Bart Ehrman on the Historical Jesus

[dejudge]

The NT Canon states that Jesus was RAISED from the dead so there would be no mortal remains of Jesus.

Actually, it doesn't. That is one among many possible inefrences about the mechanics of corpse recovery, repair and (re?)animation that could be conjectured based on the few and inconsistent observations of only the prelude and aftermath of the work. The actual mecahnics are not disclosed in the inspired word, and so what words an uninformed English-speaking translator applies to the mechanics are uninformative.

Your statement is a fallacy. You consistently present known erroneous claims.

The NT Canon does state Multiple times that Jesus was raised from the dead.

Please, get familiar with the NT Canon and the teachings of the Church.

Mark 16:6 KJV

And he saith unto them, Be not affrighted : Ye seek Jesus of Nazareth, which was crucified : he is risen ; he is not here: behold the place where they laid him.

1 Corinthians 15:15 KJV

Yea, and we are found false witnesses of God; because we have testified of God that he raised up Christ: whom he raised not up , if so be that the dead rise not.

Romans 10:9 KJV

That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved .

Galatians 1:1 KJV

Paul, an apostle, (not of men, neither by man, but by Jesus Christ, and God the Father, who raised him from the dead)

 

[proudfootz]

It is relatively important. I suppose we are speaking about the “historical Jesus” or the quest for some relevant data about a Jew prophet killed -more likely by the Romans-, in the first century in Palestine.

This is a very important issue to popular Christianity. The educated Christians are less involved in the fundamentalist reading of the Gospels and maintain more relaxed claims about the historical Jesus. Relatively more relaxed, of course.

This is a more important issue in the Anglo-Saxon than between European scholars. There is a large tradition in Protestant Christianity in Europe who denies the possibility to reach some certain features of the real Jesus by using historical methods. See Bultmann and Schweitzer, for example. Curiously, radical scepticism and radical fideism go together in these cases.

Therefore, it is possible to gather in a meeting some mythicists, minimalists and historicists together without any commotion. In Europe, at least.

The Quest for The Historical Jesus began as a project for theologians to try to get closer to the Real Jesus and find out the Original Christianity.

Perhaps the difference between European and American bible scholars is due to the cultural memory of the religious wars in Europe that makes them somewhat less willing to be antagonistic over this, while in America christianity is still a political force that does not shy away from aggressively asserting itself.

 

[Belz...]

The Quest for The Historical Jesus began as a project for theologians to try to get closer to the Real Jesus and find out the Original Christianity.

Do you have any evidence of this ? I'd think most Christians would be quite pissed to discover that their beloved boy-god is in fact just a failed preacher.

 

[JaysonR]

Ian,

You are still thinking like yourself.
What if you believed the Gospels were fact, were before Paul, and believed the resurrection was as described in the Gospels as understood by Christian tradition and creed?

 

[JaysonR]

Dejudge,

I was not claiming Jews believed in human gods.
I was stating that they believed a spirit was not to be trusted, but a physical revival was of the divine's work.

 

[IanS]

Ian,

You are still thinking like yourself.
What if you believed the Gospels were fact, were before Paul, and believed the resurrection was as described in the Gospels as understood by Christian tradition and creed?

I'm not sure how I, you, or anyone else is supposed to think not like they do themselves.

But you appear to be asking me;- if I already believed that the gospel stories of the resurrection and the miracles were all true, then would I believe those stories were about a real Jesus?

That seems to be a question which actually asks "if you believe Jesus was a certainty, then would you believe he was a certainty?".

We seem to have gone from the literally impossible suggestion of finding skeletal remains proved to be of Jesus. To saying "if you believed in Jesus then I bet you would believe in Jesus"!

The very reasons that I don't believe that the gospels are credible as evidence of Jesus, are the same reasons that no educated sane person in the 21st century should believe they are reliable evidence of Jesus.

 

[dejudge]

Dejudge,

I was not claiming Jews believed in human gods.
I was stating that they believed a spirit was not to be trusted, but a physical revival was of the divine's work.

You still appear to be in error.

Your post is recorded.

.... it was a rather hefty part of the original debates back in the 3rd and 4th c CE, and carries its roots back to the Hebrew idea that a spirit is a demon and not to be trusted whereas a physical body is divine.

In Josephus writings a Spirit is not considered a demon and a physical body is NOT divine by Jews.

 

[JaysonR]

Dejudge,

You still are misunderstanding, but that is fine; it is not important and was a very minor point.

 

[dejudge]

Dejudge,

You still are misunderstanding, but that is fine; it is not important and was a very minor point.

I am just pointing that your statement is unsupported by Jewish writers of antiquity.

