Honoring the historical Jesus

[Gray]

To continue an off-topic thought from another thread:

What's the best way to honor Jesus? To follow the gospel he most likely taught? That is to say, the gospel of good works and of distributive justice culminating in the eschaton. Or to follow the theologies that were developed after his death about salvation through belief in Jesus and Jesus' divine status?

As someone coming from a Restoration tradition, my inclination is to go back to the source. There are of course counter arguments to that too. What makes the source better than things that came later? And so on.

I'm not going to flat out say Jesus thought this or that. From my understanding of the scholarship I think the following is reasonable, although not irrefutable by any means.

• May or may not have considered himself to be the Messiah - probably considered to be that by his disciples in Jesus' lifetime
• Was himself a disciple of John the Baptist, until John was murdered
• Likely born in Nazareth, no miraculous birth
• Likely did not think of himself as divine (whether that means God, son of God, an exalted angel, or some kind of figurative stand-in for God) . Almost certainly was not viewed as divine by his disciples until after his death - they began to see him that way in retrospect. Atonement theology also came about in retrospect.
• His family probably thought he was crazy
• Was as much a religious teacher as he was a non-violent activist against collaboration with Rome (as opposed to his more violent contemporaries)
• Was probably known as a healer/miracle worker
• Came from an area with a lot of gentile presence, embraced people considered to be ritually unclean
• Expected the eschaton to come soon, where God, in collaboration with humanity, would right all wrongs, giving justice to the poor and afflicted, and humbling the wicked/wealthy (God being the father or "householder" of humanity)
• Did some kind of demonstration in Jerusalem that resulted in his death
• Probably no witnesses among the disciples to his death
• Empty tomb story probably invented later
• The disciples had some kind of transcendent experience where they came to believe that God had raised/vindicated Jesus - and others who were not disciples, including Paul

For the sake of argument, let's say Jesus considered himself to be a prophet, not the son of God in any literal sense, and had no awareness of anything like the atonement or his own cosmic importance. That does not mean that he wasn't in fact the son of God, that his death didn't atone for this sins of the world, etc. Jesus can in fact be those things. That question outside the bounds of history and into the area of faith.

But I have to think, the traditional theological Jesus has swallowed up the historical Jesus. I feel a great sense of loss at the thought.

What a tragedy! Jesus' message gets lost behind these notions of divinity and atonement and Christology and theology. But in a sense they still work in leading us to the historical Jesus, but only in metaphor. Yes, he was divine - in that the divinity of God was visible in his teachings and his life. God is made manifest in the life of Jesus, in a very first century kind of notion. Yes, he gave up his life - not as a sacrifice for sin, but in order to advance the cause of justice in an unjust world. "Sacrifice for sin" almost works as a metaphor for the same thing, so long as we're not talking about penal substitution. But the metaphors take on life of their own and end up obscuring the subject.

Even in considering the historical Jesus, we're not free from faith-based proclamations. We can talk about probability and make good arguments from the text and the historical context, but we'll never have a solid conclusion. It's like listening to echoes of echoes of echoes and trying to catch what was said. So I'll say I could be totally wrong, but this is how I've come to see Jesus.

Why do I care? Maybe because I've always been fascinated with the Jesus of the gospels, and maybe because I belong to a church that was started as an attempt try to restore the "original" Christianity that had gotten lost over the years. I love Jesus, so I want to understand him better. In so doing I think he's more impressive and miraculous to me as a human being than as a God. But am I understanding him? I hope so. But there are other interpretations too.

My point isn't to start a huge multi-tiered debate. I understand the appeal of more traditional theological views, and I see their value too. This is just something I've been thinking about a lot.

 

[Bobbieaware]

33 minutes ago, Gray said:

To continue an off-topic thought from another thread:

What's the best way to honor Jesus? To follow the gospel he most likely taught? That is to say, the gospel of good works and of distributive justice culminating in the eschaton. Or to follow the theologies that were developed after his death about salvation through belief in Jesus and Jesus' divine status?

As someone coming from a Restoration tradition, my inclination is to go back to the source. There are of course counter arguments to that too. What makes the source better than things that came later? And so on.

I'm not going to flat out say Jesus thought this or that. From my understanding of the scholarship I think the following is reasonable, although not irrefutable by any means.

