For Kapyong: Defending a historical Jesus

[Mcreal]

Trying to "make a silk purse out of a sow's ear" comes to mind.

The language-gymnastics to try to eek out a human-Jesus are convoluted -

I saw reference today to Gal 4:4 meaning something like 'water passing out of a woman through a tube'.

I can't be bothered trying to find it.

 

[Belz...]

It's unarguably true that in your above quote you very clearly said that I have been making the "mistake" of failing to appreciate that Jesus could have been largely obscure in his time, i.e. not widely known beyond his own group of what you called "his illiterate followers".

But I have explained to you at least 6 times now that it was NOT a mistake I have ever made. I have not ever disputed that Jesus may have been largely unknown in his own time.

Then why have you been arguing for a higher standard of evidence about Jesus when you know it's impossible? Self-fulfilling prophecy? I don't get it.

 

[Craig B]

Trying to "make a silk purse out of a sow's ear" comes to mind.

The language-gymnastics to try to eek out a human-Jesus are convoluted -

I saw reference today to Gal 4:4 meaning something like 'water passing out of a woman through a tube'.

I can't be bothered trying to find it.

Probably just as well, for I don't think there's much point.

The words have as one of their meanings the normal process of birth. Paul would assume that's what his readers would understand by the terms he uses. If he had wanted them to take a different meaning from it, he would have used specific terms which definitely exclude the normal process by which children come from women.

ETA Also if Jesus simply passed through like water through a tube, the very next words look a bit incongruous

γενόμενον, having been born; hypo, ὑπὸ, under; nomon, νόμον, law.​

Does it not look a bit incongruous or inappropriate or even indecent, to suggest that a child passed through the womb of a woman, like water through a pipe - and did so under the law? That just looks a bit wrong; I can't really say why.

 

[Mcreal]

Paul would assume that's what his readers would understand by the terms he uses. If he had wanted them to take a different meaning from it, he would have used specific terms which definitely exclude the normal process by which children come from women.

lol. Putting word in the mouth of a dude trying to make a living as a charlatan is an interesting approach.

Look at 1 Cor 9:1-7:

1 Am I not free? Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen Jesus our Lord? Are not you my workmanship in the Lord? 2 If to others I am not an apostle, at least I am to you, for you are the seal of my apostleship in the Lord.

3 This is my defense to those who would examine me. 4 Do we not have the right to eat and drink? 5 Do we not have the right to take along a believing wife/sister, as do the other apostles and the brothers of the Lord and Cephas? 6 Or is it only Barnabas and I who have no right to refrain from working for a living? 7 Who serves as a soldier at his own expense? Who plants a vineyard without eating any of its fruit? Or who tends a flock without getting some of the milk?

Do you see the giveaway phrases?

I'm not sure whether you're wishful thinking or dreaming, or both.

As I said, the language-gymnastics to try to eek out a human-Jesus are convoluted

 

[Craig B]

lol. Putting word in the mouth of a dude trying to make a living as a charlatan is an interesting approach.

Look at 1 Cor 9:1-7:

Do you see the giveaway phrases?

I'm not sure whether you're wishful thinking or dreaming, or both.

As I said, the language-gymnastics to try to eek out a human-Jesus are convoluted

I hope they're not so convoluted that you are unable to put your observations about them into plain words and send them to me.

 

[IanS]

Then why have you been arguing for a higher standard of evidence about Jesus when you know it's impossible? Self-fulfilling prophecy? I don't get it.

Oh, it's by no means impossible to find a good enough standard of evidence for a real Jesus. Providing of course that he actually did exist, so that such genuine evidence was once, or still is, available.

And by a "higher standard" (which I don't think I have specifically raised as an issue in this thread, i.e. except in explanatory reply when you and others have asked me about that), I only mean a "higher standard" in comparison to what HJ-posters in the other threads were describing as actually far less evidence for other ancient historical figures who they point out as universally accepted, such as Pythagoras, Socrates, Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, and even Kim Jong -il (do you remember that huge discussion over many pages from a member here who kept insisting that if we did not believe in Jesus on the evidence presented by bible scholars then we certainly should not believe in the Korean leader Kim Jong-il ... remember all that lengthy issue?).

