Those who've been on Ship for years will recall some of our struggles, which are wholly human, embarrassing, and "little faithed" at times, in spite of the miracle. Because miracles do not create faith. They just don't. At most they can serve as signposts to the object and giver of faith, the Lord. But it is entirely comprehensible to me how whole families and John the Baptist himself might have lost sight, for a moment or for years, of the miraculous events they were once a part of. Because it has happened to us.
@Lamb Chopped
I didn't respond to you in this thread because I was confused by what said about "miracle."
_________
According to the late Gospel of John, Jesus' disciples started calling him the Messiah in the first chapter, even before his ministry began, and continued calling him that throughout his entire ministry, as represented in that gospel.
while
According to the earlier Gospel Mark, the disciples (like Q's imprisoned Baptizer) struggled with trying to decide what to think of him, and did not win through to the belief that he was the Messiah until late in his ministry, in the eighth chapter of that gospel.
I see nothing miraculous there. I see a difference impossible to reconcile.
One could, however, choose to go with the earlier sources as historically the more reliable.
Those who've been on Ship for years will recall some of our struggles, which are wholly human, embarrassing, and "little faithed" at times, in spite of the miracle. Because miracles do not create faith. They just don't. At most they can serve as signposts to the object and giver of faith, the Lord. But it is entirely comprehensible to me how whole families and John the Baptist himself might have lost sight, for a moment or for years, of the miraculous events they were once a part of. Because it has happened to us.
@Lamb Chopped
I didn't respond to you in this thread because I was confused by what said about "miracle."
_________
According to the late Gospel of John, Jesus' disciples started calling him the Messiah in the first chapter, even before his ministry began, and continued calling him that throughout his entire ministry, as represented in that gospel.
while
According to the earlier Gospel Mark, the disciples (like Q's imprisoned Baptizer) struggled with trying to decide what to think of him, and did not win through to the belief that he was the Messiah until late in his ministry, in the eighth chapter of that gospel.
I see nothing miraculous there. I see a difference impossible to reconcile.
One could, however, choose to go with the earlier sources as historically the more reliable.
@Martin54
Regarding atonement, etc., on the atoning/ non atoning thread:
I'll soon be coming to this inactive thread and start posting concerning something I was asked about, as follows:
I've frequently expressed my opinion that the Gethsemane scene in Mark is historical, and indicates that Jesus expected to die a death willed by God, and that he was probably influenced by Isaiah 53 in thinking that, for in Isaiah 53 it is said that it was Yahweh's will or even pleasure that the servant should undergo punishment/chastisement for the sake of many by bearing their sin and being wounded that they might be healed.
I have been asked why I am so convinced that Isaiah 53 stands behind much of Jesus' thinking.
I'll soon be coming to this thread to try to tell, in a dramatic, semi-fictional form why I think that. It will be a somewhat long story and I hope I will be given space and time here to tell it.
@Martin54
Regarding atonement, etc., on the atoning/ non atoning thread:
I'll soon be coming to this inactive thread and start posting concerning something I was asked about, as follows:
I've frequently expressed my opinion that the Gethsemane scene in Mark is historical, and indicates that Jesus expected to die a death willed by God, and that he was probably influenced by Isaiah 53 in thinking that, for in Isaiah 53 it is said that it was Yahweh's will or even pleasure that the servant should undergo punishment/chastisement for the sake of many by bearing their sin and being wounded that they might be healed.
I have been asked why I am so convinced that Isaiah 53 stands behind much of Jesus' thinking.
I'll soon be coming to this thread to try to tell, in a dramatic, semi-fictional form why I think that. It will be a somewhat long story and I hope I will be given space and time here to tell it.
It won't JB2. It can't. We're too quirky. Fractured. And they're all too nice. Don't waste your time. Don't set yourself up.
I'll soon be coming to this thread to try to tell, in a dramatic, semi-fictional form why I think that. It will be a somewhat long story and I hope I will be given space and time here to tell it.
