Against who was the Earliest Gospel written?

[Giuseppe]

A way to realize who is the author of a story is to identify the polemical target of that story.

Against who was the first Gospel written?

The answer: "the Pagan world" is not more satisfying, sorry. It was a good answer when there was still a not-diffuse knowledge of the various Christian sects. But now we know that there were a lot of Christian sects in conflict among them. So the Christian who wrote the Earliest Gospel was polemizing against other Christians.

Who was who?

If we see the Earliest Passion Narrative, we realize that:

1) the DNA of the Gospel Jesus is the Jewish scriptures,

2) the DNA being composed of Jewish scriptures works as a religious TESTIMONIUM,

3) any possible TESTIMONIUM works always against DENIERS of that precise testimonium.

The inference is that the enemies of the first evangelist were deniers of the claim that the Jesus (life, actions and death) was predicted and known in the scriptures.

The best candidate for a such role of deniers are the Gnostics. But not only the more radical (=older) Gnostics.

Also the Gnostics who were half-Judaizers.

According to the latter, the scriptures and their prophecies work as symbol of the power of prediction of the creator. If the scripture is wrong then the demiurge is wrong. The Ialdabaoth and Sabaoth myth in A.H. shows that the demiurge Ialdabaoth failed to predict the conversion of the his son Sabaoth, who replaced him as archon of this world, ending the his same Law. Hence the Gnostic half-Judaizers were adoring a reedemed Demiurge as Jesus-Sabaoth, differently from older Gnostics who continued to hate the Demiurge.

The last inference is that the first evangelist had to insist on two points:

1) against the radical Gnostics, the identity "Jesus = called Christ" had to serve to claim that YHWH is the only god,

2) against the Gnostic half-Judaizers, the demiurge's son Jesus-Sabaoth had to be reduced to the status of a mere pious Jew. In this way he ceased to be a Second God and gave again the supremacy to YHWH.

The separationism in Mark served to claim these two points:

1) the spiritual being was not more Jesus but the spiritual Christ sent from YHWH ("you are my beloved son").

2) the Second God Jesus-Sabaoth was reduced and neutralized as a mere pious Nazarene before YHWH's Christ.


Only abstract suggestions, for the moment.

[John2]

Against who was the first Gospel written?

The Pharisees (who were in cahoots with Herodians, priests and scribes), I think. It seems to be the case throughout Jesus' ministry.

Mk. 2:16-17:

And the scribes of the Pharisees, when they saw that he was eating with the sinners and publicans, said unto his disciples, How is it that he eateth and drinketh with publicans and sinners? And when Jesus heard it, he saith unto them ...

Mk. 2:18-19:

And John's disciples and the Pharisees were fasting: and they come and say unto him, Why do John's disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees fast, but thy disciples fast not? And Jesus said unto them ...

Mk. 2:24-25:

And the Pharisees said unto him, Behold, why do they on the sabbath day that which is not lawful? And he said unto them ...

Mk. 3:6-7:

And the Pharisees went out, and straightway with the Herodians took counsel against him, how they might destroy him. And Jesus with his disciples withdrew to the sea ...

Mk. 7:5-6:

And the Pharisees and the scribes ask him, Why walk not thy disciples according to the tradition of the elders, but eat their bread with defiled hands? And he said unto them, Well did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites ...

Mk. 8:11-15:

And the Pharisees came forth, and began to question with him, seeking of him a sign from heaven, trying him. And he sighed deeply in his spirit, and saith, Why doth this generation seek a sign? verily I say unto you, There shall no sign be given unto this generation ... And he charged them, saying, Take heed, beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod.

Mk. 10:2-3:

And there came unto him Pharisees, and asked him, Is it lawful for a man to put away his wife? trying him. And he answered and said unto them ...

Mk. 12:12-13:

And they sought to lay hold on him; and they feared the multitude; for they perceived that he spake the parable against them: and they left him, and went away. And they send unto him certain of the Pharisees and of the Herodians, that they might catch him in talk.

Mk. 14:1:

Now after two days was the feast of the passover and the unleavened bread: and the chief priests and the scribes sought how they might take him with subtlety, and kill him.