What was argued in those other HJ threads was that we have enough evidence of all those other figures such that historians and everyone else do not to question the existence of those various figures (named above), hence they said that I should be satisfied with what they claimed was actually a great deal more evidence for a HJ.

What I said in response to that was, first of all (1) that it's not true that we actually have more evidence for Jesus than we have for those other named figures, and secondly (2) that if the actual existence of people like Pythagoras, Socrates, Julius Caesar, and Alexander the Great were as important to the daily lives of everyone on the planet as Jesus is today, where over 2 billion people around the world follow a belief system based upon the existence of any of those people, then we certainly would be asking for convincing evidence that they were at the very least real people and not just fictitious legends.

Though in addition to that (which I have pointed out many times in the various HJ threads) ; for people like Pythagoras, Socrates, Julius Caesar, Alexander the Great, what is important about them (important to historians, but really of zero practical importance to the daily lives of anyone today), is what was said to have been done in their names. Such as the founding of a philosophical movement called the "Pythagorean School" with it's explanation of Pythagoras Theorem, or in the case of Roman rulers like Caesar the various wars that were fought by his soldiers etc. ... and there is actually overwhelming evidence that all those things did happen. i.e. someone did form a school of Pythagorean philosophy and some Roman emperor did actually fight all those wars and have all those monuments built etc. So the evidence for that is actually enormous.

But Jesus is not like that at all. In his case it's his actual existence which is vital and which is the bedrock upon which today's worldwide Christianity is built. And that's the problem for an institution with a belief system as huge and hugely important as Christianity, because it turns out that there actually is no good or credible evidence of his existence at all.

So that's why people really should now (in the 21st century), be asking for some some sort of genuine convincing evidence to show that Jesus was a real person.

But instead what we have got is a church leadership that simply hand-waves the problem away and insists that nobody in their right mind could possibly doubt that Jesus was real. And a field of biblical studies that claims such a vast amount of evidence for Jesus that it amounts to a literal "certainty" that he was real ... but where, when the church and bible scholars are put on the spot and asked to actually produce that evidence, all that they produce is the biblical writing that simply amounts to evidence of peoples belief in a messiah that none of the biblical writers had ever known! That's evidence only of religious belief, it's not actually evidence of Jesus.

So that is the sense in which I have in the past quite often said that in fact we should demand better evidence for Jesus. "Better than" what my HJ opponents were calling far worse or far less evidence for their examples of Pythagoras, Socrates, Julius Caesar, Alexander the Great (or even Kim Jong-il). That is - if, as they all claimed, we actually have far less evidence for people like Pythagoras, then what I said was that certainly would not be good enough to accept Pythagoras either if he was today the basis of a worldwide belief system for over 2 billion people.

 

[Belz...]

Wow, thanks for that longish but interesting post, Ian.

 

[Craig B]

Wow, thanks for that longish but interesting post, Ian.

I think it's a protracted piece of obfuscation. This will continue to be repeated endlessly. But I set down two passages extracted from previous episodes of this material, and I have said they are contradictory. I have had no specific reply, and I predict that none will ever come.

1. ... It is not necessarily that a "higher" standard of evidence is needed for Jesus, as if saying that a higher standard must be applied to Jesus than is applied in the case of any other figure from ancient history ...

2. So I would argue that Jesus is a completely different case to all of those other figures of ancient history (all the figures that people list when they ask "would you demand the same "standard" of evidence for X, Y or Z?"). None of those figures X, Y, or Z are remotely comparable to Jesus.​

 

[Belz...]

Don't misunderstand me, Craig. I still disagree with him, but I appreciate the time and effort he took to explain his position with such precision.

 

[IanS]

If we are talking about a "historical Jesus" then does it not matter that we read about a figure who is set in a clear historical context as distinct from one who is "in the form of a man" without any historical context?

Certainly Paul might believe either or both were "historical" but the difference is important to us, yes?

Indeed, and of course the difference should have been important to Paul and the various gospel writers too. Though it seems that in biblical times religious fanatics like Paul may have made little or no distinction between what was truly real vs. the belief in holy spirits, angels, ghosts and "gods".