Don't bother. If you do I'll just delete it. Hosts have already cut you a lot of slack re length and sequence of posts. We're a kindly lot (yes really).
But enough is enough. Posts are expected to facilitate dialogue and expecting your Shipmates to read a long dramatic story is just self-indulgent. Try to be more concise. Try to precis.
Jesus' favourite OT quote is Psalm 110: 1 which He uses as His tagline. He also calls Himself the chief cornerstone (Ps 118: 22-23). He takes Isaiah 61: 1-2 as the manifesto for His ministry (Luke 4: 18-20; 7: 22; Matt 7: 22). And on the cross He quotes from Psalms 22 and 31.
What if any Hebrew scripture(s) was he referring to when he said, "The Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many" (Mark 10:45) or at the supper when he spoke of "my blood of the covenant poured out for many" in chapter 14? (That is, if he really did say those things.)
The Son of Man is borrowed from Ezekiel. Both Jesus and John identify themselves with the OT prophetic tradition rather than directly claiming the dangerous title of the Messiah.
Mark 10: 45 may be a reference to the Suffering Servant songs of Isaiah. Or it may represent Mark's theology of the crucifixion.
The blood of the covenant is Jesus' reinterpretation of the Passover tradition in reference to Himself. John specifically identifies Jesus as the sacrificial Passover lamb in his gospel.
The Son of Man imagery is more likely to be derived from Dan 7:13
In the original Daniel context the Son of Man represented Israel coming to meet YHWH in the heavenly realms as they were vindicated from their oppressors (the Babylonian Empire). As Jesus may well have seen himself as embodying the true Israel (having reconstituted the twelve tribes in the selection of the twelve disciples) he could apply this prophecy to himself.
NT Wright spends a lot of his works explaining that Jesus achieves his vindication when the Temple is destroyed in 70AD.
@Rublev
In Ezekiel, "son of man" is used by Yahweh simply to address Ezekiel repeatedly, as a way of saying, "Listen, mere mortal." I think it is much more important that two phrases that Jesus used repeatedly and in unusual ways are "The Kingdom of God" and "the Son of Man," neither are found significantly or word for word in the Hebrew scriptures but there is a long section of Daniel, chapters 2-7, that is actually in Aramaic and I think Jesus as a very young boy could read that passage with special ease (it was in his Mother tongue!) and was deeply influenced, especially by chapter 2 which contains the only place I know of in ancient scripture where God establishes a kingdom that destroys all others and fills all the earth and will last forever, and chapter 7 where a "one like a son of man" comes with clouds of heaven to be served by all nations and peoples of all languages.
Yet Jesus used the phrase Son of Man both in glorious ways we would expect and in surprisingly "put down" ways we would not expect. The evangelical scholar I. H. Marshall was of the conviction that in this Jesus had achieved a "creative combination" of son of man with suffering servant and messiah.
I think the first part of your comment on Mark 10:45 is the more likely.
John specifically identifies Jesus as the sacrificial Passover lamb in his gospel.
Indeed, he even puts those words in the mouth of the Baptizer as Jesus is passing by.
And if that were historical, it would make the Baptizer the first Christian.
John also dates Jesus' death on 14th Nisan (Passover Eve) when the Passover lambs were being sacrificed in the Temple (Lev 23: 5-7; John 13: 1; 19: 31).
Actually, it was the Day of Preparation around noon (19:14, the sixth hour) that G. of John has Jesus crucified, at the time when the lambs were indeed being slaughtered and returned to be cooked and eaten that night all over Jerusalem.
But the Synoptics all make the meal take place the night before, as a Passover meal.
Mark has Jesus crucified at about nine in the morning (15:25, the third hour) and it took place the day after the lambs had been slaughtered and eaten.
Historical Jesus scholars are divided on this. Some think the Supper was a Passover supper, as the synoptics have it; others think it was the Day of Preparation before Passover eve.)
I lean toward the synoptics, but there are good arguments on both sides, both historical and theological.
____________
Attempts to reconcile all this decisively, such as declaring noon to have been according to another time reckoning, have not been successful.
