What were Jesus and early Christians like?

[TimOneill]

He may well have been a nazarene at one point then the wine stuff was added later to the story, and no one noticed the problem.

Why go to all this effort to come up with a Jesus who wasn't from Nazareth, was a Nazarene and yet somehow this got forgotten and then Nazareth gets invented? Why not just accept a much more parsimonious reading of the text - that he ... was from Nazareth?

Is there some reason this is not likely? I've never seen it.

And if Nazareth was invented as a way of explaining Ναζαρηνός after it was (somehow) "forgotten" that this meant he was a Nazarite (why?), then it's very strange that a town of that name appears in the late first century, given we have an inscription detailing how a course of priests was settled there in the wake of the Jewish War. Co-incidence?

This whole tangled mess is simply unnecessary. Why was he called Ναζαρηνός? Because he was from the village of Ναζαρέτ/Ναζαρὲθ . Simple - no convoluted and unnecessary suppositions and tangled "what ifs" required. Occam's Razor applied.

[TimOneill]

Wrong. We know that gMark was using at least one original source, now lost.

Please don't start with the Q nonsense.

The "Q nonsense" that's accepted by most textual critics?

It's the tachyon of biblical apologetics.

Apologists actually tend to reject the whole idea of Q. They don't like the idea of a text that contained "the Word of God" but which God didn't bother to preserve - that disturbs them. I've never been able to work out why Mythers et al also don't like the idea. It's just yet another thing that Mythers and fundamentalists have in common.

It's never been seen. Never been measured. But some people claim it exists.

It does exist. It's right there in the texts. Note that I used the term "the Q material". That's the stuff that is not in gMark but is in both gMatt and gLuke. And at least some of it can be shown, textually, to have come from a now lost text used by both as a source. Whether all of it comes from common textual material or whether it comes from a single common text or several are other questions. But the Q material is there and it indicates at least one other textual strand, possibly more.

Let me know when you find Q. Then I'll take a look at it.

Easily done - here you are: The Q Material.

[watchamadoodle]

Can somebody explain the difference between "christ" and "messiah" in the Josephus quotes? Historians believe Josephus would not have used the word "messiah", but he could have used the word "christ". I looked up the definitions and they seem very similar.

Some argue that the wording in the Testimonium differs from Josephus' usual writing style and that as a Jew, he would not have used a word like "Messiah".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josephus_on_Jesus

[TimOneill]

Can somebody explain the difference between "christ" and "messiah" in the Josephus quotes?

Some translators translate his use of the Greek word Χριστός as "Christ" and others as "Messiah". All mean the same thing - "anointed one". Though "Christ" has more misleading Christian implications for modern readers, so I'd say "Messiah" gives a better sense of what Josephus would have meant: "the one ordained by Yahweh awaited by Jews".

Historians believe Josephus would not have used the word "messiah", but he could have used the word "christ". I looked up the definitions and they seem very similar.

Ummm, no - Josephus would have used neither "Christ" nor "Messiah", given that he was writing in Greek, not English. See above: Χριστός means "anointed one", which is what the Aramaic word Josephus used meant.

Some argue that the wording in the Testimonium differs from Josephus' usual writing style and that as a Jew, he would not have used a word like "Messiah".

Josephus is simply telling us that Jesus was "called" this. He tells us lots of people and places were "called" all kinds of things. Why would he not use the word if this was what Jesus was called? And why would a Jew not use the Greek word "Messiah" if that's the word for the Messiah that he would have found used throughout his Greek translation of the Jewish Bible?

Some of the wording in the Testimonium does differ than that used by Josephus elsewhere. That's because some of the Testimonium has been added later. Some other parts of the Testimonium use language that is distinctively Josephan but is not found in early Christian texts. That's because some of the Testimonium is original to Josephus, as the textual evidence in Jerome, Agapius and Michael the Syrian's versions of it indicates. This is why the majority view of Josephan scholars is that the Testimonium we have today is partly original to Josephus and partly some fairly clumsy later additions.

Which means the only historian of the time who had anything much to say about people like Jesus mentions him. Twice.