But if, in his letters, Paul says anywhere that his believed "Christ" was actually a part of God that adopted a human-like form when descending to Earth, then that is immediately an admission that he is not talking about reality and is not talking about anyone who was truly a human preacher named "Jesus".

Once he has said that (and I think a few pages back I quoted exactly those sort of words from Paul's letters), then that "trumps" (sorry about bad electoral pun! eek ) and should be an end to any argument that says Paul elsewhere talks as if he thought Jesus was a real human person.

Though in any case it's very clear from Paul's letters that he had never known any such person as Jesus anyway. And in his letters, when describing his first vision of Jesus, iirc he says that what he thereby learned about Jesus (it was he said "revealed" to him - he meant a revelation from God) "I got this from no man". So, he was not claiming knowledge of the messiah from anything anyone had told him about any normal bloke called Jesus walking about preaching in Judea. On the contrary, IIRC (but we can check of course) in that particular letter (describing his vision) he makes clear that his belief in Jesus as the messiah was a revelation from God ... iirc, he says or directly implies that God revealed to him the true meaning of the ancient messiah prophecies that he said had been "hidden so long" in the coded obscure language of the OT.

And just for the sake of completion - when in Paul's letter it says that 3 years after the revelation of his vision, he went to Jerusalem to confer with Cephas and others, iirc he actually says that he was totally uninterested in what the other "pillars of the church" might say to him their about their messiah beliefs, because he dismisses that entirely saying something like (from rough memory, but again it's easy to look up) " for they could add nothing to me" ... instead he loftily insisted that he knew himself directly from God what he should correctly believe about the messiah.

 

[IanS]

Wow, thanks for that longish but interesting post, Ian.

OK. And thank you too. For a gracious and fair comment.

So, I think (I hope) we now understand more clearly what each of us are saying on this issue.

 

[Craig B]

Once he has said that (and I think a few pages back I quoted exactly those sort of words from Paul's letters), then that "trumps" (sorry about bad electoral pun! eek ) and should be an end to any argument that says Paul elsewhere talks as if he thought Jesus was a real human person.

If you're going to play a trump, and thereby end the game, you have to put the card face up on the table. So I think you need to do better than "a few pages back I quoted these sort of words" - even if you did quote them "exactly", as I've no doubt you did.

I would therefore be grateful if you could refer us to the words you have in mind, particularly if they are to have an effect as radical as abolishing for all time the idea that Paul believed Jesus to have been a real human being.

 

[HansMustermann]

The primary debate,however, is about the meaning of brother.

Well, I had no objection to that one. Just pointing out that things can be muddy even if you take "brother" to only mean biological kinship, because the other word in that construct isn't ONLY used for Jesus, and in fact it doesn't technically even mean the same as the English "Lord".

 

[HansMustermann]

Probably just as well, for I don't think there's much point.

The words have as one of their meanings the normal process of birth. Paul would assume that's what his readers would understand by the terms he uses. If he had wanted them to take a different meaning from it, he would have used specific terms which definitely exclude the normal process by which children come from women.

ETA Also if Jesus simply passed through like water through a tube, the very next words look a bit incongruous

γενόμενον, having been born; hypo, ὑπὸ, under; nomon, νόμον, law.​

Does it not look a bit incongruous or inappropriate or even indecent, to suggest that a child passed through the womb of a woman, like water through a pipe - and did so under the law? That just looks a bit wrong; I can't really say why.

The problem with ginomai is bigger than that. The real problem is that Paul doesn't use that word for birth anywhere else. And for a good reason, because that's not the word for birth. It's the word for "to become", or basically a state transition, plus of course the metaphorical meanings of it.

The closest it's ever used to being born is in 1 Corinthians 15:37, where the same verb (if a different conjugation) is used for what a sown grain will BECOME. And it goes downhill from there.

In 1 Corinthians 15:10 it's about (the grace of god not) "turning out to be" (void.) Hell it's even used for sunset, in the meaning of day becoming night.

But look at even just Galatians. In Galatians 2:17 it's used basically for that last "that cannot turn out to be the case!" bit. In Galatians 3:21, it's basically used in the same way. In Galatians 6:14 it's used for "to start" (boasting.)