They were all writing theology. The Synoptics have a common perspective, whereas John wrote a complementary 'spiritual gospel' which sets aside the chronological narrative and the parables and offers a reader - response presentation of Christ's encounters. `These are written so that you may believe' (John 20: 31).
Actually, it was the Day of Preparation around noon (19:14, the sixth hour) that G. of John has Jesus crucified, at the time when the lambs were indeed being slaughtered and returned to be cooked and eaten that night all over Jerusalem.
But the Synoptics all make the meal take place the night before, as a Passover meal.
Mark has Jesus crucified at about nine in the morning (15:25, the third hour) and it took place the day after the lambs had been slaughtered and eaten.
Historical Jesus scholars are divided on this. Some think the Supper was a Passover supper, as the synoptics have it; others think it was the Day of Preparation before Passover eve.)
I lean toward the synoptics, but there are good arguments on both sides, both historical and theological.
____________
Attempts to reconcile all this decisively, such as declaring noon to have been according to another time reckoning, have not been successful.
No, Martin, they are not. Historically it was either one way or the other. Except that it hardly matters whether the supper took place the day before or on the day of Passover, for it would still have carried with it the feeling of Passover.
No crossover intended - I am seeking after the original historical message of Jesus in the gospels beneath the theological portraits of the different writers. But the threads do tangent around...
They were all writing theology. The Synoptics have a common perspective, whereas John wrote a complementary 'spiritual gospel' which sets aside the chronological narrative and the parables and offers a reader - response presentation of Christ's encounters. `These are written so that you may believe' (John 20: 31).
Yes, but John was writing theology even more than the others,* especially with regard to the conversations attributed to Jesus (see the long Supper discourse and prayer), and this is as much as admitted in John 14:25-26 and 15:26-27 and 16:13-14.
(I just spoke about this in @Rublev's Pontius Pilate thread.)
________
*As I have written elsewhere: Already in the second century Clement of Alexandria stated that the author of John “perceiving that the external facts had already been made plain in the other [three] gospels … and inspired by the Spirit, composed a spiritual gospel.”
Clement was convinced that the author of John, writing last, was not so much interested in relating the “external facts” about Jesus as in illuminating Jesus’ deeper spiritual significance. Clement’s insight helps explain why the portrait of Jesus in the Gospel of John is so different. The evangelist was not really interested in trying to report what the flesh and blood man Jesus had once said, but rather in revealing what the living, resurrected Lord of the church was still saying. Even in the second century, then, Clement of Alexandria saw that “the external facts” about Jesus are more readily available in the earlier writings, the earlier gospels.
No, Martin, they are not. Historically it was either one way or the other. Except that it hardly matters whether the supper took place the day before or on the day of Passover, for it would still have carried with it the feeling of Passover.
The last supper was obviously not on the Jews' Passover, it was 24 hours before.
Only in John's gospel, not in the Synoptic accounts. John presents the footwashing of the disciples rather than giving his version of the Last Supper. Pity about that.
@Martin, this has been argued at length by excellent historical scholars who disagree. The excellent scholar John P. Meir thinks the evidence points to it being the day before, the exellent scholar Dale Allison thinks the evidence points to it being a Passover meal.
So what makes it "obviously" the day before? Do you have a historical reason for saying that, or a theological reason?
@Martin, this has been argued at length by excellent historical scholars who disagree. The excellent scholar John P. Meir thinks the evidence points to it being the day before, the exellent scholar Dale Allison thinks the evidence points to it being a Passover meal.
So what makes it "obviously" the day before? Do you have a historical reason for saying that, or a theological reason?
I couldn't give a tuppeny bugger what disagreeing excellent scholars say. I have the reason of reason applied to my reading of the texts.
@Martin, this has been argued at length by excellent historical scholars who disagree. The excellent scholar John P. Meir thinks the evidence points to it being the day before, the exellent scholar Dale Allison thinks the evidence points to it being a Passover meal.