[Mudhammam]

Wrong. We know that gMark was using at least one original source, now lost. Then there is the Q material used by both gLuke and gMatt, at least some of which is demonstrably from a common text, also now lost. Then there is the material exclusively in gMatt and gLuke, some of which may be what you call "fanfic" (actual textual critics call it midrash) and some of it could be from further lost sources. Then there is a whole slew of stuff in gJohn that is not in any of the synoptics, which must have come from somewhere.

My brother has spent quite a bit of time reading early church material and researching different hypotheses regarding the original sources for the gospels. He suggested to me the idea that all four gospels might have been working off an earlier narrative.

But unless there is something substantial discovered, it seems to me like the speculations about when tales of Jesus originated in either oral or written form can go on and on, and it makes little sense if we assume that Jesus really was crucified sometime around 30-33 C.E., that immediately these elaborate stories began circulating...or perhaps that was a common feature of recently deceased Jewish wisdom teachers whom some small sect revered?

The idea that the other gospels are just elaborations on or embroiderings on gMark and it can all be traced back to gMark is simply wrong.

Why could not Matthew and Luke had access to Mark and Q and wrote their narratives primarily based off those, with their own agendas and anecdotes marking the rest of the differences between them?

This is most likely. The fact remains that both gMatt and gLuke are using this "fanfic" stuff to "explain" how a Galilean from Nazareth could be the Messiah and born in Bethlehem in Judea. So the question is - why? Why are they going to all this trouble to "explain" how he could be the Messiah and still be from a nowhere town in Galilee.

To unite different factions of Jewish and Gentile Christians who had different expectations about the Messiah's birthplace and because Mark's Gospel was already considered authoritative to a substantial audience?

[robvalue]

You're argueing with a point I admitted I just made up?

Anyhow, welcome back

[TimOneill]

He suggested to me the idea that all four gospels might have been working off an earlier narrative.

Then what your brother suggested doesn't fit the evidence. It indicates several separate and distinct lines of source, not just one. I tend to find careful reading of peer reviewed scholarship works better than listening to some dude who happens to be your brother.

But unless there is something substantial discovered, it seems to me like the speculations about when tales of Jesus originated in either oral or written form can go on and on, ..

Mere "speculations" are things that are simply possible, but which have no evidential support. Critical scholars work from things which are possible and which have the most evidential support and require the least suppositions. Occam's Razor. See the difference?

and it makes little sense if we assume that Jesus really was crucified sometime around 30-33 C.E., that immediately these elaborate stories began circulating...or perhaps that was a common feature of recently deceased Jewish wisdom teachers whom some small sect revered?

What?

Why could not Matthew and Luke had access to Mark and Q and wrote their narratives primarily based off those, with their own agendas and anecdotes marking the rest of the differences between them?

That's pretty much what every critical scholar on the planet thinks happened. So ... what?

To unite different factions of Jewish and Gentile Christians who had different expectations about the Messiah's birthplace and because Mark's Gospel was already considered authoritative to a substantial audience?

Ummm ... what? You need to come up with a reason we should think gMark's tradition that Jesus came from a village called Nazareth was wrong in the first place. Start there and see how far you get before Occam's Razor cuts your throat.

Over to you.

---

You're argueing with a point I admitted I just made up

I'm noting it makes zero sense. Rationalists work with what makes sense.

[Mudhammam]

Then what your brother suggested doesn't fit the evidence. It indicates several separate and distinct lines of source, not just one. I tend to find careful reading of peer reviewed scholarship works better than listening to some dude who happens to be your brother.

Uh, yeah, I guess on that logic it must be a total waste of time to talk to some amateur historian on a forum.

Mere "speculations" are things that are simply possible, but which have no evidential support. Critical scholars work from things which are possible and which have the most evidential support and require the least suppositions. Occam's Razor. See the difference?

Which is why there is virtually no agreement among scholars as to who Jesus was and how the early church started? Sounds like a great method!

What?

Forget it.

That's pretty much what every critical scholar on the planet thinks happened. So ... what?

Your tone is incredibly standoff-ish and annoying.

