Giuseppe wrote: ↑Fri Feb 14, 2020 9:00 am
Ben C. Smith wrote: ↑Fri Feb 14, 2020 7:46 am
I am saying that crucifixion is not
unique in that respect. Beheadings can be public, and the head can be displayed.
you say well:
The beheading
can be public.
The crucifixion
has to be public.
This is also not true. Private masters could crucify their slaves, and the crucifixion would not have to be public in any
real sense.
If you want to say that the frequently public nature of crucifixion was of benefit to the mythmaking process, then fine. But I do not think it was
constitutive for that process in the same way that the connection with servitude may have been.
And the head can be displayed but only after the death is already happened. What was necessary, for mythical economy, was both death and exhibition in the same moment.
I do not know what this means. It sounds very much like a gratuitous assumption.
Besides, only one good reason (two at most) for the mode of death being crucifixion being required will be sufficient. And that reason ought to be the best one available, for the sake of the theory. It is unlikely that the creator of the myth would have multiple excellent reasons to hand for its creation, all of them equally good, for such a specific part of the myth.
Giuseppe wrote: ↑Fri Feb 14, 2020 9:55 am
This is the quote I refer above. I don't report the author deliberately. I would like to know the your view about it.
Two propositions clarify what "taking the form of a servant" should mean. This form is human form: ἐν ὁμοιώματι ἀνθρώπων γενόμενος, καὶ σχήματι εὑρεθεὶς ὡς ἄνθρωπος , "become (because he made himself) in the likeness of man, and on appearance, found as a man". Both phrases say approximately the same thing; it is debatable whether both should be attached to the second stansa, or separated by attaching the first to what precedes it. The second solution is, in my opinion, more logical: "become in the likeness of men" is the arrival point of the first voluntary humbling; "and in appearance found as a man", the starting point of humbling.
A more important issue is whether or not a more realistic meaning should be given them. The expressions "in the likeness", "in appearance, found as" lend themselves to a docetic interpretation, and were undoubtedly exploited a such. They do not necessarily imply, however, that Jesus' humanity was not real. On the contrary, since his divine form was real, so should his human form be. Otherwise what becomes of kenosis ? They wish to emphasize that although Jesus resembled a man and was taken for one, through his personality he was a god. The distinction lies between the person himself and the form or forms he possesses from Birth or might assume. In his treatise De carne Christi (VI) Tertullian tells us that "our Saviour himself appeared before Abraham in the midst of angels with a body that was not the result of birth". The flesh at Mambre was real because Jesus ate and spoke with Abraham, all the more reason the body of Jesus under Tiberius. What should be observed is that the reality of Christ's body assumes neither birth nor beath.
In a next post, I will report the point about the crucifixion.
If I understand this aright, then I think I am in basic agreement, so far as the Greek goes. The docetic language is ambiguous, but the potential for docetism is quite real.
Giuseppe wrote: ↑Fri Feb 14, 2020 10:10 am
The second abasement of Jesus mentioned in the hymn is that "he humbled himself, became obedient to the point of death, death on a cross". So far no difficulties arise. Two expressions however require comment: obedience and death on a cross.
Some critics wanted to regard the repetition "to the point of death on a cross" as a later addition. But to add the specification "on a cross", there is no need to repeat "to the point of death". Death and cross are in actual fact related: if the crucifixion was not believed, there would have been no belief in Jesus' death. When his teaching mission was accomplished, he would have reascended to heaven, as he will in fact after a certain period of time depending on the traditions, when he taught his disciples after his death and resurrection: "I came from the Father and have come into the world; I am leaving the world and going to the Father" (Jn 16:28). After Jesus' farewell speech to his disciples related in the Gospel of John one would expect the Ascension rather than the Passion. Paul's insistence, recalled in the First Letter to the Corinthians, apparently directes towards those who claimed the authority of Apollos or Cephas (1 Co 1:12), that he preached the crucified Jesus (1 Co 1:17,18, 23; 2:2), suggests that his crucifixion had not always been universally accepted.
(my bold)
This is the quote that has moved me to do the point about the crucifixion as a way to confirm that Jesus was
really dead and
exhibited easily as such.
Addenda: note in particular the quote:
if the crucifixion was not believed, there would have been no belief in Jesus' death
The implication is that the crucifixion was introduced to confirm/reinforce the belief in Jesus' death, belief that therefore was not so universal at the Origins. A Jesus who didn't die is merely a divine Revealer appeared under Tiberius and then ascended to heaven...
