Biblical literacy

[DaryLLL]

Since some have been asking, I submit a sampling of where my interests lie re the intersection of: Bible and intertestamental lit, gnostic gospels and Hellenistic paganism/mystery religions.

This upcoming event presents several of my Biblical scholar heroes, Spong, Pagels, Armstrong, King and Borg.

(disclaimer: I object the the use of the term Judeo-Christian)


http://www.westarinstitute.org/Events/SPR2004/ProgramS04/programs04.html

[tracymom]

:) Thank you DaryLLL.

[DaryLLL]

So if anybody, like, has any questions or anything...

[dado]

some reading suggestions from contemporary authors...

"Who Wrote the Bible?", Friedman (this is the J,E,P,D hypothesis, and there's a follow up coming later this year

"Complete Dead Sea Scrolls in English", Geza Vermes

"Nag Hammadi Library in English", James Robinson

"Introduction To Early Judaism", James Vanderkam

"Judaism When Christianity Began", Jacob Neusner

"Lost Christianities", Bart Ehrman

that should be enough to get someone up to speed very quickly on current scholarship. for those interested in creating their own "spin" :) two of the most important original sources are Josephus and Origen. Josephus was a Jew who survived the destruction of the temple and wrote a great deal about the history of the region. Origen was a second-century figure, the first significant Christian scholar and philosopher whose writings laid the groundwork for the orthodoxy Constantine would establish a few generations later.

[DaryLLL]

But watch out for the Dick Cheneys of their day, Tertullian and Eusebius. ;)

Dado, have you read all those books?

[PaganScribe]

I'm in the middle of Lost Christianities and really enjoying it.

DaryLLL, it looks like a conference that I would really enjoy as well.

I still have so, so much to learn. :sigh:

[dado]

Originally posted by DaryLLL
But watch out for the Dick Cheneys of their day, Tertullian and Eusebius. ;)


:LOL very clever! you think anybody is going to get that?

unfortunately, i haven't been able to get to all of them just yet...

[me&3]

I googled Nag Hammadi and found this: http://www.gnosis.org/naghamm/nhlintro.html

It was a short intro on gnosticism - pretty interesting. Since I'm not knowledgable about this subject, I can't say if it's accurate. DaryLLL? Dado?

Wish I had the time to do more in-depth reading, since I find this subject fascinating. But I can't even get to my homework.. hehe, probably because I keep checking the boards. I think I may need to go cold-turkey for awhile...
:(
:LOL

[dado]

observations stemming from a truncated discussion elsewhere. the thread title clearly delineates this as a discussion about the texts themselves and not about the inherent, personal value of the texts.

un-redacting the arrest/conviction of Jesus...

All from Mark 14, starting right after the arrest at Gethsemane, noting all the participants in the drama were Jews, in Jerusalem, living under Jewish law...

53 They took Jesus to the high priest, and all the chief priests and teachers of the law came together...

Sanhedrin was not allowed to convene at night.

Sanhedrin did not convene on Shabbat(!).

Sanhedrin most assuredly did not convene on Pesach.

61 But Jesus remained silent and gave no answer. Again the high priest asked him, "Are you the Christ, the Son of the Blessed One?"

no Jew then or now would associate "messiah" with divinity. a clear Constantinization as the question has no basis in Judasim and jesus's divinity was not orthodoxed until Nicea.

62 "I am," said Jesus. "And you will see the son of man sitting at the right hand of the mighty one and coming on the clouds of heaven."
63 The high priest tore his clothes. "Why do we need any more witnesses?" he asked.

it was not then nor is it now a Judaic crime to declare oneself the Messiah. there have been so many self-proclaimed messiahs rabbi ben Zakkai is famously quoted as saying "If you should happen to be holding a sapling in your hand when they tell you that the Messiah has arrived, first plant the sapling and then go out and greet the Messiah."

64 "You have heard the blasphemy. What do you think?" They all condemned him as worthy of death

in Judaism "blasphemy" has specific legal meaning related to defiling the ineffable name of G-d. what is recorded here is not blasphemy.

capital cases in particular were forbidden to be tried right before Shabbat or a holiday.

the sanhedrin was not allowed to return immediate guilty verdicts in capital cases: there was a mandatory 24 hour "cooling down" period.

Now in chapter 15...
1 Very early in the morning, the chief priests, with the elders and the teachers of the law and the whole Sanhedrin reached a decision. They bound Jesus, led him away and turned him over to Pilate.

even assuming all the extreme irregularities actually took place and the reported verdict was accurate, there was no need to turn Jesus over to Pilate as Sanhedrin had the authority to execute people. Jesus would simply have been stoned - or possibly strangled - to death.

the story then proceeds to the Romans killing Jesus at the request of Jews.

whoever wrote this version/part of the story could not have had more than a passing familiarity with Judaism, that much is very clear. since all the apostles were Jewish, this part, at least, had to have been redacted at a later date.

but why?

we may never know for sure. the most compelling explanation for the redaction would be to flip the culpability: from "Jesus arrested by Jews for the Romans" - which is, indeed, something the Jewish leadership would quite possibly have done - to "Jesus executed by Romans for the Jews". this would have been necessitated by Constantine and Nicea. not coincidentally there are no surviving fragments corroborating the "accepted" version that predate Nicea.

ultimately this question won't be answered definitively until we find an older version of the Dead Sea Scrolls.

[tracymom]

the story then proceeds to the Romans killing Jesus at the request of Jews.

whoever wrote this version/part of the story could not have had more than a passing familiarity with Judaism, that much is very clear. since all the apostles were Jewish, this part, at least, had to have been redacted at a later date.

I just finished Holy Blood, Holy Grail by Henry Lincoln, et al and in it he poses an interesting hypothesis that since the gospels were being written for a primarily Roman audience and in a Roman-dominated culture,they needed to be palatable to that culture so as not to be completely suppressed. Since the temple had just been destroyed in the war 66-70 AD, anti-Jewish sentiment was high and so the Jews became the scapegoat in the gospels, minimizing the Roman responsibility. He gives other thoughts along that line, but I can't look them up because I've loaned it out to my dad.

[dado]

it certainly fits. putting Pilate in the story is just so completely unnecessary that it must have served a rather specific purpose. the Pilate described in the christian books doesn't sound anything like the Pilate described in works by historians of the time, with Josephus in particular showing ruthless, iron-fisted ruler who doesn't give a hoot about the religious sensitivities of his subjects. he even minted new coins for Judea bearing pagan symbols.

this is clearly not a "i wash my hands" kind of guy.

[thistle]

Originally posted by dado
it certainly fits. putting Pilate in the story is just so completely unnecessary that it must have served a rather specific purpose. the Pilate described in the christian books doesn't sound anything like the Pilate described in works by historians of the time, with Josephus in particular showing ruthless, iron-fisted ruler who doesn't give a hoot about the religious sensitivities of his subjects. he even minted new coins for Judea bearing pagan symbols.

this is clearly not a "i wash my hands" kind of guy.

On the contrary, Josephus describes an account of Pilate stepping back after a demonstration from Jewish leaders.

2. Now Pilate, who was sent as procurator into Judea by Tiberius, sent by night those images of Caesar that are called ensigns into Jerusalem. This excited a very among great tumult among the Jews when it was day; for those that were near them were astonished at the sight of them, as indications that their laws were trodden under foot; for those laws do not permit any sort of image to be brought into the city. Nay, besides the indignation which the citizens had themselves at this procedure, a vast number of people came running out of the country. These came zealously to Pilate to Cesarea, and besought him to carry those ensigns out of Jerusalem, and to preserve them their ancient laws inviolable; but upon Pilate's denial of their request, they fell (9) down prostrate upon the ground, and continued immovable in that posture for five days and as many nights.

3. On the next day Pilate sat upon his tribunal, in the open market-place, and called to him the multitude, as desirous to give them an answer; and then gave a signal to the soldiers, that they should all by agreement at once encompass the Jews with their weapons; so the band of soldiers stood round about the Jews in three ranks. The Jews were under the utmost consternation at that unexpected sight. Pilate also said to them that they should be cut in pieces, unless they would admit of Caesar's images, and gave intimation to the soldiers to draw their naked swords. Hereupon the Jews, as it were at one signal, fell down in vast numbers together, and exposed their necks bare, and cried out that they were sooner ready to be slain, than that their law should be transgressed. Hereupon Pilate was greatly surprised at their prodigious superstition, and gave order that the ensigns should be presently carried out of Jerusalem.


From The Jewish War, Book 2, Chapter 9

[dado]

that describes Pilate "stepping back" from a full-fledged revolt, not from a beaten up prophet in bloody rags about to be executed. he ultimately lost his post over his heavy-handedness and committed suicide.

[fourlittlebirds]

61 But Jesus remained silent and gave no answer. Again the high priest asked him, "Are you the Christ, the Son of the Blessed One?"

no Jew then or now would associate "messiah" with divinity.[snip]

62 "I am," said Jesus. "And you will see the son of man sitting at the right hand of the mighty one and coming on the clouds of heaven."
63 The high priest tore his clothes. "Why do we need any more witnesses?" he asked.

it was not then nor is it now a Judaic crime to declare oneself the Messiah. [snip]

64 "You have heard the blasphemy. What do you think?" They all condemned him as worthy of death

in Judaism "blasphemy" has specific legal meaning related to defiling the ineffable name of G-d. what is recorded here is not blasphemy.

I appreciate your comments, Dado. I spent some time in college with evangelists (my boyfriend was Southern Baptist) and I would love to hear what you have to say about their take on all this. Which is that previously to the above event Jesus had said things that implied that he was equating himself with God, or related to God, or some such thing, in other words redefining 'Messiah' in a special new way that assumed divinity. In Matthew the high priest asks more specifically if Jesus is the son of God, to which Jesus replies "I am." The Christian explanation for why this was considered blasphemous is that "I AM" is supposedly the name of God which must not be uttered under penalty of death, and also an equating oneself with God which is also blasphemous.

Comments?

[dado]

Originally posted by blueviolet
In Matthew the high priest asks more specifically if Jesus is the son of God, to which Jesus replies "I am."

all Israel, all humankind are "sons (and daughters) of G-d". it is a common phrase. it is also perfectly acceptable to use the term for an individual person rather than a group of people, especially for a strong leader. there's simply no crime there.

The Christian explanation for why this was considered blasphemous is that "I AM" is supposedly the name of God

"I am" isn't the ineffable name. but there's a bigger problem: language. they weren't speaking Hebrew.

that aside, i think your friends first need to establish how such an event could happen at all at night, on Shabbat, during Passover.

[AnnaReilly]

I have just started reading the Jesus Mysteries and am finding this subject very interesting. I'll have to add a few more of these books to my "to-read" list.



