Vorkosigan

Peter, to answer your question, Leidner bases his argument on the parallels between the Flaccus story in Philo from Concerning Flaccus. In Leidner's view, the Jewish community in Alexandria described serves as the community symbolized by the Suffering Servant. Leidner notes the following parallels.

1. A judas figure

2. Judas is led to betrayal by the enemies of the Servant, moved by envy.

3. There is a Temple disturbance

4. A last supper attended by friends.

5. A garden scene with the Victim in despair at his inevitable fate.

6. The arrest is made by armed soldiers.

7. The Servant/Community is blameless and the opponents merciless.

8. The companions show cowardice and desert the leader.

9. A Herodian king visits the city and discusses the fate of the Servant with the Roman governor.

10. There is a mockery scene.

11. False charges doom the Servant at trial.

12. There is a spy mission by an observer concealed among the servants.

13. The Servant is scourged and beaten prior to Crucifixion.


14. The tragic event takes place on a national holiday when clemency would be appropriate.

15. Mob instigators bully the Roman official to carry out the punishment.

16. Judas repents and confesses.

17. Judas is torn to pieces in an open field.

18. There is a Via Dolorosa on which the Victim must travel.

19. The Crucifixion takes place at the 3rd hour.

20. There is jeering an abuse by onlookers.

21. The garments of the Servant are divided by his enemies.

22. The death of the Servant leaves his followers dejected, but there is new hope at early dawn.

23. This is doubted at first, but later confirmed.

24. All gather to celebrate and praise God.

Vorkosigan

Secular Pinoy

Tercel, here's what you want:

http://www.devotions.net/bible/00bible.htm <-- Searchable NRSV online.

Tercel

Secular Pinoy,

Thanks!

Tercel

A reply to Vorkosigan's comments on 1 Corinthians:

I don't see why. It seems to me a perfectly understandable reference. The Prefect and Sanhedrin were rulers of Judea at the time. The title "rulers" is perfectly reasonable - they represent the Roman Empire and Jewish religious authorities which were from Paul's point of view the two most important earthly powers. The qualification "of this age" is understandable in the context as it distinguishes their dominion from that of Christ who Paul says is the true Lord. There is nothing strange, unclear or unusual about it.

Why would he mention it here given that he would know his readers already knew? He is writing to a Christian church he founded himself - why would he insert the clunky phrase "the Roman governer Pontius Pilate at the request of the Sanhedrian" when he can just say "the rulers of this age" (a phrase that would be at the front of his mind since he's just used it in verse 6) and know readers will understand him.

Jesus Mythers seem to be under the strange impression that people write everything they know that is relevant to a subject. I, however, (being rather lazy) have a tendency to write the minimum needed (and too often not enough) for people to understand my points and I am certain many others do likewise.

I have seen it often claimed that Paul’s letters show no knowledge of the life of Jesus depicted in the Gospels. Do you agree this passage demonstrates that claim is false? Do you agree this passage attributes a teaching against divorce to Jesus? Do you agree that if we did not have the Gospels we would still know from this passage that Paul believed Jesus taught against divorce?

Why do you deny that attribution of words is evidence for the historicity of Jesus? If Josephus had recording that Jesus taught against divorce would that have made Jesus historical?

I am well aware of the JMyther claims surrounding Paul’s experiences. However, I see no reason to believe -in these instances- that Paul is referring to anything other than the traditions about the historical Jesus that have been taught to him. The alleged historical Jesus of the gospels is recorded as teaching against divorce but not about virgins and Paul asserts the same thing. This suggests that either the Gospels are significantly dependent upon Paul (do you think this??) or they are both historical/dependent upon pre-Pauline Christian teaching.
I should probably add 7:25 to the list of verses against the myth thesis.

And here we get to the desperate JMyth attempts to explain away a basic reference. “brothers of the lord” can’t mean “apostles” as Peter is stated separately, it makes no sense if it means “all believers”... so perhaps it means brothers of Jesus? Either come up with a defensible exact definition (if you believe there are multiple possibilities then suggest them all) or admit that it means what it says.