Ummm ... what? You need to come up with a reason we should think gMark's tradition that Jesus came from a village called Nazareth was wrong in the first place. Start there and see how far you get before Occam's Razor cuts your throat.

Over to you.

I don't have the essay in my possession at the moment but I know it has been suggested that only in one instance does Mark cite Jesus as having come from a village called Nazareth, the other cases having been mistranslated to read that way. If that's the case, then confusion over what Nazarene was meant to imply may have been the cause for the author or a copier to interpret it as entailing a village called Nazareth.

[TimOneill]

Uh, yeah, I guess on that logic it must be a total waste of time to talk to some amateur historian on a forum.

Not at all. You just have to stick to what the evidence and the critical scholarship indicates and not bungled, erroneous crap from your brother. If your brother told you the evidence indicated that the gospels were all working off one single narrative, your brother was wrong. You should pay attention to people who know better than your brother. Clear?

Which is why there is virtually no agreement among scholars as to who Jesus was and how the early church started? Sounds like a great method!

There's virtually no absolute agreement on most things in the humanities. Sorry, but if you want absolute agreement then mathematics and physics are down the hall and to your right. Here in history we work from the evidence we have and come to the argument to the best explanation; the one that explains the most evidence and requires the least suppositons. For about a century now pretty much every scholar on the planet has concluded that, using these parameters, it's most likely there was a historical Jesus. You think they're all wrong? Let's see you explain why.

I don't have the essay in my possession at the moment but I know it has been suggested that only in one instance does Mark cite Jesus as having come from a village called Nazareth, the other cases having been mistranslated to read that way. If that's the case, then confusion over what Nazarene was meant to imply may have been the cause for the author or a copier to interpret it as entailing a village called Nazareth.

Utter gibberish. gMark makes it perfectly clear that Jesus comes from Nazareth and says so in the very first thing he says about him. Want the Greek? - ἦλθεν Ἰησοῦς ἀπὸ Ναζαρὲτ τῆς Γαλιλαίας = "then came Jesus from Nazareth in Galilee". Mark 1:9. Clear enough for you?

Your tone is incredibly standoff-ish and annoying.

Then let's just say that after 30 years of studying this stuff in depth, reading the sources in the orignal language and taking all the critical scholarship into account, some dude responding to me with some half remembered crap from his brother and something he doesn't quite remember that he didn't quite get around to saving but which sort of kind of said something or other doesn't exactly impress me.

Clear?

If you're going to respond again I advise you make sure you are very clear on what you're saying and why. Or just don't respond.

[Mudhammam]

Not at all. You just have to stick to what the evidence and the critical scholarship indicates and not bungled, erroneous crap from your brother. If your brother told you the evidence indicated that the gospels were all working off one single narrative, your brother was wrong. You should pay attention to people who know better than your brother. Clear?

And anyone should think you're included in that group why?

There's virtually no absolute agreement on most things in the humanities. Sorry, but if you want absolute agreement then mathematics and physics are down the hall and to your right. Here in history we work from the evidence we have and come to the argument to the best explanation; the one that explains the most evidence and requires the least suppositons. For about a century now pretty much every scholar on the planet has concluded that, using these parameters, it's most likely there was a historical Jesus. You think they're all wrong? Let's see you explain why.

I'm sure there was a historical Jesus. And a historical Bob and a historical George. Please tell me why I should think the Gospels relate any accurate historical information about this Jesus---or just stop babbling about the majority of scholars who can't seem to find any agreement over the basic facts other than that this man was born and died like thousands of other crucified victims.

Mark 1:9. Clear enough for you?

Right. One instance. Like I said. Do you read?

Then let's just say that after 30 years of studying this stuff in depth, reading the sources in the orignal language and taking all the critical scholarship into account, some dude responding to me with some half remmbered crap from his brother and something he doesn't quite remember that he didn't quite get around to saving but which sort of kind of said something or other doesn't exactly impress me.

In other words, you're about as qualified as my brother.

Clear?

Yep.

If you're going to respond again I advise you make sure you are very clear on what you're saying and why. Or just don't respond.

Here's a suggestion: go fuck yourself.

:-)