Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Toto · 05-05-2003, 11:37 AM

This paper was recently mentioned in passing on the Jesus Mysteries list:

Prophecy Historicized or History Scripturized? Reflections on the Origin of the Crucifixion Narrative by Mark Goodacre

Goodacre makes the common assumption that parts of the Passion Narrative were derived from Old Testament scripture (the "prophesy historicized" of Crossan), but makes the assumption that any part of the Narrative that cannot be traced back to a scriptural passage must have some historical core (using primarily the criterion of embarrassment.) He then tries to argue that even the parts that can be traced back to scripture may embody a historical core.

However, Goodacre ignores the possibility of other literary influences on the Passion Narrative. Crossan has traced the mockery scene, where Jesus is draped in a robe and given an crown of thorns and mocked as King of the Jews, to Philo's Against Flaccus.

In Philo's version, a madman named "Carabbas" (which differs by one small stroke from Barabbas when written in Hebrew), is draped with a royal robe and given a fake skepter by the Alexandrian crowd in mockery of the visiting Jewish king Herod Agrippa I. It is a bit of street theater that fits into the Philo's narrative of building tensions between the Greeks and Jews of Alexandria.

Harold Leidner, in The Fabrication of the Christ Myth, takes this further, and identifies 24 points of literary influence between Philo and the Passion Narrative.

Parts of Leider's argument are reproduced online here:

Christianism.com addendum (scroll down to "Passion Narrative, about 2/3 down the page.)

Quote:

A large number of episodes in the gospel passion narrative appear to derive from Philo. No fewer than twenty-four can be found. We must ask why Crossan [Who killed Jesus? Exposing the Roots of Anti-Semitism in the Gospel Story of the Death of Jesus] stopped short at three and did not go much further into the content of Philo's book ["Concerning Flaccus"], since he rejected Mark's version outright. We can guess that Crossan prudently refrained from venturing further into this dangerous territory, since it would question the very existence of the passion narrative. His colleagues have also stayed clear.

Concerning Flaccus was a political-historical work written by Philo of Alexandria in witness to the disastrous civil war in Alexandria between Greeks and Jews, and the downfall of Flaccus, governor of Egypt appointed by the Roman emperor Tiberias in 32 CE, and deposed by one of his successors. This disaster featured the torture and crucifixion of a number of elderly, respected leaders of the Jewish community.

Besides the "mockery" scene, Philo describes a betrayal, crucifixion(s) that happen at the third hour, as in Mark; the crucifixion(s) happen on a holiday when amnesty would be appropriate, but a mob forces the Roman governor to carry out the sentences. There are other familiar elements: a via dolorosa, jeering and abuse by onlookers, an arrest by a detachment of fully armed Roman soldiers, companions who show cowardice, betrayal by a Judas figure. The elements seem to be reworked in a literary fashion, as they make sense as part of Philo's narrative, but create difficulties and awkwardness in their gospel transfiguration.

It is Leidner's thesis that the character of "Jesus" in the gospels was a composite based on the Jewish people of Alexandria, who suffered crucifixion, but were later rescued when Flaccus was arrested and deposed.

Robert Price, in Of Myth and Men lists other apparent influences:

Quote:

The political coloring of the last days of Jesus seems to have been borrowed from the stories, confused together, of various popular Jewish and other revolutionary kings from the period. Mark 13:21-22 warned against such confusion, but it was already too late, as Mark's own account shows. Still another likely source was the women's mourning rituals from contemporary Mystery Religions. Here is a list of parallels and probable sources. The anointing of Jesus at Bethany (as Randel Helms recognized) comes from Isis anointing the corpse of her husband Osiris to resurrect him, part of the mummy-resurrection mythos of Egypt. Jesus' triumphal entry and ejection of the "robbers" from the temple has been derived from the welcome, during the Roman siege, of Simon bar-Giora, a messianic king, and his troops to exterminate the Zealot "robbers" who occupied the temple. Jesus' interrogation and beating before Pilate and the Jewish elders mirror those of the mad prophet Jesus ben-Ananias who, like the Christian Jesus, was condemned for predicting the fall of the city/temple. . . .