• May or may not have considered himself to be the Messiah - probably considered to be that by his disciples in Jesus' lifetime
• Was himself a disciple of John the Baptist, until John was murdered
• Likely born in Nazareth, no miraculous birth
• Likely did not think of himself as divine (whether that means God, son of God, an exalted angel, or some kind of figurative stand-in for God) . Almost certainly was not viewed as divine by his disciples until after his death - they began to see him that way in retrospect. Atonement theology also came about in retrospect.
• His family probably thought he was crazy
• Was as much a religious teacher as he was a non-violent activist against collaboration with Rome (as opposed to his more violent contemporaries)
• Was probably known as a healer/miracle worker
• Came from an area with a lot of gentile presence, embraced people considered to be ritually unclean
• Expected the eschaton to come soon, where God, in collaboration with humanity, would right all wrongs, giving justice to the poor and afflicted, and humbling the wicked/wealthy (God being the father or "householder" of humanity)
• Did some kind of demonstration in Jerusalem that resulted in his death
• Probably no witnesses among the disciples to his death
• Empty tomb story probably invented later
• The disciples had some kind of transcendent experience where they came to believe that God had raised/vindicated Jesus - and others who were not disciples, including Paul

For the sake of argument, let's say Jesus considered himself to be a prophet, not the son of God in any literal sense, and had no awareness of anything like the atonement or his own cosmic importance. That does not mean that he wasn't in fact the son of God, that his death didn't atone for this sins of the world, etc. Jesus can in fact be those things. That question outside the bounds of history and into the area of faith.

But I have to think, the traditional theological Jesus has swallowed up the historical Jesus. I feel a great sense of loss at the thought.

What a tragedy! Jesus' message gets lost behind these notions of divinity and atonement and Christology and theology. But in a sense they still work in leading us to the historical Jesus, but only in metaphor. Yes, he was divine - in that the divinity of God was visible in his teachings and his life. God is made manifest in the life of Jesus, in a very first century kind of notion. Yes, he gave up his life - not as a sacrifice for sin, but in order to advance the cause of justice in an unjust world. "Sacrifice for sin" almost works as a metaphor for the same thing, so long as we're not talking about penal substitution. But the metaphors take on life of their own and end up obscuring the subject.

Even in considering the historical Jesus, we're not free from faith-based proclamations. We can talk about probability and make good arguments from the text and the historical context, but we'll never have a solid conclusion. It's like listening to echoes of echoes of echoes and trying to catch what was said. So I'll say I could be totally wrong, but this is how I've come to see Jesus.

Why do I care? Maybe because I've always been fascinated with the Jesus of the gospels, and maybe because I belong to a church that was started as an attempt try to restore the "original" Christianity that had gotten lost over the years. I love Jesus, so I want to understand him better. In so doing I think he's more impressive and miraculous to me as a human being than as a God. But am I understanding him? I hope so. But there are other interpretations too.

My point isn't to start a huge multi-tiered debate. I understand the appeal of more traditional theological views, and I see their value too. This is just something I've been thinking about a lot.

 

In other words, let's just throw the restoration scriptures out the window in favor of so-called scholarship. Yes, let's just do the complete opposite of what the scriptures and the prophets, both living and dead, say we should do. I guess when one adopts the position that the Book of Mormon is work of pure fiction the many portions of Mormon's painstaking abridgment that totally and unequivocally debunk your understanding of who Jesus is  are made easy to just ignore. 

 

Edited September 27, 2017 by Bobbieaware

[thesometimesaint]

There was in all probability that a man called Yeshua bar Yosef an itinerant preacher who  lived some 2000 years ago in the state of Palestine. Whether he was also Yeshua bar El is a matter of religion.

[CV75]

33 minutes ago, Gray said:

To continue an off-topic thought from another thread:

What's the best way to honor Jesus? To follow the gospel he most likely taught? That is to say, the gospel of good works and of distributive justice culminating in the eschaton. Or to follow the theologies that were developed after his death about salvation through belief in Jesus and Jesus' divine status?

As someone coming from a Restoration tradition, my inclination is to go back to the source. There are of course counter arguments to that too. What makes the source better than things that came later? And so on.

I'm not going to flat out say Jesus thought this or that. From my understanding of the scholarship I think the following is reasonable, although not irrefutable by any means.

