Re: thoughts on Jesus

On Wed, 07 May 2008 19:53:58 -0700, Greg G. wrote:

On May 7, 9:15 pm, John McKendry <jlastn...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Sun, 04 May 2008 02:34:25 -0700, Greg G. wrote:

On May 3, 11:33 pm, John McKendry <jlastn...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

<snip some more>
 I even sometimes use the words "alternative Christianities" or
"lost Christianities". It's clear that as early as the time of Paul
there were other claimants to the name "Christian". But it's equally
clear that a central tradition can be traced back to a founding
community in Jerusalem that gave its authority to Paul, and that
Marcion and the Ebionites and all the various Gnosticisms are
deviations from that central tradition.
I am back at home and just started reading "Lost Christianities" that
you recommended to me. I don't doubt your account. I have noticed
that Paul never refers to "Jesus of Nazareth". Paul does claim to be
a Pharisee and claims to have been in Jerusalem around the time Jesus
was making trouble there, yet doesn't mention those incidents. For
that reason, among others, I am still skeptical that Paul's Jesus is
the same as the Gospel's Jesus.
Do you have any information that might dispel that idea? Thanks.
Greg G.

 Depends on what you mean by "the same as". If you mean simply "how
can we know they're even talking about the same person?", the point of
contact is Paul's letter to the Galatians. In Ch.1 vv 18-19 he says
"Then after three years I did go up to Jerusalem to visit Cephas and
stayed with him fifteen days; but I did not see any other apostle
except James the Lord's brother" (NRSV translation). "The Lord" is one
of Paul's conventional titles for Jesus. If James in the Jerusalem
church is the Lord's brother, it hard to see how the Lord could be
anyone other than the Jesus of the Jerusalem church, who is the Jesus
of the Gospels. James is named as one of Jesus' brothers in Mark 6:3,
"Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James and
Joses...?", and in Matthew 13:55, "Is not this the carpenter's
son...and are not his brothers James and Joseph...?"

All through Galatians 1, Paul is using the word "brother" in the
spiritual sense rather than as having common parents. Perhaps the phrase
was slightly altered to agree with Mark and Matthew, to agree with what
the scribe may have thought Paul wrote originally.

There is no manuscript evidence for variant readings; all the manuscripts
show "brother of the lord". If the text was altered it happened very
early.
If Paul meant "spiritual brother of the lord", why only James?
Finally, and most important, if Paul's Jesus is not the Jesus of
Peter, James, and John, why was he in Jerusalem in the first place?
The whole passage is about Paul establishing his authority to preach
his gospel by associating himself with the core group of undoubted
apostles at Jerusalem.


 In another sense, though, they are not the same Jesus. In the same
chapter of Galatians, Paul says "...the gospel that was proclaimed by
me is not of human origin; for I did not receive it from a human
source, nor was I taught it, but I received it through a revelation of
Jesus Christ." (Gal 1:11-12) After his conversion it was three years
before he went to Jerusalem to meet with Peter and James, and another
fourteen years before he went again to Jerusalem to get authorization
from Peter and James and John to preach his gospel to the Gentiles. The
only events of Jesus' life that Paul cares about were the Crucifixion
and the Resurrection; he neither knows nor cares about the sayings, the
parables, the miracles, or anything else in the Gospel traditions.
Still, Paul's crucified and resurrected Lord Jesus Christ is James'
brother Jesus.

Is Robert M. Price wrong about Mark being a fictional work?

THE INCREDIBLE SHRINKING SON OF MAN
How Reliable Is the Gospel Tradition? by Robert M. Price, Prometheus
Books, 2003

I haven't read the book but I saw an extensive web site a year ago or so
that I couldn't locate tonight after a brief search. I found this
reference at http://www.rationalresponders.com/the_gospels_are_midrash

Price has his own Web site at http://www.thebiblegeek.org/home .
He is the exception, the one respectable NT scholar I know of who
asserts that there was no Jesus. This makes him a celebrity. I've
only read a little of his stuff, and I find it confusing because
I don't see where his certainty comes from. I'd have to see his
arguments about Mark being "fictional". My view, which I think is
pretty mainstream, is that Mark records a tradition about a real
person. It is not history; that doesn't make it fiction.


BTW, I'm reading _Lost Christianities_. Ehrman's description of the
Gnostics and the quotes from the Gospel of Thomas reminded me of
Buddhism with "salvation" substituted for "enlightment". The sayings
attributed to Jesus reminds me of sayings attributed to Buddha.


I've heard a number of people say that. I don't see the similarities
myself, but there's a lot I don't know about Buddhism in that period.

--
Greg G.


John

.

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