Carrier proposes the NT Jesus based on Philo's Jesus angel

[Giuseppe]

We can all see that Philo has an angel who shares some of the attributes given to Jesus Christ by early Christians. This has always been recognised.

However I can’t see Philo naming this angel Jesus. He names him “the East” unless the translation is incorrect.

Zechariah names him “the Sprout” which might link him to the house of David or Messiah as we might expect.

Even if I assume that Zechariah names ''the Sprout'' not his Joshua, but the future Messiah referred later chapters in Zacharia, even in that case I find correct the Carrier's proof. It's too much improbable as coincidence the ''coincidence'' that the name ''Jesus'' appears so near to two other coincidences (that the angel of Paul and the angel of Philo share the same features).

[Blood]

Assuming Philo inspired the Jesus mythos, how come no patristic writer referred to this "prophecy"? Perhaps because they were unsure of when [Philo] lived?

20-25 BC/BCE to 40-50 AD/CE ??

These dates are just a guess by modern scholars. It is not known when Philo actually lived, only that he was alive when Caligula was emperor.

[Blood]

Assuming Philo inspired the Jesus mythos, how come no patristic writer referred to this "prophecy"? Perhaps because they were unsure of when [Philo] lived?

20-25 BC/BCE to 40-50 AD/CE ??

These dates are just a guess by modern scholars. It is not known when Philo actually lived, only that he was alive when Caligula was emperor.

[Ben C. Smith]

We can all see that Philo has an angel who shares some of the attributes given to Jesus Christ by early Christians. This has always been recognised.

However I can’t see Philo naming this angel Jesus. He names him “the East” unless the translation is incorrect.

Zechariah names him “the Sprout” which might link him to the house of David or Messiah as we might expect.

Carrier writes on pages 81-82 (Element 6), and pages 200, 203 (Element 40) of On the Historicity of Jesus:

[Element 6] In the Septuagint text, Zechariah is commanded in a vision to place the crown of kingship upon 'Jesus' (Zech. 6.11) and to say immediately upon doing so that 'Jehovah declares' that this Jesus is 'the man named ''Rising" and he shall rise up from his place below and he shall build the House of the Lord'. The key noun is anatole, which is often translated 'East' because it refers to where the sun rises (hence 'East'), but such a translation obscures the fact that the actual word used is the noun 'rising' or 'rise' (as in 'sunrise'), which was not always used in reference to a compass point, and whose real connotations are more obvious when translated literally. In fact by immediately using the cognate verb 'to rise up' (anatelei, and that explicitly 'from his place below') it's clear the Septuagint translator understood the word to mean 'rise' (and Philo echoes the same pun in his interpretation, and thus also understood: see Element 40). We know Zechariah meant this in some way to be Jesus ben Jehozadak, the legendary first high priest of the second temple (as I'll discuss shortly). But by implying this event may have occurred in heaven, interpreters could think differently. And we know some did (Element 40).

If this 'Jesus Rising' were connected to the dying servant who atones for all sins in Isaiah (and perhaps also with Daniel or I IQI 3), it would be easy to read out of this almost the entire core Christian gospel. Connecting the two figures in just that way would be natural to do: this same 'Jesus' who is named 'Rising' (or, in both places, 'Branch' in the extant Hebrew, as in 'Davidic heir', or so both contexts imply) appears earlier in Zechariah 3, where 'Jesus' is also implied to be the one called ' Rising' (in 3.8). Both are also called 'Jesus the high priest' throughout Zechariah 3 and 6, hence clearly the same person. And there he is also called God's 'servant'. And it is said that through him (in some unspecified way) all sin in the world will be cleansed 'in a single day' (Zech. 3.9). Both concepts converge with Isaiah 52-53, which is also about God's 'servant', whose death cleanses the world's sins (Isa. 52.13 and 53.11), which of course would thus happen in a single day (as alluded in Isa. 52.6). And as we saw earlier, Jews may have been linking this dying 'servant' to the dying 'Christ' killed in Daniel 9 (in 11Qt3), whose death is also said to correspond closely with a conclusive 'end of sin' in the world (Dan. 9.24-26), and both figures (in Daniel and 11Qt3) were linked to an expected 'atonement in a single day' after a period of 490 years, whose starting point one needed only to discover in order to predict the end of the world (see Element 5).

