Jesus of Nazareth, Son of Joseph

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Danmark
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Jesus of Nazareth, Son of Joseph

Post #1

Post by Danmark »

The theme of this topic is the exploration of Jesus, the Jew from Galilee and his mission. The theme borrows from Thomas Sheehan's 1986 book, The First Coming: How the Kingdom of God Became Christianity.
http://infidels.org/library/modern/thom ... rstcoming/

Rather than take the typical atheist perspective, the affirmative of this debate is that Jesus is an important religious figure who has something important to teach us today. Tho' I do not assert he was or is divine in some way different from other humans, he should not be dismissed as some crazy religious zealot. The affirmative of the debate is that neither the typical atheist, nor the typical Christian understand him or his mission properly.

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tasteslikecorn
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Re: Jesus of Nazareth, Son of Joseph

Post #21

Post by tasteslikecorn »

Danmark wrote: The theme of this topic is the exploration of Jesus, the Jew from Galilee and his mission. The theme borrows from Thomas Sheehan's 1986 book, The First Coming: How the Kingdom of God Became Christianity.
http://infidels.org/library/modern/thom ... rstcoming/

Rather than take the typical atheist perspective, the affirmative of this debate is that Jesus is an important religious figure who has something important to teach us today. Tho' I do not assert he was or is divine in some way different from other humans, he should not be dismissed as some crazy religious zealot. The affirmative of the debate is that neither the typical atheist, nor the typical Christian understand him or his mission properly.
That is why I have always been a big fan of all of the post-enlightenment authors that have sought the "historical Jesus." I went to a Borg-Crossan Seminar this summer and had some amazing conversations with John Dominic Crossan, considered by many to be the greatest living Jesus scholar. He said "God is a process whereby injustice is replaced with justice." Interestingly, in his biography, Crossan, though identifying himself as Christian says "I refuse to accept Heaven from a God that could conceive of Hell," which is a weird thing to hear from a supposed Christian. There are very interesting Christians out there, just not the ones at the altar of the mega-church stadiums preaching the prosperity gospel.

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Post #22

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tasteslikecorn wrote: [Replying to post 19 by Danmark]

Many of the misconceptions regarding Jesus can be blamed on the books of Matthew and John. Matthew's author, in an apparent attempt to not anger God by writing his name substituted "Heaven," which turned the "Kingdom of God (here on Earth)" movement into the "Kingdom of Heaven" movement, to be abused by tyrant after tyrant (no justice in this world, but you will get justice in the next).
Personally I'd say that Matthew most likely was written within a year or three of the fall of Jerusalem. He changed
"there are some standing here who will not taste death till they see the kingdom of God present with power" (Mark 9:1)
into
"there are some standing here who shall not taste death till they see the Son of Man coming in His kingdom" (Matthew 16:28)
and even added his own invented prophecy that
"you will not have gone through the cities of Israel before the Son of Man comes" (10:23).
These are pretty solid indicators that the author was convinced Jesus was about to return in glory and all the prophecies would be fulfilled, which only makes sense immediately following the destruction of the temple.

Matthew does use the phrase 'kingdom of God' sometimes (Matthew 6:33, 12:28, 19:24 and 21:31&43; coincidentally or not, all consistent with a here-and-now 'spiritual' kingdom as most commonly found in Mark), but his preference for a kingdom of heaven may have been due to his eschatological expectations.


##

Danmark wrote:The affirmative of the debate is that neither the typical atheist, nor the typical Christian understand him or his mission properly.
Perhaps because the stereotypical extremes generally make little effort to distinguish the different authors' idiosyncracies and likely flavouring of the story. And for that matter often, (as in the case of the thread OP you linked to) add their own gross prejudices on top of that!

But of course Joey's right that even the best of folk can't really claim much more than educated guesses.

Alongside speculation about John the Baptist, another angle worth looking at is possible influence on Jesus' thinking by the 'house of Hillel' amongst the Pharisees. According to Wikipedia Hillel the Elder is creditted with a version of the golden rule - telling a potential gentile convert "What is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow: this is the whole Torah; the rest is the explanation; go and learn" (though not mentioned on the Jewish page below). In general he seems to have adopted a more lenient or practical approach to Torah observance. The contrasting house of Shammai was more dominant during the period of Jesus' ministry, and many disputes between the two groups are recorded.
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jso ... illel.html

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Post #23

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Mithrae wrote:
tasteslikecorn wrote: [Replying to post 19 by Danmark]

Many of the misconceptions regarding Jesus can be blamed on the books of Matthew and John. Matthew's author, in an apparent attempt to not anger God by writing his name substituted "Heaven," which turned the "Kingdom of God (here on Earth)" movement into the "Kingdom of Heaven" movement, to be abused by tyrant after tyrant (no justice in this world, but you will get justice in the next).
Personally I'd say that Matthew most likely was written within a year or three of the fall of Jerusalem. He changed
"there are some standing here who will not taste death till they see the kingdom of God present with power" (Mark 9:1)
into
"there are some standing here who shall not taste death till they see the Son of Man coming in His kingdom" (Matthew 16:28)
and even added his own invented prophecy that
"you will not have gone through the cities of Israel before the Son of Man comes" (10:23).
These are pretty solid indicators that the author was convinced Jesus was about to return in glory and all the prophecies would be fulfilled, which only makes sense immediately following the destruction of the temple.

