Jesus' teachings. Profound?

[McCulloch]

Perhaps, but for me the miracle things are secondary, in comparison to what Jesus taught. The teachings of Jesus are for me the greatest thing, not the miracles.

In what way are Jesus' teachings extraordinary? Can it be demonstrated that Jesus had great insight? What profound wisdom is there in Jesus' teachings?

[Tired of the Nonsense]

[Replying to post 120 by JP Cusick]

Discovering the Q source is just a theory because no one knows if there ever was a Q document or was it an oral (spoken) tradition passed down, and so the final answer to the Q source is still unknown.

No one "discovered" the Q source. No such document has even been known to exist. Its existence was first proposed about 1900 and has always been entirely theoretical. Or more specifically, someone's unsupported brainstorm.

Scholars give us theories and otherwise we have nothing, and yes a THEORY is just a made up idea based on the research.

Scholars have also given us televangelists, I should point out. I would refer to them as blood sucking leeches that take advantage of the ignorant and gullible to the tune of billions of dollars each year. But I don't want to be accused of "ranting."

Religions have a long history of "make it up and declare it to be true." Major religions, not just Christianity, are founded on little more than "make it up and declare it to be true." This is also known as "make believe," and make believe can work perfectly well if everyone uniformly accepts the make believe as valid. It's when the make believe is forced to undergo fact checks and tests of logic that the problem occurs. Because when we subject make believe to fact checks and actual tests of logic, make believe inevitably falls apart like a cheap sweater. Christianity is based on a vast network of interconnected assumptions, assertions and unfounded traditions. As long as this network of assumptions is accepted as face value, it appears to be valid. When it is fact checked and tested for logic in detail however, it falls entirely apart. The question believers must ask themselves is, are they more interested in discovering what is true, or are they more interested in protecting and maintaining their beliefs? Because, as it turns out, these two things cannot be accomplished together.

I should also point out that in scientific usage a theory is far more than an idea based on research.

Wikipedia
Theory
In modern science, the term "theory" refers to scientific theories, a well-confirmed type of explanation of nature, made in a way consistent with scientific method, and fulfilling the criteria required by modern science. Such theories are described in such a way that any scientist in the field is in a position to understand and either provide empirical support ("verify") or empirically contradict ("falsify") it. Scientific theories are the most reliable, rigorous, and comprehensive form of scientific knowledge,[4] in contrast to more common uses of the word "theory" that imply that something is unproven or speculative (which is better characterized by the word 'hypothesis').[5] Scientific theories are distinguished from hypotheses, which are individual empirically testable conjectures, and from scientific laws, which are descriptive accounts of how nature behaves under certain conditions.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory

The concept of the Q source doesn't really even rise to the level of a hypothesis. It is simply a notion that B. H. Streeter came up with in 1900.

I agree that we do not know who wrote the Gospel of Matthew, but we do not really know who wrote Mark or Luke or John.

According to Christian historian Papias in the second century, the author of Gospel Mark was the translator for Peter, but did not himself know Jesus. Gospel Luke and Acts of the apostles, by nearly unanimous consent, were authored by the same individual. Little is actually known about him, but it is clear from Acts that he was an admirer of Paul and knew him well. Papais indicated that there was a second John, known as the presbyter or elder, and it is to this individual that Gospel John and the Epistles of John may be attributed. Based on what information? Gospel John was written anonymously. But the Epistles of John were not.

2John.1
[1] The elder unto the elect lady and her children, whom I love in the truth; and not I only, but also all they that have known the truth;

3John.1
[1] The elder unto the wellbeloved Gaius, whom I love in the truth.

The author NAMES himself, not as John the evangelist, but as John the presbyter.

Notice how Christian assumptions and traditions begin to fall away under the light of actual investigation.

So if we try to honor this thread topic - then - the riddle and puzzle and the mystery of who wrote the Bible and what is the secret behind the synoptic problem and what parts are true and what is not - these are very PROFOUND aspects of the Gospel and of Jesus too.