Sanhedrin was not allowed to convene at night.
Sanhedrin did not convene on Shabbat(!).
Sanhedrin most assuredly did not convene on Pesach.


It's been awhile since I was ensconced in the Evangelical Christian world, but I remember once hearing a speaker talk about this. He actually brought up all of these things as proof of the under-handed way that Jesus died. He was saying that the Jewish leaders were aware of Jesus' charismatic following undermining their authority. So they convened a special meeting of the Sanhedrin and did not follow proper protocol. He suggested that the Sanhedrin that was convened was not even the full Sanhedrin, but just a few of the members who had it out for Jesus anyway. This is not my personal viewpoint so I can't be more specific about the finer points what this speaker said, but this was the general idea.

[AnnaReilly]

And this may be a dumb question, but where does one find works by Josephus and Origen - written in English?

[dado]

Originally posted by AnnaReilly
He was saying that the Jewish leaders were aware of Jesus' charismatic following undermining their authority.

that doesn't seem consistent with prior and later actions where the Jewish leadership backed others claiming to be the Mosiach in very open, public fashion.

the other problem is that the High Priest was specifically named as present and prosecuting - and the High Priest of the time was a puppet installed by Rome itself. Rome being worried about a charismatic leader and using a corrupted element of the Jewish leadership to find and arrest him for their own purposes...this i don't have any trouble believing. they killed many, many "charismatic" Jews.

He suggested that the Sanhedrin that was convened was not even the full Sanhedrin, but just a few of the members who had it out for Jesus anyway.

i find it hard to reconcile "i know! let's have a secret lynching!" with "let's turn him over to the romans 12 hours later and have a giant public spectacle!". if they were that secretive and slimy they would have simply made him disappear Tony Soprano style.

[dado]

Originally posted by AnnaReilly
but where does one find works by Josephus and Origen - written in English?

why, at MDC's sponsor, of course! :D

http://www.powells.com/cgi-bin/biblio?inkey=62-0825429242-0
http://www.powells.com/cgi-bin/biblio?inkey=62-0809121980-0

i believe they are also available in free, electronic form from the Gutenberg Project.

[me&3]

Cool site - I haven't actually gone through what I can find on it yet... But here it is:
www.earlychristianwritings.com

AnnReilly - you can find Josephus online in English at www.earlyjewishwritings.com

Have fun!
:)

[dado]

that's an awesome find, me&3!

note to self: the original Nicean Creed from 325.

We believe in one God, the Father All Governing, creator of all things visible and invisible;
And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, begotten of the Father as only begotten, that is, from the essense of the Father, God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten not created, of the same essence as the Father, through whom all things came into being, both in heaven and in earth; Who for us men and for our salvation, came down and was
incarnate, becoming human He suffered and
the third day he rose, and ascended into the heavens. And he will come to judge both the living and the dead. And [we believe] in the Holy Spirit.

then there's this bit basically slapping Euseubius and Arius on the wrist...

But, those who say, Once he was not, or he was not before his generation, or he came to be out of nothing, or who assert that he, the Son of God, is of a differen hypostatis or ousia,
or that he is a creature, or changeable, or mutable, the Catholic and Apostolic Church anathematizes them.

[DaryLLL]

Rejoining my own thread... interesting discussion.

2 more thoughts on BarAbbas. Son of the Father. A gnostic docetic idea is, Jesus did not die on the cross. Being God he could not die in any way. How can God die? Instead, he died by proxy. In one gnostic gospel, John the Beloved, overcome with grief, leaves the cross and is joined by Christ a ways away. Christ laughs at the idea he could die.

So when BarAbbas is released, the Son of the Father is known to be alive and safe, and a human husk dies. (I thought I read this in The Jesus Mysteries, or Jesus and the Lost Goddess, but now I look and do not see BarAbbas in the index. Will keep looking.)

2nd idea, favored by Margaret Starbird of The Woman With the Alabaster Jar, BarAbbas was Jesus' son. They were both seditionists. (Jesus having a Zealot and a Sicarii [Iscariot]) in his group of followers. ) Perhaps the turning over of the Temple tables was part of the sedition that brought Jesus to trial, the true reason Rome wanted him dead. Makes more sense on a practical level. Jesus, being 30ish, could have had several children by this point. Even a grown son of 15 or more.

[DaryLLL]

Originally posted by dado
Nicean Creed from 325.

We believe in one God, the Father All Governing, creator of all things visible and invisible;
And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, begotten of the Father as only begotten, that is, from the essense of the Father, God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten not created, of the same essence as the Father, through whom all things came into being, both in heaven and in earth; Who for us men and for our salvation, came down and was
incarnate, becoming human He suffered and
the third day he rose, and ascended into the heavens. And he will come to judge both the living and the dead. And [we believe] in the Holy Spirit.


My, the Holy Spirit gets short shrift, doesn't She? :blah about the Father and Son, 5 words for Mother Sophia, who appeared at the baptism in a form of a dove (goddess symbol of old) and whose voice was heard from heaven, "This is my son, who pleases me."

Jesus is baptised in Matthew, Mark and Luke but not in John. Perhaps the Beloved Disciple (Mary Magdalene?) thought it was inappropriate for a god to be baptised by a man in the high Christology of this gospels' POV.

Perhaps Ioannes could not baptise Ioesous because they were the same person, pre- and post- resurrection (in the Pauline sense).

[DaryLLL]

Ach, Spirituality is so boring on Shabbat (sound of crickets).

[barbara]

in Judaism "blasphemy" has specific legal meaning related to defiling the ineffable name of G-d. what is recorded here is not blasphemy. Just out of curiosity, and not trying to be argumentitive on this thread that is obviously not intened for Christians, but could you answer this question in light of the quote above? In Judaism is it acceptable to call one's self G-d and to say that I and the father are one?

[DaryLLL]

(Barbara, this thread is not meant to exclude Christians, but is meant to view the Bible as literature, not as a tool for belief. If anyone wants to make that leap for the sake of this thread, they are welcome.)

Jesus also claimed to be the Temple itself. Tear this down and in 3 days I will build it back up. Oddly in Matt and Mark, he is not quoted as actually saying it, but just accused of saying it later.

Matthew 26:61
and declared, "This fellow said, 'I am able to destroy the temple of God and rebuild it in three days.' "

Matthew 27:40
and saying, "You who are going to destroy the temple and build it in three days, save yourself! Come down from the cross, if you are the Son of God!"

Mark 14:58
"We heard him say, 'I will destroy this man_made temple and in three days will build another, not made by man.' "

Mark 15:29
Those who passed by hurled insults at him, shaking their heads and saying, "So! You who are going to destroy the temple and build it in three days, come down from the cross and save yourself.

(BTW, it is easy to see the synoptic view here, between Mark and Matt.)

In John he is made to actually say it to the disciples.

John 2:19
Jesus answered them, "Destroy this temple, and I will raise it again in three days."

Yet in a letter, written before the gospel of Mark, Paul had already stated we all are the Temple of God. Yet no "Jews" came after him to lynch him. Why is that?

1 Corinthians 3:17
If anyone destroys God's temple, God will destroy him; for God's temple is sacred, and you are that temple.

If Christ is in me (Paul), if Christ and I are both the temple of God, if we are all God's sons (Jewish belief), is it a big leap to say the Father and I are one? When one says, the father and I are one, is one saying, I am God? We are always on the edge of pantheism here.

Of course the gospel of Thomas was thrown out because Jesus said in it, he could be found under a rock or in a split log, but that is echoed canonically here:

Luke 19:40
"I tell you," he replied, "if they keep quiet, the stones will cry out."


If Jesus was talking about a spirtual philosophical concept, why did all the accusers think he meant a literal building of stone? This is word play between gnostics and literalists. This also makes the accusers seem stupid, IMO.

Stones crying out in the Greek scriptures seems to be an echo from a Hebrew prophet, Habukkuk, 2:11. The stones of the wall will cry out, and the beams of the woodwork will echo it.

[DaryLLL]

Over on the Yahool Group, JesusMysteries, I have heard good things about The Incredible Shrinking Son of Man, by Robert M. Price. I want to read it.


http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1591021219/qid=1077366161/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/002-9163373-6079261?v=glance&s=books


excerpt of amazon editorial review:

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

About the Author

Robert M. Price is a lecturer and a debater for the Council for Secular Humanism and the Campus Freethought Alliance, as well as a professor for the Center for Inquiry Institute, Johnnie Colemon Theological Seminary, and Johnston Community College. His published works include: DECONSTRUCTING JESUS and THE WIDOW TRADITIONS IN LUKE-ACTS: A FEMINIST-CRITICAL SCRUTINY. Previously, Price taught New Testament courses at Drew University and mythology at Montclair State University.

Beginning with the assumption that Jesus indeed walked the earth, Price discovers that the Bible provides no paint with which to draw a historically accurate portrait of such an important religious figure....In his introduction, Price defines and defends higher criticism of the Bible, a tool he uses to reconcile history with Scripture.

[Price explores theories about] John the Baptist, proposing that the latter's role may not be historical ...

Miracle accounts, Price shows, have parallels in other Jewish and Hellenistic traditions, and each miracle story has a particular structure, which fits a general pattern...Price delves into the descriptions of the twelve disciples, analyzing each one, especially Simon Peter...

...a brief review of Buddhism. Finally, Price surveys the details of the accounts of Jesus' crucifixion and resurrection, concluding that similarities in Christian and other religious traditions must mean a common origin--one with no room for a historical Jesus.

... scrutinizing the Gospels concisely and in astonishing detail. Price takes a consistent, thorough-going critical look at the gospel tradition,...delivering good reasons for every skeptical judgment of the Gospels' historical accuracy in depicting Jesus.

[and]

... Many experts today believe that the writings of Mark, Matthew, Luke, and John cannot be taken as revelatory. A group of more than 100 scholars called the Jesus Seminar concluded that only about 18 percent of the Gospels is historically correct.
...Price analyzes sections of the Gospels, separating fact from fiction in all episodes of Jesus' life...critically explores whether Jesus preached his Messiahship or predicted his own death as a means to save souls.

from reader reviews:

The reader alternates between laughing at his wistful analogies -- Judas identifying Jesus is like the police needing someone to identify Elvis -- and being impressed by the wealth of his knowledge, seeming to relate every gospel passage to multiple Greek, Roman, Jewish, Egyptian and other ancient sources.


and:

Price isn't out to prove that Jesus never existed (like Wells or Doherty). He takes a more humble/realistic approach: Jesus may or may have not existed, we'll never know, but what we do know is that the new testament is clearly fiction/myth.

[barbara]

That's interesting DaryLLL, but it doesn't answer my question.this thread is not meant to exclude Christians, but is meant to view the Bible as literature, not as a tool for belief. If anyone wants to make that leap for the sake of this thread, they are welcome I appreciate the clairfication. Being very holistic in everything, I do not easily separate my spiritual self from the physical. With that in mind, I'm thinking this is not the best thread for me, although I do find the historical aspects fascinating.

