proudfootz
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I agree - the evidence Ehrman offers isn't strong enough for him to claim, as he does loudly and often, that Jesus 'certainly' existed.
Agnosticism about the issue is certainly a very tenable position.
Bart Ehrman on the Historical Jesus
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I agree - the evidence Ehrman offers isn't strong enough for him to claim, as he does loudly and often, that Jesus 'certainly' existed.
Agnosticism about the issue is certainly a very tenable position.
He was claimed to have a human mother: "God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those under the law, that we might receive adoption to sonship. Because you are his sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit cries out, Abba, Father." (Galatians 4:4-6)
If he was born of a woman, he was human.
If he was born under the law, he was a Jew. Jews are typically human.
If he was born a Jew under the law, he would have been cursed. Gal. 3:13 agrees. He was cursed by the law!
If he was born a Jew and male, he was circumcised. That meant he had a dick.
So to sum up: Jesus had a human mother, he was a Jew from birth, he was under the yoke of the law, and he had a dick. SOUNDS HUMAN TO ME!!
Oh but who's the daddy?? Well, Paul says God is. THAT MUST MEAN THAT JESUS HAD NO HUMAN FATHER!!! Oh but wait....what's this in the passage I just quoted? Paul says that Christians are sons as well! That must mean.... Christians aren't human! Their daddy is God, not some human man! Right? No. They are adopted as sons. I guess the Christians had human fathers after all. I suppose it makes sense because without them, they couldn't have been born under the law like Jesus. So....hey wait a minute...could God be Jesus' father in a similar sense? Too bad Paul didn't say.
"...his Son, who was a descendent of David according to the flesh, and who was appointed the Son of God in power by his resurrection from the dead." (Rom. 1:3-4)
Oh wait...maybe he did! Descendent of David.....okay, Jew. Flesh....sounds human. Okay a human Jew who died in the flesh ("he condemned sin in the flesh," as 8:3 says). Then God appointed him his Son by raising him from the dead. Huh, Acts 13:3 seems to say the same thing...God became his father when he raised him from the dead.
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David Mo
Philosopher
Sincerly, I’m feeling dizzy with this stuff of the British aristocracy.
So be it.
Well, if this is the case, the sentence can not remove the doubt that you posed. But this is not the issue. The question is about what is the feature that distinguishes James from Peter and the other apostles, in Gal 1: 18-19. We have “brother of Lord” that has two senses and we ought to discover in what sense is used here.
If Paul speaks of "brothers of the Lord" elsewhere is referring to other people and otherwise. That is to say, in another sense. If he had used the expression here in an undifferentiated way, it would have looked for an additional proposition to identify James: "the Stammerer", "the Boring" or whatever else. Because Paul uses this expression in order to differentiate James from the others.
I still do not understand how the Jews can be a "portfolio." Do you mean something like "the role of Responsibilities of the head of a government department," (Collins Concise Dictionary)? Neither Paul was the only apostle of the Gentiles, nor Peter the only apostle of the Jews, but in more recent times they have been called so to differentiate from each other and to say that they were the greatest of the apostles. Paul doesn't say this, since it places three pillars of Judeo-Christian church and not just Peter. But this would get us into the issue of the differences in the concept of apostle between Paul and the Synoptics, that apart from being a very interesting or theological issue, it not solves our problem. That is to say why the term "brother of the Lord" is used here to distinguish James from Peter and other apostles. “Portfolios” has nothing to do with this.
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David Mo
Philosopher
It is a popular saying. I remember it from an old film black and white and used here as an auto-irony.
An excellent post. But do you mean Acts 13:23?
Craig: Sorry, it's 13:33, not 13:3.
32 “We tell you the good news: What God promised our ancestors 33 he has fulfilled for us, their children, by raising up Jesus. As it is written in the second Psalm:
“‘You are my son;
today I have become your father.’
34 God raised him from the dead so that he will never be subject to decay. As God has said,
“‘I will give you the holy and sure blessings promised to David.’
32 “We tell you the good news: What God promised our ancestors 33 he has fulfilled for us, their children, by raising up Jesus. As it is written in the second Psalm:
“‘You are my son;
today I have become your father.’
34 God raised him from the dead so that he will never be subject to decay. As God has said,
“‘I will give you the holy and sure blessings promised to David.’