“constant usage”?? By my count the phrase is used once. (And James is called the brother of the Lord once also) If you can find it elsewhere I’d be happy to add it to the list though.

Because he only uses the phrase once and a variant once. Is that a good enough reason?

Unless you believe (and can substantiate it) that the Gospels are dependent upon Paul, this counts as multiple attestation.
It also shows that Paul, like the Gospels, attributes certain sayings (the same ones) to Jesus. This would imply that Paul, like the Gospels, conceives of Jesus as a historical figure who taught those things.

The issue actually makes no difference. It doesn’t matter whether Paul had been taught about the last supper by other Christians, or whether he’d then had a vision of it after being taught about it, or whether he had a vision of something and after being taught about the last supper interpreted it as a vision of that, or whether he had a vision which was coincidentally exactly the same as what other Christians were teaching. The only alternative that makes a difference is the JMyth idea that Paul’s vision was the main basis for the last supper teaching of all Christians.

I’m always amused at the vagueness of religious parallels. Yes common meals predate Christianity, funny that. It doesn’t seem amazing that Common Meal Traditions are common given that people spend quite a lot of their time eating. People have shared meals since time began and a good proportion of all festivals are common meals (eg Thanksgiving day for example) since you can either celebrate by eating or celebrate by doing something. And of course the Last Supper was based on the tradition of having a common meal for the Jewish Passover...

Sorry, but I’m not going to let you get away with “They are alleged to have had a meal together: this suggests it is legendary.”

We’re talking about the Last Supper. Last time I looked there were accounts of it in all four gospels. Has that changed? Is my memory faulty? Why would I be referring to Luke only when I said that Paul account was “in accordance with the event as recorded in the Gospels.”?



Completely improbably hypothesis invented by people with overactive imaginations, anti-orthodox Christian biases and too much time on their hands notwithstanding: How do you expect to ever know anything if your willing to pull the texts completely to pieces at leisure? All of history could be declared bunk, or all the semi-gnostic passages declared later interpolations, or I could declare that there used to be heaps more references to the historical Jesus in Paul’s writings but they got removed and modified.

!?! You seem to have just said that the fact that this passage implies a historical Jesus “is good evidence” that it is an interpolation.
You just assumed your conclusion as a premise!

Except you are ignoring the fact that this passage is not inconsistent with orthodox Christian doctrine. This passage does not at all imply that Jesus is not human. I could write such a passage and never dream I was implying Jesus was not human!

Tercel

It is quite probably that scholars doing Historical Jesus studies are well aware of the mythicist position and its faults - otherwise they obviously wouldn't have done their homework very well. But translators are not remotely the same thing as historical Jesus scholars. As I understand it the NIV was translated by Evangelicals (who are not widely renowned for their knowledge of modern Biblical criticism!). I am inclined to think that most of the translators had probably never heard of the Jesus Myth position. They're Evangelical translators (which probably means they've spent all their lives studying "God's Inerrant Word" and learning the original languages so they could know it better) not HJ scholars.

Well it doesn't exactly say "through the flesh" as kata can be translated into heaps of different things and most of is rendered as "according".
The most obvious interpretation from my point of view is this:
1. Paul believed Jesus had two natures, that of a historical human being and that of the divine Son of God.
2. The phrase "kata sarka" - "according to the flesh" is used when Paul is talking about the historical human part of Jesus and wanting to distinguish this from the divine part.
This is entirely consistent with its usage, and I see no reason to think it should be read in any other way.

It is not enough for you to wave your hands and say "kata sarka is ambiguous", do you have an interpretation you are prepared to defend? You obviously believe there are alternative interpretations as defensible as the one I proposed above. Are you prepared to defend any of them? If so, explain it and I will attempt to show why it is inferior.

It is not inserting words not in the text, only translating the phrase "kata sarka" according to the interpretation I defined above. It is an extremely natural interpretation for any conservative Christian familiar with the Christian doctrines on the dual nature of Christ.

