Philo's guide to decoding the Hebrew Bible

[Minimalist]

That's great stuff, John.

[Ishtar]

Regarding the historical Jesus, there is plenty of attested evidence he existed, though scholars can debate ad infinitum about whether all of the accounts given about his life are completely accurate.

Monk, if there is ‘plenty of attested evidence’, could you not put just a smidgen of it here? I should have thought that you could have provided at least one link to it as you are usually the one who is forever demanding ‘links please’. Yet your own links to your 'evidence' have been curiously absent throughout this whole thread.

Many of the events of his life can never be proven. How can one prove Jesus walked on water, healed particular people or even so much as visited his mother on Sunday evenings, if indeed he ever did, except that someone, somewhere, wrote about it.

For a man who drew around five thousand people for his Sermon on the Mount and then fed the whole lot of them with five loaves and two fishes, I think it would have been mentioned somewhere. You’d also think that one of the many commentators and recorders around at the time might have mentioned a man whose crucifixion caused the sun to disappear - and an earthquake that caused the graves to open, “that the bodies of many of the saints that slept arose and came out of their graves after the resurrection, and went into the holy city and appeared to many.”

Do you not think that one of those many that the dead saints appeared to would have recorded such an event?

For the most part, the only accounts we have which describe the events of his life and his works are the gospels, canonical and non-canonical.

They are just stories, Monk, although I note you are now accepting the non-canonical gospels as kosher.

Nevertheless, it is important to note, that even the gnostics attest to the fact that Jesus, walked on the earth and spoke to men and women. The gnostic leader, Valeninus, is said to have taught that Jesus was the physical manifestation of the Son. According to Valeninus, Jesus was born of Mary and Joseph and was virtually a normal human being in most respects until the time of his baptism. None of the early christians and gnostic christians were questioning the physical existence of Jesus.

That’s right. None of the early christians and gnostic christians were questioning the physical existence of Jesus. That’s because, for them, it wasn’t an issue. They knew that all their stories about Jesus were just that, stories. They didn’t believe he literally lived. So you can no more attest Jesus from Gnostic stories than you can from Literalist ones - although I expect they were all and the same in the 1st century.

All the stories about Jesus (both canonical and non-canonical) were deliberately put together as spiritual teaching stories. They were allegorical, in the same way that the story of Hercules is allegorical. We don’t say that Hercules really lived just because there was a story about him. We don't believe that Jason actually lived and went to steal the Golden Fleece. We don’t say that Harry Potter really lived because there was is a story about him.

Valentinus’s description of Jesus as the Son is following on from Plato’s “Son of Man suspended crosswise over the universe.” It doesn’t mean that there actually is a Son of Man up there in the sky suspended across a cross. It’s an allegory for a deeper truth. It’s not literal.

The reason Valentinus (and Marcion) were part of the early church is because the church hadn’t yet separated out into Literalists and Gnostics. In fact, both their excommunications give us a likely date for when this happened. And as there is evidence for Gnostics like the Essenes and the Thereputae in the first century, and none for the Literalists, I believe that the early Christians were Gnostic mystics who would have laughed at the idea of people thinking that they were referring to a Jesus who had actually lived.

Your comments are contradictory unless in the first instance you are questioning the existance of orthodox christianity during the life-time of Jesus. Certainly it did not exist, but emerged under the teachings of the apostles and somewhat later Paul between 30 and 70CE. This latter date is when Polycarp was born who claimed to be a student of the apostle John. If Polycarp attests to a christian theology, certainly it corresponds to the time when the first gospels were written, thus an orthodox christianity was established by the fall of Jerusalem in 70.

I'm not being contradictory - I'm just not viewing this issue through rose-tinted spectacles.

We are looking for non-canonical evidence as you know, Monk. So we cannot accept Paul as a historical figure, much less a Literalist historical figure for all the reasons you and I discussed earlier. So that leaves us with Polycarp. You say he was a follower of John the Apostle? Well, I guess it must be true then because the 4th century spin-meister Eusebius tells us that ...despite the fact that Polycarp never even mentions John. Hmmm, somehow I don't think so. Perhaps he was a follower of Hagred too...or Professor Dumbledore?

Polycarp lived in Turkey (which is a long way from Judaea) between 69 CE and 155 CE. The only attestation to him that can be counted on (Irananeus being a known forger) is his letter to the Phillippians which is dated 110 – 140 CE. So all we can attest through Polycarp is that there was Literal Christianity in Turkey in the second century...and thus not in 1st century Jerusalem.

