Biblical Criticism & History Forum - earlywritings.com

MichaelBG wrote:

He is not referring to his future self but the future Son of Man figure. It is only because Christians have equated Jesus with the coming Son of Man that you read it that way.

I look at it this way. I assume the Son of Man idea in the gospels is based on Daniel (I happened upon Boyarin's The Jewish Gospels at the library the other day and thought that he made a good case for this), and in Daniel there is one Son of Man. And in the gospels as we have them, yes, I read them as referring to one Son of Man, and this is how it is understood in Acts (which I take to have been written by Luke) and Hegesippus as well. I don't factor in that there could be a "Q" underlying all this and am in general disinclined to speculate about hypothetical texts.

I was just reading something MichaelBG cited in another thread and it reminds me of something I read in Boyarin regarding Jesus and the divine "authority" that was given to the Son of Man in Daniel 7:14 ("He was given authority..."), as he explains here:

https://books.google.com/books?id=Rd48n ... al&f=false

And here is the citation from Mark 11:27-33:

...“By what authority are you doing these things? Who gave you this authority to do them?” Jesus said to them, “I will ask you one question; answer me, and I will tell you by what authority I do these things ... So they answered Jesus, “We do not know.” And Jesus said to them, “Neither will I tell you by what authority I am doing these things.”

So I see the references to the Son of Man in the NT as being one figure (in the present and the future) that is based on the "one like a Son of Man" in Daniel.

John2 wrote:MichaelBG wrote:

He is not referring to his future self but the future Son of Man figure. It is only because Christians have equated Jesus with the coming Son of Man that you read it that way.

I look at it this way. I assume the Son of Man idea in the gospels is based on Daniel (I happened upon Boyarin's The Jewish Gospels at the library the other day and thought that he made a good case for this), and in Daniel there is one Son of Man. And in the gospels as we have them, yes, I read them as referring to one Son of Man, and this is how it is understood in Acts (which I take to have been written by Luke) and Hegesippus as well. I don't factor in that there could be a "Q" underlying all this and am in general disinclined to speculate about hypothetical texts.

Do you think I think there are two Sons of Man?

Do you understand that the one like a son of man in Daniel 7 is a heavenly being?

Do you think I think there are two Sons of Man?

Do you understand that the one like a son of man in Daniel 7 is a heavenly being?

Yes and yes.

I gather you are saying that some of the references to the Son of Man in the NT refer to Jesus (as a "human being," in the sense that Ezekiel uses it) and that some refer to a future heavenly being who will come on the clouds of heaven at the End of Days (who is not Jesus). This is based on your opening statement that "In Q there was a saying where Jesus talks of the Son of Man as a separate being in heaven from himself."

In any event, since your argument involves the idea that there was a "Q," I'm having trouble following it because to me Mark is Mark, Matthew is Matthew (plus Mark) and Luke is Luke (plus Mark and maybe Matthew, as per the Farrer Hypothesis) and they are all post-70 CE and say that there is one Son of Man (based on Daniel), who is Jesus (while he was on earth and when he comes on the clouds of heaven after his resurrection).

I don't think there was an earlier tradition ("Q") in which Jesus was distinct from the future Son of Man that was altered by later Christians (and that no other writings support). The examples you're giving in this thread just make me think that in some cases one gospel writer preferred to say "I" and another preferred to say "Son of Man," and either way I see them as references to Jesus.

John2 wrote:
I look at it this way. I assume the Son of Man idea in the gospels is based on Daniel......and in Daniel there is one Son of Man.

Simply not true. In Daniel there are innumerable sons of men and "ONE like A son of man", which expression only works because there are MANY sonS of man to compare this "one" who looks like A son of man to.

David wrote;

Simply not true. In Daniel there are innumerable sons of men and "ONE like A son of man" ...

I mean that there is only one "one like a son of man" in Daniel and I assumed that was understood.

