What were Jesus and early Christians like?

[Drich]

Piloet on the other hand was a fence sitter who did not want to upset the jews or Rome.

I use to think he wasn't a bad guy, but then I saw 'the passion'.. (Which illustrates a biblical truth I did not fully grasp.) after finding Jesus innocent, he had him scourged.

That is like going through a high profile murder trial, found innocent, then sentenced to being beaten to an inch of your life then nailed to a cross because 'the people' don't care about justice, they want your blood.

Piloet was a weak leader and a coward for not doing the right thing even by today's standards.

You must be joking. Have you ever read anything about Pilate outside the NT? A fence sitter worried about upsetting the Jews?

Up setting the jews in that he was on thin ice with Rome. 'Upset jews' meant revolt, and revolt meant a heavy handed response from ceasar directed at him. I wasn't looking to do a history lesson. 'Up set jews' was more than explaination enough for anyone who knows of piloets situation.

[abaris]

Up setting the jews in that he was on thin ice with Rome. 'Upset jews' meant revolt, and revolt meant a heavy handed response from ceasar directed at him. I wasn't looking to do a history lesson. 'Up set jews' was more than explaination enough for anyone who knows of piloets situation.

Apart from the above making little sense, why would a governor, whose only genuine historic references are about taking money, make his situation more difficult by upsetting the local population?

[Minimalist]

'Upset jews' meant revolt, and revolt meant a heavy handed response from ceasar directed at him.

Your knowledge of history is what is revolting. Comes from wasting too much time reading that fucking bible of yours.

[Drich]

Even if I believed the NT to be mostly factual, the beliefs of early Christians and their history as described in the NT are incomplete and somewhat contradictory. The in NT is even less helpful if I accept that the canon was cherry-picked, edited, etc.

What is your idea of complete? What more do you think you need for salvation?

Mainly, I'm trying to imagine the beliefs and behaviors of Jesus and the early Christians. Would I admire these people if I could see them and listen to them in person, or would I think they were weird cult followers? There are a few sayings from Jesus that I like (the Beautitudes for example), but did Jesus actually say anything very useful or profound, or was it the childhood indoctrination?

You understand the term indoctrinated right?

If yes then any 'indoctrination' would be from a jewish pov, as Christianity was not a thing. so where would they get this indoctrination from?

Paul often sounded overbearing, arrogant, greedy, etc. He reminded me of most of the preachers I would see on Christian TV. Most of Paul's letters seem to be rants about problems that have been lost to history. Paul's more theological letters such as Romans were not interesting to me. The letters of James, 1 John, and 1 Peter seemed more inspiring and wise to me.

Here's a question, what if you think Paul's version of Christianity is not valid, because what you think Christianity should be is that far off the mark?

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(easy targets since the Temple had been destroyed and Jerusalem burned to the ground by the time of the Gospels' writings)

I take it you don't believe Mark's Gospel was composed in the mid-sixties. But isn't it odd the author would put these words about the temple into Jesus' mouth...

"Not one stone here will be left on another; every one will be thrown down."

...when in fact this still stands?

Wester wall does not =\= temple.

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Up setting the jews in that he was on thin ice with Rome. 'Upset jews' meant revolt, and revolt meant a heavy handed response from ceasar directed at him. I wasn't looking to do a history lesson. 'Up set jews' was more than explaination enough for anyone who knows of piloets situation.

Apart from the above making little sense, why would a governor, whose only genuine historic references are about taking money, make his situation more difficult by upsetting the local population?

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pontius_Pilate

Seems even wiki has a better grasp of Pilate than you do.

[Mudhammam]

I know of some rabbis who might disagree with that unfair dismissal, Drich:
http://www.aish.com/h/9av/j/48961906.html?mobile=yes

[watchamadoodle]

Further, in the mid 3d century a xtian writer named Origen wrote a work called Contra Celsus in which he specifically referred to Book XVIII of Antiquities of the Jews and correctly noted the John the Baptist reference BUT HAS NOTHING TO SAY ABOUT THE TF AT ALL. This, in spite of the fact that it would have clinched the point he was trying to make.

That seems like a good reason to assume the TF is a complete forgery. I wonder why Geza Vermes believed it to be only a partial forgery? I assume he must have been aware of the argument you mentioned unless it is very new.

D-P has already trashed the "Jamesian reference" and while we disagree slightly about the nature of the forgery - I find it a rather innocent mistake by a well-meaning scribe - Jesus Bar Damneus is named at the end.

So you think the scribal error was to write "the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ, whose name was James" instead of "James Bar Damneus"?

I have a hard time imagining that Damneus had two sons - one of them heretical enough to stone and the other orthodox enough to be high priest. Doesn't that sound unlikely?

I haven't studied this enough to have a strong opinion of my own, so I feel more comfortable accepting the view of the majority. It might be wrong of course.

BTW, We don't need to get hung-up on the mythical/historical Jesus issue. We all agree there were early Christians, and that is also an interesting discussion.