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Thanks. Of course he keeps saying it. I have cited Psalms 2 in these threads several times, to indicate that "Son of God" is a human messianic or Davidic title. But to no avail.
Just to save time:
"It is virtually impossible to use the Bible to show that Jesus was a known human being with an earthly father.
The NT Canon of the Church is a compilation of Non-Heretical writings.
In the Pauline Corpus--Jesus was the Son of a God and was raised from the dead.
Effectively, Ehrman's HJ is a Myth.
It is virtually impossible to use the Bible to show that Jesus was a known human being with an earthly father.
The NT Canon of the Church is a compilation of Non-Heretical writings.
In the Pauline Corpus--Jesus was the Son of a God and was raised from the dead.
Effectively, Ehrman's HJ is a Myth."
Oh, and "Monstrous Fallacy!!!!"
Other titles bestowed in the resurrection according to Acts:
Acts 2: 33 Therefore having been exalted to the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, He has poured forth this which you both see and hear.....36 Therefore let all the house of Israel know for certain that God has made him both Lord and Christ—this Jesus whom you crucified.
Acts 5: 30 The God of our ancestors raised up Jesus, whom you had killed by hanging him on a tree. 31 God exalted him at his right hand as Leader and Savior that he might give repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sins.
Acts 2: 33 Therefore having been exalted to the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, He has poured forth this which you both see and hear.....36 Therefore let all the house of Israel know for certain that God has made him both Lord and Christ—this Jesus whom you crucified.
Acts 5: 30 The God of our ancestors raised up Jesus, whom you had killed by hanging him on a tree. 31 God exalted him at his right hand as Leader and Savior that he might give repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sins.
pakeha
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Thanks for posting up the mini-review, clayflingythingy.
It would seem Ehrman's using a known liar's claims as evidence, then?
Good posts, esp. on 'son of God'. My memory is that a pious Jew could be termed a son of God, and we also have Israel as God's son (Exodus: 4, 22), and also I think Adam is described like this somewhere.
I suppose that what has happened is the deJudaization of many of these terms, so that modern people assume that 'son of God' = God, which to a Jew would be absurd (and blasphemous).
And of course, saying that Jesus didn't have a father, because he had God as father accepts the Christian view anachronistically.
Do you think Paul's original audience had never heard of James before Paul mentioned him?
pakeha
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A very good question.
What do you reckon Paul's original audience were?
What previous prepping had they received before listening to Paul?
eight bits
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proudfootz
Translation is notoriously used to pimp up the scriptures. JW's, who beat Bart to the "angel Jesus" idea, manage to get their very own New Testament just by shading the translation of the one everybody else has. Even in discussing more mainstream ideas, we run into doctrinally driven improvements over and over. Comparisng several translations is a minimal precaution, and dropping back to the Greek with a linked-up concordance is often a good idea (Bart's "angel"of Galatians 4: 14 and "messenger" elsewhere are the same word, for instance).
Sometimes people are dissatisfied, because this caution opens up new possibilities (Paul never says Jesus' body was on a stick before he died, Mark never says Jesus actually entered the boat he was walking toward, ...), and leaves them unresolved. I think "shrewd vagueness" is part of the authors' plan. Anyway, you and I seem to be generally agreed about the Lord's "brothers."
David Mo
I do not know whether James was boring or stammered. Regardless, Paul chose the epithet that helped Paul make his point. Neither "the Boring" nor "the Stammerer," even if applicable, would help Paul convey to his readers what a BFD Paul is. Paul only deals with the cream of the cream. You've got to have a lot more going for you than just being on speaking terms with the risen Christ to get a sit-down with Paul. Simiarly, Paul's use of the BoL title in the other place also makes his point there, serving as the middle term in a rhetorical "build of three" whose climax is somebody almost as important as Paul himself.
That was easy. Here's a tip: People who need an ambitious literal reading of two figurative words awkwardly placed in a text ought not to argue that big nearby chunks of the same text may have been faked, or that if genuine, their blunt plain meaning should be reinterpreted.
Finally, no doubt you have some story about how Peter, James, and John reputedly sharing one epithet in common, pillars, eliminates any possibility that Peter and James also share another epithet in common. You seem to have omitted that from your presentation on collective governance in the early church. With which, by the way, I have few quarrels. Just because Paul is preoccupied with status and titles doesn't mean that his preoccupations affected anybody else.
