Implications for historical Jesus scholarship.

[Elijah John]

The consensus among historical Jesus scholars seems to be that the real, historical Jesus never claimed to be God, and portions of the New Testament which seem to indicate that he is God are ambiguous at best.

For debate,

-What should the Church do with the HJ conclusion that real, historical Jesus is not God, and that he never actually claimed to be God? Should the Church rework it's Creeds and/or it's liturgy? How would you envision this to be done?

-If you are a believing Christian, how do you integrate this conclusion with your own belief system? Do you dismiss the findings of HJ scholars out of hand? Or do you consider their arguments? Do you continue to worship Jesus as "God" despite evidence to the contrary, or with no real evidence that he is?

-If you wanted to remain a Christian, would you refocus the object of your devotion, from Jesus to the God of Jesus, namely the Father? And concentrate on love of God and neighbor, (as Jesus seems to have taught) instead of worshiping Jesus and attempting to convince others that he is "God" and that he died in order to "pay for" our sins?

[bjs]

[Replying to Tart]

Hi, Tart. Welcome to the forum.

I will say for my part that I was painting with a pretty broad brush, and I was responding to the specific claims in the opening post.

HJ scholarship (that is short hand for “historical Jesus�) has been around since the 18th century. There have been a lot of people who called themselves HJ scholars, and many of them have disagreed with each other. The idea that they focus on certain passages while ignoring others has been the most common criticism of this school of thought, but it is certainly not a universal criticism.

Not much is universal. I have heard that Jesus baptism and crucifixion are the only things HJ scholar agree on. Some HJ scholars insist Jesus claimed to be God, while others deny it. I think that the majority say he claimed to be the Messiah, but others deny that.

Generally speaking HJ scholars start with an assumption of naturalism and try to make Jesus fit that model, but even that is not universal among HJ scholars.

It is a big area of study with a long history that can’t be summed up in an internet post. If you are really interested in the topic you will probably need to get a few books that survey the topic, or take a college class on it.

[marco]

First century Jews would not have had words like “unique incarnation of YHVH,� but they would have had no need for that kind of language. Claiming to be the son of God would absolutely be putting oneself on equal footing with YHVH, and they would not have needed to explore that level of blasphemy any deeper.

You are taking Christ's audience to be theological judges when their simplicity is known. Recall this:

"Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born?"

That indicates that his audience did have difficulty with figurative language. If Christ were speaking of himself as a son of God, there is every possibility he would have been taken literally - but wrongly so. He had often to explain patiently what his parables meant.

When he compared himself, puzzlingly, with Abraham: in John 8 -


58 "Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Before Abraham was, I am."

they took they up stones to cast at him: but Jesus hid himself.

So it seems they had no taste for figurative language, seeing blasphemy where it was not intended. Using these people as an indication of the literal truth of what Christ said is not too sound.

[polonius]

Elijah John asked:

-If you are a believing Christian, how do you integrate this conclusion with your own belief system? Do you dismiss the findings of HJ scholars out of hand? Or do you consider their arguments? Do you continue to worship Jesus as "God" despite evidence to the contrary, or with no real evidence that he is?

RESPONSE: No. I follow Paul's advise to "test everything" and "hold fast to what is true." But also "to put aside childish things."

Jesus' followers considered him to be the Messiah in Matthew, Mark, and Luke. But about 85 AD they came up with the idea that he himself was divine. This is hinted at in John's gospel.

As John reported, they were excluded from the Jewish synagosues. The Jewish 12 Benediction labeled them as "minum" (apostates from Judaism)

Having two Gods was a clear violation of Scripture. "Hear O Israel. The Lord is one."

[bjs]

First century Jews would not have had words like “unique incarnation of YHVH,� but they would have had no need for that kind of language. Claiming to be the son of God would absolutely be putting oneself on equal footing with YHVH, and they would not have needed to explore that level of blasphemy any deeper.

You are taking Christ's audience to be theological judges when their simplicity is known. Recall this:

"Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born?"

That indicates that his audience did have difficulty with figurative language. If Christ were speaking of himself as a son of God, there is every possibility he would have been taken literally - but wrongly so. He had often to explain patiently what his parables meant.

When he compared himself, puzzlingly, with Abraham: in John 8 -


58 "Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Before Abraham was, I am."

they took they up stones to cast at him: but Jesus hid himself.

So it seems they had no taste for figurative language, seeing blasphemy where it was not intended. Using these people as an indication of the literal truth of what Christ said is not too sound.

I do not understand why you brought up John 8, since in that chapter his audience seemed to rightly understand what Jesus said. He placed himself “before� Abraham. He used an odd grammatical structure to say “I am,� as a clear call back to the name of God, YHVH. He then applied the name of YHVH to himself. His audience rightly understood that he was claiming to be God. Since they did not believe the claim, they considered it to be blasphemy and were ready to stone him for it.

It is true that Nicodemus did not understand what Jesus was saying about being born again. However, you are draw way to broad of a conclusion from that. Symbolic language was parables were well established in Jewish literature before this point. Jesus regularly employed parables and, while there were a few instances of confusion, people almost always at least understood that it was meant to be symbolic. Even Jesus expressed surprise that Nicodemus did not understand that he was speaking symbolically.

Taking these rare cases of someone not understand that a line was meant to by symbolic and applying them to everything Jesus said does not seem reasonable. Nor do I see a reason to think that Jesus’ statement of being the “Son of God� was symbolic, particularly during his trial. In first century Judaism claiming to be the Son of God would almost certainly be a claim of Divinity.

[bjs]

Personally, I do not dismiss HJ scholarship out of hand..

Which conclusions of HJ scholarship do you accept? Any that differ with the Creeds of the Church and conventional Trinitarianism?