Yup. Anything "can be read either way". You could interpret "New York is in the USA" as really meaning "the moon is made of cheese" if you so desired. However your interpretation would be deemed idiotic by most people. Some interpretations are more sensible than others. This list attempts to show that the Historical Jesus interpretation is much much more sensible for these verses than the Mythical Jesus interpretation is.
I cannot of course stop you believing that the moon is made of cheese or say that such an interpretation is flat impossible.

At the present time seems to be a perfectly understandable term and quite plain enough.
Why didn't Paul say "Jesus died in my life time"? Because he was writing to Christians who knew about Jesus already, not Jesus Mythers!

It is also being contrasted to the times of the law and prophets (vs 21), so whatever twists you want to try to put on "present" it's got to be more recent that those.

Yes, you said before there's quite a bit out there. Could you name some of them so that I can go away and read them for myself? If Eisenman discusses it extensively then that will make it easy for you to list them for me.

Now who's adding words not in the originals?

I have already defended the NIV's translation. It is a perfectly legitimate interpretation and there is nothing wrong with it.
Paul tells us in the same verse that the Patriarchs are of the Jewish people and follows that immediately with saying that Christ, according to the flesh, is from them. The clear statement of the passage is that Christ, like the patriarchs was a Jew.

To you perhaps.

This is quite possibly a new low in bad arguments...

There is not the least doubt at all that the "Israel" in 9:5 refers to the race of Jews - just read 9:1-4, and that Paul's apologetic response to the question "has the promise of God failed?" (9:6) is to then say that the true Israel is God's chosen nation and isn't just the Jewish people.

Peter Kirby

Vorkosigan and Tercel, I suggest that your argument deserves a wider audience. Would you consider starting a formal debate over the proposition that Paul accepted the humanity of Jesus?

best,
Peter Kirby

Celsus

Seconded.

Joel

Vorkosigan

No. I don't like formal debates. Nobody reads them.

I don't need to have an interpretation that I wish to defend....

As you note, kata sarka can be translated in heaps of ways. It cannot be translated "as to his human nature" because that is not in the original text. We're arguing over what that phrase "through the flesh" or "according to the flesh" means. Does it signify a Jesus that is human? Clearly not, or Paul would have used a much less ambiguous phrase.

Please see 1 Cor:
So it is written: "The first man Adam became a living being"[ 15:45 Gen. 2:7] ; the last Adam, a lifegiving spirit.

Clearly Paul distinguished between the Primal Adam, the living being, and Jesus as the New Adam. Again in 1 Cor 15:22 this same sense occurs. In Romans 5:14 Adam is "the pattern of one to come."

No more time now. More later.
Vorkosigan

Soul Invictus

I would read it! Heck, if there's anything suffering from scarcity it's debates!

Regards,

Invictus

Vorkosigan

The other reason I cannot debate Tercel is that I am not yet settled on what I think of Paul. I see four basic possibilities:

• 1) The "authentic" Pauline epistles are from the period 40-60 in accordance with the conventional chronology and theology.
  
  2) The "authentic" Pauline epistles were originally addressed to gentiles who were wanting to become Jews, and were redacted and rewritten by a Christian writer to become the current Christianized epistles (David Hindley)
  
  3) The "authentic" Pauline epistles date from the post-70 period a la Leidner.
  
  4)The "authentic" Pauline epistles are cold-blooded forgeries like every other NT letter and every other Pauline epistle we know of, dating from the second century.

I believe (1) is the least likely, I am not familiar enough with (2) to have an opinion, (3) works best chronologically IMHO and (4) I am uncomfortable with for a variety of reasons. Thus, I am not sure what I would be defending. No human Jesus? I don't know. The passages are ambiguous, and I think we tend to read them in the light of later theology and ideology. I do not think Paul had in mind a human being who died under Pilate when he wrote "kata sarka." He would have been a lot clearer. The ambiguiuty was necessary to some theological idea he had, and not the later one backprojected onto the letters that Tercel advocates. If Paul had in mind a human Jesus, it was not the one we know.

Vorkosigan