So what makes it "obviously" the day before? Do you have a historical reason for saying that, or a theological reason?
I couldn't give a tuppeny bugger what disagreeing excellent scholars say. I have the reason of reason applied to my reading of the texts.
Nicely put, @Martin54 - once more, you're not the only one!
Wednesday Nisan 14th Passover preparation day, slaughter of Passover lambs - day of crucifixion.
Thursday Nisan 15th First [Day] of Unleavened Bread, a High Day Sabbath.
John 19:31 The Jews therefore, because it was the preparation, that the bodies should not remain upon the cross on the sabbath day, (for that sabbath day was an high day,) besought Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away
Friday Nisan 16th - between the Sabbaths - the two Marys and Salome bought and prepared spices and ointments to anoint Jesus after the weekly Sabbath.
Mark 16:1 When the Sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices so that they might go to anoint Jesus' body.
… and rested the sabbath day according to the commandment. Luke 23:56
Saturday Nisan 17th, the weekly Sabbath, Jesus may well have been resurrected around that day's sunset.
Show me where Mark, Luke and John disagree with that chronology which obtained around Wednesday April 25th 31 A.D. once upon a time. Matthew of course does disagree!
Matthew 26:17 On the first day of the Festival of Unleavened Bread, the disciples came to Jesus and asked, “Where do you want us to make preparations for you to eat the Passover?”
He even says that the first... of UB happened before the Passover!!! How do we reconcile this?!?!?
He's outvoted. Like John on Jesus being interviewed by Pilate halfway through the crucifixion.
Idioms and no modern, forensic, historical method at the time notwithstanding.
He presents an interactive story of encounter with positive and negative examples of faith which are intended to bring his readers to the point of decision.
He offers an extra level of theological reflection through the symbolic discourses on the Bread of Life, the Vine and the Branches and the Farewell Discourses. The 'I Am' sayings reveal His divine identity and present Christ as meeting the spiritual needs of all who come to Him.
He adds a cosmic dimension to the Synoptic portrait of Jesus by presenting Jesus as the pre-existent Logos and Incarnate God. His gospel is a story of His revelation to the world. His miraculous signs reveal His glory and His mission is accomplished by the final sign of His glorification upon the cross. There is no account of the Transfiguration because the entire gospel is a Transfiguration of Jesus.
They were all writing theology. The Synoptics have a common perspective, whereas John wrote a complementary 'spiritual gospel' which sets aside the chronological narrative and the parables and offers a reader - response presentation of Christ's encounters. `These are written so that you may believe' (John 20: 31).
Yes, but John was writing theology even more than the others,* especially with regard to the conversations attributed to Jesus (see the long Supper discourse and prayer), and this is as much as admitted in John 14:25-26 and 15:26-27 and 16:13-14. <snip>
(My emphasis) There’s no ‘but’ about it. The verses you quote affirm that more is to come from the Holy Spirit, but that is not the same as suggesting that the reported words of Jesus don’t substantially represent what he actually said.
Well, since we have done the chronology of the crucifixion we can move onto another topic. This one is JB2s thread, so when he comes back he can direct the discussion.
Comments
@Lamb Chopped
I didn't respond to you in this thread because I was confused by what said about "miracle."
_________
According to the late Gospel of John, Jesus' disciples started calling him the Messiah in the first chapter, even before his ministry began, and continued calling him that throughout his entire ministry, as represented in that gospel.
while
According to the earlier Gospel Mark, the disciples (like Q's imprisoned Baptizer) struggled with trying to decide what to think of him, and did not win through to the belief that he was the Messiah until late in his ministry, in the eighth chapter of that gospel.
I see nothing miraculous there. I see a difference impossible to reconcile.
One could, however, choose to go with the earlier sources as historically the more reliable.
Uh huh.