Thanks,
~b :wave

[DaryLLL]

Originally posted by barbara
That's interesting DaryLLL, but it doesn't answer my question. I

Barbara, I made no attempt to answer your question. I am not a Jew.

[barbara]

Sorry, my confusion. No disrespect ment, like I said I find this discussion fascinating.

:hippie

[kama'aina mama]

Originally posted by DaryLLL
Ach, Spirituality is so boring on Shabbat (sound of crickets).
Yup.


tumbleweed blows through...

[DaryLLL]

Back to talking to myself...(windchimes tinkle on porch...dog barks in distance)

Got the new book, the Incredible Shrinking Son of Man yesterday. Such a cute title, but a serious book.

To refer back to the discussion of who wrote the gospels, I found a little more info. The author Robt Price, is discussing early Xtian "historians" (who created a history of the Xtian church that is quite sanitized). Eusebius quotes an earlier (and perhaps fictional ) historian, Papias, who said Matthew was originally written in Hebrew, b/c the author was of course a Hebrew-speaking disciple of X. But Price points out, Papias may have been looking at a different gospel attributed to Matthew, as the one we have is obviously derived from Mark, a Greek document. This evangelist could not have been a disciple of Jesus, since he would have no need to crib from a writer who was not a disciple. Make sense? BTW, Jerome, who translated the Greek writings into Latin in 405, agreed with this. Price then points out, "There seem to have been a number of writings attributed to Matthew, including the notorious Infancy Gospel..."

The Infancy gospel of Matthew is non-canonical but was widely circulated, popular, and believed in nontheless. In it, Mary, mother of Jesus, is raised from toddlerhood in the Temple itself, and fed by angels. She conceives of God, Jesus is born and all kinds of miracles occur, some including lions and dragons.

In this link, the gospel is preceded by letters from "Jerome" to some bishops, concerning its translation.

http://jeromekahn123.tripod.com/chxbible/id9.html

[DaryLLL]

kama, since I heard your bible study class is off for a while, anything you'd care to discuss here?

[DaryLLL]

Tonight, Feb 22, CNN, 8PM ET, The Mystery of Jesus.

A historical/scientific approach, not faith based, I understand.

Just to preview, that "ossuary of James" is a huge hoax.

[tracymom]

A historical/scientific approach, not faith based, I understand.


Just to preview, that "ossuary of James" is a huge hoax.

Oooh! I can't wait!!! Gotta go set the VCR!

[kama'aina mama]

You mean at Santiago in Spain?

[dado]

Originally posted by barbara
this thread that is obviously not intened for Christians

where on earth did you get that idea???

[barbara]

Originally posted by dado
where on earth did you get that idea??? :LOL
Well,...oh, nevermind.



:hippie

[DaryLLL]

kama, Spain? What are you on about?

this:

http://answers.org/apologetics/jamesbonebox.html

[feebeeglee]

Howdy. I'm not really feebee, I'm her husband. I told her my thoughts after reading this fascinating thread, and she asked me to post them.

I have some thoughts about some of the things that were said here:

Originally posted by dado

Sanhedrin was not allowed to convene at night.

Sanhedrin did not convene on Shabbat(!).

Sanhedrin most assuredly did not convene on Pesach.

capital cases in particular were forbidden to be tried right before Shabbat or a holiday.

the sanhedrin was not allowed to return immediate guilty verdicts in capital cases.

there was no need to turn Jesus over to Pilate as Sanhedrin had the authority to execute people.


1: I found these assertions very interesting, having never heard the argument before. I don't doubt that these assertions are true, but do you have a source link so I can verify them?

2: Doesn't Shabbat commence on Friday night? And didn't Jesus's trial before the Sanhedrin occur on Thursday night? How does the prohibition against convening on Shabbat apply here?

3: Don't these assertions, when taken together, contain a bit of a contradiction? I mean, if the Sanhedrin weren't authorized even to meet, then they certainly had no authority to execute.

In sum, then, even granting the truth of all these assertions, why couldn't the trial have happened exactly as the Gospels said it happened? Some members of the Sanhedrin wanted Jesus dead (and in a hurry), but realized they lacked the authority to condemn Him (since it was nighttime, or Pesach, or some other reason), and so gave Him to Pilate? The notion that they would rather have Him whacked in secret, mafia-style, is unconvincing. Isn't it plausible that they wanted Him publicly humiliated so that His disciples would be discredited and ashamed?

4: Someone on this thread quipped that the soldiers needing Judas to identify Jesus was akin to needing someone to identify Elvis Presley. Well, yeah, that's pretty funny, but wouldn't you need someone to point out Elvis if you'd never even seen a photograph of him? Remember, the soldiers had to arrest Him at night, among a crowd of followers who just might have wanted to conceal Him from his captors, or even to deny knowing Him altogether. Bringing Judas along would make a lot of sense.

I'm not saying here that the possibility that the Gospel accounts are true proves that they are true, only that these assertions about the authority of the Sanhedrin, or the Presleyescence of Christ, are not the proof of their falsity. The standard of proof must be higher than the arguments that are offered here.

Other arguments, such as the fact noted in Price's book that some of the stories in the Bible are similar to previous ancient legends, do not prove them false either. If we were to accept that standard of proof, I could prove George Washington never existed, but rather he's an amalgam of the lives of Romulus and Cincinnatus, or some such.

Anyway, those are my own thoughts, and I hope to have added something fruitful to this discussion.

Sean (Phoebe's husband)

[kama'aina mama]

The legend goes that when the disciples spread out to tell the world about Jesus, James was sent/ went to Spain. (Which James I just now realsied I am not certain... there were two, right?) He did very poorly. Got nowhere with his message and returned disappointed. When he died his followers put him/his bones into a stone box and put it on a raft and set it adrift in the Med. It landed, finally, in the north of Spain and the miracle of this achieved the conversion in Spain that he was unable to achieve in life.

The cathedral built there to house his relics, Santiago de Campostela was the most popular pilgrimage site in Europe, worldwide second only to Jerusalem. People still make the pilgrimage by the thousands every year.
A site witha variety of related links. (http://europeforvisitors.com/europe/articles/santiago_de_compostela3.htm)

[kama'aina mama]

Sean, great to have you here!

I am going to take a stab at some of your Q's, primarily to amuse my more learned sisters.

It was Shabbat... not a weekly Shabbat, but Pesach, one of the .. well, don't know what to call it. A Great Shabbat? If it were Catholic I would call it a High Holy Day. Same rules as weekly Sabbath and then some, if I am not mistaken.

They were "not permitted" to meet by their own rules, not by Roman rules. So them meeting at a religiously inappropriate time would not change the license the Romans had allowed them to execute transgressors against their own religious laws. It simply makes the whole proceding invalid/ highly suspect from the Jewish point to view.

I honestly think the use of Judas has reason and symbolism within the story... I think it was the authorities trying to make it look like the people, his own people, were rejecting Jesus, turning him in rather than the authorities cracking down.. but that's just my opinion... worth it's usual cost!

[fourlittlebirds]

Dado wrote: ""I am" isn't the ineffable name."

Okay. But what about the implication of equating oneself with God? As in, "I say to you, Before Abraham was, I am." Or when he says, "I and the Father are one." Or the fact that he claimed to be able to forgive sins. Etc. *If* he said those things, and it was well known that he was saying these things, wouldn't it be reasonable to assume that those later hearing him say, "I AM", would take that as a declaration of divinity? DaryLLL mentioned something about pantheism -- perhaps this is what Jesus was talking about, and that does complicate the picture. But still he would have been claiming something that was hostile to the Jews' belief system, no? And to claim to be the messiah while also claiming a hostile belief, whether it be that of pantheism or literally claiming to be God, what might the response to that be?

"but there's a bigger problem: language. they weren't speaking Hebrew."

Why is this important? Could the meaning not be translated into another language? (Not arguing, just not picking up on your reasoning. Being dense, I suppose.)

DaryLLL wrote: "Back to talking to myself..."

Oh please! The absence of a dialogue doesn't mean no one is listening. :) I enjoy reading your posts very much but usually have nothing to add or argue against. The latter not because your arguments are so air-tight, but because your style is not argumentative in the first place. You tend to present possibilities or ask questions in the spirit of provoking thought rather than disproving someone's belief. A good approach, but hard to dialogue with, again, when no one here is at your level of scholarship on the subject.

Someone wrote: "this thread that is obviously not intened for Christians"

And Dado replied: "where on earth did you get that idea???"

Dado, you may not intend it, but your posts often come across in a way that give the reader the feeling that you think Christianity is the stupidest, most illogical belief system ever. That's not an atmosphere, I imagine, in which Christians feel comfortable, or welcome, in participating in the discussion.

[kama'aina mama]

hhmm... I was going to say that the thread is not going to work for a Christian (or anyone) who cannot entertain the possibility that not every word in the Bible is absolute fact. It is a discussion of the historical context in which these words were set to papyrus as well as the hows and whys of the specific words that are there. If it is a part of your beliefe system that the Bible is an infallible document written in some mystical fashion by God Herself this whole discussion is going to be problematic for you. But not all Christians believe that. In fact most do not. So I don't think it's fair to say this is not a conversation for Christians or that they are unwelcome.

As for blueviolets take on some of dado's posts... BV, let me, once again, attempt to speak for another/others. :D I have learned in my years here rapping with the nice Jewish mommies that they are often quite frustrated with Christians. Not angry or condescending in my experience.. but frustrated. They are frustrated by our lack of understanding of their central, sacred texts and traditions. They are frustrated by the very common Christian belief that we understand the Old Testament/ Hebrew Bible when, as a general rule, we in fact do not. We lack the context to understand it. And in far too many instances our interpretation of their writings is an outright perversion of the actual, historical meaning. Should every Christian be required to be a Torah scholar. No, of course not. But it would help if we tried to be more open to the idea that we have lost that thread of our heritage and no longer understand it very well.

[tracymom]

kama'aina mama:l

:clap

Very well stated, I think.

[dado]

Originally posted by feebeeglee
I don't doubt that these assertions are true, but do you have a source link so I can verify them?

all the rules of Sanhedrin are recorded in Talmud. in excruciating, laborious detail. :)

there is another i had missed: capital cases were not led by Kohen Gadol - the high priest - ie, Caiaphus couldn't have the role he is portrayed as having if it was indeed a proper Jewish trial.

if the Sanhedrin weren't authorized even to meet then...

...all bets are off as to what really happened next because it means Jesus was never convicted by a Jewish court of a Jewish crime. which brings us back to the Roman role.