Translation is notoriously used to pimp up the scriptures. JW's, who beat Bart to the "angel Jesus" idea, manage to get their very own New Testament just by shading the translation of the one everybody else has. Even in discussing more mainstream ideas, we run into doctrinally driven improvements over and over. Comparisng several translations is a minimal precaution, and dropping back to the Greek with a linked-up concordance is often a good idea (Bart's "angel"of Galatians 4: 14 and "messenger" elsewhere are the same word, for instance).
Sometimes people are dissatisfied, because this caution opens up new possibilities (Paul never says Jesus' body was on a stick before he died, Mark never says Jesus actually entered the boat he was walking toward, ...), and leaves them unresolved. I think "shrewd vagueness" is part of the authors' plan. Anyway, you and I seem to be generally agreed about the Lord's "brothers."
David Mo
Well, I'm an American. My predecessors fought a war to rid ourselves of this crap, and another to keep it that way. Nevertheless, peer-tracking is an accessible example that one person can hold many titles, and will usually be referred to only by the most prestigious of those. Sometimes a distinctive nickname for a well-known person will eliminate the need for any of his titles altogether.
Which was my point. It is my opponent who reads much into a few very ambiguous words, suspiciously placed within a verse whose outright removal would preserve sensible fluency.
As to Rocky, having a different name suffices. I do not accept your premise that the epithet is applied to James only to distinguish him from other apostles, even from other apostles named James, if any. Paul's point is that he was selective in granting interviews. He says that he favored exactly two apostles, his own peer, Peter, and only one other man of highly eminent distinction, Brother of the Lord James.
I do not know whether James was boring or stammered. Regardless, Paul chose the epithet that helped Paul make his point. Neither "the Boring" nor "the Stammerer," even if applicable, would help Paul convey to his readers what a BFD Paul is. Paul only deals with the cream of the cream. You've got to have a lot more going for you than just being on speaking terms with the risen Christ to get a sit-down with Paul. Simiarly, Paul's use of the BoL title in the other place also makes his point there, serving as the middle term in a rhetorical "build of three" whose climax is somebody almost as important as Paul himself.
A church department, not a government department.
So, Galatians 2: 7-9 is an interpolation, in your view? Dandy. I now counterclaim that Galatians 1: 19 is an interpolation.
That was easy. Here's a tip: People who need an ambitious literal reading of two figurative words awkwardly placed in a text ought not to argue that big nearby chunks of the same text may have been faked, or that if genuine, their blunt plain meaning should be reinterpreted.
Finally, no doubt you have some story about how Peter, James, and John reputedly sharing one epithet in common, pillars, eliminates any possibility that Peter and James also share another epithet in common. You seem to have omitted that from your presentation on collective governance in the early church. With which, by the way, I have few quarrels. Just because Paul is preoccupied with status and titles doesn't mean that his preoccupations affected anybody else.
dejudge said:
You have identified the very verse in Galatians which describes Jesus as a Myth.
The Father of the LORD Jesus was God.
Driwus said:
Please, your argument is without a shred of logic.
You have exposed your lack of knowledge of Jewish, Egyptian, Roman and Greek Mythology.
This is a partial list of Myths with dicks.
1. Adam had a dick in the myth fables of Genesis.
2. Zeus had a dick in Roman/Greek mythology.
3. The Holy Ghost had a dick in the myth fables of gMatthew .
4. The Holy Ghost had a dick in the myth fables of gLuke.
5. The God of the Jews had a dick in the myth fables of Genesis.
6. Mars, a God of the Romans had a dick in myth fables of Romulus.
Based on your absurdity, Adam, Zeus, the God of the Jews, the God Mars and the Holy Ghost were figures of history because they produced children.
proudfootz
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Interesting, perhaps. But that does not blunt the point of dejudge's observation.
proudfootz
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As we all acknowledge, the evidence of a human Jesus is scant, so extraordinary measures may be required to rescue the hypothesis.
Belz...
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If what someone says to you always amounts to "[true statement], you *********** douchebag ****** moron." you might get to a point where you ignore the first part of the sentence. I'm using hyperbole, of course.
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