These dots are so easily connected, and with such convincing force for anyone enamored of the thought process generating the Jewish pesherim as a literary genre, that it would be astonishing if no Jews had thought of this.

....

[Element 40] In fact, the Christian idea of a preexistent spiritual son of God called the Logos, who was God's true high priest in heaven, was also not a novel idea but already held by some pre-Christian Jews; and this preexistent spiritual son of God had already been explicitly connected with a celestial Jesus figure in the OT (discussed in Element 6), and therefore some Jews already believed there was a supernatural son of God named Jesus because Paul's contemporary Philo interprets the messianic prophecy of Zech. 6.12 in just such a way. This is the prophecy about a high priest crowned king in heaven named 'Jesus Rising', God's 'servant', who will 'rise' from below and be given godly authority and somehow be involved in cleansing the world of sin.

As discussed in Element 6, in Zechariah 6 we have a man named Jesus being crowned king, 'rising' from his place below, and building up God's house, which is a feasible description of our Jesus; and this same Jesus appearing in Zechariah 6 also appears in Zechariah 3, where he is given supreme authority over God's domain (just as our Jesus was), and somehow ends all sins in a single day just as our Jesus does), and this same Jesus is in both passages called a high priest (as was our Jesus). Discussing this Jesus figure in Zechariah, Philo argues: "'Behold, the man named Rising!' is a very novel appellation indeed, if you consider it as spoken of a man who is compounded of body and souI. But if you look upon it as applied to that incorporeal being who is none other than the divine image, you will then agree that the name of 'Rising' has been given to him with great felicity. For the Father of the Universe has caused him to rise up as the eldest son, whom, in another passage, he calls the firstborn. And he who is thus born, imitates the ways of his father."

In the same book, Philo says that even if no one is 'worthy to be called a Son of God', we should still 'labor earnestly to be adorned according to his firstborn Logos, the eldest of his angels, the ruling archangel of many names'. Elsewhere Philo adds that 'there are two Temples of God, and one is this cosmos, wherein the High Priest is his Firstborn Son, the divine Logos' (whom Philo elsewhere identifies as the primordial 'image of God').

....

I have heard doubts whether Philo (or his source) was aware of the whole sentence he quotes from Zechariah and thus of the name 'Jesus' being in it. But such doubts are unwarranted. Nearly the whole sentence in Zechariah, in the Greek translation quoted by Philo, reads: "You shall make crowns, and set them upon the head of Jesus the son of Jehovah the Righteous, the high priest, and say to him, 'Thus says the almighty Lord, "'Behold, the man whose name is Rising (anatole)" and he shall rise up [anatelei] from his place below and shall build the house of the Lord, and receive power, and sit and rule upon his throne'" (Zech. 6.11-13).

The whole sentence (of which Philo quotes only the part here in bold thus identifies the man spoken of as both God's son and high priest, and in the very same sentence names him Jesus. This creates a series of coincidences far too improbable to imagine on any other conclusion than that Philo and Paul were talking about the same figure: Jesus the Son of Jehovah the Righteous, the image of God, God's agent of creation, God's high priest and firstborn son (see Elements 6 and I0).

(I cite these passages so as to present a fuller view of the argument at hand, not in order to endorse it.) Carrier appears to be arguing that, because Zechariah "in some way" thought of Jesus/Joshua ben Jehozadak as the man named "East" or "Rising", therefore Philo must have thought this figure was named Jesus/Joshua.

Ben.

