A Japanese Model for Christian origins with a Jesus who never preached

Discussion about the New Testament, apocrypha, gnostics, church fathers, Christian origins, historical Jesus or otherwise, etc.
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Ken Olson
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Re: A Japanese Model for Christian origins with a Jesus who never preached

Post by Ken Olson »

GakuseiDon wrote: Thu Dec 02, 2021 5:30 pm]
One thing that interests me is the lack of apparent visions of a heavenly Jesus reported in the early literature. Paul notes apparent appearances, but beyond that, the "age of revelation" (as I personally call it) seemed to have ended with Paul. Yet, to my mind, having a heavenly Jesus that was accessible with people on earth should have driven a lot more appearances stories than just Paul's.

Some options:
  1. No further significant appearances occurred at that early time, which I find hard to believe.
  2. There were stories of appearances but they were dropped by proto-orthodox editors since they didn't conform to the proto-orthodoxy of the time
  3. Some other reason
GakuseiDon,

What do you expect a vision of a heavely Jesus to look like? Might it look like this:
12 Then I turned to see whose voice it was that spoke to me, and on turning I saw seven golden lampstands, 13 and in the midst of the lampstands I saw one like the Son of Man, clothed with a long robe and with a golden sash across his chest. 14 His head and his hair were white as white wool, white as snow; his eyes were like a flame of fire, 15 his feet were like burnished bronze, refined as in a furnace, and his voice was like the sound of many waters. 16 In his right hand he held seven stars, and from his mouth came a sharp, two-edged sword, and his face was like the sun shining with full force.

17 When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead. But he placed his right hand on me, saying, “Do not be afraid; I am the first and the last, 18 and the living one. I was dead, and see, I am alive forever and ever; and I have the keys of Death and of Hades. 19 Now write what you have seen, what is, and what is to take place after this. 20 As for the mystery of the seven stars that you saw in my right hand, and the seven golden lampstands: the seven stars are the angels of the seven churches, and the seven lampstands are the seven churches.
I don’t think the Age of Revelation ended with Paul.

Best,

Ken
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GakuseiDon
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Re: A Japanese Model for Christian origins with a Jesus who never preached

Post by GakuseiDon »

Ken Olson wrote: Thu Dec 02, 2021 6:09 pmWhat do you expect a vision of a heavely Jesus to look like?
I was thinking about appearances on earth, like we had at Lourdes and Fatima of the Virgin Mary. I know that some speculate that the 'old man' in Justin Martyr's "Dialogue with Trypho" was supposed to be Jesus in a different form, but Justin himself doesn't explicitly say that.
Ken Olson wrote: Thu Dec 02, 2021 6:09 pmMight it look like this:
Yes, those as well, though I was thinking more about actual appearances. I'd have expected that Paul and the early Christians to have started a cottage industry around communications with Jesus. One of the weaknesses of my own "magic" origin of Christianity is the lack of accounts of such an industry.
Ken Olson wrote: Thu Dec 02, 2021 6:09 pmI don’t think the Age of Revelation ended with Paul.
I don't expect that it did either. Which is why I'm curious about what happened with Amitabha Buddha.
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neilgodfrey
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Re: A Japanese Model for Christian origins with a Jesus who never preached

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GakuseiDon wrote: Thu Dec 02, 2021 5:30 pm Some options:
  1. No further significant appearances occurred at that early time, which I find hard to believe.
  2. There were stories of appearances but they were dropped by proto-orthodox editors since they didn't conform to the proto-orthodoxy of the time
  3. Some other reason
Anthropological studies of religious practices point to the above middle option being the most likely explanation. See a discussion of one relevant article at https://vridar.org/2021/03/23/changing- ... societies/

Visions of individuals are not subject to organizational control. They are good for getting things started but they cannot be allowed to continue for reasons explained in the article. Christianity's visions in the orthodox catholic branch were controlled as founding events in the gospels and Acts: All the apostolic visions at the founding time are recorded there and they preclude alternative accounts of visions found in some of the "gnostic" literature.