Isn't it plausible that they wanted Him publicly humiliated so that His disciples would be discredited and ashamed

quite possibly. it certainly would have shown he probably wasn't Moschiach.

but there is a conflation of "they" in there. parsing out what (probably) could and (probably) couldn't have happened, it is highly likely some subset of the Jewish leadership centered on the high priest was involved in the incident. i think we're more or less in agreement up to this point.

what is at issue - for me - is how the prominent Roman role was later redacted away and all that was left was Jews as christ-killers.

somebody arrested Jesus. Caiaphus was involved. whatever Caiaphus did was not a proper Jewish court. Caiaphus worked for Pilate and Rome. Pilate ordered Jesus executed. from those assumptions, which i think we're in agreement on, we somehow end up with texts 300 years later quoting "all the Jews" saying "his blood be on us and our children".

that is an enormous non sequitir. no Jewish crime, no Jewish trial, no Jewish conviction, yet...a statement incredibly damning of Jews.

does anybody know if a Roman of the time would have considered a claim of g-dhood "blashpemous"? since the roman emperors did claim g-dhood for themselves...?

Anyway, those are my own thoughts, and I hope to have added something fruitful to this discussion.

welcome! stick around! :)

[dado]

Originally posted by blueviolet
But what about the implication of equating oneself with God?

that may well have been a crime for a Roman, living under self-proclaimed emperor-g-d, but not for a Jew. for a more complete answer i refer you to our more mystically-conversant members.

Or the fact that he claimed to be able to forgive sins.

being able to forgive sins is a fundamental principle of Judaism. G-d is there to forgive sins against G-d, for sins against each other Judaism requires both the seeking AND GRANTING of forgiveness to happen between the individuals involved.

if a Jew steals a neighbor's camel, he/she needs to seek forgiveness from the neighbor.

"but there's a bigger problem: language. they weren't speaking Hebrew."
[quote]Why is this important?

the ineffable name is only ineffable in Hebrew.

Dado, you may not intend it, but your posts often come across in a way that give the reader the feeling that you think Christianity is the stupidest, most illogical belief system ever.

then i must work on my delivery, because that is not my intent. i do have strong strong feelings regarding some notions of "inerrancy" - and that crosses the BCE/CE dateline - because i believe it runs contrary to what a long line of prophets have taught - that the message is far far more important than the individual words. the better i can understand the roots of the stories, the better i can grasp the message being obscured by sometimes (imo) inappropriate literalism.

and if you think i'm being unfair to the post-CE crowd, anytime you want to have a critical disccusion about Exodus, or about Leviticus possibly being cut from whole cloth, i'm happy to participate! :)

[tracymom]

dado said:

that the message is far far more important than the individual words. the better i can understand the roots of the stories, the better i can grasp the message being obscured by sometimes (imo) inappropriate literalism.

I feel this way as well. I can see how it would pose a great problem to those who believe strongly in the literalism of the texts. That may be where it is interpreted as "not being for Christians." I've had difficulty with discussions IRL at church for the same reasons.

and if you think i'm being unfair to the post-CE crowd, anytime you want to have a critical disccusion about Exodus, or about Leviticus possibly being cut from whole cloth, i'm happy to participate!

:Bow Not me, not me. You guys are awesome in your level of knowledge.

[DaryLLL]

Great to see everyone back. And a few new ones. I like this.

Hopefully people will be inspired to do googles and find books and not just take the word of the ones here who have been doing some studying.

kama, I had not heard the James bone box floating in the sea thing before. Reminds me of Osiris big time!

In ref to another thread that questioned whether the priests may have been corrupt, so breaking their own rules to meet at night, on Shabbat, in a private home: they were already considered corrupt by some Jews (esp the Essenes who had given up on Temple worship already and retreated to desert caves), b/c they were "quislings," that is, under the control of the Roman rulers. But they still had authority to execute other Jews that broke Jewish law. So why didn't they? To publicly humiliate J? But they almost didn't get him executed that way!

According to the gospels, Pilate only executed J at the insistence of the Jewish crowd. According to history he executed people whom he considered seditionists by the hundreds without trial. Once he was called to Rome to answer for this behavior it was so bad.

There are just too many ''what ifs" in this story for it to seem historical. And the thing is, as Karen Armstrong points out in The Battle for God, it was not even meant to be historical in the first place, but meant to be a symbolic story to propound a religious idea. Only in our moderrn times do we (want to ) see it as History. In those days, histories and even biographies were written to expound upon ideas. Realism/accuracy was not the point.

Keep in mind the history of this kind of dying and rising godman had already been around for at least 3500 yrs. Ie: Osiris mentioned above. Tammuz in Palestine. Jesus' life story adheres so directly to this pattern that early "Church historians" such as Eusebius made up the idea of demonic mimicry to wiggle out of the situation. and I know some still believe this.

[Sean]

Hi, I went and got my own account so I wouldn't confuse everybody by using Phoebe's.

Thanks for answering that bit about the Shabbat, kama'aina mama. I like your insight about Judas, too.

Dado, thanks for answering, too, and I believe I shall stick around a bit. I agree that we are in agreement about the possibility that the Sanhedrin might not licitly have convicted and executed Jesus. (The Gospels say so, too.)

Originally posted by dado
from those assumptions, which i think we're in agreement on, we somehow end up with texts 300 years later quoting "all the Jews" saying "his blood be on us and our children".

that is an enormous non sequitir. no Jewish crime, no Jewish trial, no Jewish conviction, yet...a statement incredibly damning of Jews.


Well, not exactly. I think you're trying to quote Matthew 27:25, which goes, "Then answered all the people, and said, His blood be on us, and on our children." But it says "all the people," not "all the Jews." (That's the King James translation, but no other translation has the word "Jews" in that verse either.)

So your non sequitur becomes a non sequitur, because the Gospel makes emphatically clear that it is not a statement particularly damning of Jews at all, but of "all the people," if of anyone.

(In fact, I've heard an interesting exigesis that it is not a damning statement at all, but rather a sort of mystical blessing. Christ's blood, after all, is not a bad thing to be on you, according to the Book of Revelation.)

I've been following the dialogue between Blueviolet and Dado about whether Jesus could have been convicted of blasphemy. Dado's argument, if I may state it as a syllogism, seems to be...

premise: The evidence presented was not sufficient to convict Jesus of blasphemy under Jewish law.

therefore: The Sanhedrin could not have found Jesus guilty of blasphemy.

Of course, the conclusion does not follow deductively from the premise, unless there is posited a second premise: namely, that the Sanhedrin was incapable of rendering incorrect decisions. (In logic, this would be called the major premise; and the premise that Jesus was in fact innocent would be the minor premise.) Now it's a valid syllogism; that is, if both premises are true, the conclusion must be true.

Blueviolet attacks the conclusion by attacking the minor premise. That is, she keeps asking, couldn't this or that aspect of Jesus's words or actions be regarded as blasphemy? To which Dado keeps answering, no, not under a correct application of the law. Not being an expert in Jewish law (or any other kind of law) myself, I won't even conjecture as to who's right.

But I'm going to take issue with the (unspoken) major premise. Even demurring on Dado's premise that Jesus was in fact innocent, it is entirely possible that the Sanhedrin could have found him guilty anyway.

Can I prove that a judicial decision never happened simply by proving that it would have been incorrect? If such were the case, I could prove that any number of accounts of U.S. Supreme Court decisions are mere works of fiction. (Forgive the reduxio ad absurdum; it's my favorite device for demonstrating logical unsoundness.)

[PaganScribe]

Originally posted by blueviolet

Dado, you may not intend it, but your posts often come across in a way that give the reader the feeling that you think Christianity is the stupidest, most illogical belief system ever. That's not an atmosphere, I imagine, in which Christians feel comfortable, or welcome, in participating in the discussion.

I utterly disagree with this; I have never gotten that impression. As a non-Christian, my viewpoint may not count for much, but I thought I would share it.


DaryLLL: I quite enjoy listening to you talk to yourself. ;) I would participate but that I have light years left to go before I become knowledgeable enough to have anything significant to add. I am working on reading many of the books that have been recommended (currently reading both The Origin of Satan and Lost Christianities) but there are still many left on this list.

Do you by chance have a link to the Yahoo group that you mentioned earlier, and could you tell me if it is open membership? It's something I think I would really like to check out.

Thanks to all in this thread for once again educating me. :)

[dado]

Originally posted by Sean
because the Gospel makes emphatically clear that it is not a statement particularly damning of Jews at all, but of "all the people," if of anyone.

i like your reasoning on this, but it is a stretch. a crowd in Jerusalem, in the middle of Passover, is going to be read as overwhelmingly Jewish. thessalonians also proceeds to specifically single out Jews as having killed Jesus. then there are millenia of papal bulls confirming - and in some cases, ie Gregory 13 - extending the blame/guilt. not to single out catholicism, the same interpretations have come from all corners of c'ian leadership from eastern orthodox to david koresh.

with all due respect, this does not jibe with the gospels making it "emphatically clear" Jews aren't to be specifically blamed.

namely, that the Sanhedrin was incapable of rendering incorrect decisions.

agreed. however before you it can be argued that the Sanhedrin could make an incorrect decision in this case, it first needs to be established this was, in fact, a Sanhedrin. the text at hand does not support it.

[DaryLLL]

Thank you for the compliments, PaganScribe. It's not so much of a much. I have only been studying for 3 yrs come Easter. Homeschooling myself, in my spare time.

Before that, I avoided Xtianity like the plague! :eek It has been a great journey, once I was ready for it.

JesusMysteries Home Page:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/JesusMysteries

(Yes, it's open membership, prepare to be humbled)

Don't miss Peter Kirby's, "Historical Jesus Theories":
http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/theories.html or his "Christian Origins" page: http://christianorigins.com/

[dado]

Originally posted by Sean
That's the King James translation, but no other translation has the word "Jews" in that verse either.

from the NAB...

"And the whole people said in reply, 'His blood be upon us and upon our children'" (Matthew 27:25).

The New American Bible note on this verse says:

The whole people: Matthew sees in those who speak these words the entire people (Greek laos) of Israel. His blood ... and upon our children: cf Jer 26:15. The responsibility for Jesus' death is accepted by the nation that was God's special possession (Exodus 19:5), his own people (Hosea 2:23), and they thereby lose that high privilege, see Matthew 21:43 and the note on that verse. "

[kama'aina mama]

I must be a dolt. I think I just finally got one of the things you have been driving at Dado. Saying it was not a Sanhedrin is akin to making it clear that if Ruth Bader-Ginsberg and Clarence Thomas invite Norma McCorvey over to one of their homes and subsequently announce they have overturned Roe V Wade it simply ain't true cuz that was NOT a Supreme Court. Right?

