HJ and Christian origins plausibility

[TedM]

He did not fit the bill in that way.

There were very detailed accounts of what a messiah is, and the Aramaic jew did not fit the bill. he was almost the opposite of what the messiah is supposed to be.

How was he almost the opposite? .

Isaiah 1:26: "And I will restore your judges as at first and your counsellors as in the beginning; afterwards you shall be called City of Righteousness, Faithful City." Some Jews[9] interpret this to mean that the Sanhedrin will be re-established."(Isaiah 1:26)
Once he is King, leaders of other nations will look to him for guidance. (Isaiah 2:4)
The whole world will worship the One God of Israel (Isaiah 2:11-17)
He will be descended from King David (Isaiah 11:1) via Solomon (1 Chronicles 22:8-10, 2 Chronicles 7:18)
The "spirit of the Lord" will be upon him, and he will have a "fear of God" (Isaiah 11:2)
Evil and tyranny will not be able to stand before his leadership (Isaiah 11:4)
Knowledge of God will fill the world (Isaiah 11:9)
He will include and attract people from all cultures and nations (Isaiah 11:10)
All Israelites will be returned to their homeland (Isaiah 11:12)
Death will be swallowed up forever (Isaiah 25:8)
There will be no more hunger or illness, and death will cease (Isaiah 25:8)
All of the dead will rise again (Isaiah 26:19)
The Jewish people will experience eternal joy and gladness (Isaiah 51:11)
He will be a messenger of peace (Isaiah 52:7)
Nations will recognize the wrongs they did to Israel (Isaiah 52:13-53:5)
The peoples of the world will turn to the Jews for spiritual guidance (Zechariah 8:23)
The ruined cities of Israel will be restored (Ezekiel 16:55)
Weapons of war will be destroyed (Ezekiel 39:9)
The people of Israel will have direct access to the Torah through their minds and Torah study will become the study of the wisdom of the heart (Jeremiah 31:33)[10]
He will give you all the worthy desires of your heart (Psalms 37:4)
He will take the barren land and make it abundant and fruitful (Isaiah 51:3, Amos 9:13-15, Ezekiel 36:29-30, Isaiah 11:6-9)


Jesus may have been an apocalyptic teacher telling of the kingdom of god. That does not make him king of the Jews, nor would he create mythology about himself that he was from a Davidic line like the gospel authors did.

thanks. I guess I see it as plausible that if a teacher comes along after JTB during a time of high expectation, and there was an existing belief that the Messiah would be preceeded by Elijah or an Elijah-type, then it wouldn't be surprising if there was a direct proportion between the interest generated by that teacher and the speculation that he was some kind of Messiah figure. Have you read anything by the guy I mentioned earlier? Seems to me there was no cookie-cutter formula for the Messiah, and some Jews were very liberal with their interpretations, which opened the door for different types of Messiahs in people's minds. Multiply that by 10 given their political situation as well as the timing of Daniel's 70 weeks. I'm not meaning to sound like the Aramaic Jews immediately thought Jesus was the son of God, or maybe even ever did.

We perhaps could even change the word Messiah to 'a gifted holy person' in my list of 9. You may be right that he may have been almost a nobody, but I think that makes the origins harder to explain. The flip-side is that the more one claims he is like the Jesus of the Gospels, the harder it is to explain the absence of evidence outside of the NT.

[outhouse]

Seems to me there was no cookie-cutter formula for the Messiah, and some Jews were very liberal with their interpretations, which opened the door for different types of Messiahs in people's minds

.

I think your right on that Ted.

The Hellenist in the diaspora obviously viewed him as such. I think the problem is the lack of knowledge on how different sects of Judaism adhered to Judaism.

We know Zealots and some Pharisees did adhere more tightly.

We also know Hellenist perverted Judaism freely, as the christian movement plagiarized the hell out of Judaism as well as many other types of mythology.

[MrMacSon]

Yet there are no other stories of a Aramaic man from Nazareth who caused trouble in the temple and was killed by Romans for it.

While there are no stories of an Aramaic speaking man from "Nat'Sar-eth" (Roughly "City of Guards"...) there WAS a Story of someone who was probably from a Settlement named "Jabnit" who caused trouble in the Temple and saved a Priest and returned in 12 years to finish the job, only to see the Priest murdered.

His name was given to us as "Peter".