Paul's letters speak of ecstatic events -- comparable to visions, especially since visionary states were often catalyzed by bodily regimens -- and history does show the Montanist "movement" arising in the second century and that was no doubt a wake up call for some serious control to be imposed. Turmel has proposed that it was in response to Montanism that the restrictions on tongues was slipped into 1 Corinthians. There are good reasons for dating Acts in the latter part of the second century, too.
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Jagd
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Re: A Japanese Model for Christian origins with a Jesus who never preached

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GakuseiDon wrote: Thu Dec 02, 2021 8:26 pm appearances on earth
Don't the epistles imply that Paul saw Jesus in visions? It sounds like the visions would necessarily make him an apparition of some kind, even if they're mundane in comparison to the Book of Revelation. I suppose "docetism" suggests that anyone who saw Jesus was seeing him as an apparition of some kind.
Jesus says: I stood in the middle of the world, and in flesh I appeared to them. - Saying 28, Gospel of Thomas
I know it gets a bit tedious to break down the wording.
Last edited by Jagd on Fri Dec 03, 2021 12:24 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Jagd
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Re: A Japanese Model for Christian origins with a Jesus who never preached

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I remember someone quoting a Buddhist monk's response to the question of if the Buddha was a real and historical person. Paraphrasing:
For the person who needs the Buddha to exist, the Buddha exists.
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Jagd
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Re: A Japanese Model for Christian origins with a Jesus who never preached

Post by Jagd »

neilgodfrey wrote: Thu Dec 02, 2021 9:12 pm Visions of individuals are not subject to organizational control.
When I was reading into the historicity of Muhammad I was shocked to learn that there's perhaps even less information about him than the historical Jesus. The origins of Islam appear to be:
  • Inherited aphorisms from older cultures (a lot of Syriac imports, apparently)
  • Stories from other cultures/traditions retold (there's no way the "listeners" of Muhammad could sit down and hear those long, long retellings of Biblical figures and remember them word-for-word)
  • Mystical Arabic poetry from individual(s)
And then Muhammad was invented as the speaker of the whole book and as the hero for some legend made up for how their people came to power. This Muhammad became the "seal of the prophets" - no more visions allowed!

It seems that we see a similar closing of prophecy in the Pentecost story ("We used to have all these visions, but that's over -- now go listen to your priest!"). I suppose the resumed revelations you see in the founders of Manichaeism, Mormonism, and Swedenborgianism are, technically, returns of that old apostolic way.
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neilgodfrey
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Re: A Japanese Model for Christian origins with a Jesus who never preached

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Jagd wrote: Fri Dec 03, 2021 12:34 am It seems that we see a similar closing of prophecy in the Pentecost story ("We used to have all these visions, but that's over -- now go listen to your priest!"). I suppose the resumed revelations you see in the founders of Manichaeism, Mormonism, and Swedenborgianism are, technically, returns of that old apostolic way.
Indeed. Acts is the classic foundation story. All the miracles -- visions, tongues, God striking people dead, angels, miracles -- they all happen at the beginning for a reason. As that anthropological analysis points out, the weakness of organized religions is that rebels can always arise to break off with a new teaching, and so often we find that rebel introducing a new order with visions or tongues that are subsequently shut down or "die out" as the new order is established.
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GakuseiDon
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Re: A Japanese Model for Christian origins with a Jesus who never preached

Post by GakuseiDon »

neilgodfrey wrote: Thu Dec 02, 2021 9:12 pmVisions of individuals are not subject to organizational control. They are good for getting things started but they cannot be allowed to continue for reasons explained in the article. Christianity's visions in the orthodox catholic branch were controlled as founding events in the gospels and Acts: All the apostolic visions at the founding time are recorded there and they preclude alternative accounts of visions found in some of the "gnostic" literature.
Good comment, and thanks for the link.
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GakuseiDon
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Re: A Japanese Model for Christian origins with a Jesus who never preached

Post by GakuseiDon »