Michael BG wrote:

I do not think that the traditions attributed to Hegesippus are reliable especially if we have to rely on Eusebius to transmit them ... I have suggested that the whole story regarding the death of Stephen [in Acts] is not historical

Regarding Hegesippus, I view him as a reliable Jewish Christian source, given that what he says is in keeping with the Letter of James and Eusebius' comment that he used the Gospel of the Hebrews and "mentions other matters as taken from the unwritten tradition of the Jews" (EH 4.22), so if nothing else I see him as evidence that post-70 CE Jewish Christians believed that Jesus was Daniel's Son of Man who will come on the clouds of heaven.

I don't view the story of Stephen in Acts as historical, but I think it at least shows that post-70 CE Pauline Christians also believed that Jesus was Daniel's Son of Man who will come on the clouds of heaven.

So to me Jesus is being presented as being divine in the (post-70 CE) gospels (based on the "one like a Son of Man" in Daniel who is given divine "authority," as Boyarin discusses), and this is in keeping with the belief in the divinity of Jesus in the pre-70 CE Philippians Hymn (2:6-7):

Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness.

Michael, This teaching is only and exclusively in reference to Peter the denier, hence Peter the denier is the one and only Jesus betrayer.

God is a Man, Let's make man in our image according to our likeness.

And God created man in His own image,
in the image of God He created man,
male and female He created them.

NOTE: Never, no place, no where, no how and no when God created man according to His likeness.
God creating man according to His likeness and man (male and female) wrongfully thinking, assuming, be-lie-ving, saying, accepting or preaching that he (man: male and female) are like God, are two completely different things.

If you and/or anyone else wants to know the truth, you and/or everyone else must start at the Beginning. Genesis 1:1 Like Jesus Himself teaches "You must be born again"

Back to Peter, Peter is one of the seven angels of God sent into the earth with God' message, But Peter being the real traidor, betrayer and denier three times, 1- I don't know the guy, I don't know who he is, 2- Not I wasn't with Him, have no idea, 3- I sure I don't know who He is nor I was with Him.

Therefore Peter in one of the seven angels of God (Revelation) and is the only one angel who will be denied in front of the Father and in front of all angels of heaven.

NOTE: Roman Catholic Church.

Roman = From and exclusively related to Roma.
Catholic = Universal.
Church = House or place of worship. (Human Body).

Therefore: If something or someone is Roman, can not in any way possible be Universal, if is Roman is from and related to Roma, and if is Universal, them Roma is irrelevant and obsolete.

The Roman Catholic Church is in reality "THE ROMAN UNIVERSAL EMPIRE" still in power.

Remember: The Jews and the Romans crucified/killed Jesus and the Bible is all Jewish put together by the Romans.

The only relevant Book to know the truth is the: "BOOK OF LIFE OF LAMB OF GOD 777" coming soon to all humanity. By of way: The Seal of The Living God is {777}

John2 wrote:

Do you think I think there are two Sons of Man?

Yes

I gather you are saying that some of the references to the Son of Man in the NT refer to Jesus (as a "human being," in the sense that Ezekiel uses it) and that some refer to a future heavenly being who will come on the clouds of heaven at the End of Days (who is not Jesus).

I don’t think I hold this position. I wanted to hold it but it makes no sense. There are many different positions a person could take. I liked the idea that the term “son of man” was an Aramaic term used to mean the speaker and the group he was a member of, which I think is the position of Maurice Casey. However I do not think Jesus ever spoke of his second coming. It was a Christian creation. But he did speak of the coming eschatological event. It therefore the Son of Man sayings which refer to a future coming Son of Man make sense in this context. This is a proposition which I have to test.

To be clear I am saying that for my proposition to be true none of the sayings where Jesus is using the Son of Man to mean only himself are genuine.

If you have read everything in this thread you will have read:

neilgodfrey wrote:Some of us might find points of interest in the following. They are Lester Grabbe's conclusions in an article ""Son of Man: Its Origin and Meaning in Second Temple Judaism" in Enoch and the Synoptic Gospels: Reminiscences, Allusions, Intertextuality ed by Stuckenbruck and Boccaccini, 2016 -- pp 196-97 (my own bolding):

A number of new points of consensus have developed out of the continuing discussion:
…
3. It is generally agreed (in spite of Vermes’s claim) that the Aramaic expression is not the equivalent of “I” in the first century CE, and my investigation supports that conclusion.

