4 ms·

What about Josephus?

geoduck14 4y ago
I'm curious why people are so quick to dismis evidence of Jesus as contained in the gospels. From POV, we have between 4 and 6 (depending on your cannon) different people that record first hand records of Jesus. And it turns out that these same people were passionate followers of Jesus. What other response would you expect from someone who actually knew someone who actually died and was brought back to life?
- defrost 4y ago
  [flagged]
  - trump_exists 4y ago
    [flagged]
    - defrost 4y ago
      That should be evident by reading my comment, a comment that addressed the gospel of Jesus rather than Jesus himself.
- krapp 4y ago
  None of the canonical Gospels were written by people who had firsthand knowledge of Jesus. All of them were written over a generation after the crucifixion, and those were only four out of many such Gospels in pre-Biblical Christian history. And none of them (not even the canon) agree on any but the most basic narrative, which you would expect at the very least for eyewitness, firsthand accounts. Since you seem to be a Christian working from a perspective of faith, I don't expect to convince you of anything, but you should at least study Biblical history a bit[0] before making as naive an argument as this. >What other response would you expect from someone who actually knew someone who actually died and was brought back to life? Many people are passionately convinced of things that aren't true. Passion is not a signifier of truth, rather it signifies a willingness to abandon objectivity. You're presenting the common Christian apologetic that the passion of the original Christians and the longevity of the religion is a sign of the validity of the resurrection, as no one would be expected to suffer for a known falsehood. This argument fails to take into account that every religion has its zealots, and people who suffer and die for their faith. That no more validates Christianity than it does the pagan faiths it replaced. [0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_reliability_of_the_Gospels https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_reliability_of_the_...
  - geoduck14 4y ago
    Thanks! I am a Christian (though, that term has many inaccurate definitions). I'll look through the Wikipedia article. You mention that the Gospels don't agree on anything except the basic narrative. We actually only need a small number of facts to agree. The Wikipedia article you linked confirms Jesus was real and he was crucified. His crucifixion fulfilled a lot of prophesy in plenty of scripture. Jesus' resurrection is pretty hard to prove (there is no body!), but we see ancillary evidence: His followers gave up their lives for what Jesus taught. Luke-Acts was written "shortly after" the resurrection, when eye witnesses were still alive. Thomas ran off to India and started a church "before" early Christians had a chance to "fake" evidence I agree with you that passion alone is weak- every (most?) religion has zealots. The 4 Gospels and Paul's account are first hand accounts. They heard directly from Jesus who claimed to be God. Jesus might be crazy, but the original Apostles watched Jesus ascend into heaven - and then they died pursuing what Jesus taught. Paul was passionate about persecuting Christians (note the misplaced passion!), but then Jesus visited him directly and redirected Paul's passion and faith. People have definitely died for lesser causes. People have definitely pursued petty fights - but the decision of Jesus isn't petty - it is quite literally a decision that defines what happens after our short life here on earth. I appreciate you sharing the Wikipedia article. I'll read through it so I can better understand you and people like you. I wholeheartedly believe that the God of the Universe made you and loves you - and I want to show you that same love.
    - geoduck14 4y ago
      One theory presented is that Matthew and Luke were largely based on Mark. And that Mark was written by people "not with first hand account" (also, not Mark). My take: Mark has plenty of references to Jewish law - it was almost certainly written by someone with a strong Jewish background. The names of the people in the book of Mark are "normal" names for people during the time of Jesus. A study got what amounts to a census during the time and location of Jesus - they documented the most popular names - and these names aligned with the names contained in each of the Gospels. This means that the person who wrote Mark was probably near Jerusalem during Jesus' time The Gospels reflect personal differences in the authors... I haven't seen this yet in the Wikipedia article, but i expect to see it: Luke was Roman trained. Matthew, Mark, and John were jewish trained. Luke's account of the times when Jesus died are shifted by 6 hours. This is important. Luke believes that the day starts at midnight (like most Americans). Mark believes the day starts at sunset (like most Jews). Mark and Luke had distinct authors. I'll keep reading. Thanks!
- coliveira 4y ago
  First of all: the accounts are not first hand. They were in fact anonymous. Nobody put their names in these Gospel-style compositions, identifying themselves, until very late when the church decided to name them as we now have. Second of all: these accounts are not independent. There is the gospel of Mark, and them other authors went on copying most of the previous books, but adding sections that frequently contradict others. So, what we have are not 4 to 6 different accounts, we have a single story that has been copied and edited by several anonymous people.
Archelaos 4y ago
Josephus has a single paragraph about Jesus. It had been debated whether this is a later Christian interpolation into the manuscripts. The oldest manuscripts of Josephus' works that survived are from the 9th or 10th century. It might be possible that all our text witnesses go back to a single intermediate "Christian" Josephus. What speaks against such a conclusion is a) that (if I remember it correctly, I didn't cross-check) the passage uses the non-standard spelling "Chrestos" instead of "Christos", a so called iotacism, caused by a shift in the pronounciation of Ancient Greek where the sound of iota and eta morphed into each other, and b) that the paragraph appears in the context of Roman religious scandals, a quite unfavourable location. The counter-argument is that a clever forger has deliberately made a spelling mistake and chosen an unfavourable context to make his interpolation seem all the more credible. Be that as it may, another aspect from Josephus is much more interesting, because it provides us with some context we would have otherwise missed: He tells us about other pretenders of the Messiah from that time, inluding the Roman suppression of this movements, and about John the Baptist in some detail. These passages are usually considered original.
- yyyk 4y ago
  >Josephus has a single paragraph about Jesus. It had been debated whether this is a later Christian interpolation into the manuscripts. Two different paragraphs to be exact. The first is accepted as at least a partial interpolation, while the second is usually accepted in full.