When Matthew has Pilate's wife intervene in Jesus' trial proceedings, hoping to free him, he has likely borrowed the notion from John the Baptist's passion narrative, where, however, it was Herodias' intervention that led to the Baptist's death. . . . . Luke has one of Jesus' crucified colleagues bid him, "Remember me when you come into your kingdom," a phrase borrowed directly from Diodorus Siculus. The divine portents attending Jesus' death on the cross reflect those at the crucifixion of rebel king Cleomenes of Sparta at Alexandria according to Plutarch. These omens cause visitors to the cross in each case to declare the crucified one to be son of god. And like Cleomenes, Jesus is stabbed to make sure of death.

As the Gospels have Mary Magdalene and her companions seek the body of Jesus only to find it gone, so do Isis, her sister Nephthys, and their maidens seek the slain Osiris, hoping to anoint him. The incognito appearance of the risen Jesus to two disciples on the road to Emmaus bears a striking resemblance to a much older and well-known story in which Asclepius appears unrecognized to a woman suppliant heading back home disappointed-only to gain the hoped-for miracle after all. Again, in Luke 24 and John 20 Jesus appears to his astonished disciples, who have given him up for dead, showing them his solid flesh for proof that he has not died to reappear as a ghost but has miraculously escaped Pilate's wrath-just as Apollonius of Tyana appears to his dumbfounded disciples, extending his hands to convince them he has escaped Domitian's evil intentions. After Apollonius' final ascension, one of his disciples remains stubbornly unconvinced until Apollonius appears in a special epiphany just for him-precisely as Jesus does for doubting Thomas in John 20:24-29.

Jesus' parting commission to carry his teaching to the nations and make them his disciples (Matthew 28:18-20) is uncannily similar to the commission of the risen Romulus to the leaders of his newly founded city to spread the dominion of Rome to all the nations. The ascension of Jesus into cloudy concealment is also reminiscent of Romulus but seems to have been modelled directly upon Josephus' account of the ascension of Moses before the forlorn eyes of his disciples.

Given all this, there appears to be absolutely no reason to assume that there is any historical basis to the crucifixion of Jesus. If there did happen to be a historical person behind the gospel stories, the crucifixion cannot be shown to be a historical detail.

Yellum Notnef · 05-05-2003, 01:52 PM

Hi Toto,
I was just about to start a new thread with a question I had,but I think it fits perfectly with this thread.

If jesus' crucifixion was historical and everything Christians claim it to be,how come it wasn't depicted in Christian art until the 7th century?

From http://www.religioustolerance.org/chr_symb.htm

Quote:

The use of the cross as a symbol was condemned by at least one church father of the 3rd century CE because of its Pagan origins. The first appearance of a cross in Christian art is on a Vatican sarcophagus from the mid-5th Century. 11 It was a Greek cross with equal-length arms. Jesus' body was not shown. The first crucifixion scenes didn't appear in Christian art until the 7th century CE.

SLD · 05-05-2003, 04:21 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Fenton Mulley
Hi Toto,
I was just about to start a new thread with a question I had,but I think it fits perfectly with this thread.

If jesus' crucifixion was historical and everything Christians claim it to be,how come it wasn't depicted in Christian art until the 7th century?

From http://www.religioustolerance.org/chr_symb.htm

I thought it was in art long before then. There is a room in Herculaneum with a cross symbol in it, and also one with the words Pater Noster in the form of a cross.

SLD

Yellum Notnef · 05-05-2003, 05:59 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by SLD

I thought it was in art long before then. There is a room in Herculaneum with a cross symbol in it, and also one with the words Pater Noster in the form of a cross.

SLD

You mean this thing ? Click on the link that says "carbonized wooden chest" to see a picture of it.

But even if that cabinet bracket was a cross symbol (which I don't believe it is),it's still not a depiction of the crucifixion with Jesus on the cross.

I haven't found anything about the Pater Noster thing yet.

Toto · 05-05-2003, 06:24 PM

Fenton - that link got lost somewhere.

There was a thread last year on the whole cross / tree /stake thing.

Hanging in a Tree

The original verses in the Bible use the Greek word stauros, which is now translated "cross", but really means "stake."

The cross seems to have been used by Mithraism for astrological symbolism.

Yellum Notnef · 05-05-2003, 06:31 PM

Thanks Toto. I fixed the link in my post above.

I'll check out the "hanging in a tree" thread later tonight.