What Jesus is opposed to is the Pharisee's oral Torah, which Josephus says was the law of the land during this time (Ant. 13.10.6 and 18.1.3-4) and which was presumably considered to be divine:

Rabbinic Judaism has long held the Oral Law to be of divine origin. The divinity and authoritativeness of the Oral Law as transmitted from God to Moses on Mount Sinai, continues to be universally accepted by Orthodox and Haredi Judaism as a fundamental precept of Judaism.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oral_Tora ... _tradition

So Jesus' rejection of the oral Torah would have been as (if not more) controversial as the later Rabbinic response to Karaism, which similarly rejects the divinity of the oral Torah (even I got flak from my Reform rabbi when I became interested in Karaism).

Mk. 7:8-13:

Ye leave the commandment of God, and hold fast the tradition of men. And he said unto them, Full well do ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may keep your tradition. For Moses said, Honor thy father and thy mother; and, He that speaketh evil of father or mother, let him die the death: but ye say, If a man shall say to his father or his mother, That wherewith thou mightest have been profited by me is Corban, that is to say, Given to God; ye no longer suffer him to do aught for his father or his mother; making void the word of God by your tradition, which ye have delivered: and many such like things ye do.

http://www.karaitejudaism.org/talks/Who ... eretic.htm

[DCHindley]

For whom the Gospel tolls, It tolls for thee!

No man is an Iland, intire of it selfe; every man is a peece of the Continent, a part of the maine; if a Clod bee washed away by the Sea, Europe is the lesse, as well as if a Promontorie were, as well as if a Mannor of thy friends or of thine owne were; any mans death diminishes me, because I am involved in Mankinde; And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; It tolls for thee.

"Devotions upon Emergent Occasions," Meditation XVII.

As Patchy the Pirate says, as he opens the treasure chest to see a gold miner looking up at him as if in the mouth of his mine, he closes the lid and looks at the camera, saying: "I don't now what it means either ..."

[Giuseppe]

Against who was the first Gospel written?

The Pharisees (who were in cahoots with Herodians, priests and scribes), I think. It seems to be the case throughout Jesus' ministry.

So you can't apply the Criterion of Embarrassment to prove that Jesus was really killed by the Romans, since the responsability of the death was really, according to your view, on the shoulders of the only scribes and pharisees.

[Giuseppe]

John2's paradox:

1) Jesus was killed by Romans, not by Jews.---> the scribes and pharisees are only defamed and attacked without reason by the earliest gospel.

2) The scribes and pharisees were the true enemies of Jesus---> the Romans were innocent for the his death, as per the earliest gospel.
.
How can John2 believe both the things?

[John2]

John2's paradox:

1) Jesus was killed by Romans, not by Jews.---> the scribes and pharisees are only defamed and attacked without reason by the earliest gospel.

2) The scribes and pharisees were the true enemies of Jesus---> the Romans were innocent for the his death, as per the earliest gospel.
.
How can John2 believe both the things?

The Pharisees, in cahoots with priests and scribes and Herodians (and Judas), used their power and the influence they had with the people to have Jesus executed by the Romans.

Mk. 14:1:

It was now two days before the Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread. And the chief priests and the scribes were seeking how to arrest him by stealth and kill him.

Mk. 14:10-11:

Then Judas Iscariot, one of the Twelve, went to the chief priests to betray Jesus to them. They were delighted to hear this and promised to give him money. So he watched for an opportunity to hand him over.

Mk. 14:43:

And immediately, while he was still speaking, Judas came, one of the twelve, and with him a crowd with swords and clubs, from the chief priests and the scribes and the elders.

Mk. 14:53:

And they led Jesus to the high priest. And all the chief priests and the elders and the scribes came together.

Mk. 14:55:

Now the chief priests and the whole council were seeking testimony against Jesus to put him to death ...

Mk. 14:64:

They all condemned him as worthy of death.

Mk. 15:1:

And as soon as it was morning, the chief priests held a consultation with the elders and scribes and the whole council. And they bound Jesus and led him away and delivered him over to Pilate.

Mk. 15:3:

The chief priests accused him of many things.

Mk. 15:6-11:

Now it was the custom at the festival to release a prisoner whom the people requested. A man called Barabbas was in prison with the insurrectionists who had committed murder in the uprising. The crowd came up and asked Pilate to do for them what he usually did.

“Do you want me to release to you the king of the Jews?” asked Pilate, knowing it was out of self-interest that the chief priests had handed Jesus over to him. But the chief priests stirred up the crowd to have Pilate release Barabbas instead.

Mk. 15:15:

Wanting to satisfy the crowd, Pilate released Barabbas to them. He had Jesus flogged, and handed him over to be crucified.