Regarding atonement, etc., on the atoning/ non atoning thread:
I'll soon be coming to this inactive thread and start posting concerning something I was asked about, as follows:
I've frequently expressed my opinion that the Gethsemane scene in Mark is historical, and indicates that Jesus expected to die a death willed by God, and that he was probably influenced by Isaiah 53 in thinking that, for in Isaiah 53 it is said that it was Yahweh's will or even pleasure that the servant should undergo punishment/chastisement for the sake of many by bearing their sin and being wounded that they might be healed.
I have been asked why I am so convinced that Isaiah 53 stands behind much of Jesus' thinking.
I'll soon be coming to this thread to try to tell, in a dramatic, semi-fictional form why I think that. It will be a somewhat long story and I hope I will be given space and time here to tell it.
It won't JB2. It can't. We're too quirky. Fractured. And they're all too nice. Don't waste your time. Don't set yourself up.
Would you deny me a chance at martyrdom?
Don't bother. If you do I'll just delete it. Hosts have already cut you a lot of slack re length and sequence of posts. We're a kindly lot (yes really).
But enough is enough. Posts are expected to facilitate dialogue and expecting your Shipmates to read a long dramatic story is just self-indulgent. Try to be more concise. Try to precis.
Barnabas62
Purgatory Host
Mark 10: 45 may be a reference to the Suffering Servant songs of Isaiah. Or it may represent Mark's theology of the crucifixion.
The blood of the covenant is Jesus' reinterpretation of the Passover tradition in reference to Himself. John specifically identifies Jesus as the sacrificial Passover lamb in his gospel.
In the original Daniel context the Son of Man represented Israel coming to meet YHWH in the heavenly realms as they were vindicated from their oppressors (the Babylonian Empire). As Jesus may well have seen himself as embodying the true Israel (having reconstituted the twelve tribes in the selection of the twelve disciples) he could apply this prophecy to himself.
NT Wright spends a lot of his works explaining that Jesus achieves his vindication when the Temple is destroyed in 70AD.
In Ezekiel, "son of man" is used by Yahweh simply to address Ezekiel repeatedly, as a way of saying, "Listen, mere mortal." I think it is much more important that two phrases that Jesus used repeatedly and in unusual ways are "The Kingdom of God" and "the Son of Man," neither are found significantly or word for word in the Hebrew scriptures but there is a long section of Daniel, chapters 2-7, that is actually in Aramaic and I think Jesus as a very young boy could read that passage with special ease (it was in his Mother tongue!) and was deeply influenced, especially by chapter 2 which contains the only place I know of in ancient scripture where God establishes a kingdom that destroys all others and fills all the earth and will last forever, and chapter 7 where a "one like a son of man" comes with clouds of heaven to be served by all nations and peoples of all languages.
Yet Jesus used the phrase Son of Man both in glorious ways we would expect and in surprisingly "put down" ways we would not expect. The evangelical scholar I. H. Marshall was of the conviction that in this Jesus had achieved a "creative combination" of son of man with suffering servant and messiah.
I think the first part of your comment on Mark 10:45 is the more likely.
Indeed, he even puts those words in the mouth of the Baptizer as Jesus is passing by.
And if that were historical, it would make the Baptizer the first Christian.
Actually, it was the Day of Preparation around noon (19:14, the sixth hour) that G. of John has Jesus crucified, at the time when the lambs were indeed being slaughtered and returned to be cooked and eaten that night all over Jerusalem.
But the Synoptics all make the meal take place the night before, as a Passover meal.
Mark has Jesus crucified at about nine in the morning (15:25, the third hour) and it took place the day after the lambs had been slaughtered and eaten.
Historical Jesus scholars are divided on this. Some think the Supper was a Passover supper, as the synoptics have it; others think it was the Day of Preparation before Passover eve.)
I lean toward the synoptics, but there are good arguments on both sides, both historical and theological.
____________
Attempts to reconcile all this decisively, such as declaring noon to have been according to another time reckoning, have not been successful.
Barnabas62 has answered as a host. As a mortal, can I say that reading those posts turned me off buying and reading your book.
And they are just as easily reconcilable.
This particular thread seems to have morphed into having an historical theme, so which thread should we be following?