Yes, this is indisputable and so one can see the so-called 'heretical' sects emerging nearly simultaneously. No doubt, while the orthodox christians were busy documenting their theology in letters and such for distribution to their various centers of activity, the gnostic christians were doing the same. While the core theologies of each have some common elements (as I have said all along) it does not obscure the fact, the each evolved separately as evidenced by the attested documents which have survived.

Hey ...wait up slippery boy!

“While the core theologies of each have some common elements (as I have said all along)”.

No you haven’t said all along! In fact, you've been saying the opposite all along ... that their core theologies are totally different! This is your first admission of such a polnt. But thank you and well done... you’ve got that bit finally.

“... it does not obscure the fact, the each evolved separately as evidenced by the attested documents which have survived...”

No. Because there is no evidence of any historical Jesus or even Literalist thinking until the second century. There is, however, evidence of Gnostics before that in the 1st century and even earlier. Thus there is every reason to believe that the first stories about Jesus were Gnostic and thus allegorical, and that they were made literal later...and after that you can have your separate evolutions.

What happened, later, in late third and fourth centuries is not my issue. The establishment of the political church, and its wholesale repression of heretics, and absorption of pagan rites (if indeed they did so) is a topic for another thread, in my opinion.

No, it’s the same topic and thus not another topic for another thread. This is because the wholesale repressions and murders and book burnings were part of the smoke and mirrors the Church has erected to mislead its followers into believing that only they are following “the true Christ” and all the rest were evil heretics. These ‘heretics’ are the very Gnostics whose stories are the root of the Christian tradition and that's why the Church wanted them out of the way, to hide that fact.

Reading the writings, it seems the orthodox christians have taken the saying of Jesus and built a theology on a hebrew religious foundation (as evidenced by many OT references) while the gnostic christians have taken the sayings of Jesus and built a theology on a foundation of mysticism and greek philosophy.

You think that because you don’t yet know enough about mythology and Greek and Egyptian philosophy, as well as Zoroastrianism, to see any of it in the OT or the NT.

Your first clue should be that those who canonised the NT and consolidated the orthodox church in the 2nd and 3rd centuries did not live in Judaea or even have Jewish names. Your second clue should be that the whole Literalist story puts the Jews in a terrible light.

You only know your own religion, and so can only see what your own religion has taught you to see.

[Ishtar]

Just a small addendum to all that:

As time went on, the stories of the Valentinians began to differ one from another. Gnostics don't have a problem with their stories differing, as they know they're not true anyway, and each story is just one teachers's attempt to convey a hidden teaching through the means of the plotline, and they may change the plotline accordingly. That stories differ in meaning is only important when you are trying to peddle the line that your story is the not only true, but also the only true one - as the Literalists did.

That said, Elaine Pagels who is professor of religion at Princeton has written a very good book Gnostic Paul: Exegesis of the Pauline Letters. In this book, Pagels shows, from Valentinian writings, how the Valentinians not only read Paul's letters as Gnostic but also the story of the Christ.

http://www.amazon.com/Gnostic-Paul-Exeg ... 1563380390

[Ishtar]

What I don't get though is why should it have mattered? Certainly the message should have been more important than the man.

That's just it, though, Seeker. The Literalist message IS the Man. After tearing the deeper philosophical guts out of this myth, that's all they're left with:

That this Man lived then and was really really special and that you could never ever ever hope to be even good enough to clean His Boots and anyway, that was then and this is now ...so unless you lived 2,000 years ago and were one of the few lucky enough to touch The Hem of his Robe, don't expect any spiritual miracles to come your way. Just have faith that This Happened... even though it doesn't make any sense and there's no evidence for it in history ... but just keep believing in This, and when you die, you'll go to Heaven. And it must be true, Seeker, because no-one's ever come back from the dead to tell us that it's not! QED.



PS Monk, I have a question. If the aim of human life is to go to Heaven when you die, why did Jesus bring Lazarus back from the dead?

Clue: The raising of Lazarus from the dead is an Egyptian story.

[Ishtar]

Monk, I'd like to examine this with you further:

Nevertheless, it is important to note, that even the gnostics attest to the fact that Jesus, walked on the earth and spoke to men and women. The gnostic leader, Valeninus, is said to have taught that Jesus was the physical manifestation of the Son. According to Valeninus, Jesus was born of Mary and Joseph and was virtually a normal human being in most respects until the time of his baptism. None of the early christians and gnostic christians were questioning the physical existence of Jesus.

