Kosh

OK, let's see what we got here. Looks like Magus has gone in search of evidence of this claim in the Gospels - the first four books of the NT:

This is not a quote of Jesus, it's an introduction written by the anonymous author of the Gospel of John (currently dated to anwhere from 90 ad to 120 ad) source: Early Christian Writings

Hence, this is once again merely telling us about the eschatology which had developed 60 years after the fact.

By your own admission, the "He" is a Christian interpretation, and is not in the original greek, therefore, Jesus never said "I am he", he simply said "I am". Now keep in mind that when YHWH said it, he was telling Moses what his name was. Here's the context from Exodus:

Exodus 3:14
God said to Moses, "I AM WHO I AM"; and He said, "Thus you shall say to the sons of Israel, 'I AM has sent me to you.' "

However, Jesus did not say that his name was "I am". Let's take a look at the phrase without the inserted "He":

"I said therefore to you, that you shall die in your sins; for unless you believe that I am, you shall die in your sins."

He is simply claiming that you must believe in his existance, not that his name was the same as Gods. So your assertion that this ties to the Exodus exchange is baseless.


Ah, finally you have found one! However, let's look at this in the proper context. A few verses later, we see Jesus explaining to the angry crowd why he made that statement:

John 10:34
Jesus answered them, "Has it not been written in your Law, 'I SAID, YOU ARE GODS'?

So, Jesus clearly considers all people to be Gods, according to the scriptures! This does not appear to be claim of a unique deity.

Once again, this is not a quote from Jesus. It is a quote from Paul, writing a good 20 to 30 years after the fact (Source: Early Christian Writings)

As I have just shown, you've yet to provide scriptural evidence for this assertion. Perhaps you could find some in the Gospels of the NT?

Uh, psssst, Magus! Isaiah is in the OT, and it contains no quotes from Jesus! He allegedly lived much later.

Revelation also contains no direct quotes of Jesus during his life. The book was written many years later, and was the result of a "vision". It's basically a really bad dream that somebody had after getting ahold of some bad mushrooms.

Care to try again, Magus?

Vinnie

The Christians claim can account for Jesus praying to God and all that. If you remember to way back when you should know that Jesus being 100% fully human is official Christian doctrine. The contrary was rejected as heresy.

I would tend to go for a more kenotic view: Jesus, in becoming human, emptied himself, or voluntarily relinquished such properties as omnipotence and omniscience etc as opposed to the "two-minds view".

Of course, this has to be done in the context of a trinity. Otherwise, the question William Temple once rhetorically posed would be very difficult to address, "What was happening to the rest of the universe during the period of our Lord's earthly life?"

The transforming and living Jesus is functionally God to Christians. Because of that Christians make claims about the ontological nature of Jesus of Nazareth. Such claims are largely untestable in a scientific sense (e.g. historical) and accepted on the basis of Creed and more important for me, the functional role of Jesus in our lives. Though I will say that to call Jesus God functionally naturally brings up questions of his ontological nature. Though there can be no "proving" that Jesus of Nazereth was God incarnate in the hard sense. The important thing is to focus on his death and what it meant to the first Christians and what it means now. The Cross has always stood at the heart of Christian theology.

On a historical level I am not sure how well it can be maintained that Jesus thought he was a second member of the trinity. In relinquishing such qualities as omnipotence and omniscience this is not hard to explain. Surely there are no positive internal or external reasons for accepting the historicity of most or any of the sayings material in GJohn. Whatever we make of it, at the least, Jesus probably did think of himself as very high up on the ladder. And very early on he was thought of as being at the top or right near the top by Paul. A case can be made for deity by Paul which would serve to tell us that the belief goes back very early. Even E.P. Sanders has said that Jesus thoiugh of himself as very high, much higher than "Messiah". He probobly thought of himself as the Vicar of God. Now as the agent of God he was functionally serving as God.

The important thing for me is the functional role of Jesus' death. Does it serve to reconcile people to God? If so would I be correct in saying that is functions at a level that only God is capable of?

Though many might say these cannot be fully seperated as one invokes the other (I am not fully convinced of that but it seems valid in so far as it goes), I think the functional role of Jesus' death and his own attitude precedes the ontological claims made about him. On the grounds of his death serving to reconcile many of us sinners to God and his view of himself as the vicar of God, Christians make the ontological claims about. he claimed to be and did what only God could do. Ergo, we think Jesus was God incarnate.

have questions or objections? Feel free to comment

Vinnie

Celsus

[pet topic]
Add to that that the tetragrammaton (YHWH) is derived from the original Hebrew (also in Exodus 6:2) which is: 'ehye 'asher 'ehye which may also be translated as "I am that shall be". The main point is, if YHWH is derived from this phrase, then perhaps Asherah is as well?

Note:
I call this a poorly-covered redaction to excuse polytheism of early Hebrews. Here's another example:
Oh dear. It seems that Elyon gave YHWH his share according to the number of gods! Can you spell
P-O-L-Y-T-H-E-I-S-M?

[/pet topic]
Joel

(Please don't pull out a liberal translation as a refutation, check a Hebrew key study Bible)

Vinnie

What do you make of Deut 6:4-9?

4 Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. 5 Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. 6 These commandments that I give you today are to be upon your hearts. 7 Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. 8 Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. 9 Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.

Vinnie

Um, unless you are arguing that Paul made that up (contra the consensus) it would go back earlier. Also, given that this is a hymn it is probably significantly earlier. Many would date this hymm to the late thirties. That is within 10 years of the death of Jesus, not 20 or 30. This does not prove Jesus is God by any means but it serves to show that you are uncritically dismissing some cited evidence.

Vinnie

Celsus

Later redaction by the Deuteronomist c. 621BCE (Josiah's court)

Joel

Kosh

Vinnie, the discussion here is whether Magus' cites are direct quotes of Jesus claiming to be God. My statement stands.

Carrie

To Celsus,

To me that scripture means that God is ONE, not two or three. And we're supposed to love him and talk about him all the time. How fun. "Hey kids, God said we could take slaves, isn't that great? So you won't have to clean up your room anymore." And, "You'd better behave little Johnny, because God said I can kill you if you are rebellious." What a great God to talk about.

Vinnie

Oops. My bad

Did someone actually claim Jesus said that?

I must have missed that?

Vinnie

Vinnie

Magus55, I applaud you for trying to defend and share your faith here but I honestly have to caution you. Given a few comments you said I think you are out of your "apologetical league" here. I think you should focus on doing more studying and asking questions of your Pastor, more knowledgeable Christian friends etc., before coming here to defend certain views. Given that you claimed Paul followed the earthly Jesus around I am sure that you are ready to be here. You can't be very familiar with apologetics if you don't know something basic such as this which is found in Acts and Paul's own epistles (not to mention the slinece on Paul in the Gospels). Your statement which says that you "haven't done much reading on Paul's life other than what he did in response to Jesus" shows me that you are not grounded enough to do historical apologetics here. Just a friendly caution from a fellow Christian

Vinnie