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(2) John the Baptist

...is a curious character. Supposedly, his whole ministry was a warm-up act for Jesus. He even supposedly told his followers this on no uncertain terms. Yet, strangely, Josephus tells us that JtB had a successful ministry with no reference to it just being a warm-up act for someone else. His followers considered JtB to be the messiah and still do to this day. How odd he told them to follow Jesus and they just didn't get the memo.

...or maybe the whole thing about him kneeling before Jesus is just a propaganda piece the Christians made up about their arch rival at the time. Kind of like what the Muslims would later do with Jesus.

So what were the two Jewish sects like that produced John the Baptist and the Early Christians?

[Godscreated]

Read the NT it's recorded there.

And should your NT conflict with actual known history, what then? Which takes precedence?

What Jesus and the apostles and early Christians were like has nothing to do with history, it's a spiritually based belief and the Bible tells us about it. There was no question about history, was there.

GC

[Mudhammam]

What do you guys make of Hebrews? Dating? Content? As far as I know, it's the earliest text after the seven Pauline letters universally accepted as authentic, it relates a lot to Second Temple Judaism and excludes any mention of the Jewish revolt or Jerusalem's destruction... and it clearly emphasizes a Jesus who was a man and now reigns as the Jewish God in heaven.

[Godscreated]

And should your NT conflict with actual known history, what then? Which takes precedence?

Hell, forget history. If the Gospels conflict with each other or with other books of the Bible, which one takes precedence?

Example: After his baptism, did Jesus go off into the wilderness for 40 days (Mark) or did he hang around for a few days gathering disciples and then attend a wedding (John)?

Mark 1:12-13 And immediately (after the baptism) the spirit driveth him (Jesus) into the wilderness. And he was there in the wilderness forty days, tempted of Satan; and was with the wild beasts; and the angels ministered unto him.

John 2:1-2 And the third day (after the baptism) there was a marriage in Cana of Galilee; and the mother of Jesus was there: And both Jesus was called, and his disciples, to the marriage.

Your deception might fool the foolish ones here, but not the Christians. Matthew, Mark, Luke all say Jesus went into the desert after His baptism. Johns Gospel never mentions the 40 days in the desert. John's gospel gives no time line for the baptism, it does say John gave a testimony of Jesus and how he knew who Jesus was, but as I said there is no time line on when he baptized Jesus. Since the 40 days were not mentioned in John's gospel and the baptism has no true time line, speculation is all you have and nothing more.

GC

[Minimalist]

That seems like a good reason to assume the TF is a complete forgery. I wonder why Geza Vermes believed it to be only a partial forgery? I assume he must have been aware of the argument you mentioned unless it is very new

Vermes was a religious scholar of varied creeds and tastes...interesting fellow. Jewish catholic priests are rare.

Nonetheless, this middle ground position seems to be popular among scholars who don't want to make too many waves in their field. None of them want to break their own rice bowl. But the evidence is not compelling no matter how much they want to believe.

So you think the scribal error was to write "the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ, whose name was James" instead of "James Bar Damneus"?

This is tricky. The Greek phrase as we have it now, is tou legomenou Christou. "The one known as Christos" is a perfectly acceptable translation. However, so is "The one called Christos" or even "the so-called Christos." So there is some ambiguity to begin with. But we don't know if Josephus wrote it - doubtful - or the scribe wrote it

Christos was the Greek translation of Moschach and it referred to someone was anointed. This was a purely Jewish rite and referred to the installation of a king or high priest. In that chapter virtually everybody except the two Romans was a king or high priest and thus a "christos" at one time or another.

Would a pharisee of a noble priestly family have equated some crucified hippie with a king or high priest of Judaea? I doubt it. Origen tells us that Josephus did not accept Jesus as the Christ the odds are that this is nothing more than jesus-freak wishful thinking. But it just doesn't make sense because the word meant something totally different to Josephus.

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Of a related curiosity, a fragment of Mark's Gospel that scientists are dating to 80 C.E. was recently found. This would make it the oldest copy of any gospel passages yet discovered.

Well....let's not shit golden nickles just yet.

http://www.cnn.com/2015/01/21/living/gospel-mummy-mask/

Though it may be making headlines now, the claim that the "oldest known gospel" has been discovered is not new.

News of the fragment first came to light in 2012 when its existence was (perhaps inadvertently) announced by Daniel Wallace, founder of the Center for the Study of New Testament Manuscripts at Dallas Theological Seminary.

No one saw the text then, and no one has seen it now; though it has been mentioned repeatedly by a select group of people who evidently have been given access to it, its planned date of publication has been consistently pushed back, from an original plan of 2013 to 2015 and now, just this week, all the way to 2017.

Despite the seemingly explosive quality of the news, therefore, it is important to take a step back and consider what is actually being revealed here.

Some people are saying they have this really old and important thing, and they will show it to all the rest of us in a few years. (Essentially, this papyrus is the scholarly equivalent of "my girlfriend who lives in Canada.")

The moment you have these divinity school shits making claims like this it is best to wait. How many fucking arks have these morons found?