There is no real mystery. The author of Gospel Matthew used the Gospel of Mark for the bulk of his Gospel, and wove in new information that he considered important. The author of Gospel Luke did more or less the same thing, except that he added even more of his own original information. The author of Gospel John gives no clue that he was even aware of the three synoptic Gospels.

Some of the saying attributed to Jesus do not hold up under scrutiny, and yet other sayings are very profound.

First it is important to keep in mind that Jesus wrote NOTHING himself. The words that are attributed to him in the Gospels were put into his mouth by anonymous individuals who cannot even be shown to have met Jesus, decades after Jesus was dead. Christians simply "assume" on faith that the words actually belonged to Jesus originally. And many of the "profound" sayings attributed to Jesus, the golden rule and "love thy neighbor," for example, are actually centuries older than Jesus, and were derived from the philosophies of other cultures.

I say to judge the message more-so than the messenger.

I am a big fan of the golden rule myself, and have used it as my yardstick throughout life. It is much more simple than trying to remember ten commandments. In fact I am the moderator of the "Supports the Golden Rule" user group and I invite you to join. Membership carries with it no further obligations, implied or other wise.

The message of Christianity however, is that Jesus rose from the dead, subsequently flew off up into the sky, and will return again "soon." Besides being based on apparently total nonsense, Christianity brings with it a 2,000 year history of being DEAD WRONG. That much foolishness, I am afraid, demands a summary judgement of bogus.

[McCulloch]

For the purposes of this thread, Jesus should be defined as the character known by that name as portrayed in the New Testament. Whether he existed, whether he is portrayed accurately and how the New Testament came to be written are not particularly relevant to this topic.

[alwayson]

Jesus did not give the Sermon on the Mount.

The Sermon of the Mount originated originated in Greek. It relies extensively on the Greek text of Deuteronomy and Leviticus especially, and in key places on other texts. For example, the section on turning the other cheek and other aspects of legal pacifism (Mt. 5.38-42) has been redacted from the Greek text of Isa. 50.6-9.

Refs:

Thomas Brodie, ‘An Alternative Q/Logia Hypothesis: Deuteronomy-Based, Qumranlike, Verifiable’, in The Sayings Source Q and the Historical Jesus (ed. A. Lindemann; Leuven: Leuven University Press, 2001), pp. 729-43.

Allison, Studies in Matthew, pp. 219-22.

[JP Cusick]

Jesus did not give the Sermon on the Mount.

The Sermon of the Mount originated originated in Greek. It relies extensively on the Greek text of Deuteronomy and Leviticus especially, and in key places on other texts. For example, the section on turning the other cheek and other aspects of legal pacifism (Mt. 5.38-42) has been redacted from the Greek text of Isa. 50.6-9.

Refs:

Thomas Brodie, ‘An Alternative Q/Logia Hypothesis: Deuteronomy-Based, Qumranlike, Verifiable’, in The Sayings Source Q and the Historical Jesus (ed. A. Lindemann; Leuven: Leuven University Press, 2001), pp. 729-43.

Allison, Studies in Matthew, pp. 219-22.

What you say here is profound and interesting and I like this info, but the conclusion you draw that it did not come from Jesus is absurd.

The fact that Jesus would reword the doctrines into shorter and more simple words is exactly what we would expect Jesus to do.

Link below:
Jesus vs. Torah: How the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew's Gospel redefined God’s Law

Turn the other cheek = Isaiah 50:6

The beatitudes = Deuteronomy 28

[alwayson]

[Replying to post 124 by JP Cusick]

Even if Jesus existed, how do you know Jesus taught anything???

"the Jesus who was only a teacher from Galilee disappeared from the tradition at a very early date, so early that one wonders whether it was ever there at all"
----------Margaret Barker, ‘The Secret Tradition’, Journal of Higher Criticism 2 (Spring 1995), pp. 31-67 (58).

Paul, who wrote the earliest material in the NT, doesn't say one word about Jesus preaching or teaching.