[dado]

Originally posted by kama'aina mama ...is akin to making it clear that if Ruth Bader-Ginsberg and Clarence Thomas invite Norma McCorvey over to one of their homes and subsequently announce they have overturned Roe V Wade it simply ain't true cuz that was NOT a Supreme Court. Right?

pretty much. you can claim "some" americans did the act, but you cannot claim they acted in the name of "americans" in general or that americans in general support what they did. in fact, it goes the other way: having to perform this kind of back door coup strongly suggests "americans" in general aren't supportive, because if they were, it would be safer for all parties concerned to take the direct, public route. but that part is admittedly circumstantial.

if what you described were to happen, we all know people - in real life and even right here on MDC ;) - who would compose polemnics honoring them for the bravery in doing what people really secretly wanted them to do.

and the obvious question would be: on whose behalf were they really acting?

[Sean]

Originally posted by dado
a crowd in Jerusalem, in the middle of Passover, is going to be read as overwhelmingly Jewish.

Yes, and maybe that's why Matthew took the pains to put that line in the mouths of "all the people," to clear up any misunderstanding that he meant just the Jews. He wasn't shy elsewhere about saying "the Jews" when that's who he meant.


thessalonians also proceeds to specifically single out Jews as having killed Jesus.

(You mean 1 Thessalonians 2:14-16.) Yes, that's exactly what Paul is doing, singling out Jews, with an emphasis on singling. He is not imputing blame for killing Jesus on those Jews who did not, in fact, have a hand in killing Him, only on the "Jews who killed the Lord Jesus." Paul is reminiscing about the persecution the Church faced early on from the Jewish authorities in Jerusalem, the very people you just agreed probably had some sort of culpability in His death. Interestingly enough, the NAB note for this verse says

Paul is speaking of historical opposition on the part of Palestinian Jews in particular and does so only some twenty years after Jesus' crucifixion. Even so, he quickly proceeds to depict the persecutors typologically, in apocalyptic terms. His remarks give no grounds for anti-Semitism to those willing to understand him, especially in view of Paul's pride in his own ethnic and religious background...

But apparently you aren't so willing to give credence to the NAB editors here.


then there are millenia of papal bulls confirming - and in some cases, ie Gregory 13 - extending the blame/guilt.

Sorry, I am unfamiliar with any papal pronouncement that assigns any particular blame for Christ's death to Jews who weren't even alive at the time of His death. I would be very interested in reading such a text. I looked at http://www.papalencyclicals.net/ but I can't find anything on the topic, and nothing at all by Gregory XIII, so maybe I'm missing it. Do you know where I could find some of these texts?

My understanding of Christian belief on this is, since all sinners are responsible for the necessity of Christ's saving mission, those Jews who are sinners would have to bear their share of the blame, but no more than Christians who are sinners (i.e., all of them).


not to single out catholicism, the same interpretations have come from all corners of c'ian leadership from eastern orthodox to david koresh.

I'd take a bullet for the Pope, but I can't answer for David Koresh or anyone else. We were talking about what the Bible says, right?


before it can be argued that the Sanhedrin could make an incorrect decision in this case, it first needs to be established this was, in fact, a Sanhedrin.

No, I'm arguing that doesn't matter whether it was a licit meeting of the Sanhedrin or not. (I mean, it's a facinating question and the answer may well be important, but not to the end of disproving the truth of the Gospel, which I don't think it does.)

Look: if some members of that body met, there are only two possibilities: either it was a lawful convention of the Sanhedrin, or it wasn't.

If it wasn't (and you've given many good reasons to suppose it wasn't), then they couldn't lawfully execute Jesus, but they could have delivered him to the Romans, like the Gospels say.

If it was, then they shouldn't have found him guilty of blasphemy (because, as you noted, he was innocent of this charge), but still might have done so. And whatever their verdict was, guilty or innocent, they still could have delivered him to Pilate, where He was charged under Roman law with treason, not blasphemy. He was convicted of being a "King," not the Messiah. His crime, written on a placard on the cross, was that He was the "King of the Jews."

As for why the evangelists bothered to mention the Sanhedrin trial at all, when it was the Romans who convicted and executed Him, maybe they didn't have an ulterior motive; maybe they just wrote what happened.

These speculations as to the symbolic significance of this or that character in the story only become necessary when you proceed from an a priori assumption that the story is fictional. (It's perfectly right to wonder why Shakespeare put Tybalt in Romeo and Juliet, but it makes no sense to wonder why McCollough put Abigail in John Adams. That's just how it happened is all.)

I know you think that assumption is warranted. I know you think you've proven the Gospel fictional. But I don't think you've proven that. Keep trying though, I'm enjoying your posts.

[kama'aina mama]

I don't think anyone is trying to prove the Gospel is fictional. Flawed. Slanted. I mean... there is no such thing as a "purely factual" account. Everything written is viewed through the lens of the writers experience, feelings about the events, etc. I feel that to refuse to acknowledge that is perhaps more dangerous than anything.

[dado]

Originally posted by Sean
Do you know where I could find some of these texts?

google will turn them up. you won't find them in the "official" online encyclopedias. ;)

"The guilt of the Jews only grows deeper with successive generations, entailing perpetual slavery." - Gregory XIII, 1581

(in fairness to catholics, it needs to be pointed out vatican II officially reversed the position.)

If it wasn't [legal] (and you've given many good reasons to suppose it wasn't), then they couldn't lawfully execute Jesus, but they could have delivered him to the Romans, like the Gospels say.

if they were unconstrained enough to hold something like a kangaroo court and pronounce a totally illegal verdict, there is no basis on which to say they suddenly felt constrained by legality and couldn't carry out their own illegal sentence. nor would they have be constrained by public opinion, since to the Jewish public it wouldn't have made any difference if Caiaphus or Pilate killed Jesus: either way, he'd be dead, the romans still in charge, and Jesus by definition not the Moschiach.

He was convicted of being a "King," not the Messiah.

not sure what you're getting at there...a Jew could never properly be convicted of being Moschiach since Moschiach wouldn't be Moschiach if he was convictable. it's a proof in the pudding kind of thing.

if you're saying he was killed for a secular - ie, Roman - crime, that's my current opinion and it makes a lot of sense to me.

I know you think you've proven the Gospel fictional. But I don't think you've proven that.

yikes. i can't even prove what i had i breakfast yesterday, lol, this stuff happened two thousand years ago and we have virtually no original texts. the odds of anyone actually "proving" anything are exceedingly small. but you never know, there may be another Nag Hammadi out there (what we lost with the destruction of the library at Alexandria...!)

what i'm looking for is the version of the story that requires the minimum number of extraneous assumptions - and no genuinely whacky ones - and requires the fewest changes to the text. but even finding that wouldn't mean that was necessarily how it actually happened.

frankly, i wish more people read the books the way you do. i can assure you from personal experience that "jew as christ killer" is still a very very common reading of the material.

[tracymom]

But apparently you aren't so willing to give credence to the NAB editors here.

:scratch :confused:




As for why the evangelists bothered to mention the Sanhedrin trial at all, when it was the Romans who convicted and executed Him, maybe they didn't have an ulterior motive; maybe they just wrote what happened.

OR they were writing for a Roman audience in a Roman culture and it wouldn't have been too wise to make the Romans too culpable.

[dado]

another book for the list...

http://www.powells.com/cgi-bin/biblio?inkey=62-0802840981-0

"Text of the New Testament"

this book is the most current source i have for a complete list of early fragments etc. i don't believe there have been any major finds in the past 15 years, but if anybody does have a more up to date reference, i'd love to hear about it.

[Sean]

Originally posted by tracymom
OR they were writing for a Roman audience in a Roman culture and it wouldn't have been too wise to make the Romans too culpable.

It's true that Mark was a Roman, writing in Rome, for a Roman audience. But Matthew, Luke and John weren't. Matthew in particular -- where the "His blood be on us" verse is found -- was a Jewish writer, writing for a Jewish audience, in Jerusalem. Of all the Gospels, his is the most chock-full of quotes from and references to Jewish scripture, which would have been lost on Gentile readers. (Even the "His blood be on us" line is probably a reference to Jeremiah 26:15.) So if he had any incentive to cater to his audience, it would have been the other way, to emphasize, not minimize, Roman villainy. (You could reply that it was still a "Roman culture" he was writing for, inasmuch as Israel was under the rule of Rome; but from what I gather, the Roman occupation wasn't much appreciated by his audience.)

Originally posted by kama'aina mama
Everything written is viewed through the lens of the writers experience, feelings about the events, etc. I feel that to refuse to acknowledge that is perhaps more dangerous than anything.

You're right, of course! Even a thoroughly detailed completely factual account must of necessity leave some details out while including others. And those decisions are always conscious and deliberate.

But I thought Dado was arguing not just that the details were included to reflect a particular point of view, but that the details were demonstrably false, which is a very different thing. I sure didn't mean to misstate your position, Dado, and if I did, I withdraw it.

Originally posted by dado
"The guilt of the Jews only grows deeper with successive generations, entailing perpetual slavery." - Gregory XIII, 1581

Well, you were right, Google turned up the document in question.
http://www.menorah.it/articoli/lettori/ariberti/dce/djud.htm
It's called "Antiqua Judaeorum improbitas." Only it's in Latin. I know some Latin, but it's hard slogging, and I can't find an English translation anywhere. Furthermore the one Latin text I found was only on one Italian website that might have an axe to grind (though my Italian's worse than my Latin!), so I can't be sure it's authentic. And even if the Latin's authentic, I can't seem to find that sentence you quoted anywhere. The first sentence, which is 134 words long (!), does contain the phrase "perpetuae mancipati," which for all I know can mean perpetual slavery, but the document, near as I can figure, is about prohibiting slavery, and outlawing heresies. It will be an interesting project to tackle when I have time to translate it. It's a bit off our topic, but thanks for the citation. And I'll grant at least that whatever it says about Jews, it doesn't seem to be at all complimentary. It looks like it says Judaism is a form of heresy, but that can't be right, because only Christians can be heretics. Maybe it says Jews are causing heresy? Beats me. I'll try to figure out what it says and get back to you, probably on a different thread.


not sure what you're getting at there...a Jew could never properly be convicted of being Moschiach since Moschiach wouldn't be Moschiach if he was convictable. it's a proof in the pudding kind of thing.

Well, yeah. Similarly, nobody could literally be convicted of being the King of the Jews. How could being a king be against the law? No the treasonous charge was that He claimed to be the king, when of course the empire already had a king. On His cross the placard said "King of the Jews." When Pilate was informed that it would have been more correct to write "He said He was King of the Jews," he replied, "Quod scripsi scripsi." I wrote what I wrote! More of a brush-off than an answer.


if you're saying he was killed for a secular - ie, Roman - crime, that's my current opinion and it makes a lot of sense to me.

Yup, that's what I'm saying. I'm glad we agree!

[barbara]

Good discussion here while I was away. :thumb
I appreciate all the scholarly debate, and have learned a lot of historical information from several of the posters.