Jagd wrote: Fri Dec 03, 2021 12:20 am
GakuseiDon wrote: Thu Dec 02, 2021 8:26 pm appearances on earth
Don't the epistles imply that Paul saw Jesus in visions? It sounds like the visions would necessarily make him an apparition of some kind, even if they're mundane in comparison to the Book of Revelation.
Here I am differentiating between "vision" and "appearance" in this way: A vision is something one can have with their eyes closed. An appearance implies that one sees something with the eyes open. I know that "vision" can be the latter as well, but I'm curious about appearances. I'm thinking of 1 Cor 15:16 which has "he was seen of above five hundred brethren at once", which to me implies an "appearance", though it might also be some kind of group vision event.

Anyway, I didn't want to sidetrack the thread to make it about Jesus! I'm interested in what the literature tells us about Amitabha Buddha, for any hints about how it might apply to earliest Christianity.
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neilgodfrey
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Re: A Japanese Model for Christian origins with a Jesus who never preached

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neilgodfrey wrote: Thu Dec 02, 2021 9:12 pm
GakuseiDon wrote: Thu Dec 02, 2021 5:30 pm Some options:
  1. No further significant appearances occurred at that early time, which I find hard to believe.
  2. There were stories of appearances but they were dropped by proto-orthodox editors since they didn't conform to the proto-orthodoxy of the time
  3. Some other reason
Anthropological studies of religious practices point to the above middle option being the most likely explanation. See a discussion of one relevant article at https://vridar.org/2021/03/23/changing- ... societies/
I have dusted off a copy of Norelli's 1995 commentary and am reminded that he argues that the Ascension of Isaiah was put together to protest against the stifling of visionary prophetic experiences among Christians. I plan to outline his case in a future blog post.

DeepL translation:
In AI 1-5 we therefore have an author who writes to defend AI 6-11, a pre-existing writing, against the attacks of the ecclesiastical authorities. The fact that 6-11 was already fixed and circulated, and as such was under discussion, explains why the author of 1-5, while adding it to his own work, did not make any changes to it . . . . .

Indeed, the very fact that he wants to re-propose and defend A I 6-11, and with it the group of prophets for whom that is the fundamental Christological text, implies that he feels in continuity with the group within which 6-11 was produced. These must be two phases in the history of the same group. Both parts of AI therefore emanate from a Christian milieu . . . .


Now, in 6-11 the anabatic prophets are presented as the core and chief authority in the Christian community, and their position does not appear seriously threatened; conversely, c. 1-5 state that prophecy has become rarefied and that the leaders of the church, driven by the spirit of error, seek to thwart prophecies, especially the vision of Isaiah . . . . .
Original:
In AI 1-5 abbiamo dunque un autore il quale scrive per difendere AI 6-11, uno scritto preesistente, contro gli attacchi delle autorità ecclesiastiche. Che 6-11 fosse uno scritto già fissato e divulgato, e che come tale fosse in discussione, spiega perchè l'autore di 1-5, pur aggiungendolo alla propria opera, non vi abbia apportato modifiche . . . . .

In effetti, il fatto stesso che voglia riproporre e difendere A I 6-11, e con esso il gruppo dei profeti per i quali quello è il testo cristologico fondamentale, implica che egli si sente in continuità con il gruppo entro il quale 6-11 è stato prodotto. Deve trattarsi di due fasi della storia dello stesso gruppo. Entrambe le parti dell'A I emanano quindi da un ambiente cristiano . . . .


Ora, in 6-11 i profeti anabatici sono presentati come il nucleo e l'autorità principale nella comunità cristiana, e la loro posi- zione non appare seriamente minacciata; viceversa, i c. 1-5 affermano che la profezia si è rarefatta e che i capi della chiesa, spinti dallo spirito di errore, cercano di vanificare le profezie, specialmente la visione di Isaia. . . . .
Norelli goes on to suggest that Ignatius may have been one of the bishops who was working to suppress the visionary prophetic activity we see represented in the AI.
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