There are only a few fragmented writings from Valentinus - apart from which is the second century Gospel of Truth, a Gnostic Nag Hammadi gospel purported to be written by the Valentinians which is almost Greek (and Norse!) in the way it presents the story of Error nailing the Son to a tree. By using the word Error, these Gnostics have bypassed any metaphorical names and gone straight to the heart of matter. So if Jesus is a real person in in this story, so is the abstract noun Error. Unlikely eh?

No, Error refers to the fall from grace of Sophia's aspect, Achamoth, through the cross, so that the Son (as Plato says 'suspended crosswise') has to reach through it and down to save her.

The few fragments from Valentinus himself, though, give us only the following:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gospel_of_Truth

Layton printed eight fragments of Valentinian literature, each a quote which a Church Father claimed to take from the Valentinian corpus although none from the "Gospel of Truth". Layton further noted where the excerpts agree with one another.

"Fragment G", which Clement of Alexandria (Stromateis 6.52.3-4) related to "On Friends", asserts that there is shared matter between Gnostic Christian material, and material found in "publicly available books"; which is the result of "the law that is written in the [human] heart". Layton relates this to GTr [Gospel of Truth] 19.34 - when Jesus taught, "in their hearts appeared the living book of the living which is written in the Father's thought and intellect". Both rely on a shared concept of pre-existent yet obscured knowledge, which had emanated from the Father of the Gnostics.

"Fragment F" also comes from the Stromateis, 4.89.1-3. Directed to the Gnostics, it calls the congregation "children of eternal life" and hopes that they will "nullify the world without being yourselves nullified". Layton relates the former to GTr 43.22 at the end of the work, which emphasises that the Gnostics are the Father's children and will live eternally. Layton relates the latter to GTr 24.20, which proposes to "nullify the realm of appearance" and then explains this as the world which lacks the Father.

This is what Irananeus had to say about the Gospel of Truth:

But the followers of Valentinus, putting away all fear, bring forward their own compositions and boast that they have more Gospels than really exist. Indeed their audacity has gone so far that they entitle their recent composition the Gospel of Truth, though it agrees in nothing with the Gospels of the apostles, and so no Gospel of theirs is free from blasphemy. For if what they produce is the Gospel of Truth, and is different from those which the apostles handed down to us, those who care to can learn how it can be show from the Scriptures themselves that [then] what is handed down from the apostles is not the Gospel of Truth.

So Iranaeus didn't think the Valentinians were of the view that Jesus literally lived.

Actually, Iranaeus in exactly right in saying that the Gospel of Truth is not true. What he fails to point out, though, is that the same applies to the canonical four gospels, which are not true either.

However, they all point to a deeper spiritual truth - gnosis, or 'inner knowing'.

[seeker]

That's just it, though, Seeker. The Literalist message IS the Man. After tearing the deeper philosophical guts out of this myth, that's all they're left with:

That this Man lived then and was really really special and that you could never ever ever hope to be even good enough to clean His Boots and anyway, that was then and this is now ...so unless you lived 2,000 years ago and were one of the few lucky enough to touch The Hem of his Robe, don't expect any spiritual miracles to come your way. Just have faith that This Happened... even though it doesn't make any sense and there's no evidence for it in history ... but just keep believing in This, and when you die, you'll go to Heaven. And it must be true, Seeker, because no-one's ever come back from the dead to tell us that it's not! QED.



PS Monk, I have a question. If the aim of human life is to go to Heaven when you die, why did Jesus bring Lazarus back from the dead?

Clue: The raising of Lazarus from the dead is an Egyptian story.

I'm not so sure about that Ish. Honestly though its hard for me to even understand how a person could even accept the story as remotely possible so maybe I'm not the best judge. One of the points Freke and Gandy make is the the literal story was supposed to be improbable precisely to get people to look deeper and become initiates. No one was supposed to take the literal story alone as any sort of full explanation.

[Ishtar]

Seeker

I think that Freke and Gandy go along with the idea of one story for the masses and then the select few go on to the secret initiation and have the real meaning of the story revealed to them.

This is what Jesus says about it in Mark. He more or less says that's what's going on.

And the Greek Lesser and Greater Mysteries apparently followed a similar format.

So the story remain the same, but the meaning changes, or rather its hidden meaning is revealed.

I'm not sure, though, that the story is ever put over as true.

In those days of no televisions, books or newspapers, the oral story telling tradition was the only means of entertainment, and great crowds would gather around the wandering storyteller when he hit town. So they were used to the idea of 'stories' as opposed to 'history'.