Well, the above are approximate translations in which I try to emphasize the meaning of coming to be, to happen, to become, as best I can. But you get the idea even if the most legible translation is using other words. No matter what word you use, none of those has the meaning of being born, and Paul never uses it for being born.

So WTH is with Galatians 4:4? Well, my conjecture is that there was SOME kind of interpolation or transcription error later, so basically we don't actually know WTH Paul actually wrote there, or if anything at all.

 

[Craig B]

The problem with ginomai is bigger than that. The real problem is that Paul doesn't use that word for birth anywhere else.

As Greek 1096 in Strong's Concordance, listed in its occurrences are

to be born, Romans 1:3 (ἐκ σπέρματος Δαυίδ); Galatians 4:4 (ἐκ γυναικός)​

My erudition in this matter is very recently acquired. Took less than two minutes to look up. It's here, in the first meaning given.

1. to become, i. e. to come into existence, begin to be, receive being: absolutely, John 1:15, 30 (ἔμπροσθεν μου γέγονεν); John 8:58(πρίν Ἀβραάμ γενέσθαι); 1 Corinthians 15:37(τό σῶμα τό γενησόμενον); ἐκ τίνος, to be born, Romans 1:3 (ἐκ σπέρματος Δαυίδ); Galatians 4:4 (ἐκ γυναικός) ... etc.​

 

[Mcreal]

Then why have you been arguing for a higher standard of evidence about Jesus when you know it's impossible? Self-fulfilling prophecy? I don't get it.

The reason you don't get it is likely to be for the same reason you mixed up 'burden of proof' and 'level of proof'.

The issue is not just the standard of evidence; it's also the degree of evidence, specifically the lack of it.

Argument from silence is a valid argument when, based on claims of supporters of a concept, we might expect more evidence for that concept than is otherwise available.

That goes to the ethic of the burden of proof - they who aver, must prove.

 

[vridar]

I think the suggestions in your last para are untenable. If a writer says that a person came from a woman, using a word that has as one of its meanings the normal process of birth, then the writer is implying that normal process, and nothing else.

If Paul wanted to suggest something other than the normal order of things, he would have chosen words that explicitly excluded it. If I say, I "took" a cup of tea with my dinner, then you will understand me to mean that I drank it normally, even if the word has other meanings. If I wanted you to understand something out of the normal course of events, I would have made my meaning clear. That principle of textual analysis must surely be applied in this case.

There's a difference between an idiom ("took a cup of tea...") and simply using unconventional terms. Context is everything, and the concept of being "born" flies in the face of every other reference to Jesus in Galatians and leaves a reader mystified -- unless the reader is assuming the gospel narrative as the background to Paul. It is far from clear what "being born of a woman" could mean or what relevance it could possibly have against the rest of Paul's discussions of that Christ figure.

The context also involves our earliest witness to a knowledge of that phrase and that's where it is being used to counter a particular docetic type of christology, but is not known by all patristics even though it would have served them very well, as I covered in an earlier comment.

The context of the Christ figure in Galatians and his relationship to the flesh of Paul, and the context of the first use of the verse -- these weigh against the assumption that would only make sense if we assume Paul knew the narrative of Jesus as per the gospels, something he says did not interest him.

 

[vridar]

I don't like the expression "historical Jesus". It seems to imply a lot of things.

Agreed. To ask if X existed it is necessary to have some concept of X. And in the case of Jesus that concept can only come from the gospel narratives -- and so the "quest" is skewed from the start.

 

[vridar]

Are you sure? In my Ancient Greek dictionary γενόμενος , η, ον means “birth". And also here: http://perseus.uchicago.edu/perseus-cgi/morph.pl?id=4427674&next=true&lang=greek

I'm taking my cue from the NT scholars (Ehrman included) and biblical reference tools. Perseus would be addressing classical, not koine, Greek, yes? -- Or more likely does your dictionary cover the various meanings the word can in certain contexts mean rather than strictly means on its own? The idea of a figure being "made" from or "coming" from another has interesting implications given the array of mystical and spiritual concepts of the day.

 

[Mcreal]

I don't like the expression "historical Jesus". It seems to imply a lot of things.

I agree too. I've seen discussion elsewhere suggesting terms like NT-Jesus, human-Jesus, or human-NT-Jesus (hNT-Jesus, or even hNT-J)