It would be interesting to see a translation of the "Antiqua Judaeorum improbitas." that your search found Sean. Maybe we should all brush up on our Latin and have a go at it.

Some one said about the Jewish mamas and papas that "They are frustrated by our lack of understanding of their central, sacred texts and traditions." I can certianly understand that and have felt that frustration for them on more than one occasion. I guess I feel that as a Christian I would have to say that I also feel that frustration myself, when my sacred texts are treated as fabrications. Again I appreciate a discussion of scripture from an historical perspective, but when talking about sacred texts, I feel that a certian amount of respect is due, regardless of one's own opinion of them. I hope that makes some sense in light of being respectful of the diversity on MDC.

[kama'aina mama]

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Originally posted by kama'aina mama
Everything written is viewed through the lens of the writers experience, feelings about the events, etc. I feel that to refuse to acknowledge that is perhaps more dangerous than anything.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sean said

You're right, of course! Even a thoroughly detailed completely factual account must of necessity leave some details out while including others. And those decisions are always conscious and deliberate.

hhmm... see I would disagree with that last statement. I think certainly slant is sometimes deliberate, but not always. It is easy enough to imagine potential motivation for various biblical scribes to have introduced this train of thought or that line of thinking.. but it is, in the final analysis unsupportable so cannot ever be anything but speculation. I think what is more supportable is to look at concurrent accounts of the same events or similar ones and simply try to make the most educated presumption as to what filters the writings may have been through.

[DaryLLL]

Last night's CNN thing, total waste of time. Same old, same old. Silly episode on what he looked like with a bust by a forensic sculptor. Snore.

An expert (full of bias) said:

"There is absolutely no evidence in the Bible Jesus was married."

"Of course it was completely common for Jewish men of the time to be celibate."

"Jesus was a humble carpenter."

Me talking to screen:

Yes, there is evidence he was married.

Of course it was required for all Jews to marry and breed, esp rabbis.

Jesus' stepfather was a "tekton." An architect (reference to the gnostic Demiurge, whom Joseph symbolizes). Whether Jesus was a carpenter or not is moot. He was seemingly a trained rabbi. He was called rabbi by his followers. Rabbis were required to be married by Jewish law.

So, back to my Incredible Shrinking Son of Man.

Sean, are you a lawyer? You have a very logical mind.

[dado]

Originally posted by barbara
...as a Christian I would have to say that I also feel that frustration myself, when my sacred texts are treated as fabrications.

do you take that feeling into consideration when quoting Isaiah in a manner completely inconsistent with Judaism?

"my" text..."your" text...this implies ownership where there is none, imo.

[Sean]

DaryLLL: No, I'm an ad man, not a lawyer. Thanks for the compliment, though. (It was a compliment, right?)

Originally posted by dado
do you take that feeling into consideration when quoting Isaiah in a manner completely inconsistent with Judaism?


I'm all for doing away with the ignorance that can cause disharmony among people of different faiths, but I don't think that was a fair criticism.

Isaiah, like all the prophets, Psalms, Torah, and other Jewish sacred texts, is a Christian sacred text as well. The difference is, Christians interpret the texts in light of Christ's revelation, so in that sense it would be "in a manner completely inconsistent with Judaism." (I assume that's what you mean by that accusation.)

So a Christian might go and say something like...
Isaiah 61:1
The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me; because the LORD hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek; he hath sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound.

...is actually a prophecy of Christ's mission. A Jew, naturally enough, would disagree. I don't think either party would be displaying ignorance or insensitivity, though. The Christian, having accepted Christ, is required to interpret Isasiah this way, because that's how Christ interpreted it!
Luke 4:20-21
And he closed the book, and he gave it again to the minister, and sat down. And the eyes of all them that were in the synagogue were fastened on him. And he began to say unto them, This day is this scripture fulfilled in your ears.


But it surely shouldn't give any more offense than when a Jew interprets these texts in a manner inconsistent with Christianity? These particular disagreements don't arise from ignorance or any sort of ill feeling, but a genuine belief that Christ's revelation is -- or is not -- true.

[dado]

Originally posted by Sean
I'm an ad man

you write well, i was curious myself. (yes, it's a compliment :))

[quote]Isaiah, like all the prophets, Psalms, Torah, and other Jewish sacred texts, is a Christian sacred text as well.

i agree. that is why i dislike the idea that someone "owns" texts or has a special "right" to certain texts. ultimately - imo - it is about what the reader brings to and takes from the texts that gives them value. Matthew no more belongs to Barbera than Isaiah belongs to me: or even the reverse, Matthew belongs as much to me as Isaiah belongs to her.

(i'm not picking on you, B, just using your post as a convenient jumping off point.)

I assume that's what you mean by that accusation

there was no "accusation". we're making more or less the same point.

[kama'aina mama]

I am afraid I am the one who started the "my text" "your text" loqution. Ooops. :blush

[Chanley]

Nothing of substance to say except,
DaryLLL, keep up the talking. we are listening and taking it all in.
Fascinating stuff!

[DaryLLL]

Thx Chanley.

Maybe I should mention some reasons as to why I started this thread.

Philosopher King asked and this is my answer, whether he checks back in or not.

There is a conflict today in our culture between those who insist every word of the Bible be taken as inerrant, and those who see it differently.

Iwas raised in a conservative Lutheran church with an insistence on the first way to believe. Well, it just did not suit my personality or intellect. My mother (a closet atheist) encouraged me to question every assumption our pastor tried to force down our throats.

I left the Xtian church when I was about 15. When I was in college I learned more about Eastern religions.

Later I came across the writings of Joseph Campbell, who is a comparative mythologist. A great mind. He really clicked with me. Some Xtians object to the word "myth" as disrespectful, but IMO, all culture's sacred scripture is myth and it is not a dirty word. I find truth in myth.

I look at all sacred scripture/myth as beautiful and important and meaningful. Greek and ancient Egyptian as well. I have a new tender love of the Christ consiousness (in the Pauline, not the gospel sense) and it goes with Buddha nature and Krishna consciousness that I also hold dear. I am gnostic and look deeply into sacred scripture to find the underlying streams of relationship to God/dess.

I find the first several books of Paul to elucidate best my area of intersection with Xtianity. The rest of it is interesting and fascinating as a window into 2000 yr old politics and culture, but I do not find all the ideas and narratives to be convincingly or historically accurate. I enjoy the Tanakh for these reasons as well. I take Exodus as a gnostic myth of release from identification with the body and becoming subsumed into the spirit (as Paul did) .

To close, my sig is a Tibetan Buddhist mantra which calls to the foreground of consciousness the compassionate Buddha and goddess, Kwan Yin.

[dado]

Originally posted by DaryLLL
I take Exodus as a gnostic myth...

Exodus is an awesome story that works on any number of levels - whether it happened or not. if nothing else, wandering the desert for 40 years is a cautionary tale on what happens when men simply refuse to stop and ask for directions.

:bolt

[Nemmer]

:LOL

[Sean]

Originally posted by kama'aina mama
I am afraid I am the one who started the "my text" "your text" loqution. Ooops. :blush

"My" and "your" are what's called possessive pronouns, but they don't always denote possession or ownership. For instance, the United States is my country (but I am not claiming to own the United States any more than I own France) because I live here. English is my language (even though the guys who print the dictionaries don't pay me a nickel in royalties) because I speak it. See, sometimes the possessive grammatical form is used to modify aspects of a person besides ownership.

Barbara didn't speak of "my texts," implying some sort of proprietorship. She said "my sacred texts." There's a world of difference, and any speaker of English should know what she meant by that: the texts she believes to be sacred. Kama'aina mama similarly referred to "their central, sacred texts and traditions." They were both entirely within their rights to use these pronouns in this sense. It's common, standard, simple, English usage of the possessive, and I don't wish to see "my" branded as an insensitive word no one is allowed to utter for fear of offending the tender-eared.

So, Dado: you are quite right to assert that, say, the Gospel According to Matthew is not "Barbara's text" any more than it is "your text." Nobody ever claimed otherwise.

But if you do not believe the text to be sacred, and she does, then it is quite right to say it is her sacred text, and not yours. If you both believe the text to be sacred, it is her sacred text, and also yours. But either way, she should be allowed to number it among her sacred texts.

Yes, I think I'll allow that. (And remember, English is my language, so I can do that.)

[DaryLLL]

Originally posted by dado
Exodus...is a cautionary tale on what happens when men simply refuse to stop and ask for directions.


Yeah. Too bad Miriam wasn't leading. They'd've been through that nasty desert in 6 months! ;)

[DaryLLL]

Originally posted by DaryLLL
I find the first several books of Paul to elucidate best my area of intersection with Xtianity..

Want to correct myself. I also have spent time reading much of the Nag Hammadi gnostic texts, and the teachings of Mani, Marcion and Valentinus, who were called heretics by Eusebius.

Just because the early Roman Church wanted to edit and consolidate their belief system is not a reason for me to want to neglect the fascinating diversity of the writings of the first Christians.

Freke and Gandy (the Jesus Mysteries) elucidate how the inner (esoteric) teachings of Xtianity were neglected in favor of the outer (exoteric) teachings. These teachings were kept alive to an extent in certain monasteries, by alchemists and in certain parts of Europe outside the reach of Rome. We have Jews and Muslims to thank as well for keeping this heresy alive in their libraries and retreats. The underground stream keeps bubbling up here and there all along. William Blake, for ex., was an 18th-early 19th century poet/mystic/painter who was gnostic.

[dado]

Originally posted by DaryLLL
Yeah. Too bad Miriam wasn't leading. They'd've been through that nasty desert in 6 months! ;)

...and they wouldn't have ended up in the one place in the region without oil.

:)

[DaryLLL]

Um, well, Israel/Judah gots plenty of olive oil.

[tracymom]

William Blake, for ex., was an 18th-early 19th century poet/mystic/painter who was gnostic.

I just knew I liked him for a reason. Course they don't tell you that in high school. ;)

[barbara]

Originally posted by dado
do you take that feeling into consideration when quoting Isaiah in a manner completely inconsistent with Judaism?

"my" text..."your" text...this implies ownership where there is none, imo. My sincere appology if that offended you. I quoted Isaiah in order to answer a question asking for the Scripture chapter and verse. I understand that your interpertation of that verse would be different from the commonly accepted Christian interpertation, and it would have been more sensitive of me to have stated that at the time of quoting it.

In refering to the scriptures as "mine" I was stating that I hold them sacred, not that they in any way belong to me.
:guilty sorry,
~b

edited to say that I posted this before reading the posts that followed. It looks like Sean did a better job of explaining this than I. thanks!

[DaryLLL]

Was it fair of the proto-Xtian evangelists to use the Hebrew Scriptures in this way? Taking things out of context?

As I understand it, prophecy was not originally meant to be fortune telling.