Nazareth/Nat'Sr-eth was unlikely to have been established at the time.

[outhouse]

[We perhaps could even change the word Messiah to 'a gifted holy person' in my list of 9. You may be right that he may have been almost a nobody, but I think that makes the origins harder to explain. .

Actually it fits right into the evidence we have perfectly.

Poor Galilean nobody that took over a Zealot movement and stayed under the radar to avoid the mistakes John made. So he takes his show to the road and traveled with his inner circle teaching what ever he was doing based on Johns teachings.

Makes at least one trip to the temple where he causes some kind of trouble and finds himself on a cross in front of unbelievable sized crowds including Hellenist who found importance in his martyrdom and mythology and took home these legends back to all over the Empire. This is how the movement became so geographically widespread, and each Passover they would get together and add to the mythology.

The concept evolved into a messiah no doubt, it is just my opinion that it did so in Hellenistic circles in the diaspora.

[outhouse]

Yet there are no other stories of a Aramaic man from Nazareth who caused trouble in the temple and was killed by Romans for it.

While there are no stories of an Aramaic speaking man from "Nat'Sar-eth" (Roughly "City of Guards"...) there WAS a Story of someone who was probably from a Settlement named "Jabnit" who caused trouble in the Temple and saved a Priest and returned in 12 years to finish the job, only to see the Priest murdered.

His name was given to us as "Peter".

Nazareth/Nat'Sr-eth was unlikely to have been established at the time.

You mean it Is almost impossible that it was not. Rene Salm is a quack, and even Carrier thinks it was there, and for good reasons.

[TedM]

Makes at least one trip to the temple where he causes some kind of trouble and finds himself on a cross in front of unbelievable sized crowds including Hellenist who found importance in his martyrdom and mythology

If he was a nobody, what was it that separated him from any other crucified person in a way that the Hellinists would have appreciated? I happen to think it is likely he was crucified along with others.

[The Crow]

Hi TedM,

Does this hypothesis fit the actual historical evidence?
Josephus was born in 37 and should have heard of Jesus or the Christian movement, but in two massive works, "Wars" and "Antiquities," there is not a word about Jesus or Christians.
Let us pretend for a moment, despite the evidence that Eusebius composed it, that some portion of the TF might have been about some Jesus figure. The TF has 128 words in Whiston's translation. In book 19, Josephus devotes 12,729 words (Whiston's translation) to the Emperor Gaius (A.K.A. Caligula), mostly about his assassination. Gaius ruled for less than four years from March 37 to Jan 41 CE. Gaius' only relationship with the Jews, is that he apparently ordered some kind of statue of himself put into the Jewish Temple at Jerusalem in the last year of his reign. Josephus devotes 3,488 words to this affair. (book 18). Thus he devotes a total of 12,729 and 3,488 words to Gaius' and one incident involving Jews, for a total of 16,217 words devoted to Gaius. That is 16,217 words devoted to Gaius and 128 words devoted (allegedly) to Jesus. Why does Josephus give Gaius, a very minor Roman Emperor, 127 times the textual space he devotes to Jesus?

Warmly,

Jay Raskin

I am still inclined to believe that the entire passage in 18.3.3 was forged by Eusebius.....but then again if Josephus was born in 37 like you say that would put him some 5 to 7 years after jesus so called death on the cross and he would not have even known about it. Just shooting in the dark here.

[Charles Wilson]

Yet there are no other stories of a Aramaic man from Nazareth who caused trouble in the temple and was killed by Romans for it.

While there are no stories of an Aramaic speaking man from "Nat'Sar-eth" (Roughly "City of Guards"...) there WAS a Story of someone who was probably from a Settlement named "Jabnit" who caused trouble in the Temple and saved a Priest and returned in 12 years to finish the job, only to see the Priest murdered.

His name was given to us as "Peter".

Nazareth/Nat'Sr-eth was unlikely to have been established at the time.

You mean it Is almost impossible that it was not. Rene Salm is a quack, and even Carrier thinks it was there, and for good reasons.

It's a JOKE! It's like "Bethsaida". It's like "Golgotha" and "Gabbatha". The CATHOLICS don't know where "Golgotha" was and that's because it's a JOKE!
The "Swine at Gadara" have to run 35 miles to drown and the townspeople know about the Lunatic almost instantaneously. WHY?