I find it easier to think that the line about crucifixion was added to the poem, if such it is, and rather as an emphasis on the Christian kerygma than as a way to make sure that Jesus "really" died. I am still rather fond of
my analysis earlier on this forum:
When we divide the passage up into clauses by marking the finite verbs, the line balance in Philippians 2.6-11 is pretty remarkable by contrast with the immediate context:
Philippians 2.1-18:
1 Εἴ τις οὖν παράκλησις ἐν Χριστῷ, εἴ τι παραμύθιον ἀγάπης, εἴ τις κοινωνία πνεύματος, εἴ τις σπλάγχνα καὶ οἰκτιρμοί, 2 πληρώσατέ μου τὴν χαρὰν
ἵνα τὸ αὐτὸ φρονῆτε, τὴν αὐτὴν ἀγάπην ἔχοντες, σύμψυχοι, τὸ ἓν φρονοῦντες, 3 μηδὲν κατ᾽ ἐριθείαν μηδὲ κατὰ κενοδοξίαν ἀλλὰ τῇ ταπεινοφροσύνῃ ἀλλήλους ἡγούμενοι ὑπερέχοντας ἑαυτῶν, 4 μὴ τὰ ἑαυτῶν ἕκαστος σκοποῦντες ἀλλὰ [καὶ] τὰ ἑτέρων ἕκαστοι.
5 Τοῦτο φρονεῖτε ἐν ὑμῖν ὃ καὶ ἐν Χριστῷ Ἰησοῦ,
6 [ὃς] ἐν μορφῇ θεοῦ ὑπάρχων οὐχ ἁρπαγμὸν ἡγήσατο τὸ εἶναι ἴσα θεῷ,
7 ἀλλὰ ἑαυτὸν ἐκένωσεν, μορφὴν δούλου λαβών, ἐν ὁμοιώματι ἀνθρώπων γενόμενος,
8 καὶ σχήματι εὑρεθεὶς ὡς ἄνθρωπος ἐταπείνωσεν ἑαυτὸν γενόμενος ὑπήκοος μέχρι θανάτου [θανάτου δὲ σταυροῦ].
9 διὸ καὶ ὁ θεὸς αὐτὸν ὑπερύψωσεν καὶ ἐχαρίσατο αὐτῷ τὸ ὄνομα τὸ ὑπὲρ πᾶν ὄνομα,
10 ἵνα ἐν τῷ ὀνόματι Ἰησοῦ πᾶν γόνυ κάμψῃ ἐπουρανίων καὶ ἐπιγείων καὶ καταχθονίων
11 καὶ πᾶσα γλῶσσα ἐξομολογήσηται ὅτι κύριος Ἰησοῦς Χριστὸς εἰς δόξαν θεοῦ πατρός.
12 Ὥστε, ἀγαπητοί μου, καθὼς πάντοτε ὑπηκούσατε, μὴ ὡς ἐν τῇ παρουσίᾳ μου μόνον ἀλλὰ νῦν πολλῷ μᾶλλον ἐν τῇ ἀπουσίᾳ μου,
μετὰ φόβου καὶ τρόμου τὴν ἑαυτῶν σωτηρίαν κατεργάζεσθε·
13 θεὸς γάρ ἐστιν ὁ ἐνεργῶν ἐν ὑμῖν καὶ τὸ θέλειν καὶ τὸ ἐνεργεῖν ὑπὲρ τῆς εὐδοκίας.
14 Πάντα ποιεῖτε χωρὶς γογγυσμῶν καὶ διαλογισμῶν,
15 ἵνα γένησθε ἄμεμπτοι καὶ ἀκέραιοι, τέκνα θεοῦ ἄμωμα μέσον γενεᾶς σκολιᾶς καὶ διεστραμμένης,
ἐν οἷς φαίνεσθε ὡς φωστῆρες ἐν κόσμῳ, 16 λόγον ζωῆς ἐπέχοντες, εἰς καύχημα ἐμοὶ εἰς ἡμέραν Χριστοῦ,
ὅτι οὐκ εἰς κενὸν ἔδραμον οὐδὲ εἰς κενὸν ἐκοπίασα.
17 Ἀλλὰ εἰ καὶ σπένδομαι ἐπὶ τῇ θυσίᾳ καὶ λειτουργίᾳ τῆς πίστεως ὑμῶν,
χαίρω καὶ συγχαίρω πᾶσιν ὑμῖν·
18 τὸ δὲ αὐτὸ καὶ ὑμεῖς χαίρετε καὶ συγχαίρετέ μοι.