition.