atrahasis

sorry, wrong account

[ August 02, 2002: Message edited by: Black Moses ]</p>

Ted Hoffman

I inferred from the following quote that you are not exactly a Jesus Myther. Unless we have sects of Jesus Mythers. You were categorical that you specifically believed that the Jesus of the Gospels is mythical. Why? Does that mean you find other Jesuses historical? Which other Jesuses? From the Apocryphal Gospels(GThomas?, GPeter, Didache?)? From Josephus (Ant 18? Ant 20)?

Vorkosigan
(emphasis mine).

Please help me understand.



*Mark may be trying to set up Jesus for his execution. Why would the Jews want a nice, gentle, harmless, compassionate guy whacked? So create someone not very likable for plausibility....

*Mark may have been trying to harmonize conflicting versions of stories he'd heard. Or the message of the stories is now lost to us or difficult to recapture. For example, in Isaiah, as I recall, there is a reference to Israel as a fig tree. Jesus' withering of the fig with the words "May you never bear fruit again!" may relate to that, an anti-Jewish remark, with Jesus cursing Israel.

I think both of the above are plausible explanations. As for Mark creating the story ex-nihilo, Mark too, employed midrash and its evident and an example is Jesus' last words in Mark 15:34 which was copied from Psalms 22:1.
So Maybe Mark didnt have to imagine so much, just read the OT scriptures, interpret, enlargen and blow up.

You think this is historical!? Question: why would any sane ancient people, convinced that a powerful magical healer is in their midst, ask him to leave?
I explained earlier that its probable he was asked to leave only when exorcisms were involved, because Jesus did not exactly "heal" the victims in exorcism cases. As an example is the exorcism that involved the legion where the demons, with Jesus' permission, invaded the 2000 pigs. Then Jesus drowned them. So exorcisms involved a transfer of demons as opposed to destruction of the demons. Thus the people were afraid Jesus was letting loose the demons and their fear was that they would become the demons' new hosts. In such a situation, it would make sense if they told Jesus to leave: he was clearly upsetting the balance. In another case, the exorcism candidate died then Jesus said the demons were too strong.
But in healings, he was welcomed.

aikido7

I come out of left field, where a fair number of balls are being hit my way. I have no choice but to play this game: I have been reading this thread off and on, dipping in and out, ever since it began.

It seems to me that there are ways of approaching the New Testament:

1.Everything in the gospels is literally true.
2.Everything in the gospels is literally false.
3.Everything in the gospels is a amalgam of
truth and fiction.

Fine as it is. But first shouldn't we attempt to go back to the ancient mindset--especially the literary/historial mindset--of those who were self-consciously writing "sacred texts"?

And to further complicate matters, what we grow up culturally as knowing what truth, falsity, fiction, etc. might mean are something entirely different to a first-century scribe conscious of reading, editing and creating a sacred text.

A biblical scholar has said that Jesus spoke in parables and the New Testament writers wrote his life AS a parable. Part of this involved combing their own texts (what we call the Old Testament) to look for tie-ins to what they knew about Jesus (and I admit my own bias here that he did in fact exist) and also to alter Jesus' words and deeds to "fit" with themes and myths in the Old Testament.

(I am using the word "myth" in the same sense that anthropologists use it--as the deepest structural level that supports a culture. It seems to have a double function: it reconciles contradictions on a mundane level but also holds out hope for reconciliation on a permanent basis. It is the closest thing to "absolute truth" humans can approach and usually functions below our cultural awareness)

I believe Jesus did exorcisms (which I believe could be recorded with a video camera--and that passes for "truth," I suppose, in the 21st Century). I also believe the story of the pigs running off the cliff is too densely-written to be CNN journalism (pigs=pork, "My name is leigon"=the Roman Empire, etc). To me it is a story which points to a larger truth.

I guess my position is that just because an ancient story is incredible or impossible to 21st Century sensibilities does not automatically render the story useless or even "untrue." However, to those on this board who see things within their paradigm of rationalistic scientism the story can only be false, untrue or impossible. And to those on this board who may be fundamentalist literalists, the story is literally true. And both fundamentalists and rationalists are concerned with the surface structure only. Perhaps both sides experienced a bit of mystification in high school if they were required to take a poetry class, for poetry and parable (along with madness, music, humor and paradox) are subversive. They use the structure of literal words to push the listener (or reader) into a "rude escape" from the "koan" of everyday appearances.

The deep structure of Jesus' parabolic speech shows an oral brilliance perfectly suited to his own first-century audience of poor and marginalized and his aphoristic put-downs of the power structure in his day point to a true gadfly and visionary of his times--one that would be impossible to invent out of whole cloth. New studies by scholarship showing the political, economic and social context of first-century Palestine seem to confirm the organic evolution of a "real" Jesus who arose out the tinderbox of that time to articulate a different vision than the one offered by Pax Romana. He was consumed by that vision and died in that tinderbox.

John Lennon once said that "Jesus was all right, it's the disciples twisting it that ruins it for me." The disciples' "twisting" has also provoked a misunderstanding of the New Testament in regard to Jesus' words and deeds along with a modern view of the text as "either/or" true or false. The gospel writers were not unlike the authors of the "Left Behind" best-sellers: They were taking their interpretations of claims about Jesus and writing them (and changing them as well) to address different communities of believers in different places with different concerns decades after the crucifixion.

[ August 02, 2002: Message edited by: aikido7 ]</p>

Ted Hoffman

Aikido,
I largely agree with what you have said, however, I dont exactly agree that we should look for deeper meanings in the events narrated in the NT.
True, if we look for deeper meanings, we will come up with deeper meanings, but of what practical use would those meanings have? They would remain abstract - like poetry - and that would only serve to propagate the christ myth theory - in any case the gospels talk of real people, real events, real people. On what basis do we divert from the usual interpretation and jump to a symbolic one?

Fine, one can say this represents the young church and that other one represents Israel and that other one symbolises the kingdom of God. But that is just senseless palaver that serves to beguile people with NO practical purpose. Fine, the human mind is drawn to mystery and people get very facsinated when one can unravel such a different and poetic interpretation from an otherwise mundane piece of scripture. But how does that help us? appreciate the depth of the scripture? And how is that useful for humanity?

In any case, when Jesus talks of parables, it is indicated he is talking about a parable and sometimes the parable is interpreted, when he is talking about pigs and demons, its pigs and demons, to try to squeeze a deeper meaning out of a myth might be very interesting, but whats important is (1) The NT does not indicate that the scene (like the pigs scene) is allegorical (2) Even if we yarn beautiful interpretations out of the myth, we dont go anywhere, such an excersise is like a rocking chair - keeps you busy but takes you nowhere. And then, it only serves to obfuscate the issue because we will have to take leaps of logic and construct a jigsaw puzzle that does not exist and then we try to fit in interpretatiuons - Occams razor is violated.
I think that for all intents and purposes, the principle of parsimony is one of the best in arriving at a clear meaning.

Lastly, I dont say that the whole of the NT is fiction, I say it contains unabashed fiction and what remains that is plausible is of no useful purpose.

Its like you get a robot, when you take it apart you find a human heart beating in it. Do you then claim there was a human who was a robot?
In the same way, even if one were to read the Gospels and decide, okay, this scene is obviosuly fictional, this one is plausible etc, one would end up with a totally different story that would be of no value.

boneyard bill

Vorkosigan writes:

1. Paul refers to Jesus as "born of woman, born under the law" this strongly suggests that Paul believed in a human Jesus. I know that Doherty responded to this and I don't remember his response but it seemed rather weak at the time. The claim that Paul is not referring to a historical Jesus is central to the Jesus Myth position.

2. Paul refers to James as "the brother" of Jesus. It is possible, of course, that Paul is not using this expression literally and that is what Doherty claims. But I am unaware of evidence for why we should assume this. Paul, of course, refers to "Christian brothers" but he doesn't refer to any one else as the brother of Jesus. So Jesus Mythers are forced to speculate that the meaning here is something other than a straightforward statement. But we have no reason to accept such a speculation.