Lester Grabbie writes that the claim that the son of man was used in Aramaic as a “circumlocution for ‘I’ … has been widely rejected by Aramaists”. He continues “the whole point of using that phrase [bar nash(a)] instead of ‘I’ is to create a particular semantic situation different from using ‘I’.” (p 173 https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=eeM ... sm&f=false). He states that in his “opinion, none of the examples given by Vermes demonstrates” its use “as a circumlocution for ‘I’”. He discusses why Vermes is wrong in his interpretation of the story of Rabbi Simeon ben Yohai and his son coming out of hiding in a cave c 145 CE. Maurice Casey uses the same main saying “A bird is not caught without heaven: how much more the soul of the son of man [bar nasha]” and states that it “is clearly intended to refer to them both [Simeon and his son] (Jesus of Nazareth p 360).

John2 wrote: This is based on your opening statement that "In Q there was a saying where Jesus talks of the Son of Man as a separate being in heaven from himself."

In any event, since your argument involves the idea that there was a "Q," I'm having trouble following it because to me Mark is Mark, Matthew is Matthew (plus Mark) and Luke is Luke (plus Mark) and they are all post-70 CE

I don't think there was an earlier tradition ("Q")

Have you read anything on the two-source hypothesis?
Would I be correct to believe that you accept that Matthew and Luke used Mark?

When you find agreements between only Matthew and Luke do you assume they are telling the same story?
If so then that can be classified as Q. Q can stand just for what is the most likely more primitive version of a saying which only Matthew and Luke have.

Do you accept that not everything in the gospels is historical?

John2 wrote:

Do you understand that the one like a son of man in Daniel 7 is a heavenly being?

and yes.

and say that there is one Son of Man (based on Daniel), who is Jesus (while he was on earth and when he comes on the clouds of heaven after his resurrection).

Are you saying that Jesus was the heavenly Son of Man not only after resurrection but while on earth before he was crucified?

Are you saying that Jesus existed before he was on earth (like say in the “Philippians Hymn”)?

John2 wrote:I don't view the story of Stephen in Acts as historical

I am glad that you do accept that something in Luke-Acts is not historical.

John2 wrote: Regarding Hegesippus, … Eusebius

I regard Eusebius as highly unreliable and all “Christian Father” texts as unreliable. The Gospels and Acts cannot be relied on for being historical. Even the seven “authentic” letters of Paul cannot be treated as reliable because there is always the possibility of interpolation (e.g. 2 Cor.6:14-7:1). However my default position is to accept things written in them as Paul unless there is general scholarly agreement it is an interpolation or I have been convinced it is an interpolation.

Have you read anything on the two-source hypothesis?
Would I be correct to believe that you accept that Matthew and Luke used Mark?

When you find agreements between only Matthew and Luke do you assume they are telling the same story?
If so then that can be classified as Q. Q can stand just for what is the most likely more primitive version of a saying which only Matthew and Luke have.

Do you accept that not everything in the gospels is historical?

I lean towards the Farrer Hypothesis, and see Mark as being written first, then Matthew (who used Mark), and then Luke (who used Mark and Matthew). Here is a recent book that discusses it.

https://books.google.com/books?id=WQ90B ... 0q&f=false

I do not think that everything in the gospels is historical.

Are you saying that Jesus was the heavenly Son of Man not only after resurrection but while on earth before he was crucified?

That's the impression I get from the gospels, yes, and I think Boyarin makes a good case for this. And post-70 CE Jewish Christians believed that Jesus was an archangel, like Daniel's Son of Man (I agree with spin that the latter is the archangel Michael). Epiphanius, for example, says that:

...Christ descended upon him from above in the form of a dove. They [Ebionites] do not say that he was born of God the Father but that he was created as one of the archangels (and even higher) and that he is Lord over the angels as also over everything that the Almighty has created.

https://books.google.com/books?id=1_sKc ... us&f=false

Are you saying that Jesus existed before he was on earth (like say in the “Philippians Hymn”)?

Well, Paul seems to be saying this, and post-70 CE Jewish Christians believed that "Christ," in the sense of being an archangel, existed before Jesus and entered Jesus while he was on earth.