.... it was a rather hefty part of the original debates back in the 3rd and 4th c CE, and carries its roots back to the Hebrew idea that a spirit is a demon and not to be trusted whereas a physical body is divine.

 

[JaysonR]

Dejudge,

Spirits (of various names) were seen as what we would call, "demons" (they didn't really use that word for it, as that word was a later borrowed term).
They believed them to be the cause of human suffering and affliction; most voluminously in the Babylonian Talmud.

Counter to this, all accounts of resurrection and Olam Ha-Ba are regarding the physical resurrection of the human body and not just a spirit brought back.

The craft of communicating with, or the conjuring of, the dead spirit was strictly forbidden, however Rabbinic literature elaborates that if the spirit of the dead arrives in dream then it is to be considered good.

Later (in European Jewish lore), these ideas influenced the ideas that would become "dibbuk" - spirits of the dead which would inhabit the living and do terrible acts caused by their unrest.

These forms of discussions are present in Talmudic texts, and there are scatterings of Hebrew protection amulets from evil spirits all through the Levant region across various eras.


Still to this day, a Jew is not permitted to cremate the dead and this is a related practice from the belief of the resurrection and Olam Ha-Ba.

 

[JaysonR]

I'm not sure how I, you, or anyone else is supposed to think not like they do themselves.

But you appear to be asking me;- if I already believed that the gospel stories of the resurrection and the miracles were all true, then would I believe those stories were about a real Jesus?

That seems to be a question which actually asks "if you believe Jesus was a certainty, then would you believe he was a certainty?".

We seem to have gone from the literally impossible suggestion of finding skeletal remains proved to be of Jesus. To saying "if you believed in Jesus then I bet you would believe in Jesus"!

The very reasons that I don't believe that the gospels are credible as evidence of Jesus, are the same reasons that no educated sane person in the 21st century should believe they are reliable evidence of Jesus.

I was asking you to pretend to believe as I outlined and then consider the ramifications of Jesus' bones.

Not simply logic a reasoning around the issue through pointing out Paul was evident first, then the Gospels so really the Gospels are errant and Paul's non-physical Jesus is accurate, etc....

That's great, but that's not what a Sunday-standard Christian works off of.
So I was asking you to think from that perspective; to confine yourself to the only option being that the Gospels came first, Paul later, that there was a physical Resurrection as per the various Christian Creeds, and that what the Gospels account is fact, and that an empty tomb is empty for the physical departure of your Christ Lord your Savior and access for eternal life.

From that perspective, pretend I just walked up and showed you a disease ridden femur in a 1st c CE box which contained the inscription, "Here lies Jesus, son of Joseph, the Anointed and Crucified." or some other form of rather specific text, and pretend that it really was Jesus' bones.

Now what do you think the response is going to be?
Cheer? Elation?

 

[dejudge]

Dejudge,

Spirits (of various names) were seen as what we would call, "demons" (they didn't really use that word for it, as that word was a later borrowed term).
They believed them to be the cause of human suffering and affliction; most voluminously in the Babylonian Talmud.

Counter to this, all accounts of resurrection and Olam Ha-Ba are regarding the physical resurrection of the human body and not just a spirit brought back.

The craft of communicating with, or the conjuring of, the dead spirit was strictly forbidden, however Rabbinic literature elaborates that if the spirit of the dead arrives in dream then it is to be considered good.

Later (in European Jewish lore), these ideas influenced the ideas that would become "dibbuk" - spirits of the dead which would inhabit the living and do terrible acts caused by their unrest.

These forms of discussions are present in Talmudic texts, and there are scatterings of Hebrew protection amulets from evil spirits all through the Levant region across various eras.


Still to this day, a Jew is not permitted to cremate the dead and this is a related practice from the belief of the resurrection and Olam Ha-Ba.

Again, you still continue to make the same erroneous claims. You seem to have no idea that Jews did consider some spirits as good and some as evil.

Josephus explained that demons are the spirits of wicked persons.

Wars of the Jews 7.6

...... it quickly drives away those called demons, which are no other than the spirits of the wicked, that enter into men that are alive and kill them.

In 2Kings it is claimed Elisha asked for a double portion of the spirit
Elijah.

2 Kings 2:9 NIV

When they had crossed, Elijah said to Elisha, "Tell me, what can I do for you before I am taken from you?" "Let me inherit a double portion of your spirit," Elisha replied.

A Pauline writer claimed he was helped by the Spirit of Jesus.

Philippians 1:19 NIV

...for I know that through your prayers and the help given by the Spirit of Jesus Christ, what has happened to me will turn out for my deliverance

 

[JaysonR]

Dejudge,

I am fully aware of the nature of good and bad spirits.
I'm not really certain that you understand what I have been articulating very well, but you seem to think I am referring to something more than what I am and are seemingly interested in defining an error that simply isn't present since you are taking me to convey something beyond what I conveyed.