"Not once does Paul refer to Jesus as a teacher, to his words as teaching, or to [any] Christians as disciples. ....... In short, Paul cannot be considered a reliable witness to either the teachings, the life, or the historical existence of Jesus."
---Gerd Lüdemann, ‘Paul as a Witness to the Historical Jesus’, Sources of the Jesus Tradition: Separating History from Myth (Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2010), pp. 196-212 (211-12)


"Moreover, when Paul himself summarizes the content of his missionary preaching in Corinth (1 Cor. 2.1-2; 15.3-5), there is no hint that a narration of Jesus’ earthly life or a report of his earthly teachings was an essential part of it. . . . In the letter to the Romans, which cannot presuppose the apostle’s missionary preaching and in which he attempts to summarize its main points, we find not a single direct citation of Jesus’ teaching."
----Lüdemann, ‘Paul as a Witness to the Historical Jesus’, p. 211

[JP Cusick]

Even if Jesus existed, how do you know Jesus taught anything???

First - I did not know about "Turning the other cheek" being in Isaiah 50:6, and so I really appreciate you giving me the guidance to this info, because this is real spiritual food to me, and that text confirmed that "to turn the other cheek" means to defy the attacker and not to be passive.

Answer = it just does not matter if Jesus taught this message or not because that message is profound, and so it does not matter if the message came from an ancient drunken bum or from a stupid talking donkey, because the messenger is not the message.

You are falling into the Christian trap that the person of Jesus matters the most, when it is just the message that matters most.

In this case here I learned the message of Isaiah 50:6 from you, and so you were the messenger for me.

"the Jesus who was only a teacher from Galilee disappeared from the tradition at a very early date, so early that one wonders whether it was ever there at all"
----------Margaret Barker, ‘The Secret Tradition’, Journal of Higher Criticism 2 (Spring 1995), pp. 31-67 (58).

Paul, who wrote the earliest material in the NT, doesn't say one word about Jesus preaching or teaching.

"Not once does Paul refer to Jesus as a teacher, to his words as teaching, or to [any] Christians as disciples. ....... In short, Paul cannot be considered a reliable witness to either the teachings, the life, or the historical existence of Jesus."
---Gerd Lüdemann, ‘Paul as a Witness to the Historical Jesus’, Sources of the Jesus Tradition: Separating History from Myth (Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2010), pp. 196-212 (211-12)

"Moreover, when Paul himself summarizes the content of his missionary preaching in Corinth (1 Cor. 2.1-2; 15.3-5), there is no hint that a narration of Jesus’ earthly life or a report of his earthly teachings was an essential part of it. . . . In the letter to the Romans, which cannot presuppose the apostle’s missionary preaching and in which he attempts to summarize its main points, we find not a single direct citation of Jesus’ teaching."
----Lüdemann, ‘Paul as a Witness to the Historical Jesus’, p. 211

Most of Christianity follows Paul, and yet they use the name of Jesus Christ but they just follow Paul.

Paul was like Moses in that both Paul and Moses taught a watered down and compromised message, and so most people take the easy way from Moses and from Paul, and they ignore the more demanding message from the Father God and from Christ.

It does not mean that Paul was wrong, because Paul was trying to teach a powerful message to a bunch of simpletons, and so Paul had to start out with easy teaching, see 1 Corinthians 3:1-3

The Gospel messages from Jesus has some hard stuff, as like to take up thy own cross and follow Him, while Paul said the more comfortable message that everyone falls short.

[alwayson]

[Replying to post 126 by JP Cusick]

But the Gospels take Paul's teachings and put them in the mouth of Jesus.

The Gospels were written after Paul's letters.

[OnceConvinced]

I haven't had the time to read through most of this thread, but a thought came to my mind when I last saw it on the list of recent threads posted on. As a Christian I actually found Paul's teachings way more profound than Jesus's. In fact from my experience in churches it was mainly Paul's teachings that were focussed on.