[Secret Alias]

Since the angel Ish is already attested in multiple sources the fact that Zechariah identifies this anatole figure as an Ish makes a much better argument. Indeed Justin when discussing the passage (Dialogue multiple references) he does so by means of him being called "man" (= Ish). Carrier's efforts to develop a "stupid man's argument" i.e. one that everyday folks/groupies can latch on to (so that groupies can latch on to his torso) is an oversimplification which distracts from the ultimate aim of recognizing pre-existent Jewish interest in the "Jesus angel" (= the angel Man)

[Secret Alias]

And what does it tell the rest of the world when the first 'notorious' mythicist has to stoop to misrepresenting the evidence in order to bolster the case for a supernatural Jesus? My sense (from following his various media outlets) is that he doesn't even care about the cause he espouses. It only serves to reinforce the perception that atheism is indistinguishable from rabid uncontrolled egoism. God doesn't exist so now I take his place at the center of the fucking universe. All he cares about is his own notoriety. Uncovering the truth is secondary and only needed if it furthers his greater ambitions. I've said it before, Carrier is the worst first Jesus mythicist of any notoriety.

[Giuseppe]

Carrier appears to be arguing that, because Zechariah "in some way" thought of Jesus/Joshua ben Jehozadak as the man named "East" or "Rising", therefore Philo must have thought this figure was named Jesus/Joshua.

Ben.

Ben, I would do this clarification in your comment above (please correct me if I'm wrong):

Carrier appears to be arguing that, because a possible prima facie reading of Zechariah is that he "in some way" thought of Jesus/Joshua ben Jehozadak as the man named "East" or "Rising", therefore Philo must have thought this figure was named Jesus/Joshua.

Why I think it's necessary that clarification?

Because I think that the Carrier's argument holds all his force even if we assume that the original true reading of Zacharia is that ''East'' didn't refer to ''Joshua ben Jehozadak'', but to future Messiah mentioned later chapters.

Please read how Richard himself replied me here.

[Secret Alias]

The tsemach is clealy not Joshua who in turn is explicitly human with a human lineage. You'd think if Justin could have made the argument he would have made the argument. But he doesn't because he has more intellectual integrity than Carrier.

[Michael BG]

That Philo calls his angel :
the first-born son of God
the celestial image of God
God's agent of creation
God's celestial High Priest, etc,

it's a mere coincidence.

That Paul calls his Jesus:
the first-born son of God
the celestial image of God
God's agent of creation
God's celestial High Priest, etc,

it's a coincidence.

But that Philo calls his angel 'JESUS' (by seeing that Zecharia calls Anatolè his Jesus - even if that Jesus was not meant by Zecahria), alas, that cannot be a coincidence!

Many people have seen the parallels between the language of Philo and the language used in some New Testament documents.
However neither Zechariah nor Philo use the name “Jesus”.

2) the Archangel/Logos of Philo, already named 'Jesus' (via Carrier's proof of this I presume you know already), represents the maximum of moral perfection, etc.

There is no Carrier proof.
A case can be made that Philo has a heavenly being or angel and early Christian writers used the same terms as Philo to refer to Jesus Christ, but this is not the same as saying Philo has an angel named Jesus.

[TedM]

Many people have seen the parallels between the language of Philo and the language used in some New Testament documents.
However neither Zechariah nor Philo use the name “Jesus”.

Well, we ought to be able to establish if that is correct or not, right?


The Greek Septuagint has this for Zechariah 11:

"And thou shalt take silver and gold, and make crowns, and thou shalt put them upon the head of Jesus the son of Josedec the high priest;

SO, can we agree that the name Jesus appeared in the Greek version of Zechariah -- Yes or No?


Next, what was Philo quoting from?
"Behold the man whose name is the Branch" is found in Zechariah, and nowhere else in the OT. Philo used the OT writings, and not sparingly.

SO, was Philo referencing some OTHER text with the exact same wording, or is it likely that he was referring to the verse in Zechariah?


Q for Bernard: You say that the Greek passage should be interpreted as: and he[the Branch] shall spring up from his[Jesus, son of Josedec's] stem,

While yes, that seems to clearly say that the Branch come out of Jesus' stem -- meaning it would not be Jesus himself, would you agree that the passage very well may have been slightly differently interpreted by some in a way that says Jesus, son of Josedec, is the Branch who will build the temple?

For example the NASB seems to do just that:

11 Take silver and gold, make an ornate crown and set it on the head of Joshua the son of Jehozadak, the high priest. 12 Then say to him, ‘Thus says the Lord of hosts, “Behold, a man whose name is Branch, for He will branch out from where He is; and He will build the temple of the Lord.