IOW, there appears to be a bit of a crossover, with the danger of people repeating themselves...
Yes, but John was writing theology even more than the others,* especially with regard to the conversations attributed to Jesus (see the long Supper discourse and prayer), and this is as much as admitted in John 14:25-26 and 15:26-27 and 16:13-14.
(I just spoke about this in @Rublev's Pontius Pilate thread.)
________
*As I have written elsewhere: Already in the second century Clement of Alexandria stated that the author of John “perceiving that the external facts had already been made plain in the other [three] gospels … and inspired by the Spirit, composed a spiritual gospel.”
Clement was convinced that the author of John, writing last, was not so much interested in relating the “external facts” about Jesus as in illuminating Jesus’ deeper spiritual significance. Clement’s insight helps explain why the portrait of Jesus in the Gospel of John is so different. The evangelist was not really interested in trying to report what the flesh and blood man Jesus had once said, but rather in revealing what the living, resurrected Lord of the church was still saying. Even in the second century, then, Clement of Alexandria saw that “the external facts” about Jesus are more readily available in the earlier writings, the earlier gospels.
The last supper was obviously not on the Jews' Passover, it was 24 hours before.
So what makes it "obviously" the day before? Do you have a historical reason for saying that, or a theological reason?
I agree. Pity. Yet as I'm sure you know, even G of J has Jesus speak of eating his "flesh" and drinking his blood in chapter 6:53, f.
I couldn't give a tuppeny bugger what disagreeing excellent scholars say. I have the reason of reason applied to my reading of the texts.
Yes, some commentators think the Bread of Life discourse is John's version of the theology of the Last Supper.
I want to discuss John further with you according to your post above, but I will need some time to collect my thoughts.
Are we allowed to know your reasons or are we to live in ignorance?
Nicely put, @Martin54 - once more, you're not the only one!
Wednesday Nisan 14th Passover preparation day, slaughter of Passover lambs - day of crucifixion.
Thursday Nisan 15th First [Day] of Unleavened Bread, a High Day Sabbath.
John 19:31 The Jews therefore, because it was the preparation, that the bodies should not remain upon the cross on the sabbath day, (for that sabbath day was an high day,) besought Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away
Friday Nisan 16th - between the Sabbaths - the two Marys and Salome bought and prepared spices and ointments to anoint Jesus after the weekly Sabbath.
Mark 16:1 When the Sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices so that they might go to anoint Jesus' body.
… and rested the sabbath day according to the commandment. Luke 23:56
Saturday Nisan 17th, the weekly Sabbath, Jesus may well have been resurrected around that day's sunset.
Show me where Mark, Luke and John disagree with that chronology which obtained around Wednesday April 25th 31 A.D. once upon a time. Matthew of course does disagree!
Matthew 26:17 On the first day of the Festival of Unleavened Bread, the disciples came to Jesus and asked, “Where do you want us to make preparations for you to eat the Passover?”
He even says that the first... of UB happened before the Passover!!! How do we reconcile this?!?!?
He's outvoted. Like John on Jesus being interviewed by Pilate halfway through the crucifixion.
Idioms and no modern, forensic, historical method at the time notwithstanding.
As I said, easily reconciled.
The theology of John's gospel:
He presents an interactive story of encounter with positive and negative examples of faith which are intended to bring his readers to the point of decision.
He offers an extra level of theological reflection through the symbolic discourses on the Bread of Life, the Vine and the Branches and the Farewell Discourses. The 'I Am' sayings reveal His divine identity and present Christ as meeting the spiritual needs of all who come to Him.
He adds a cosmic dimension to the Synoptic portrait of Jesus by presenting Jesus as the pre-existent Logos and Incarnate God. His gospel is a story of His revelation to the world. His miraculous signs reveal His glory and His mission is accomplished by the final sign of His glorification upon the cross. There is no account of the Transfiguration because the entire gospel is a Transfiguration of Jesus.
Why on Earth did I have to? It's been there for 1950 odd years.
About what?