Scapegoat Sacrifice and the Crucifixion

[Secret Alias]

Really? So it's up in the air whether (a) Paul believes in the scriptures or (b) observant Jews lived in a liturgical year which distinguished between Passover and Yom Kippur. Isn't it likely you don't much about how Jews think or whether or not there are profound cultural differences? Maybe just maybe ...

I've met a lot of Jews in my life. More than you. I think I am entitled to be an expert on 'how Jews think' or at least that it should be conceded that

(a) people who know how to distinguish between Passover and Yom Kippur are 'different' from white people
(b) white people maybe 'don't give a fuck' but that's because they don't know the difference between Passover and Yom Kippur
and
(c) white people are more prone to accept the 'don't give a fuck' hypothesis because they themselves 'don't give a fuck.'

I represent someone who knows how to distinguish Passover and Yom Kippur but who in spite of that doesn't give a fuck. Nevertheless I don't think Paul was like me (or like you for that matter).

[Peter Kirby]

So it's up in the air whether (a) Paul believes in the scriptures

No.

I don't care about your feelings of entitlement, however.

Let us know when you have something. Like a better explanation.

[Peter Kirby]

Or if you only care about the mysterious weird contradiction, you could at least quote the passages of Romans that are supposed to contradict 1 Cor 5:7 and thus be all mysterious and weird.

[Secret Alias]

It is not a matter of 'contradicting' one passage or another. There are references to Jesus being the Paschal lamb and other references to Jesus being the goat of Yom Kippur. The idea that Jesus' death provides an atonement or reconciliation of humankind with heaven (e.g., Romans 5:10) carries an echo of the scapegoat sacrifice. The Letter to the Hebrews 8-10, in particular, explicitly proposes that the blood of Jesus substitutes for the blood of future atonement sacrifices. Did Paul write Hebrews? The ancients seemed to think so. Clement argued that 'Luke' translated the work or wrote it for Paul (from memory). There is also Romans 3:25 which mentions the 'mercy seat' which was used in the Yom Kippur sacrifices.

My only point here is to (as always) emphasize that we can have little or no certainty about anything. Our gospels are not original. They are late second century copies of something written in the first century. How many times these texts were rewritten is anyone's guess. I suppose that this occurred many times so I am exploring whether it is at least theoretically possible (how ever remotely possible) that the earliest gospel went Yom Kippur to Yom Kippur (= one year) with Jesus and Simon Peter going to the priest and Simon Peter 'sent away' to become the apostle and Jesus sacrificed as Yom Kippur goat.

Is this likely? I don't know. Probably not. But it is worth investigating how original the scapegoat imagery might run.

[Secret Alias]

The next obvious question is - how important is Passover to the crucifixion narrative? Does it really change anything if Jesus isn't the Passover lamb but the Yom Kippur goat?

[Secret Alias]

FWIW I cursory examination of Barnabas reveals no explicit reference to Passover only Yom Kippur.

[Secret Alias]

And I think this points to the underlying danger of mythicism which traditional scholarship is quite aware of. I coined the term 'white mythicism' because I wanted to shine light on the fact that ever since Drews there has been a tendency of mythicism to reflect the POV of the mythicist. An obvious exception is Raschke. But for the most part mythicists - IMO owing to their distaste or general lack of knowledge of Judaism - tend to develop mythical explanations of the gospel from their cultural background (i.e. pagan myths, Western myths).

I have argued consistently that given the Jewish scriptural bedrock upon which the gospel was developed, the most likely developers of a 'Jesus myth' (assuming there were such people) would be Jews. White mythicists at this forum and elsewhere in some form have to acknowledge that reality but typically want or need to accommodate their ignorance about what is or isn't likely within a proposed subset of 'Jewish mythicists inventing Christianity' by basically saying that 'anything could be possible' simply because they are too ignorant or too lazy (= too stupid?) to make convincing arguments for what is 'most likely' among this subset of people.