Secular Pinoy · 05-06-2003, 03:36 AM

Concerning the passion narrative, a local bookstore here recently started stocking up Raymond Brown's two-book series Death of the Messiah vol. 1 and 2. Do you think it's worth buying? It's a bit on the expensive end, though I'm willing to buy it as there is little else in the bookstore worth buying.

Vorkosigan · 05-06-2003, 03:42 AM

Looks like we have to get that book!

Michael

Toto · 05-06-2003, 11:00 AM

Leidner has no respect for NT scholarship and refuses to engage with it. It is not clear from the reviews that Meier has enough respect for the mythicist position to want to engage with it.

One reviewer on Amazon says:

Quote:

It should perhaps be noted that his book is fully within the Roman Catholic tradition. Do not expect to find many conclusions that differ greatly from traditional Catholic teachings on the subject. Students who are influenced by scholars such as the Jesus Seminar or John Dominic Crossan will find much to disagree with.

But even the most liberal scholars will have to take this book very seriously. The Jesus Seminar and Crossan can argue very reasonably about what percentage of all the words attributed to Jesus are really his. But few doubt that Jesus was crucifed. (Muslims, whose beliefs are based upon what the Koran says about the subject, are the only reasonable persons who think that Jesus was not killed on the cross. The others are crackpots.) So there must have been some sort of trial, Jews confering with each other and with Romans, and so forth. Thus there is, I think, more possibility for agreement here than on some other issues.

I have outlined Leidner's and Price's arguments against seeing the Passion Narrative as historical, and I find them persuasive; without the Passion Narrative, there is no reason to think that Jesus, if he existed, was crucified under Pilate, and only some vague language in Paul's letters (that might have been a later interpolation), that indicates that he was crucified at all, versus indications that he was stoned and hung on a tree, or merely a mythic projection.

joedad · 05-07-2003, 10:35 PM

Fenton Mulley and Toto,

If there's no depiction of a crucified Jesus until the seventh century, which comes as quite a surprise to me, then the thread Bede started a while back about the magical amulet on the cover of the Jesus Mysteries makes a lot more sense. It's big time evidence of more christian borrowing.

If such amulets are third and fourth century as he says, and were quite common, as would seem to be evidenced by his posts, the case for a mythical Jesus is tremendously strengthened. Seems like just more christian borrowing, and in this case a couple centuries after the fact.

joe

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05-05-2003, 06:24 PM	#5
Toto Contributor Join Date: Jun 2000 Location: Los Angeles area Posts: 40,549	Fenton - that link got lost somewhere. There was a thread last year on the whole cross / tree /stake thing. Hanging in a Tree The original verses in the Bible use the Greek word stauros, which is now translated "cross", but really means "stake." The cross seems to have been used by Mithraism for astrological symbolism.

05-05-2003, 06:31 PM	#6
Yellum Notnef Banned Join Date: Sep 2002 Location: Gone Posts: 4,676	Thanks Toto. I fixed the link in my post above. I'll check out the "hanging in a tree" thread later tonight.

05-06-2003, 03:36 AM	#7
Secular Pinoy Veteran Member Join Date: Feb 2001 Location: Quezon City, Philippines Posts: 1,994	Concerning the passion narrative, a local bookstore here recently started stocking up Raymond Brown's two-book series Death of the Messiah vol. 1 and 2. Do you think it's worth buying? It's a bit on the expensive end, though I'm willing to buy it as there is little else in the bookstore worth buying.

05-06-2003, 03:42 AM	#8
Vorkosigan Contributor Join Date: Jan 2001 Location: Barrayar Posts: 11,866	Looks like we have to get that book! Michael

05-07-2003, 10:35 PM	#10
joedad Veteran Member Join Date: Mar 2001 Location: PA USA Posts: 5,039	Fenton Mulley and Toto, If there's no depiction of a crucified Jesus until the seventh century, which comes as quite a surprise to me, then the thread Bede started a while back about the magical amulet on the cover of the Jesus Mysteries makes a lot more sense. It's big time evidence of more christian borrowing. If such amulets are third and fourth century as he says, and were quite common, as would seem to be evidenced by his posts, the case for a mythical Jesus is tremendously strengthened. Seems like just more christian borrowing, and in this case a couple centuries after the fact. joe

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