I am more than happy to discuss the finer points of Hebraic anthropology in debated form, but I suppose I would wonder if that is really possible.

For instance, can you tell me what is interesting about frankincense and myrrh being gifted to a baby in Matthew, or what gods were typical of the Hebraic peoples before 6th c BCE, or what act was commonly required to do to the dead for fear their spirit would not be able to leave their body?

I don't know why you think I was claiming that all spirits were one or the other when I was referring to the visage of trust regarding the image of the dead compared against the inherent trust of the physical body.

Do you know what a ruah tum'ah is, or what a shedim is, or how exactly an evil spirit is notated in Hebrew in the various means in which it is done?
Or did you just grab the English and search for the word, "spirit", and consider that means the same thing?

Because the general word you just cited from Kings is the word for the life animating spirit in general and not a specific reference to an unclean spirit; meaning it has been judged as to the nature of that spirit as being a motive of life.

I'm not really sure why you cited anything from Philippians in a conversation about Hebrew cultural beliefs, especially when you yourself consider that a falsehood of work.
Do you think that was created as a fake by Jews?

When I wrote "spirit" and "demon" I was referring rather specifically to the unclean spirit context and the general phobia around the dead being summoned compared against (as I noted before) the dead freely visiting in vision or dream.

Care had to be taken with spirits to ensure that one was not dealing with the unclean acting as if clean.

On the other hand, if a body shows up, then it is not a concern as such (not that this likely ever happened; but the concept was treated as such).

 

[eight bits]

dejudge

The NT Canon does state Multiple times that Jesus was raised from the dead.

That is neither in dispute, nor is it relevant to the matter being discussed, as has already been explained to you.


JaysonR

There may be a problem in your discussion of Jewish attitudes towards incorporeal spirits versus resuurection (a Pharisaic idea, and the Pharisees are who surivive and dominate after the events of 70CE). The earliest documents we have about the issue among Christians are Gentile in authorship, audience or both. Paul does accord the pneuma body corporeal status, but such bodies can fly, for instance, which hardly reflects the body that is typing this messge. Paul's pneuma, then, is neither flesh nor spirit, but something new (or maybe it is that astral body that he can't tell from his own body when he's visiting other planes of existence).

Luke seems to be the earliest to make a "case" for a robust corporeal Jesus (that is, Jesus points out that he has flesh and bones, and has a bite of fish). Even then, John is later willing to settle for "solid to the touch" (so to speak, Mary and Thomas) and able to manipulate objects (the cookout on the beach), but unimpeded by locked doors. One is reminded of the Patrick Swayze character in Ghost, for example, if Jesus were a much quicker learner.

I think this is a recurrence of something which you and I have discussed before: that analysis of what is typical is fraught when applied to something that has been selected for examination because it is exceptional and very likely innovative. Antecedent Jewish thinking about spirits may provide background (for example, as one factor among many that Paul is trying to juggle), but not necessarily guidance to the actual nature of the fielded innovation or exception.

 

[dejudge]

dejudge


That is neither in dispute, nor is it relevant to the matter being discussed, as has already been explained to you.

Your statement is a known fallacy. The supposed resurrection is always relevant in discussions about "the Empty Tomb".

It has already been explained to you that the NT is NOT history, that you have NO supporting contemporary evidence from antiquity, and that Jesus of Nazareth and Paul of Tarsus were inventions AFTER the Fall of the Temple c 70 CE.

 

[dejudge]

...I'm not really sure why you cited anything from Philippians in a conversation about Hebrew cultural beliefs, especially when you yourself consider that a falsehood of work.

You seem to have little understanding of what evidence is. It is completely illogical to discard writings of antiquity simply because they were forgeries or falsely attributed.

Every writing of antiquity which mentions stories of Jesus, the disciples and Paul are EXTREMELY important.

How in the world can a writing be declared a forgery or falsely attributed WITHOUT an examination of the very contents?

It is IMPERATIVE that I make references to the Pauline Corpus since it is claimed to be authentic and written by a Hebrew of Hebrews, a Pharisee from the Tribe of Benjamin.

Philippians 3:5 KJV

Circumcised the eighth day, of the stock of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, an Hebrew of the Hebrews; as touching the law, a Pharisee

Paul the Jew in Philippians contradicts you.

I am merely exposing your fallacies that "the Hebrew idea that a spirit is a demon and not to be trusted whereas a physical body is divine.

 

[JaysonR]

Alright Dejudge,

I'll have this discussion when you answer my questions and show some understanding of anthropology.