Historism finds itself in a similar difficulty when its apologists try to argue that it is 'possible' or even likely that Jews could have accepted a man (= Jesus) as a God. Perhaps I should similarly label this 'white historicism.' Nevertheless white mythicists love to exploit implausible or unlikely Jewish beliefs among historicists but somehow invent a hitherto unknown historical cultural group - what we may loosely refer to as 'scripturally obedient Jews who embraced pagan myths.'

My only point in bringing up the possibility of two Jesus cultures - i.e. one which assumed that Jesus was crucified on the Passover another which seemed to understand Jesus in terms of a Yom Kippur offering - because it highlights some important issues for mythicism. Let's suppose for a moment that there was no historical 'event' behind the gospel, that it was all made up (the position I think of most mythicists). Since there is no historical event but rather a broad sweeping myth, how can we know for certain that the Epistle of Barnabas for instance did not come from a Yom Kippur based interpretation of Jesus's sacrifice as opposed to let's say the Book of Revelations with its obvious Passover based sacrifice?

Indeed I would go one step further since Paul would have had the freedom to invent either a Paschal or a Yom Kippur sacrifice based 'myth' one would expect him to limit himself to buttress the understanding that this ahistorical event had fulfilled the expectations of the Jewish religion. There is no room for 'he didn't give a fuck.' In the case of a Passover sacrifice Jesus was either 'the man of war' (Ex 15:3) or the sacrificed lamb - he can't be both this is 'mythically incongruous.' The fact that white mythicists have little or no feel for the Jewish mythical system isn't my problem.

Similarly either the gospel is a made up story about a god who came to die as the Paschal lamb on Passover or the Yom Kippur sacrifice on Yom Kippur. If Paul invented the myth of Jesus the Paschal lamb one would expect more in his letters that interpret the non-event as a Paschal offering. Instead what we find in Romans (the most comprehensive 'offering' or 'sacrifice' discussion is the idea that Jesus was the goat not the lamb.

Again I think that mythicists want it both ways. On the one hand they haven't entirely embraced the nihilism inherent in their break with the past - viz. there was no historical event. I think a real historical Jesus 'really' being sacrificed on a particular day of the calendar year which happened to be close to Passover allows for Paul and others to argue that the real historical death meant X or Y in the allegorical world of symbolism. However if Paul had no historical framework to work from and was simply developing a myth 'as if' Jesus was sacrificed on a particular religious holiday - in this case Passover allegedly - it is surprising and in fact implausible for him and subsequent embracers of this non-event to develop a Paschal sacrifice as a Yom Kippur offering (as in Romans and Hebrews).

The reason for this is obvious. It is difficult to believe that Paul and his followers would really accept that a non-event could be the offering which put to an end the Jewish religion. Unlike Mormons and other examples that might be brought up, Jews were locked up within an extremely repressive religious system which denied them any escape. The only way Paul and his followers could have appealed his message to Jews and succeeded was if he was arguing that Jesus and his sacrifice completed the abolition of Jewish law according to reasonable halakhic arguments.

It would be unreasonable to suggest that early Christians 'didn't give a fuck' (to quote Peter) about these considerations. As such I think there are strong reasons for assuming that within a Christian mythicist framework (a) Paul had to make reasonable halakhic arguments for the justification of the central premise of the gospel - viz. that Jesus crucifixion ended the law and brought in a new age of freedom because of the accompanying 'redemption of humanity' and (b) any argument making the case for redemption would necessarily be developed around a Yom Kippur sacrifice not a Paschal sacrifice.

[Peter Kirby]

It is not a matter of 'contradicting' one passage or another. There are references to Jesus being the Paschal lamb and other references to Jesus being the goat of Yom Kippur. The idea that Jesus' death provides an atonement or reconciliation of humankind with heaven (e.g., Romans 5:10) carries an echo of the scapegoat sacrifice.

Romans 5:10 (ESV) -
For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life.

There is also Romans 3:25 which mentions the 'mercy seat' which was used in the Yom Kippur sacrifices.

Romans 3:25 (ESV) -
whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins.

If Paul invented the myth of Jesus the Paschal lamb one would expect more in his letters that interpret the non-event as a Paschal offering. Instead what we find in Romans (the most comprehensive 'offering' or 'sacrifice' discussion is the idea that Jesus was the goat not the lamb.