The Story of Peter has been dismembered and Transvalued. Stop looking for places that don't exist! Guardtown doesn't exist.

Mark 6: 45 - 49: (RSV):

[45] Immediately he made his disciples get into the boat and go before him to the other side, to Beth-sa'ida, while he dismissed the crowd.
[46] And after he had taken leave of them, he went up on the mountain to pray.
[47] And when evening came, the boat was out on the sea, and he was alone on the land.
[48] And he saw that they were making headway painfully, for the wind was against them. And about the fourth watch of the night he came to them, walking on the sea. He meant to pass by them,
[49] but when they saw him walking on the sea they thought it was a ghost, and cried out;

Matthew 14: 28 - 30 (RSV):

[28] And Peter answered him, "Lord, if it is you, bid me come to you on the water."
[29] He said, "Come." So Peter got out of the boat and walked on the water and came to Jesus;
[30] but when he saw the wind, he was afraid, and beginning to sink he cried out, "Lord, save me."

Mark 13: 32 - 37 (RSV):
[32] "But of that day or that hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.
[33] Take heed, watch; for you do not know when the time will come.
[34] It is like a man going on a journey, when he leaves home and puts his servants in charge, each with his work, and commands the doorkeeper to be on the watch.
[35] Watch therefore -- for you do not know when the master of the house will come, in the evening, or at midnight, or at cockcrow, or in the morning --
[36] lest he come suddenly and find you asleep.
[37] And what I say to you I say to all: Watch."

THERE! THERE! Did you see it?

Luke 13: 23 - 24: (RSV):

[23] And some one said to him, "Lord, will those who are saved be few?" And he said to them,
[24] "Strive to enter by the narrow door; for many, I tell you, will seek to enter and will not be able.

Matthew 18: 1 - 5 (RSV):

[1] At that time the disciples came to Jesus, saying, "Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?"
[2] And calling to him a child, he put him in the midst of them,
[3] and said, "Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.
[4] Whoever humbles himself like this child, he is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.
[5] "Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me;

THERE! THERE IT IS! DO YOU SEE IT?

This is the Story of Peter who saves a Priest. Both Peter and the Priest should be DEAD and they are not! Why? Because Peter knows of the narrow door. Peter is obsessed with the DEATHS that come at the hands of the Pharisees and Archelaus and returns 12 years later to finish the job of eliminating the Herodians and the Romans.

"Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me".

The last verse means what it says and that makes all of the Transvaluation that comes later as a Cynical JOKE. There is no "Golgotha" because it is a cynical manipulation of a word play as "Gabbatha" is.

CW

[outhouse]

Makes at least one trip to the temple where he causes some kind of trouble and finds himself on a cross in front of unbelievable sized crowds including Hellenist who found importance in his martyrdom and mythology

If he was a nobody, what was it that separated him from any other crucified person in a way that the Hellinists would have appreciated? I happen to think it is likely he was crucified along with others.

Timing for the mythology to grow.

First an foremost. His actions in the temple against Hellenistic corruption were more then likely single handed. By all accounts his apostles are portrayed as cowards. This started the perception of a selfless sacrifice that was the foundation the mythology grew rapidly from. One Aramaic peasant from Galilee stood up against Roman corruption and oppression for the common man without greed or any other motive less to make things right for those who suffered under the tyranny. This action and execution, in front of almost half a million people would have been the talk of the event that year and it is what made him famous and placed him on the radar. Its why Josephus and a few others noticed the blip on the radar and recorded what little they knew.

Two factors tied together evolved the movement rapidly. Hellenist had long wanted to divorce cultural Judaism, and the mythology started and was taking hold, and with the timing of the fall of the temple, the divorce from Judaism was finished. This movement absorbed all of Hellenistic Judaism, its what the movement was all about.

[outhouse]

The Story of Peter has been dismembered and Transvalued. Stop looking for places that don't exist! Guardtown doesn't exist.

That may be so.

But satellite villages were essential for agrarian needs to feed build and manage Sepphoris and its increase in population by the tens of thousands of Hellenist that placed a terrible burden on Aramaic Jewish villages.

Many of these satellite villages popped up during this period. And a good water well within walking distance of Sepphoris makes Nazareth very plausible.


We already known the unknown author of Mark did not know the geographic area and compiled pre existing traditions for his gospel. Your not making any kind of a case against Nazareth.