Another question; what language is Pilippians?
Another; by which century did the Hebrew culture begin to lose appreciation for unclean spirit manifestation protection?

 

[David Mo]

The Quest for The Historical Jesus began as a project for theologians to try to get closer to the Real Jesus and find out the Original Christianity.

Perhaps the difference between European and American bible scholars is due to the cultural memory of the religious wars in Europe that makes them somewhat less willing to be antagonistic over this, while in America christianity is still a political force that does not shy away from aggressively asserting itself.

I was using “quest” in the widest sense of “search for something”. The word was specified in the Twentieth Century as the search for historical Jesus as a reply both to materialist neo-Hegelians (Bauer, Strauss, Feuerbach) and bultmannians. Before this, the existence of Jesus was accepted as a non questionable fact. If someone would cast doubt on this subject he risked to finish on the stake or similar.

It is not easy to say why the issue of historical Jesus is not so hot -relatively hot- in Europe as in America. The religion wars fall very far away for the most of the European countries. In Spain the Catholic Church had a relevant function in the justification of the Franco’s dictatorship and however a meeting between diverse tendencies of study of “historical Jesus” was possible a few years ago. And the institutional weight of the Church continues to be important.

Some similar situations happened in France, Germany or Italy when the church hierarchies were compromised with the fascism and so the fall of fascist regimes produced a divorce between the democratic intelligentsia (a big part of the academic world) and the churches. The churches have a great force in these countries yet, both between the big parties and the conservative layers of people, but not in the intellectual world.

Of course, this is a hypothesis. Sociological facts have rarely a single explanation.

Be as it may, the animosity against the only idea of a real Jesus, even though very different from the Gospel narrative, seems odd to me. I think the struggle against the power of the churches, an actual fact, is far more important. It is to say, the struggle for laicism against ecclesial interference in the State and the civil society. The anger of some people in this forum in the debate of some circumstantial idea -i.e.the historical Jesus- surprises me.

 

[proudfootz]

Do you have any evidence of this ? I'd think most Christians would be quite pissed to discover that their beloved boy-god is in fact just a failed preacher.

Yes, once it was allowed to apply rationality to the devotional texts, the genie was out of the bottle.

It's my impression the eruption of 'protestantism' against the monopoly of the Catholic Church instigated the translation of these texts fro the Latin into various local languages, which spurred scholarship to discover the 'best' texts.

"Historical criticism began in the 17th century and gained popular recognition in the 19th and 20th centuries. The perspective of the early historical critic was rooted in Protestant reformation ideology, in as much as their approach to biblical studies were free from the influence of traditional interpretation."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_criticism

This would appear to explain why so many theologians involve themselves in this - the idea is to get as close as possible to the 'real Jesus' and to 'back the real christianity'.

But once people began to look critically at this stuff, it could only inevitably lead to some abandoning the idea of Jesus as a messiah at all.

 

[proudfootz]

I was using “quest” in the widest sense of “search for something”. The word was specified in the Twentieth Century as the search for historical Jesus as a reply both to materialist neo-Hegelians (Bauer, Strauss, Feuerbach) and bultmannians. Before this, the existence of Jesus was accepted as a non questionable fact. If someone would cast doubt on this subject he risked to finish on the stake or similar.

It is not easy to say why the issue of historical Jesus is not so hot -relatively hot- in Europe as in America. The religion wars fall very far away for the most of the European countries. In Spain the Catholic Church had a relevant function in the justification of the Franco’s dictatorship and however a meeting between diverse tendencies of study of “historical Jesus” was possible a few years ago. And the institutional weight of the Church continues to be important.

Some similar situations happened in France, Germany or Italy when the church hierarchies were compromised with the fascism and so the fall of fascist regimes produced a divorce between the democratic intelligentsia (a big part of the academic world) and the churches. The churches have a great force in these countries yet, both between the big parties and the conservative layers of people, but not in the intellectual world.

Of course, this is a hypothesis. Sociological facts have rarely a single explanation.

Be as it may, the animosity against the only idea of a real Jesus, even though very different from the Gospel narrative, seems odd to me. I think the struggle against the power of the churches, an actual fact, is far more important. It is to say, the struggle for laicism against ecclesial interference in the State and the civil society. The anger of some people in this forum in the debate of some circumstantial idea -i.e.the historical Jesus- surprises me.

The venom of some does seem way out of proportion to the level of certitude justified by the paucity of evidence. It appears that there is a certain amount of defensiveness in the bible study academy as exampled by the punishment visited on sceptics of the historical Jesus hypothesis. One would imagine scholars to be more interested in academic freedom than indulging themselves in that sort of pettiness.