1) Don't know if Paul were the inventor.
2) Don't find anything about Jesus being the goat of Yom Kippur in Romans.
3) Do find the explicit reference to Jesus being a passover sacrifice in 1 Corinthians 5:7.

1 Corinthians 5:7 (NASB) -
Clean out the old leaven so that you may be a new lump, just as you are in fact unleavened. For Christ our Passover also has been sacrificed.

Did Paul write Hebrews?

Doubt it.

Since there is no historical event but rather a broad sweeping myth, how can we know for certain that the Epistle of Barnabas for instance did not come from a Yom Kippur based interpretation of Jesus's sacrifice as opposed to let's say the Book of Revelations with its obvious Passover based sacrifice?

That would seem to be a valid point.

As such I think there are strong reasons for assuming that ...... Paul ...... would necessarily [have the death of Jesus] be developed around a Yom Kippur sacrifice not a Paschal sacrifice.

This just illustrates the irrelevance of your subjective feelings about the matter... because that's not something that can be shown from the letters of Paul.

[Peter Kirby]

Historism finds itself in a similar difficulty when its apologists try to argue that it is 'possible' or even likely that Jews could have accepted a man (= Jesus) as a God. Perhaps I should similarly label this 'white historicism.' Nevertheless white mythicists love to exploit implausible or unlikely Jewish beliefs among historicists but somehow invent a hitherto unknown historical cultural group - what we may loosely refer to as 'scripturally obedient Jews who embraced pagan myths.'

You seem to be developing a point that could be valid in general, but any such validity doesn't carry over into your own particular judgments.

I think a real historical Jesus 'really' being sacrificed on a particular day of the calendar year which happened to be close to Passover allows for Paul and others to argue that the real historical death meant X or Y in the allegorical world of symbolism. However if Paul had no historical framework to work from and was simply developing a myth 'as if' Jesus was sacrificed on a particular religious holiday - in this case Passover allegedly - it is surprising and in fact implausible for him and subsequent embracers of this non-event to develop a Paschal sacrifice as a Yom Kippur offering (as in Romans and Hebrews).

This just shows how much the barrel has to be scraped in order to reach these bottom-of-the-barrel type arguments. By rights, the so-called "real historical Jesus 'really' being sacrificed on a particular day of the calendar year which happened to be close to PASSOVER" should be an arrow in the "mythicist" quiver. The significance of Passover is not nil, and it is a very real option for selection in a myth-making scenario.

But, no, instead of this fact being recognized, we get to hear ranting (we can only really call it ranting, since it primarily proceeds on the basis of the idea that a certain single individual necessarily has superior insight and therefore correct opinions) about how the Passover should not have entered into the myth-making at all, how the Yom Kippur sacrifice should have been the only connection made with Jesus, how the Jewish mindset could not abide developing two different associations with cultic sacrifices made during different times on the Jewish calendar, and therefore how there must have been a 'real historical Jesus' being killed 'close to' Passover in order to explain all this.

Good grief. Let's just declare the historicity of Jesus, as a part of known history, dead already then. It really has no very good arguments in its favor.

PS--

'scripturally obedient Jews

Paul was a non-'scripturally obedient' Jew, and the people that he were recruiting certainly did not consist of a bunch of entirely "scripturally obedient Jews." Did you not get the memo? Circumcision is no longer necessary, ergo obedience to the law is unnecessary, ergo scriptural obedience is unnecessary. This is 101-level stuff, and in your zeal to paint a certain picture ("this could not have happened, but only this could have happened, because I understand Judaism and I say so"), you've left this fact out of the equation. Can we really trust your judgment completely, as you insist that we do, if you can misunderstand what you are pontificating about so completely, even if you simply made a gross misstatement by mistake?

[Secret Alias]

Well it depends what you mean by scripturally obedient Jews. When I used the term I meant Paul believed that the scriptures (Isaiah etc) knew and foretold the future, that they had the power of the spirit. For instance that the Law commanded all the commandments be fulfilled etc. It wasn't like he was an atheist.