Musings on biblical studies, politics, religion, ethics, human nature, tidbits from science
My post “The Chosen People Were Not Awaiting the Messiah” led to more diverse comments than I had been expecting and I thought I should cover a little more of Akenson’s grounds for his view that there is no unambiguous evidence for popular messianic expectations as part of the background to the life of Jesus … Continue reading “Were Jews Hoping for a Messiah to Deliver Them from Rome? Raising Doubts”
I put Richard Carrier’s arguments on hold in this post in order to point out what another scholar I have not yet cited has had to say about what J. H. Charlesworth calls “the myth that Jews expected a Messiah and knew what functions he would perform.” I would even say William Scott Green‘s opening … Continue reading “Origin of the Myth that the Jews Expected a Messiah”
What “Messiah” meant at the time of Paul and the earliest Christians Continuing with notes from Christ among the Messiahs: Christ Language in Paul and Messiah Language in Ancient Judaism by Matthew V. Novenson . The messianic idea We saw in Part 1 that interpreters of Paul have confidently concluded that whatever Paul meant by … Continue reading “Christ among the Messiahs — Part 2”
I am copying here a post I just submitted on another forum, so with apologies to readers who have already seen this . . . . This topic is not about “Jewish prophecies of the messiah’s arrival”. It is not about the second century Bar Kochba rebellion. Nor is it even about popular beliefs and attitudes at the time of the 66-73 … Continue reading “Myth of popular messianic expectations at the time of Jesus”
Here for convenience is an annotated list of the recent posts on “the myth of messianic expectations”. 1. Questioning Carrier and the Common View of a “Rash of Messianism” at the time of Jesus Carrier’s claim “Palestine in the early first century ce was experiencing a rash of messianism” is introduced. His assertion that “The … Continue reading “Questioning Carrier and the Conventional Wisdom on Messianic Expectations”
One does expect a little better from someone who makes a living out of biblical studies and even charges audiences for his scholarly wisdom. There was not a Jew on the planet who thought the messiah was going to be crushed by his enemies — humiliated, tortured, and executed. That was the *opposite* of what … Continue reading “And now it’s Bart’s turn”
Let’s sit down and look at the score sheet. Richard Carrier kicked 11 “errors of fact” at the net of Bart Ehrman’s book Did Jesus Exist? Carrier says he could have kicked many more but that it was getting dark and the referee told him he had limited time. Since beginning to write this post … Continue reading “The Facts of the Matter: Carrier 9, Ehrman 1 (my review, part 2)”
This continues from Part 2 where I continued discussing what Richard Horsley has to say about popular messianic movements in Israel up to the time of Jesus in Bandits, Prophets & Messiahs. In the last post I covered “social banditry” in Palestine (especially Galilee) and those who were looked upon as rightful kings in the … Continue reading “Popular Messianic(?) Movements Up To The Time Of Jesus and Beyond – Part 3”
This continues from Part 1 where I began discussing what Richard Horsley has to say about popular messianic movements in Israel up to the time of Jesus in Bandits, Prophets & Messiahs. Previous posts addressed the concept of a future messiah among the literate elites. This post considers what Horsley has to say about the … Continue reading “Popular Messianic(?) and Bandit Movements Up To The Time Of Jesus and Beyond – Part 2”
This post surveys the evidence and questions the conclusions of Richard A. Horsley (with John S. Hanson) in Bandits, Prophets & Messiahs: Popular Movements in the Time of Jesus (1999) concerning messianic hopes and movements among the common people of Palestine up to the time of Jesus. It is some years since I first read … Continue reading “Popular Messianic Movements Up To The Time Of Jesus – Part 1”
It is standard practice to classify Jewish messianism as national, ethnic, political and material, and to mark Christian messianism as universal, cosmopolitan, ethical and spiritual. That Jewish anticipation of the messiah’s arrival was unusually keen in first century Palestine and constituted the mise en scène for the emergence of Christianity is a virtual axiom of … Continue reading “The Myth of a General Messianic Expectation in Jesus’ Time”
21:20 Feb 16, Edited to add a quote from Mack in a book, edited by Neusner and others . . . The following is presented by Dr James McGrath on his Did Jesus Exist Youtube video as fundamental evidence for the historical existence of Jesus. It is a standard line, almost a “historicists’ creed”, and … Continue reading “Did Jesus exist on youtube? Dismantling the “evidence” presented by James McGrath”