I'm curious why people are so quick to dismis evidence of Jesus as contained in the gospels. From POV, we have between 4 and 6 (depending on your cannon) different people that record first hand records of Jesus. And it turns out that these same people were passionate followers of Jesus. What other response would you expect from someone who actually knew someone who actually died and was brought back to life?

defrost 4y ago
[flagged]
- trump_exists 4y ago
  [flagged]
  - defrost 4y ago
    That should be evident by reading my comment, a comment that addressed the gospel of Jesus rather than Jesus himself.
krapp 4y ago
None of the canonical Gospels were written by people who had firsthand knowledge of Jesus. All of them were written over a generation after the crucifixion, and those were only four out of many such Gospels in pre-Biblical Christian history. And none of them (not even the canon) agree on any but the most basic narrative, which you would expect at the very least for eyewitness, firsthand accounts. Since you seem to be a Christian working from a perspective of faith, I don't expect to convince you of anything, but you should at least study Biblical history a bit[0] before making as naive an argument as this. >What other response would you expect from someone who actually knew someone who actually died and was brought back to life? Many people are passionately convinced of things that aren't true. Passion is not a signifier of truth, rather it signifies a willingness to abandon objectivity. You're presenting the common Christian apologetic that the passion of the original Christians and the longevity of the religion is a sign of the validity of the resurrection, as no one would be expected to suffer for a known falsehood. This argument fails to take into account that every religion has its zealots, and people who suffer and die for their faith. That no more validates Christianity than it does the pagan faiths it replaced. [0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_reliability_of_the_Gospels https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_reliability_of_the_...
- geoduck14 4y ago
  Thanks! I am a Christian (though, that term has many inaccurate definitions). I'll look through the Wikipedia article. You mention that the Gospels don't agree on anything except the basic narrative. We actually only need a small number of facts to agree. The Wikipedia article you linked confirms Jesus was real and he was crucified. His crucifixion fulfilled a lot of prophesy in plenty of scripture. Jesus' resurrection is pretty hard to prove (there is no body!), but we see ancillary evidence: His followers gave up their lives for what Jesus taught. Luke-Acts was written "shortly after" the resurrection, when eye witnesses were still alive. Thomas ran off to India and started a church "before" early Christians had a chance to "fake" evidence I agree with you that passion alone is weak- every (most?) religion has zealots. The 4 Gospels and Paul's account are first hand accounts. They heard directly from Jesus who claimed to be God. Jesus might be crazy, but the original Apostles watched Jesus ascend into heaven - and then they died pursuing what Jesus taught. Paul was passionate about persecuting Christians (note the misplaced passion!), but then Jesus visited him directly and redirected Paul's passion and faith. People have definitely died for lesser causes. People have definitely pursued petty fights - but the decision of Jesus isn't petty - it is quite literally a decision that defines what happens after our short life here on earth. I appreciate you sharing the Wikipedia article. I'll read through it so I can better understand you and people like you. I wholeheartedly believe that the God of the Universe made you and loves you - and I want to show you that same love.
  - geoduck14 4y ago
    One theory presented is that Matthew and Luke were largely based on Mark. And that Mark was written by people "not with first hand account" (also, not Mark). My take: Mark has plenty of references to Jewish law - it was almost certainly written by someone with a strong Jewish background. The names of the people in the book of Mark are "normal" names for people during the time of Jesus. A study got what amounts to a census during the time and location of Jesus - they documented the most popular names - and these names aligned with the names contained in each of the Gospels. This means that the person who wrote Mark was probably near Jerusalem during Jesus' time The Gospels reflect personal differences in the authors... I haven't seen this yet in the Wikipedia article, but i expect to see it: Luke was Roman trained. Matthew, Mark, and John were jewish trained. Luke's account of the times when Jesus died are shifted by 6 hours. This is important. Luke believes that the day starts at midnight (like most Americans). Mark believes the day starts at sunset (like most Jews). Mark and Luke had distinct authors. I'll keep reading. Thanks!
coliveira 4y ago
First of all: the accounts are not first hand. They were in fact anonymous. Nobody put their names in these Gospel-style compositions, identifying themselves, until very late when the church decided to name them as we now have. Second of all: these accounts are not independent. There is the gospel of Mark, and them other authors went on copying most of the previous books, but adding sections that frequently contradict others. So, what we have are not 4 to 6 different accounts, we have a single story that has been copied and edited by several anonymous people.

Archelaos 4y ago

Josephus has a single paragraph about Jesus. It had been debated whether this is a later Christian interpolation into the manuscripts. The oldest manuscripts of Josephus' works that survived are from the 9th or 10th century. It might be possible that all our text witnesses go back to a single intermediate "Christian" Josephus. What speaks against such a conclusion is a) that (if I remember it correctly, I didn't cross-check) the passage uses the non-standard spelling "Chrestos" instead of "Christos", a so called iotacism, caused by a shift in the pronounciation of Ancient Greek where the sound of iota and eta morphed into each other, and b) that the paragraph appears in the context of Roman religious scandals, a quite unfavourable location. The counter-argument is that a clever forger has deliberately made a spelling mistake and chosen an unfavourable context to make his interpolation seem all the more credible. Be that as it may, another aspect from Josephus is much more interesting, because it provides us with some context we would have otherwise missed: He tells us about other pretenders of the Messiah from that time, inluding the Roman suppression of this movements, and about John the Baptist in some detail. These passages are usually considered original.

yyyk 4y ago
>Josephus has a single paragraph about Jesus. It had been debated whether this is a later Christian interpolation into the manuscripts. Two different paragraphs to be exact. The first is accepted as at least a partial interpolation, while the second is usually accepted in full.