Vinnie

I have that and started reading it before. I am guessing that if I finished it now I might actually find parts of it humorous. Other parts I might agree with.

Not at all. In Jesus Under Fire (consists of articles by (IMO) evangelicals) someone mentioned the third quest. They were disputing the JS and said how third questers reconstruct a Jesus somewhat similar to the traditional view of Jesus. But this would be similar in a very basic outline only.

This is the outline probably:

Jesus was baptized by JBap, taught moral commands (e.g. divorce is one), perfomred miracles, had 12 disciples, had a final supper with his disciples, was crucified by Pilate etc.

But within this outline that seemingly agrees with evangelical viewpoints is a host of material directly at odds with it.

Thid-questers dispute the historicty of the sayings material in the Gospel of John. They would point things out like the Messianic Secret. many would also limit the types of miracles Jesus performed and and dismiss many (e.g. the nature ones). They would accept baptism by JBap but deny how the Christians frame it. For example, GJohn has JBap calling Jesus the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. Further, they would deny Matthew's redaction of Mark that John should be baptized by Jesus etc. Brown in his seminal commentary on the birth narratives of Luke and Matthew finds much material suspect there (magi story, birth in bethlehem etc.). I believe he agrees that Matthew and Luke contradict one another on their views of the details of how Jesus came to be born in Bethlehem. He sees the lucan census as problematic, etc. But Brown does lean towards historicity on the virginal conception though. But he, apprantely, does not think the evidence is lop-sided on that.

Further, many "third-questers" think Jesus was mistaken about the coming of the kingdom of God (Sanders, Fredriksen et al). Such a Jesus who is mistaken about an important feature of his ministry hardly coheres with the evangelical outlook.

You mean ipsissima vox vs ipsissima verba? Anyways, mainline scholars do not accept everything that the gospels say happened. Bona fide scholars treat the Gospels as hostile witnesses and try to find out what goes back to the historical Jesus and what doesn't.

I don't like the characterization of the JS as stubborn skeptics. To call them stubborn skeptic is something a conservative Christian will do, but not another mainline scholar. Both Meier and Crossan are mainline scholars on Jesus.

I think of Wright as being on the very conservative end of the mainline spectrum. Witherington, from what I hear, is there with him. Most mainline scholars, as far as I am aware, do not share all the same views. When I say mainline scholars I think of people like Brown, Meier, Borg, Crossan, Chilton, Mack, Fredriksen, Sanders, Koester, Fitzmeyer and tons and tons of others.

The mainline scholars on the HJ that I read do not try to defend it as such to the best of my knowledge. I actually overlooked Wright. I read the Two Visions book and he might appear to do so but he seems to think history has its limits as well:

"Of course, the historian qua historian cannot compel anyone to assent to anything. The historian can take the argument as far as I have taken it, leaving it clear what the options are: either solve the historical puzzle by agreeing that Jesus' body was transformed into a new sort of life, or leave it in essence unsolved by coming up with flights of fancy, which themselves create far more problems." p.124

He does seem to think that historically, the best expolanation is that Jesus rose but he does lay out a reservation. Many scholars would agree that early Christians believed Jesus literally rose from the dead. but the nature of the claim prevents the historian from going any further.

I agree that the historical evidence points to this. It seems hard to explain Christianity without the claim of a resurection and I am convinced Jesus' first followers seem to have had some sort of resurrection experiences. As best as I can understand the evidence points to this but history cannot argue for a literal resurrection. I accept the burial story without some details (e.g. guard story) so the question is where was the body?

But think of it like this, even if miracles were "possible" what are the odds of a man being raised froim the dead? Surely they would be very high. History works under uniformitarianism, doesn't it? So an affirmation of something such as a literal bodily resurrection is just as improbable as some other conjured theory that Wright would call a 'flight of fancy".

Aliens took the body.
It was stolen.
The disciples didn't know where it was buried.
They made it all up.
Some of them had visions and this turned into the bodily Rez.

These are all dismissed as improbable by apologists and I agree with them that they are "improbable". They are all improbable but so is a man being resurrected from the dead. Historically, it seems just as improbable as these speculated events, if not more so. That seems to be the difficulty with "miracles" such as this. History can point to them. It could say that Jesus was buried and his followers shortly after he died thought he was resurrected but it cannot affirm that the did occur. If history works in terms of probabilities and tries to figure out the most "likely" course of events then surely miracles, which are very improbable (if not considered impossible) make such claims problematic.

But I believe that resurrection does seem to fit in that explains a lot of details of the records that we have. That is not enough to prove the event happened though. We might be able to prove that Jesus' followers thought he rose from the dead but that is not the same as proving it actually happened.

See my previous thoughts on the rez.

Its been a long while since I read Craig on the Rez but I know there are some elements I would disagree with him on. He seems to accept the guard story, I don't. I accept burial by Joseph but not the added details of Matthew. But I don't think he presses the guard story at all though.

Given that we don't know many details of the burial story (we cannot take the gospel material at face value--any details have to be argued for and defended) it might be harder to dismiss some theories that apologists would call "flights of fancy". But if this was a non-miraculous event with the same level of attestation I couldn't see any scholar denying the events historicity. *To edit* This may be a little too strong. Given divergences of who the risen Jesus appeared to some reservations could surely be held here. I still find much of the material persuasive thought. This seems to be an instance where the historian says I don't know what happened.