But that stories could be used as more than light entertainment is evidenced in Vedic ayurvedic practises that go back 5,000 years, and are also in evidence today in India. You can go to an ayurvedic doctor in India with a headache, and instead of coming away with pills or herbs or even dietary advice, you get given a story.

Fairy tales, like those of the Brothers Grimm, are also thought to perform a similar function other than just geting the child to go to sleep. After all, some of them are grisly, and possibly the equivalent of allowing your child to watch a 'video nasty' before they go bed. But apparently, these old folk stories that the Grimm brothers gathered could almost be considered folk healing remedies, in that they helped the child to develop psychologically .... in other words, they could go on adventures and fight dragons and face their demons while still safe in their mother's arms.

There's a very good book on this, a classic called The Uses of Enchantment: The Meaning and Importance of Fairy Tales by Bruno Bettelheim, where he goes through classic tales like Little Red Riding Hood and shows how each landmark of the story is a component of a pyschological journey.

The story of The Sleeping Beauty is also supposed to be an allegory for what the alchemist Rosacrucians called the Chemical Marriage and the Gnostics called the Divine Marriage.

I know this has wandered a little way from the subject, but it's just to illustrate how story telling used to be regarded - in that it could be valuable without necessarily having to be literally true.

These days, we don't value fictional stories as having any use other than to entertain in a much more ephemeral way which has no lasting impact on us. Meanwhile, we are bombarded with 'the news' 24 hours a day - well, not in my house because I refuse to have it on. Having said that, I watched a great episode of South Park last night which will stay with me for a long time.

[Minimalist]

So all we can attest through Polycarp is that there was Literal Christianity in Turkey in the second century

Pliny tells us this....without the "literal" part. Somehow, Pliny is more convincing.

[seeker]

I think people now have real difficulty understanding just how different things are in a world of oral as opposed to written traditions. Stories change from teller to teller and even between tellings by the same teller (I'm telling you). One of the reasons there were so many different ideas about Christianity early on was because things weren't spelled out. in that kind of environment the details of the story weren't as important as the 'message' the story was meant to convey because the details always changed.

[Ishtar]

So all we can attest through Polycarp is that there was Literal Christianity in Turkey in the second century

Pliny tells us this....without the "literal" part. Somehow, Pliny is more convincing.

I take it you mean Pliny the Younger and, at that time, I'd be interested to hear what kind of Christians they were.

The forged Letter to Timothy by Paul says 'All Asia has turned against against me', meaning that Gnostics there flourished. Polycarp (in Turkey) says that the great majority of Christians do not worship Jesus in the flesh. Gibbon wrote that the Gnostics covered Asia and Egypt.

[Minimalist]

http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/jod/texts/pliny.html

Those who denied that they were or had been Christians, when they invoked the gods in words dictated by me, offered prayer with incense and wine to your image, which I had ordered to be brought for this purpose together with statues of the gods, and moreover cursed Christ--none of which those who are really Christians, it is said, can be forced to do--these I thought should be discharged. Others named by the informer declared that they were Christians, but then denied it, asserting that they had been but had ceased to be, some three years before, others many years, some as much as twenty-five years. They all worshipped your image and the statues of the gods, and cursed Christ.

They asserted, however, that the sum and substance of their fault or error had been that they were accustomed to meet on a fixed day before dawn and sing responsively a hymn to Christ as to a god, and to bind themselves by oath, not to some crime, but not to commit fraud, theft, or adultery, not falsify their trust, nor to refuse to return a trust when called upon to do so. When this was over, it was their custom to depart and to assemble again to partake of food--but ordinary and innocent food. Even this, they affirmed, they had ceased to do after my edict by which, in accordance with your instructions, I had forbidden political associations. Accordingly, I judged it all the more necessary to find out what the truth was by torturing two female slaves who were called deaconesses. But I discovered nothing else but depraved, excessive superstition.

I highlighted a couple of points which xtians would not be pleased with.

So much for the myth of early xtian martyrs going joyfully to their deaths for this fellow "jesus." When given the opportunity by Pliny to demonstrate their loyalty to the state, they did so. That is pretty much at odds with the tale of glorious martyrdom which the church later foisted upon history.

Second, I've always been mildly amused by Pliny's comment that they sang a hymn to Christ "as to a god." Why not, "as a god?" I keep getting images of the islamic saying that there is no god but allah and mohammad is his prophet.

Pliny admits that he knew nothing whatsoever about xtians until he arrived at his post in Asia which pretty much discredits the notion that there were multitudes of xtian arsonists running around Rome in Nero's time which would have been 50 years earlier. Thus, whatever Pliny learned about these people he learned as a result of his interrogations.