Prophet-
1) A person who speaks by divine inspiration or as the interpreter through whom the will of a god is expressed.
2)A person gifted with profound moral insight and exceptional powers of expression.
3)A predictor; a soothsayer.
4)The chief spokesperson of a movement or cause

A soothsayer is only one meaning of prophet. Any Jews want to give insights as to the value of the prophets in Judaism today and in the past?

[dado]

Originally posted by DaryLLL
Any Jews want to give insights as to the value of the prophets in Judaism today and in the past?

in the latest Heb/Eng JPS version of Tanakh, Torah proper comes in at 454 pages, Ne'evim, the books of the prophets, weighs in at 953 pages.

prophets were/are the spokespersons for G-d. the vast majority of prophets spoke to and for their own generations - you can think of them as social critics, generational conscience, etc - as role models, not for living, per se, but for the way to approach the process of living. for me, personally, the prophets are really the key, because they are the bridge between what is recorded so legalistically in Torah and the everyday acts of living. and also because they embody so much passion.

prophets are as necessary as ever today, and will remain so until Moschiach comes.

and since i'm sure someone is going to ask, no, daniel was not a prophet. his visions were just that, visions, not prophecies.

[Sean]

Originally posted by DaryLLL
Was it fair of the proto-Xtian evangelists to use the Hebrew Scriptures in this way? Taking things out of context?

Fair or unfair? Those are loaded words, and that question is largely moot, at least for Christians. Bear in mind that for people who believe the Gospels are true and not fictional, it wasn't the "proto-Xtian evangelists" who interpreted Jewish scripture this way; it was Jesus Christ. That pretty much takes it out of the realm of fairness or unfairness, since it's not something a Christian is at liberty to contravene, without simultaneously rejecting Christ and His Gospel.

(For that matter, it wasn't just the evangelists; Paul did it too.)

Besides, we've already established that nobody "owns" the texts, so I don't see how fairness could be called into question.

If it makes you feel better about it, Christian scholars have always held that interpreting scripture is not necessarily an either-or choice. That is to say, the Holy Spirit could have put numerous meanings in a passage, all of which are true. So, assigning a new Christian interpretation to a text does not negate other true interpretations.

I should like to repeat that the differing interpretations Christians and Jews assign to the very same texts should not be taken as evidence of ignorance, bigotry, unfairness, or any other bad thingy. That would be a very bad path to go down.

[DaryLLL]

Originally posted by Sean
.If it makes you feel better about it, Christian scholars have always held that interpreting scripture is not necessarily an either-or choice. That is to say, the Holy Spirit could have put numerous meanings in a passage, all of which are true. So, assigning a new Christian interpretation to a text does not negate other true interpretations.

I do not see evidence they "always" held this viewpoint. They (scholars, bishops and Popes) were pretty big on rooting out "heresy" for centuries.

Leaving the Holy Pneuma and the "Truth" out of it , of course, any time an artist (writer/chronicler, poet, etc) puts something out there, people will read their own personal meanings into it.

Just like Charles Manson and Paul McCartney's song Helter Skelter. Was Paul comfortable with his song being used this way?

I should like to repeat that the differing interpretations Christians and Jews assign to the very same texts should not be taken as evidence of ignorance, bigotry, unfairness, or any other bad thingy. That would be a very bad path to go down.

Leaving simplistic value judgements like "bad" out of it, let's say the syncretizing was very-- creative! (The Septuagint was not the only text the evagelists used. Paul quotes Plato, Jesus quotes Dionysus.)

I think it is worth pointing out that the Xtian interpretation of Jewish prophecies is not the only or original one, as I was led to believe and I am sure many Xtian children still are. Which is why I asked for the Jewish perspective.

Bear in mind that for people who believe the Gospels are true and not fictional, it wasn't the "proto-Xtian evangelists" who interpreted Jewish scripture this way; it was Jesus Christ.

And I know one can be a Xtian and not take the Bible as literal historical fact, word for word.

[dado]

yeah, i'm having trouble parsing that last sentence myself. anyway, i slogged through Tellurian's "Adverso", surprisingly benign stuff really. well not entirely benign, the quality of translation nearly killed me :LOL

i think next i'm going tackle pre-Jamnian material, starting with the Qumran scrolls.

[Sean]

Originally posted by DaryLLL
I do not see evidence they "always" held this viewpoint.

Nonetheless.

They (scholars, bishops and Popes) were pretty big on rooting out "heresy" for centuries.

And they still are. It's their job.


Leaving the Holy Pneuma and the "Truth" out of it , of course, any time an artist (writer/chronicler, poet, etc) puts something out there, people will read their own personal meanings into it.

Yes, they will.

Just like Charles Manson and Paul McCartney's song Helter Skelter. Was Paul comfortable with his song being used this way?

I expect not. (But then, Paul really did "own" that text, so might not the analogy suffer?)

Leaving simplistic value judgements like "bad" out of it, let's say the syncretizing was very-- creative!

Very appropriate. Not to quibble, but I might capitalize Creative.

And I know one can be a Xtian and not take the Bible as literal historical fact, word for word.

Indeed that's the case. Thank you for your response.

[DaryLLL]

Fair or unfair? Those are loaded words, and that question is largely moot, at least for Christians. Bear in mind that for people who believe the Gospels are true and not fictional, it wasn't the "proto-Xtian evangelists" who interpreted Jewish scripture this way; it was Jesus Christ. That pretty much takes it out of the realm of fairness or unfairness, since it's not something a Christian is at liberty to contravene, without simultaneously rejecting Christ and His Gospel.

Coming back to say, hey wait a minute! When did this thread become one for the literalist Xtian viewpoint only? Are you in charge of defining terms now?

You (and 2 or 3 other people) may have decided nobody owns the Hebrew Scriptures. I did not take place in that conversation. I feel the Hebrew Scriptures belong to the Hebrews. At least they get first dibs.

But that's just me. :wave

[tracymom]

You (and 2 or 3 other people) may have decided nobody owns the Hebrew Scriptures. I did not take place in that conversation. I feel the Hebrew Scriptures belong to the Hebrews. At least they get first dibs.

But that's just me.

Nope, not just you. Me, too. :)

[kama'aina mama]

Maybe someone can help me out. How many times did Jesus quote Hebrew scripture? And how many times did He specifically say that they refered to Him?

[dado]

Originally posted by DaryLLL
I feel the Hebrew Scriptures belong to the Hebrews.

it's ok. Yeshua was a Jew, too, so the interpretations attributed to him fall under the Fair Use umbrella. ;) Saul would be provisionally covered thanks to the Beit Hillel connection attributed to him in Acts, but it has to be said there is now a lot of evidence the Gamliel story is a complete fabrication.

what's ironic is that Saul's brand of Paulinism gained prominence over the more jewish-flavored sects run by people who had actually known Yeshua thanks to the promotion of a Gnostic who himself was later declared heretical. it is interesting to wonder what c'ianity - and judaism - would look like today if constantine hadn't put the pagan stamp of approval on the Pauline stream.

sigh. two peoples separated by a common book.

[dado]

Originally posted by kama'aina mama How many times did Jesus quote Hebrew scripture?

kama, that is an enormous can of worms. in theory, there are hundreds of Tanakh excerpts in the c'ian books.

the problem is that if we take the scriptures as they stand today as "the" word, it means nobody *ever* recorded Yeshua - a Jew in Judea speaking to other Jews about Hebrew scripture - nobody ever recorded him speaking in Aramaic or Hebrew or quoting Hebrew scriptures in their native form. which to me strongly suggests we have lost the original words. we simply don't have them, all we have is greek translations.

the idea that he only spoke Greek when among his own people talking about his own faith strikes me as, well, not very likely. it is difficult to explain just how unlikely i find this without taking you to a yeshiva and letting you see how Jews actually study Torah. especially study at a level warranting the title "rabbi".

imagining a pope from the 1500s walking the corridors of the Vatican quoting the Vulgate to his top cardinal in Swahili is about the level of likelikhood i'm feeling.

[Sean]

Originally posted by DaryLLL
Coming back to say, hey wait a minute! When did this thread become one for the literalist Xtian viewpoint only? Are you in charge of defining terms now?
No, nothing like that, I just thought you might like to be sensible of the orthodox Christian viewpoint while you give voice to your own viewpoint.

(Not the "literalist" Christian viewpoint, though, as I really know very little about that. I would welcome hearing from a literalist, if one happens to drop by.)

I feel the Hebrew Scriptures belong to the Hebrews. At least they get first dibs.
So will you leave New Testament interpretation to the Christians? And can the Catholics have the Septuagint? No one else is using it, and I think they're the only ones who really want it, anyway.

[tracymom]

So will you leave New Testament interpretation to the Christians?

I don't think the point is the interpretation, unless we're talking about Christians co-opting the Torah into the "Old Testament" and completely disregarding any other interpretation of it other than their own, which is what a great number of Christians have done for 1700-1900 years, killing a whole bunch of people in the process. But I digress.

I think the point is the ownership. My personal view is that the Hebrews own the Torah (that's probably an inaccurate statement, apologies for that, like many of my Christian brothers and sisters I'm pretty ignorant!), the Christians own the New Testament, Muslims own the Koran. Et cetera. Now, for interpretation? Nah, anybody can interpret it. But you should interpret it with respect to that cultural and religious tradition. You can't help but interpret it with respect to your own, so you don't have to take special care with that, but you do with the other.

Now, can you take it at face value without doing that? Yeah, but you lose a lot in the process, which is fine if you're going on faith alone, but not so great for scholarship. IMO these are two different things.

My Jesus said to have faith like a little child. So I do. My scholarship and readings of Gnostic texts and other traditions have nothing really to do with that. Like a little child, I have my faith, and oddly enough, through all these explorations, nothing seems to shake that. But then my experience of the Christ had little to nothing to do with the texts, so subtracting them takes nothing away from it.

I apologize if this sounds like proselyting as I don't intend it to be such. I found it was the only way I could illustrate my point as I am not nearly as well read or as articulate as some of the other minds in this thread.

[kama'aina mama]

Originally posted by dado
kama, taking you to a yeshiva and letting you see how Jews actually study Torah. especially study at a level warranting the title "rabbi".


I would LOVE that!

Okay... what I am driving at is this. Off the top of my head, not citations provided, there is room to interpret many of Jesus's Torah citations not as "I am referencing this prophet because I am fulfilling his words" and more as "Well, Isaiah said it and look around you! It's still true today!". If I quote from King Lear you don't think I am claiming to be the heir of Shakespeare. You understand that I am simply refering to our common cultural heritage. Much of what is pointed to as "Jesus laying claim to His fulfillment of the prophecies" has appeared to me to be more often the former.

[dado]

it makes a lot of sense to me, kama, for sure. all dynamic cultures are self-referential.