Vinnie

Vinnie

E.P. Sanders said this:

TheDiddleyMan

Thanks for the replies Vinnie. I still am somewhat confused, though. But maybe I'll pick up some books for myself and read. Or when I have more specific questions, I will ask them....

I found the stuff you said about the resurrection interesting. Personally, I'd agree with you that the resurrection has explanatory power for the events involved. At the same, I personally don't believe in the resurrection. I guess I just don't think the evidence is a strong or as airtight as it should be. I really don't see why I just believe in the resurrection because Paul says that Jesus christ appeared to him and 500 other people. I'd like to more about the events surrounding the appearances. I guess that is part of the difficulty - we only have Christian sources, who present their interpretations of the events that occurred.

Question: What book is that Sanders quote from? He discusses the appearances. What does he think about the empty tomb though? Just curious.


Kevin

Vinnie

I didn't get to the section in V2 of Meier's Marginal Series on miracles yet but I made a note of something Meier said on page 48 regarding Luke 1:15 and JBap's alleged nazirite status: "Apart from the problems of taking the words of an angel as a historical datum, Raymond E. Brown judges..."

Sanders states (Historical Figure of Jesus, p. 276), "The resurrection is not, strictly speaking, part of the story of the historical Jesus, but rather belongs to the aftermath of his life."

Vinnie

Vinnie

Sander's doesn't mention the empty tomb. He accepts burial by Joseph of Arimathea (called a distant admirer of Jesus who donated a grave).

Sander's seems to stop with the burial:

"“Faced with accounts of this nature – sharply diverging stories of where and to whom Jesus appeared, lack of agreement and clarity on what he was like (except agreement on negatives) – we cannot reconstruct what really happened. Throughout this book I have offered suggestions about what lies behind passages in the Gospels. On the present topic, however, I do not see how to improve on the evidence, or how to get behind it."

But he does see the early Rez experiences as a fact:

"That Jesus’ followers (and later Paul) had resurrection experiences is, in my judgement, a fact. What the reality was that gave rise to the experiences I do not know.”

Sander's seems to leave it at that. The sharply diverging stories and differing details prevent a reconstruction of what happened. Craig would seemingly disagree and say the basic outline of all the stories is the same. Jesus died, was buried, a group of woman went to the tomb and it was empty. But Sander's seems more correct especially when we look at the various descriptions of what the risen Jesus was like. Not to mention one wonders why they couldn't agree on who saw him and why competition grew. I think Crossan sees these as "authority" views. He appeared to Peter first (does that bolster Peter's authority?).

Vinnie

CX

You can never have too many of either (though perhaps my wife would disagree). We're building a playground for Jaz and Sophie in the back yard now that Spring has pretty much sprung so I can get back to making large pieces of dimensional lumber into smaller pieces of dimensional lumber.

Yuri Kuchinsky

Hello, folks,

I've read this discussion, and it sure gets pretty confusing with all those "Third Questers", the "New Questers", and the "New and Improved Questers". Of course, myself, I think this whole house of NT scholarship is a hill of beans.

Perhaps all this confused terminology is simply a way to hide the utter bankruptcy and dishonesty of modern NT scholarship?

I see the Jesus Seminar as basically a bunch of mainstreamers. They are not any sort of radicals. The only "radical" thing they've done is take the Gospel of Thomas seriously (although they seem to have done it for the wrong reasons).

Our whole modern NT scholarship is based on one massive cover-up. They are still covering up the Semitic-language gospels -- the Aramaic, as well as the Hebrew. None of them have a clue about what they are. They've never laid their eyes on them, and are not interested... This is political bias, pure and simple.

What a bunch of frauds...

Regards,

Yuri.

Baqqesh shalom veradphehu -- Seek peace and pursue it (Psalm 34:15)

Yuri Kuchinsky -- http://www.trends.ca/~yuku -- Toronto

Vinnie

The terminology is hardly that confusing. This isn't tensor calculus here. New-comers just need to understand the relevant history (various quests and proponents) and all should fall into place.

A simpleton like me can understand the terminology so I hardly think it can be conceived of as being a "way to hide the utter bankruptcy and dishonesty of modern NT scholarship". Your apologetical bias against NT scholarship (whether your arguments are valid or invalid) is seeping through here where it shouldn't be.

Vinnie

Yuri Kuchinsky

Hi, Vinnie,

Well, perhaps the terminology isn't so confusing for those who've spent their whole life rehashing these matters over and over again... Still, I don't think it really has any relevance in the real life.

Quote:

so I hardly think it can be conceived of as being a "way to hide the utter bankruptcy and dishonesty of modern NT scholarship". Your apologetical bias against NT scholarship (whether your arguments are valid or invalid) is seeping through here where it shouldn't be. Vinnie

My only "apologetical bias" is against *bad* NT scholarship. Because I have a lot of respect for the scientific method, I guess.

So what about those Semitic gospels? How come nobody is interested in them? Is it just the "Jesus the Greek" cult, after all?

Yours,

Yuri.