What were Jesus and early Christians like?

[abaris]

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

I was talking about genuine historical references, not the canonical gospels or Josephus. I'm well aware of Tacitus and the plate they found.

So, again: Why would a Roman governor be out to upset the locals?

[watchamadoodle]

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.

Lately I've been wondering if Hebrews is somewhat Gnostic? (I don't know much about the book of Hebrews. As I recall, it tried to show that the temple practices foreshadowed the Christian practices.)

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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.

I don't see anything strange about Josephus referring to "the brother of Jesus, the so-called Christos". That phrase explains why the authorities wanted to kill James, and it doesn't imply that Josephus believed the claims about James' brother.

So what do you think the text would have read without the scribal error? "James son of Damneus" or something different?

[Drich]

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

I was talking about genuine historical references, not the canonical gospels or Josephus. I'm well aware of Tacitus and the plate they found.

So, again: Why would a Roman governor be out to upset the locals?

He wasnt. He was looking to passify them. The jews were always on the teetering edge of revolt. They hated rome, and in 70AD they did indeed revolt, which is what cause the romans to destroy the temple, full filling the prophesy Jesus gave.

Despite your misgivings about the Historical documentation concerning pilate, it has been well established that he was on thin ice with Tiberius/Ceasar about keeping the jews under control.

So to upset the jews by setting Jesus free, because he found him innocent of the charge they accused Him of would have caused trouble for pilate. So he had Jesus flogged and crucified to placate the crowd, rather than do what was right.

[Cyberman]

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

So which takes precedence - what actually happened, or what your book says happened?

[watchamadoodle]

He wasnt. He was looking to passify them. The jews were always on the teetering edge of revolt. They hated rome, and in 70AD they did indeed revolt, which is what cause the romans to destroy the temple, full filling the prophesy Jesus gave.

Despite your misgivings about the Historical documentation concerning pilate, it has been well established that he was on thin ice with Tiberius/Ceasar about keeping the jews under control.

So to upset the jews by setting Jesus free, because he found him innocent of the charge they accused Him of would have caused trouble for pilate. So he had Jesus flogged and crucified to placate the crowd, rather than do what was right.

Maybe part of the disagreement and confusion comes from speaking of "the Jews" when there were actually different Jewish groups with different interests?

[robvalue]

What jesus was like has nothing to do with history?

Finally we agree on something.

[Anomalocaris]

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

Spiritually based belief. Was there.



In other words, it's a tall tale that feels good to idiots like you, and seem all the more credible to idiots like you because it comes packaged with additional bullshit promises of ridiculous reward if you believe it and spread it around, and bullshit promises of ludicrous punishments if you call it for the bullshit tall tale it is.

[Jenny A]

Read the NT it's recorded there.

GC

In part. But much of it's lost. Other bitses that the orthodox church didn't manage to suppress keep popping up. The Bible, was collected by the theological victors. But there were opponents. As is, all you need do is read Paul's letters to know there were other Christianities, because he's so busy arguing against them.

[abaris]

As is, all you need do is read Paul's letters to know there were other Christianities, because he's so busy arguing against them.

Arianism was one of the staunchest competitors in the early centuries, since many Germanic tribes adopted that version of christianity. And they were the ones ultimately capturing Rome and Italy.

[DeistPaladin]

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'm no expert on ancient Hebrew history but everything I know about it suggests it was a theologically volatile time. History doctoral students I've spoken with joked that there was a messiah-of-the-week. The penalty for being discovered to be a false prophet was most dire. It would not be a surprise if the same son could be the anointed one (christos or messiah) one day and stoned to death the next, never mind a brother high priest and a brother who was stoned to death as a false messiah.

But fine, fine, fine, let's assume the "brother of Jesus" was neither an interpolation nor a reference to "Jesus Bar Damneus". All that granted, this oblique reference tells us what exactly?

The majority of scholars do seem convinced there was some kind of religious leader named "Yeshua" (which was a common name) who taught some stuff, we don't know what, who was thought to be the messiah by his followers (there was one on every street corner), who ran afoul of the Romans for some reason but we don't know exactly why (the Romans killed a lot of Jewish leaders) and mumble mumble "revolutionary" something something... Mix it all together and out comes THE HISTORICAL JESUS! (Ta da)

To quote Thomas Paine: "It may be so, and what then?"

Every "historist" (faction that believes in a historical Jesus) I've asked to please clarify for me what, if anything, can we know about him and what do we base this on, can't do any better than some-guy-named-Yeshua.

This is why I've renounced being a Jesus Myther and now call myself a Jesus Mooter. I'm exhausted riding the same merry go round and dancing the "scholars say" shuffle. I now think it's a waste of time, time better spent debunking the Bible and supernatural claims.

Even granting The Historical Jesus existed:

1. We know nothing of what he really taught.
   
2. We know nothing of his real life.
   
3. We will never be able to parse the truth from the folklore and myths.
   
4. Granting some-mortal-guy-named-Yeshua does nothing to validate Christian claims any more than discovering a historical Clark Kent would a belief in a real Superman.
   

So you see what I mean by "moot"?

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

There were many Jewish sects at that time. Judaism was in a theological crisis. Their god Yahweh seemed to have abandoned them to the Romans. Yahweh had promised the "seed of David" would rule upon the throne forever and ever. "So how come we gotta pay taxes to Rome and are living under Roman law?"

The ancient Jews couldn't reconcile the religion which said they were the chosen people to the reality that they were a colony of another empire.

On cue, as happens when religion is in crisis, many doom criers emerged proclaiming that the end was neigh. There were many claimants to "the messiah" as the Jews were desperately looking for any sign of deliverance. John the Baptist was one such leader. He had a substantial following.

Read the Gospels in the order in which they were written: Mark, Matthew, Luke and John. Notice how JtB sinks lower and lower on his knees, becoming more submissive with each Gospel account. The story got better with the telling.

Mark: JtB puts himself down as being unworthy to tie Jesus' sandals. He baptises Jesus and must be put away in prison before Jesus can start his ministry.

Matthew: Matthew seems uneasy with JtB's role as a baptist for Jesus. JtB says "you come to ME?"

Luke: Doesn't go into detail comparatively.

John: JtB never baptizes Jesus at all. Neither does he need to get out of the way. Jesus took up a rival baptizing ministry and outdid John at his own game.

But if JtB really got on his knees before Jesus or told his followers he was only the warm up act to a coming messiah, his followers clearly didn't get the memo. They regarded him as the messiah. They still do to this day.