[barbara]

So will you leave New Testament interpretation to the Christians? And can the Catholics have the Septuagint? No one else is using it, and I think they're the only ones who really want it, anyway. :thumb good one :LOL

[DaryLLL]

Sean, I believe you are Roman Catholic? (I am guessing from where your dw posts. ) Correct me if I am wrong.

You refer to yourself above, I think, as orthodox. A Greek word meaning straight thinking. Is that your meaning?

Saying the Septuagint is not being used today, do you mean to say the Greek Orthodox Church would have no use for a text in Greek? That makes no sense.

(For those that do not know, the Septuagint is a translation of the Hebrew Scriptures into Greek, as commissioned by Alexander the great in 300 BCE.)

I am having trouble with your loose use of terms, you see.

Are you also saying you are not a literalist? Because you come across as one of those inerrancy promoters. You claim to think the gospels are "true and not fictional," you see.

This is a thread for Biblical discussion and history, not for promoting "belief" in the Bible one way or another.

dado said:

kama, that is an enormous can of worms. in theory, there are hundreds of Tanakh excerpts in the c'ian books

In theory, much of the teachings in the Greek Scriptures, and quite a bit of the narrative, are Tanakh exegesis and midrash. And the rest is Greek and Egyptian religion and philosophy. Jesus is the spokesman for the syncretization.

[dado]

a tool i use for perusing passages...

http://www.crosswire.org/sword/index.jsp

there are lots of things still missing - ie, a complete lack of Hebrew commentaries - but the collection of material already available is quite impressive.

[Sean]

Originally posted by DaryLLL
Sean, I believe you are Roman Catholic? (I am guessing from where your dw posts. ) Correct me if I am wrong.

You're right.

You refer to yourself above, I think, as orthodox. A Greek word meaning straight thinking. Is that your meaning?


By orthodox I mean the English word:
or·tho·dox adj.
1. Adhering to the accepted or traditional and established faith, especially in religion.
2. Adhering to the Christian faith as expressed in the early Christian ecumenical creeds.
(The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)

Saying the Septuagint is not being used today, do you mean to say the Greek Orthodox Church would have no use for a text in Greek? That makes no sense.
I was kidding, as I thought the tone of that sentence would make evident. Sorry to confuse you. (For those that do not know, the Septuagint is accepted as canonical by the Catholic Church, but not by most Protestants. I don't know whether the Greek Orthodox Church uses the Septuagint, or some other Greek translation.)

I am having trouble with your loose use of terms, you see.

I was kidding about the Septuagint, but I used "orthodox" in it's exact sense, and I don't use other terms loosely, either.

Are you also saying you are not a literalist?
Yes.
Because you come across as one of those inerrancy promoters. You claim to think the gospels are "true and not fictional," you see.

That is what I think (but I never claimed that until just now because you brought it up). You seem to think that everyone who believes the Bible is inerrant must be a literalist, but I'd prefer not to use those terms so loosely.

This is a thread for Biblical discussion and history, not for promoting "belief" in the Bible one way or another.

Under the aegis of 'Biblical discussion and history,' many of the posts here are making explicit claims that parts of the Bible are false, and therefore do, to that extent, argue for disbelief. I responded to those posts in the same spirit of inquiry, but only regarding the particular claims being made. I never even said what I believe about any of it, until you asked. You had to look up my wife's posts just to guess what religion I am.

Thank you for starting the thread, I enjoyed it!

[dado]

delete. duplicate.

[dado]

Originally posted by Sean
Adhering to the Christian faith as expressed in the early Christian ecumenical creeds.

the first such creed wasn't until 300 years after the crucifixion. that's 15 generations of believers and can't really be argued as an "early" definition of faith. an early definition of orthodox faith, yes, but not of c'ian faith in general.

you seem to think that everyone who believes the Bible is inerrant must be a literalist

conversely, you seem to think that anyone who doesn't accept the words were then as they are now is dismissing the message as well. i have a feeling that isn't actually true, but it is what comes across, at least to me. from my perspective placing an undue importance on the actual words is exactly the attitude Yeshua - in a long, proud prophetic tradition - preached against.

[tracymom]

Good thread, y'all. I'm going back to lurking. Hopefully I won't be foolish enough to spend 30 minutes slaving over a post that obviously isn't pertinent enough to make a ripple in the discussion. :p Your brains've got me beat! :o

[barbara]

from my perspective placing an undue importance on the actual words is exactly the attitude Yeshua - in a long, proud prophetic tradition - preached against. Good point Dado :thumb I think I made the same point, although not so eloquently as you, on another post.

You seem to think that everyone who believes the Bible is inerrant must be a literalist, but I'd prefer not to use those terms so loosely. I'm with you Sean!

[kama'aina mama]

If you feel that people misuse the terms "literal" and "inerrant" in respect to Biblical reading... please explain. I have started a thread asking and have no satisfactory answer thus far.

[DaryLLL]

Reviving this thread.

Somewhere there was a ref to Marcion but I can't find it. I do not know if it was in this thread or elsewhere, but since this is a Bib Lit thread, I thought I would bring it up here.

Marcion was a 2nd century Christian, non-orthodox, once he was excommunicated, that is. His church survived until the 5th century.

There was a question wheter a gnostic could be a literalist and I thought, no, one couldn't. But was Marcion a literalist? He liked to use only specific texts of what we now call the NT, certain letters of Paul (with Jewish refs taken out), and only Luke, with the nativity of Jesus and John taken out. He denied the use of the Tanakh as valid to Xtian teachings.

He didn't like to use Jewish teachings in his belief system, as he thought Yahweh was the Demiurge and not the Father Jesus was talking about.

It is hard to define gnosticism. Marcion was a docetist, ie; Jesus only lived on earth in the "appearance of flesh" as Paul said, not as a real human. Hence, no nativity would be possible.

This article

http://www.tyndale.cam.ac.uk/Tyndale/staff/Head/Marcion.htm

makes the claim that Marcion was not a true gnostic, as:

Certainly he was very influenced by gnosticism, through the ideas of Cerdo; and the fundamental theory of two gods: one the creator deity and the other god of love, may come from a gnostic environment. Nevertheless, the lack of speculative ideas, the allegiance to Paul, and the avers_ion to allegorical exegesis distance Marcion from the gnostics.

Marcionism was subsumed into Manichaeism in the 3rd century.

[Sean]

Originally posted by DaryLLL
Somewhere there was a ref to Marcion but I can't find it.
That was me, it the "inerrant v. literal" thread. I mentioned him as an example of a gnostic who nonetheless interpreted some scripture literally. But if he's not really a gnostic after all, then of course that example isn't valid.

Thanks for the info, and the link!

[DaryLLL]

A contemporary of Marcion, 2nd century CE, and founder of another popular school of Christian thought, ie: church, was Valentinus. Now he was a gnostic. Here is his plan:

http://www.netacc.net/~mafg/book/v1c3s3.htm

This ancient material is not copyrighted.

At the summit of all being is God, the Father, and His companion Sige (Silence). God is One, unique, known only to Himself, remote, inaccessible; and between God and the world is a whole universe of "demi-gods."

From the Father and Sige proceed Intellect and Truth, and from these Word and Life, and from these again Man and the Church; these are the eight superior eons. This process of generation among the eons continues until the Pleroma is complete -- the perfect society of divine beings, thirty in all.

So far all is abstraction, idea. Physical reality originates through a breach of the harmony of the ideal pleroma, "a kind of original sin." ... The lowest of the thirty eons, Wisdom [Sophia], conceives a desire to know the Father -- an inordinate desire, necessarily, since the Father is knowable only to His own first born, Intellect. This inordinate desire of Wisdom [Sophia] is a new being, imperfect necessarily and therefore cast out from the Pleroma. Its name is Hachamoth[or Achamoth].

To prevent any recurrence of such disorder Intellect and Truth produce a sixteenth pair of eons, Christ and the Holy Ghost [Pneuma] to teach the rest the limits of their nature. Then in an act of Thanksgiving all the thirty-two eons unite their powers and produce the thirty-third eon, Jesus the Saviour.

The thirty-third eon and the eon Christ are now dispatched by the Pleroma to Hachamoth -- the imperfect desire[offspring] of Wisdom. From the eon Christ it receives a beginning of form and the elements of conscience -- whence a sense of its own inferiority. The thirty-third eon separates the passions from it.

The separated passions are inanimate matter (hylike); Hachamoth, freed from them, is animate matter (psychike). Hachamoth's vision of the Saviour results in a third substance, the spiritual (pneumatike). So originate the elements of the world that is to be. Hachamoth, from the psychike, produces the Creator, Demiurge [or Ialdabaoth], and he gives form to the rest of creation.

Demiurge is ignorant of his own origin, believes himself supreme. ["Thou shalt have no other gods before me."] He is the maker of man, material and animated, the god of the Jews and the Old Testament [sic], a bad god and to be resisted. (Whence the common Gnostic teaching of a fundamental opposition between the Old Testament[sic] and the New.)

Men are of three types, according to the element predominating in them. There are material men (hylikoi), who cannot be saved; spiritual men (pneumatikoi) who have no need of salvation (the Gnostics); and animate men (psychikoi) who need salvation and can attain to it. For these last there is the plan of Redemption.

The Redeemer is spiritual, he is animate, he has the appearance of the material, and, a fourth element in him, he is the eon Jesus. This eon descended into him at his baptism [making the nativity story spurious]and remained until the trial before Pilate when it returned to the Pleroma, taking with it the spiritual element. The actor in the Passion was no more than the animate element with its appearance of matter. The Passion is not the source of redemption.

Salvation, the redemption of the spiritual in man from the influence of the psychic, is due to the knowledge [gnosis] brought by the thirty-third eon -- knowledge of the secret [esoteric]traditions and mysteries, knowledge of the Gospel, which can only be truly known through this esoteric knowledge. The possession of this knowledge is the key to [pneumatic] life, and knowledge is the highest of virtues. Matter is the source of evil in man, and since the Gnostic is spiritual, his [/her] actions cannot but be good. Spirit and flesh are independent, and the spirit is not responsible for the flesh.

And a Catholic rebuttal:

It was not through such elaborations of learned fantasy as these that the new religion was to live. This was again to show itself as primarily the tradition of an unaltered block of truth revealed once and for all. The test, for the Church, of the Gnostic theology's truth was its accord with the tradition; and the judge of that accord was to be, not the encyclopaedic erudition of the Valentines and Basilides, nor even the trained minds of convert philosophers. Victory was to lie with the tradition and its sole authorised exponent the hierarchy of bishops.

[DaryLLL]

Are any of the readers here familiar with this gnostic worldview and creation story?

So, the 3 forms of humaninty are:

Hylic, or fleshy. These would be completely selfish people, criminals in fact, only out for themselves, believing in the separateness of all beings. Short sighted and interested in th