boneyard bill

SmashingIdols writes:

"Born of woman. Born under the law." Sounds pretty historical to me. There's also the question of what Paul means by "James the brother of Jesus."

I think Paul's understanding of Jesus is a bit more ambiguous than you are claiming. Of course, Paul shows no interest in Jesus' biography. If his reference to James is understood to be metaphorical, then he could be talking about an event that he believed occurred in the remote past.

But there are two things that lead me to think that there must have been a historical Jesus. The first is how Galilee entered the picture. Galilee doesn't figure in anything significant in the O.T. It wasn't even Jewish until converted by the Macabees a century or two earlier. If you're a late first or second century believer trying to reconstruct the event of Jesus life on the basis of the O.T. and early traditions a letters of Paul or Hebrews, you have no reason to put Jesus in Galilee, and putting him there would cause all kinds of problems. We have seen the problems it created for Matthew and Luke who had to explain, somehow, a Bethlehem birth. It seems virtually certain to me that there must have been an oral tradition relating to Galilee.

The second problem relates to the passion story. According to Michael Goulder, the descriptions of the passion story do not correspond to the feast of passover but do correspond to the feast of tabernacles. There are no palm leaves in Jerusalem in the spring but there are in the fall when tabernacles is held. People shout "hosanna" and "blessed is he who comes in the name of the lord." Tabernacles is also eight days long. The same as holy week. It would appear that Jesus' triumphant entry into Jerusalem wasn't about him at all, but the ordinary activity of people arriving for the tabernacles feast.

But why would anyone trying to account for Jesus' life deliberately conflate tabernacles and passover? It seems more logical to assume that there was a real event at tabernacles that was conflated by someone else, probably non-Jewish, into the passover feast.

Amos

Passover is like Christmas in Catholicism and Easter is like their feast of Tabernacles. In Jewish tradition our Christmas is celebrated in spring with their Passover and our Easter in fall with their feast of Tabernacles when the palm leaves are available for the triumphant entry into the New Jerusalem. The time seperation between these two is important to show the coming of age of the son of man (coming to maturity in Christ and we call this purgatory).

Ruy Lopez

Amos

I've read quite a number of your posts over the last 3 weeks and came to a tentative conclusion that it borrows from New Age, Buddhism and Gnostic Christianity and made into a mishmash only Amos could decipher. Of course, it is deliberately made mystical, speculative and metaphysical so it cannot be pinned down. I doubt if someday you will tell us what you're really doing,

I'd like to ask you though to step in front of a speeding truck if you believe our physical world is an illusion once we accept, as you seem to do, eternal life. My real New Ager acquaintance refused the challenge. I appreciate some basic insights of NA philosophy and Buddhism but not when carried too far.

Amos

The reason we should not step in front of a truck is because we are divided in our own mind and are both temporal and eternal in this divided mind. From the perspective of our ego awareness is life temporal and from the perspective of our true identity are we eternal. So for as long as we are divivded in our own mind do we not have a free will and so it is also not until we crucify our ego that we do have a free will.

Since both our identities are ours can we function as free agents and should not step in front of a moving truck because if that is how we want to destroy our ego we will sacrifice our true identity to do so-- which would not be very wise, you might agree.

To crucify our ego does not require a physical death (because our ego is an illusion) but a series of mysterious events. The reason why they must be mysterious is because our ego consciousness (the mind wherein we are rational beings) must be annihilated first and later recalled into the upper room where it will be placed subservient to the true identity (subconscious mind).

Ruy Lopez

Thank you for the measured reply Amos. I'm really more interested in your comments regarding the sources and evolution of your hard-to-fathom Philosophy.

The mystical stuff I've read involves THREE planes in man's consciousness as compared to your TWO. We have the rational conscious, the subconscious(involuntary programmed memory) and the superego or soul or true identity. While I do not wish to discuss this matter back and forth because it is speculative and unprovable, I'd like to understand more fully what you really mean, valid or not.
This is not exactly the thread but there is a connection because you repeatedly explain Jesus' reality in this mystical terms. Not that I agree with you but its interesting to see how you think.

Amos

Hello demon-sword, what I write is really my own. Is it really? Yes and no, and how would I know?

I find superego misleading and never use it. "True identity" is nice and "soul" is just fine with me.

[ May 01, 2002: Message edited by: Amos ]</p>

Ted Hoffman

*comes floating on the third plane of consciousness his superego clutched tightly under his armpit - puts his ego in a tin, tightens the lid and places it on the second plane*

*sees Jesus standing next to Amos. Jesus is knocking Amos' head with his knuckles - a hollow sound emanates*

Amos' head represents the hollow tomb in which Jesus was buried. From the tomb emerges the resurrected christ who represents eternal life and hope for humanity.

Amos' magic-carpet philosophical escapades represent the birth of eternal wisdom from a virgin brain, untainted by long-haired intellectual crap.

*snatches the darkness from Amos' eyes and strikes Amos' lips. Amos instantly stops rambling*

Behold!