Matthew does use the phrase 'kingdom of God' sometimes (Matthew 6:33, 12:28, 19:24 and 21:31&43; coincidentally or not, all consistent with a here-and-now 'spiritual' kingdom as most commonly found in Mark), but his preference for a kingdom of heaven may have been due to his eschatological expectations.


##

Danmark wrote:The affirmative of the debate is that neither the typical atheist, nor the typical Christian understand him or his mission properly.
Perhaps because the stereotypical extremes generally make little effort to distinguish the different authors' idiosyncracies and likely flavouring of the story. And for that matter often, (as in the case of the thread OP you linked to) add their own gross prejudices on top of that!

But of course Joey's right that even the best of folk can't really claim much more than educated guesses.

Alongside speculation about John the Baptist, another angle worth looking at is possible influence on Jesus' thinking by the 'house of Hillel' amongst the Pharisees. According to Wikipedia Hillel the Elder is creditted with a version of the golden rule - telling a potential gentile convert "What is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow: this is the whole Torah; the rest is the explanation; go and learn" (though not mentioned on the Jewish page below). In general he seems to have adopted a more lenient or practical approach to Torah observance. The contrasting house of Shammai was more dominant during the period of Jesus' ministry.
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jso ... illel.html
I don't pretend to be a scholar on this issue, but agree that the tradition of Hillel is the one I favor. My sense of Jesus and his message comes strictly from my reading of the synoptic gospels. My experience is that many Christians [tho' a minority] agree with view of Jesus as a reinterpreter of the law, regardless of their view on his divinity.

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Post #24

Post by tasteslikecorn »

Mithrae wrote:
tasteslikecorn wrote: [Replying to post 19 by Danmark]

Many of the misconceptions regarding Jesus can be blamed on the books of Matthew and John. Matthew's author, in an apparent attempt to not anger God by writing his name substituted "Heaven," which turned the "Kingdom of God (here on Earth)" movement into the "Kingdom of Heaven" movement, to be abused by tyrant after tyrant (no justice in this world, but you will get justice in the next).
Personally I'd say that Matthew most likely was written within a year or three of the fall of Jerusalem. He changed
"there are some standing here who will not taste death till they see the kingdom of God present with power" (Mark 9:1)
into
"there are some standing here who shall not taste death till they see the Son of Man coming in His kingdom" (Matthew 16:28)
and even added his own invented prophecy that
"you will not have gone through the cities of Israel before the Son of Man comes" (10:23).
These are pretty solid indicators that the author was convinced Jesus was about to return in glory and all the prophecies would be fulfilled, which only makes sense immediately following the destruction of the temple.

Matthew does use the phrase 'kingdom of God' sometimes (Matthew 6:33, 12:28, 19:24 and 21:31&43; coincidentally or not, all consistent with a here-and-now 'spiritual' kingdom as most commonly found in Mark), but his preference for a kingdom of heaven may have been due to his eschatological expectations.

Many conservative Christian theologians would agree that it was because of eschatological expectations. See http://www.sbts.edu/resources/files/201 ... ington.pdf


##

Danmark wrote:The affirmative of the debate is that neither the typical atheist, nor the typical Christian understand him or his mission properly.
Perhaps because the stereotypical extremes generally make little effort to distinguish the different authors' idiosyncracies and likely flavouring of the story. And for that matter often, (as in the case of the thread OP you linked to) add their own gross prejudices on top of that!

But of course Joey's right that even the best of folk can't really claim much more than educated guesses.

Alongside speculation about John the Baptist, another angle worth looking at is possible influence on Jesus' thinking by the 'house of Hillel' amongst the Pharisees. According to Wikipedia Hillel the Elder is creditted with a version of the golden rule - telling a potential gentile convert "What is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow: this is the whole Torah; the rest is the explanation; go and learn" (though not mentioned on the Jewish page below). In general he seems to have adopted a more lenient or practical approach to Torah observance. The contrasting house of Shammai was more dominant during the period of Jesus' ministry, and many disputes between the two groups are recorded.
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jso ... illel.html

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