So yes, the Romans killed Jesus, but it was at the instigation of the Pharisees, who used their power and position to work the system to have Jesus killed, as Mark says from the outset of Jesus' ministry in 3:6:

And the Pharisees went out, and straightway with the Herodians took counsel against him, how they might destroy him.

This situation is similar to that of the Damascus Document sect, which is commonly seen as being opposed to (and by) the Pharisees and their oral Torah while nevertheless believing in Pharisaic "notions" like the resurrection of the dead.

As VanderKam notes:

In a series of texts among the Scrolls a group of opponents is called "those who seek/look for smooth things" ... It is likely that the word for smooth things (halaqot) is a wordplay for the Pharisaic term halakhot (laws).

https://books.google.com/books?id=i2i5h ... ls&f=false

And Randall Price notes an example of belief in resurrection in the DSS here:

https://books.google.com/books?id=Y5OEH ... ls&f=false

These "Seekers of Smooth Things" (aka the Pharisees), who were in cahoots with what the Damascus Document calls "the kings of the peoples," used their power and position to "band together against the life of the righteous" and "exulted in the strife of the people":

For they sought smooth things and preferred illusions and they watched for breaks and chose the fair neck; and they justified the wicked and condemned the just, and they transgressed the Covenant and violated the precept. They banded together against the life of the righteous and loathed all who walked in perfection; they pursued them with the sword and exulted in the strife of the people.

[arnoldo]

The legendary Mountain Man had his Eusebian Fiction Postulate (EFP) and now the OP appears to support what may be called a Gnostic Fiction Postulate(GFP).

According to the GFP my guess is that the earliest gospel was written against the Pauline writer(s). In this case the anithesis would be the gospel writers reacting against the original gnostic Pauline writer(s) (thesis) in the first century. In the second century, according to the Proto-Orthodox Postulate (POP) a synthesis resulted in what came to be known as the Roman Catholic Church (RCC).

[Giuseppe]

The legendary Mountain Man had his Eusebian Fiction Postulate (EFP) and now the OP appears to support what may be called a Gnostic Fiction Postulate(GFP).

According to the GFP my guess is that the earliest gospel was written against the Pauline writer(s). In this case the anithesis would be the gospel writers reacting against the original gnostic Pauline writer(s) (thesis) in the first century. In the second century, according to the Proto-Orthodox Postulate (POP) a synthesis resulted in what came to be known as the Roman Catholic Church (RCC).

An unconcealed way to accuse my views of being similar to these of this guy, “the legendary Mountain Man”, when in terms of scientific respectability of the my thesis I may appeal to Robert M. Price, and especially to Jean Magne (reviewed positively by Jacob Neusner).

[arnoldo]

Point taken. I haven't read much of Price/Magne but will look it up. I have read some of Earl Doherty's and Herman Deterring's books. Deterring's The Fabricated Paul was well written although it seemed to be written more for a layman rather than academic audience. I looked up a review of the book and Price gives his approval to this book.

"Hermann Detering once again proves himself the most keenly insightful New Testament scholar of this generation, worthy to stand among the neglected giants of the radical criticism whose work he has brought to light to stir today's Bible students from their deep dogmatic slumbers. My own debt to his work is profound." - Prof. Robert M. Price

This may be an oversimplistic/wrong response but perhaps all of these authors, including yourself, would agree that the earliest gospels were written against a Pauline writer(s), no?

[Giuseppe]

This may be an oversimplistic/wrong response but perhaps all of these authors, including yourself, would agree that the earliest gospels were written against a Pauline writer(s), no?

I don't understand why the earliest gospel should be written against precisely Paul or Paulines.

Not even against the Ophites, the Naassenes, the Peratai, and other adorers of the Jesus-Revealer, the Jesus-Serpent.

I should examine the possibility that, between the more radical views (Paul and the Ophites) and the more judaizing views (e.g. Matthew), the earliest gospels (e.g Mark) were written against the adorers of Jesus-Sabaoth as Second God after YHWH (ditheism as evolution of a previous dualism).

What I am sure of is that the genre “Gospel” is OT-TESTIMONIUM: a story that proves that Jesus is predicted and KNOWN fully in the OT scriptures.

Just as another kind of TESTIMONIUM, the TESTIMONIUM FLAVIANUM , had to serve to prove that Jesus is in the real History.

If the Testimonium Flavianum was written against the mythicists of the time, then against who was the Testimonium called Gospel written ?

Simply this is the my question in this thread.