Peter Kirby

There is a new essay by Sid Green on the "Did Jesus Exist?" web site. Check it out and let us know what you think.

best,
Peter Kirby

Celsus

Hi Peter,

Am I correct in thinking that Green appears to fall somewhere between Ellegård and Eisenman? He seems to borrow plenty of ideas from the two of them. His connection between the Early Church and the Nazoreans or Essenes or Qumran community (a breakaway Sadducean sect?) seems a little confusing to me, or at least presupposes some arguments made elsewhere. As I understand it, he identifies the Teacher with Jesus, only that the author of Mark mistook his understanding of the historical account and thus wrote his gospel with his misunderstanding intact?

One thing I do like is his understanding of the Qumran use of "code words," and what light such an understanding might shed if understanding NT documents in the same light. (I'm thinking in particular of his forthcoming Hidden History in Acts of the Apostles, which uses this method a lot, and reveals a lot, as a little-known intermediary between pre- and post-gospel narrative) On the other hand, his essay seems quite short and he seems to need to flesh it out a lot more and it would be icing to see more references and support.

Joel

Tharmas

Thanks a lot Peter. I look forward to reading this. I found your other essay from Green, Qumran and Early Christianity, very thought provoking.

Zadok001

Sheesh, don't do that to me. I'm 19, for crying out loud! :-P

(Zadok is my middle name. Really.)

Tharmas

I’ve now had a chance to read the essay and I find it as interesting as I found his first. I look forward to more.

Personally, I probably need more background in the Scrolls myself before I could make a truly educated comment. I found what had to say about the “Sons of Zadok” very interesting; I need more education to understand how his fitting this history into the Scrolls fits with “mainstream” scholarship.

In general I instinctively respond to his thesis about the historical origins of Christianity. His model answers many questions for me that neither the historical nor mythical Jesus camps by themselves do.

On the other hand I’m not so sure I follow Green into his analysis of GMark. Does he mean to literally imply that Mark had access to some kind of proto-narrative that he garbled?

Which of the Church Fathers was it who said that Mark wrote down what he was told, but didn’t necessarily get things in the correct order? Green’s thesis certainly puts an “Amen” to that comment!