Note also Emperor Trajan's reply which is mild and reasonable and I would prefer him to be Attorney General of the US rather than the collections of shitwits that Bush has appointed.

[Ishtar]

Thanks Min.

What else is interesting, though, is that Pliny mentions two deaconesses. The Literalists got rid of the women early (or downplayed their roles) while the Gnostics had many women in prominent positions. Some of the Nag Hammadi gospels seem to have been written by women or at least attributed to women, unlike your staunchly male New Testament with not one woman writer among them.

Anyway, whatever kind of Christians they were that Pliny ran into, they didn't seem that dedicated.

[Ishtar]

One of the reasons there were so many different ideas about Christianity early on was because things weren't spelled out. in that kind of environment the details of the story weren't as important as the 'message' the story was meant to convey because the details always changed.

I think all the Gnostic stories were various developments, in one way or another, on the teachings of Pythagorus and Plato.

Freke and Gandy say: "Plato's Timaeus, the most cryptic and mystical of all Plato's dialogues, was composed from Pythagorean texts bought from a Pythagorean of southern Italy called Timaeus. The influence of this text on Gnostic speculation was profound. As Layton writes: 'The formation of Gnostic myth ultimately drew on Platonist interpretation of the myth of creation in Plato's Timaeus, as combined with the Book of Genesis.'"

And it is in Timaeus that we first find the Son of Man 'suspended crosswise across the universe".

[Minimalist]

Thanks Min.

What else is interesting, though, is that Pliny mentions two deaconesses. The Literalists got rid of the women early (or downplayed their roles) while the Gnostics had many women in prominent positions. Some of the Nag Hammadi gospels seem to have been written by women or at least attributed to women, unlike your staunchly male New Testament with not one woman writer among them.

Anyway, whatever kind of Christians they were that Pliny ran into, they didn't seem that dedicated.

Ehrman deals with the disenfranchisement of women. Far later than Pliny who was governor between 110-112 AD.

Yes, it does seem to be a rather lackluster outfit, huh?

I found this link for you Ish. If you start following links I figure it will keep you busy for a while.

http://www.mountainman.com.au/essenes/


By all means check out the Introductory Articles.

[kbs2244]

No Ish,
I certainly do believe in the fact that Jesus lived a human life.
And that he had a three and a half year ministry in the 30 AD time frame.
But I don’t believe he died on a cross. It was just a stake.
The cross would have been too much work for the practical Roman to expend on something for common criminals.
And, on the same practically issue, tying the hands above the head, and then hanging the body from them, collapses the lungs, causing a faster death.
The cross thing came in with all the other stuff around 100-150 AD.

That is the time frame where I feel “The Church” lost its roots.

On seekers idea that the message should have been more important than the man:
I would have to say they were both co-important.
You have to remember the message freed the Hebrews from the requirements of the Law, so the requirement of the Law had to be fulfilled, which only a perfect man could do.
So it had to be Jesus.
That was real important to the Hebrews.
But at the same time the message allowed non Hebrews into Gods favor, so it was important in that way also.
That part of the message is what changed the Western World.

On his not being mentioned in any non Biblical histories:
He for sure wouldn’t have been the first or last to be officially erased from history.
Historians were usually paid by someone richer than them.
It was not a self supporting way of life.
For sure they would not mention something embarrassing to their sponsor.
But if he didn’t ever exist, who were the millions of people following?
As an aside, even in Islam, Jesus is recognized as an historical important figure.
They just do not think he was The foretold (in the same “stories” as the OT) Prophet.


On the polytheism thing.

I am aware that the practices of the people did not match the official doctrine. It does in very few cultures.
That the people, even royalty, in Jerusalem practiced it doesn’t surprise me at all.
But it was not approved doctrine.
But I very much disagree with Godfrey Higgins about Abraham personally.
Although he lived in a polytheistic world, and some of his many servants, and maybe even some of his family, may have practiced polytheism, I doubt he did.


So, in the end, if you can agree that the so called “Orthodox Christianity” that dates from the time of 100 to 200 AD is not the same animal as what I call “Primitive Christianity” prior to that time, we may have more in common than you think concerning the treatment of the “Gnostic Christians.”
Mostly because I don’t think they were any more Christian than the ones hunting them down.
It is a kind of “pot calling the kettle black” thing.

I guess the problem may be that my "Christianity" is not very "Orthodox."
Or very "Roman." Or Luthern. Or whetever.
It is mine.
But you are assigning me orthodox ideas.