As you know, I accept the doctrine of the Trinity so of course I don’t agree with any HJ scholarship which differs with that specific doctrine.

Nor do I accept any HJ scholarship that differs with the two major creeds. Though to be fair those creeds don’t say all that much about Jesus. They say that he was God, that he was born of a virgin, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, and rose from the dead. That’s about it.

Most HJ scholars don’t say anything about him being born of a virgin or rising from the dead, unless they are trying to make a specific point about not believing in the supernatural. HJ scholars who are not trying to espouse either a materialistic or theistic worldview tend to say nothing about if Jesus’ mother was a virgin or if he rose from the dead.

One of the few things that HJ scholars almost universally agree on is that Jesus was executed by the Romans, most likely by order of Pontius Pilate. So on that account HJ scholars agree with the creeds.

The last claim from the creeds is that Jesus is God. Some (but far from all) HJ scholars have said that Jesus did not claim this. Here I think that I have made it clear that from any standpoint – Christian, atheist, or otherwise – I think it far more likely that Jesus did claim to be God. If we believe his claim to be true or not, the theory that he made the claim best fits the available evidence.

[marco]

I do not understand why you brought up John 8, since in that chapter his audience seemed to rightly understand what Jesus said. He placed himself “before� Abraham. He used an odd grammatical structure to say “I am,� as a clear call back to the name of God, YHVH. He then applied the name of YHVH to himself. His audience rightly understood that he was claiming to be God. Since they did not believe the claim, they considered it to be blasphemy and were ready to stone him for it.

You too seem to accept that the words Christ used were a claim to divinity. My point is that the listeners are not good judges as to whether Christ was speaking figuratively or literally. Jesus mischievously liked to challenge his listeners, and in this case quite riskily. There are a dozen ways to interpret his meaning and one of them is the simplistic literal one: I am God. He is claiming to have precedence over Abraham, and yes, his bold use of a present tense suggests he has been sent as a messenger from God (as he always taught). Here's the interpretation I think makes sense:

I am the TRUTH; to get to know God, you listen to me. Abraham may have given good examples, but I convey the word of God, which was there before Abraham ever was. My truth - given to me by God - is eternal.

Far fetched? No, for he calls himself the WAY, the TRUTH and the LIFE. Yes, one can naively think this means he's a god or one can accept Jesus liked figurative language, as demonstrated in his parables.

It is true that Nicodemus did not understand what Jesus was saying about being born again.

There were hundreds of listeners and Nicodemus is named. Is he named because he's stupid, a simpleton? He represents the blank faces on Christ's listeners. If I am assuming then you more so, for you are endowing NAMELESS people with a sense of understanding that the named person did not have. Christ's surprise is an oratorical device, akin to the expression "O ye of little faith."

Taking these rare cases of someone not understand that a line was meant to by symbolic and applying them to everything Jesus said does not seem reasonable.

We don't know if they were "rare" cases since we don't have thousands of audience reaction reports. Nor did I apply this case to all cases - I found an example for you to show that we cannot simply trust the interpretation of Christ's listeners. Most of the time we don't know what it was. The word "sheep" was wisely used.

Nor do I see a reason to think that Jesus’ statement of being the “Son of God� was symbolic, particularly during his trial. In first century Judaism claiming to be the Son of God would almost certainly be a claim of Divinity.

And in Rome or in Athens that would also be the case, if Jesus was speaking in heathen terms. He didn't come to break with monotheism but to guide people towards the Father. Incidentally, when he advises people to say "OUR Father..." he is suggesting that they are all "sons". There is absolutely no reason to conclude that Christ was a god or the actual son of a God.

[brianbbs67]

Yes , Christ liked to speak in parables. He even explained why. He never claimed to be God, but the Son of man. Aren't we all?(and no, I am not claiming divinity, just stating what is written) He just did it better. God's breathe resides in each of us. That should tell us of our origin.

I have often wondered this. It seems there are that which is real, and that which is unreal.

[marco]

I have often wondered this. It seems there are that which is real, and that which is unreal.

Very true. We have real and unreal in mathematics and in physics we have virtual particles which are real. We can make use of the unreal to give concrete solutions to everyday problems.

One could playfully say that even if God is unreal he reacts with our real world, affecting it for good or bad. Belief in God brings God into existence. Belief in Jesus may have done the same thing.

[brianbbs67]

[Replying to post 18 by marco]

I thought of Imaginary numbers too. Real for the created equation, but not really real. I think the Apocalypse of Peter put it best. I paraphrase, one day that which is real will remain and the unreal will fade away. Just like our virtual existence. The internet is real and yet fiction. And could be gone in an instant. But, its fun for now.

[marco]

[Replying to post 18 by marco]

I thought of Imaginary numbers too. Real for the created equation, but not really real. I think the Apocalypse of Peter put it best. I paraphrase, one day that which is real will remain and the unreal will fade away. Just like our virtual existence. The internet is real and yet fiction. And could be gone in an instant. But, its fun for now.

Plato of course speculated that our world is the image; we are shadows on a cave wall. We may well be images in a dream, perhaps God's dream or his nightmare. The philosopher Bishop Berkeley regarded all material as illusory; existence comes from something being seen (esse est perspici) which led to his example of the tree falling unseen in the forest. Did it exist? Perhaps it did, since it was seen in the eye of God.

We tie ourselves in knots with speculation as to how we are, what we are and why we are. I like Omar Khayyam's observation, given to us through Fitzgerald:

Myself when young did eagerly frequent
Doctor and Saint, and heard great Argument
About it and about: but evermore
Came out by the same Door as in I went

For all our intellectual angst, we are no wiser. But it's good fun. Go well.