3. How does Galilee get into the picture? This seems to me to be the biggest problem for Jesus Mythers. I should point out that Wells himself seems to have accepted this argument late in life. "There may have been a Galilean preacher" he admitted in his last book.

Galilee is a most improbable place for a Jewish savior to be from. It creates all kinds of problems. It doesn't figure in much of anything in the O.T. In fact, it wasn't even Jewish until converted by the Macabees. It's impossible as a birth place and quite unnecessary as the scene for any important events. Jerusalem and Judea are the center of Judaism and there is no reason to create events in Galilee.

I'm not saying that these points necessarily prove the truth of the Gospels, but I think they suggest the existence of a historical person around whom at least some to these events revolve.

In other words, the Jesus Myth scenario does not really answer all the facts as neatly as some of its supporters seem to be claiming.

My apologies if these points have been dealt with. I haven't had much time lately so I haven't read all seven pages of this post.

Vorkosigan

Actually, we were discussing Rodahi's position on the Gospel of Mark. That certain passages show Jesus in a way that may indicate authenticity. We're not discussing the historicity of Jesus per se.

Vorkosigan

Ted Hoffman

Boneyard
1. Paul refers to Jesus as "born of woman, born under the law" this strongly suggests that Paul believed in a human Jesus. I know that Doherty responded to this and I don't remember his response but it seemed rather weak at the time. The claim that Paul is not referring to a historical Jesus is central to the Jesus Myth position.
Galatians 4:1-4 says:
Why doesnt Paul identify the "woman" as Mary?
Why doesnt he also identify where this son was born? And why doesnt he refer to the son as Jesus?
What does Paul mean when he says "while we were children"?

What law held them "in bondage under the elemental things of the world"?

In Plilipians 2:5-7 it is written "Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, 6 who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men"

Is this verse talking about the same subject as the one above?

What does he mean by "when the fullness of time came"?

When he mean when says "God sent forth His Son, born of a woman"?, does he mean a woman will give birth to God's son or does he mean the son will take the form of someone born of a woman?

In Mark 1:14, Jesus says : "The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel."

Which "time" is Jesus referring to?

What does Isaiah 7:14 mean where it is written:
Is Isaiah talking of a virgin actually giving birth to a son?

In John 1: 14 "And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth."

What is "the word" and what does John mean by "became flesh"?

What about Romans 1:3 "concerning His Son, who was born of a descendant of David according to the flesh and Romans 8:3 "For what the Law could not do, weak as it was through the flesh, God did: sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and as an offering for sin, He condemned sin in the flesh"

What is "the flesh"?
What was the law?

Please let me know how you interpret these passages before we can focus on the verse.

2. Paul refers to James as "the brother" of Jesus. It is possible, of course, that Paul is not using this expression literally and that is what Doherty claims. But I am unaware of evidence for why we should assume this
Doherty explains why. Check again if you cant get where, let me know.

3. How does Galilee get into the picture? This seems to me to be the biggest problem for Jesus Mythers. I should point out that Wells himself seems to have accepted this argument late in life. "There may have been a Galilean preacher" he admitted in his last book.
Galilee is where the sect shot from. I dont see the mystery there.

[ August 03, 2002: Message edited by: IntenSity ]</p>

Vorkosigan

The claim that Paul is not referring to a historical Jesus is central to the Jesus Myth position.

To some myth positions. To others, it is not so important.

Ted Hoffman

Vork,
I posted my response to your not being neutral in the previous page, it seems you havent seen it. I would appreciate a response.

Ted Hoffman

And Paul, many years after Jesus alleged death, says in Romans1:3
This tells us Paul embraced the Davinic descent of Jesus, according to the Old Testament, not the virgin-born Nazarene called Jesus.
Thus Paul's christ did not entail a historical Jesus.