thief of fire

I gave my explanation. How about you explain why jesus would be the original reading? After all you've read the article.

sotto voce

Jewish rabbi? Not alive? Cognitive dissonance rampage!

So many True Believers!

Anyhow:

Critical Update :

"I tell you the truth," Jesus answered, "before Abraham was born, I am."

At this, they picked up stones to stone him.' Jn 8:58-59

'In the future he will honour Galilee of the Gentiles, by the way of the sea, along the Jordan. The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of the shadow of death a light has dawned... because to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called wonderful counsellor, mighty God, everlasting father, prince of peace.' Isa 9:1...6

Grog

JSTOR only has Novum Testamentum up to 2006 and my university account doesn't give me access to the above article. Looks interesting though.

maryhelena

Thanks for the link - and a good laugh for the day. I only know Matt from the Les Mis DVD - so great to see him in his 'natural' state....

andrewcriddle

Jesus and Joshua are the same word in Greek.

It is possible that the original author wrote Jesus meaning Joshua the colleague and successor of Moses.

Andrew Criddle

sotto voce

Not possible, because this Joshua destroyed unbelievers (in the desert, excluding the other Joshua); and bound disobedient angels in darkness.

andrewcriddle

That is a good point. The destruction of unbelieving Israelites in the desert probably refers to Numbers 14 and its consequences. (The Israelites lose their nerve, decide not to invade Palestine just yet and are condemned to wander in the wilderness until the current adult generation is mostly dead.) Joshua is involved in this, (the Israelite rejection of him leads to their judgment), but Joshua does not himself judge or punish them.

IF the original author meant Joshua then he must have been referring to the events in which Joshua took part rather than Joshua's exact role in them.

jude-5 suggests that Jesus/Joshua is not original in Jude 5 but was introduced by scribes seeking to connect OT Joshua and NT Jesus.

Andrew Criddle

Solo

Not only possible, but a certain probability that this was so. The association with Joshua the Son of Nun was evidently strong among the original Nazarenes.

Epiphanius, Panarion 1.19:

Nasaraeans, meaning “rebels,” who forbid the eating of any
meat and do not partake of living things at all. They have the holy names
of patriarchs which are in the Pentateuch, up through Moses and Joshua
the son of Nun, and they believe in them—(2) I mean Abraham, Isaac,
Jacob, and the earliest ones, and Moses himself, and Aaron, and Joshua. But
they hold that the scriptures of the Pentateuch are not Moses’ scriptures,
and maintain that they have others besides these.

Later in 29:5,6-7, Epiphanius recounts how Nazoreans came to become converted to Jesus:

For by hearing just Jesus’ name, and seeing the miracles performed
by the hands of the apostles, they came to faith in Jesus themselves. And
since they found that he had been conceived at Nazareth and brought up
in Joseph’s home, and for this reason is called “Jesus the Nazoraean” in
the Gospel—as the apostles say, “Jesus the Nazoraean, a man approved
by signs and wonders,”30 and so on—they adopted this name, so as to be
called Nazoreans. Not “nazirites”—that means “consecrated persons.”
Anciently this rank belonged to firstborn sons and men who had been dedicated to God.
Samson was one, and others after him, and many before him.
Moreover, John the Baptist too was one of these same persons who were consecrated to God,
for “He drank neither wine nor strong drink."

(This regimen, an appropriate one for their rank, was prescribed for such persons.)
They did not call themselves Nasaraeans either; the sect of
Nasaraeans was before Christ and did not know Christ.

It strikes me as probable that Epiphanius was confused by the resemblance in names and simply misunderstood the fact that there was one sect of Nazoreans which came to adopt Jesus (the one from Galilee) as a prophet of the last days and sent his former disciples out to Diaspora as missionaries. The reason Epiphanius could not link the two would almost certainly be the Acts-of-the-Apostles legend which claims the Christ church was self-founded in Jerusalem. In greatest probability, if Jesus existed, after his death, his disciples would have been sheltered by a pre-established assembly of messianists in Jerusalem.

The reference in Jude 5 to Joshua IMHO would then reflect the continuance of Nazorean traditions, in which the coincidence in the name "Jesus" would be deployed in haggadic readings.

Best,
Jiri

sotto voce

And now for a comedy spot.

Solo

Oh boy, another buzz between the ears believing itself to be thought !

Best,
Jiri