• May or may not have considered himself to be the Messiah - probably considered to be that by his disciples in Jesus' lifetime
• Was himself a disciple of John the Baptist, until John was murdered
• Likely born in Nazareth, no miraculous birth
• Likely did not think of himself as divine (whether that means God, son of God, an exalted angel, or some kind of figurative stand-in for God) . Almost certainly was not viewed as divine by his disciples until after his death - they began to see him that way in retrospect. Atonement theology also came about in retrospect.
• His family probably thought he was crazy
• Was as much a religious teacher as he was a non-violent activist against collaboration with Rome (as opposed to his more violent contemporaries)
• Was probably known as a healer/miracle worker
• Came from an area with a lot of gentile presence, embraced people considered to be ritually unclean
• Expected the eschaton to come soon, where God, in collaboration with humanity, would right all wrongs, giving justice to the poor and afflicted, and humbling the wicked/wealthy (God being the father or "householder" of humanity)
• Did some kind of demonstration in Jerusalem that resulted in his death
• Probably no witnesses among the disciples to his death
• Empty tomb story probably invented later
• The disciples had some kind of transcendent experience where they came to believe that God had raised/vindicated Jesus - and others who were not disciples, including Paul

For the sake of argument, let's say Jesus considered himself to be a prophet, not the son of God in any literal sense, and had no awareness of anything like the atonement or his own cosmic importance. That does not mean that he wasn't in fact the son of God, that his death didn't atone for this sins of the world, etc. Jesus can in fact be those things. That question outside the bounds of history and into the area of faith.

But I have to think, the traditional theological Jesus has swallowed up the historical Jesus. I feel a great sense of loss at the thought.

What a tragedy! Jesus' message gets lost behind these notions of divinity and atonement and Christology and theology. But in a sense they still work in leading us to the historical Jesus, but only in metaphor. Yes, he was divine - in that the divinity of God was visible in his teachings and his life. God is made manifest in the life of Jesus, in a very first century kind of notion. Yes, he gave up his life - not as a sacrifice for sin, but in order to advance the cause of justice in an unjust world. "Sacrifice for sin" almost works as a metaphor for the same thing, so long as we're not talking about penal substitution. But the metaphors take on life of their own and end up obscuring the subject.

Even in considering the historical Jesus, we're not free from faith-based proclamations. We can talk about probability and make good arguments from the text and the historical context, but we'll never have a solid conclusion. It's like listening to echoes of echoes of echoes and trying to catch what was said. So I'll say I could be totally wrong, but this is how I've come to see Jesus.

Why do I care? Maybe because I've always been fascinated with the Jesus of the gospels, and maybe because I belong to a church that was started as an attempt try to restore the "original" Christianity that had gotten lost over the years. I love Jesus, so I want to understand him better. In so doing I think he's more impressive and miraculous to me as a human being than as a God. But am I understanding him? I hope so. But there are other interpretations too.

My point isn't to start a huge multi-tiered debate. I understand the appeal of more traditional theological views, and I see their value too. This is just something I've been thinking about a lot.

 

I don’t think honor can be measured or quantified; one can certainly honor the process of objective quantification by a historical standard and the image and message of a man that data recalls. By what objective means does one human being merit more honor than another?

[JLHPROF]

You would honor the mortal over the divine?
A curious approach to religion.

[bluebell]

So these are my questions from reading the OP-

1)  How can we separate Jesus' teachings into 'mostly likely taught' and 'theologies developed after his death'?  All we have to go by, as far as the teachings of Jesus, are religious writings written either before or after His death.  

2)  What makes one source more 'the source' than another source?  Why is the NT better than the D&C, for example?

3)  Also, you said "What a tragedy! Jesus' message gets lost behind these notions of divinity and atonement and Christology and theology."  Is there any reason we should assume that Jesus' message does not include notions of divinity and Atonement?

4)  What evidence is there that the historical Jesus is not the same as the theological Jesus?

[CV75]

19 minutes ago, bluebell said:

So these are my questions from reading the OP-

1)  How can we separate Jesus' teachings into 'mostly likely taught' and 'theologies developed after his death'?  All we have to go by, as far as the teachings of Jesus, are religious writings written either before or after His death.  

2)  What makes one source more 'the source' than another source?  Why is the NT better than the D&C, for example?

3)  Also, you said "What a tragedy! Jesus' message gets lost behind these notions of divinity and atonement and Christology and theology."  Is there any reason we should assume that Jesus' message does not include notions of divinity and Atonement?

4)  What evidence is there that the historical Jesus is not the same as the theological Jesus?

I think @Gray is saying there are extra- or non-scriptural sources upon which we can base a historically accurate persona whom merits "honor." If we are religiously or spiritually inclined, we might attribute a divine hand to that. If we are not, we might use religious terminology ("worship" instead of "honor") anyway to introduce this viewpoint among the religious and find a degree of acceptance within that community. 

Edited September 27, 2017 by CV75

[bluebell]

10 minutes ago, CV75 said:

I think @Gray is saying there are extra- or non-scriptural sources upon which we can base a historically accurate persona whom merits "honor." If we are religiously or spiritually inclined, we might attribute a divine hand to that. If we are not, we might use religious terminology ("worship" instead of "honor") anyway to introduce this viewpoint among the religious and find a degree of acceptance within that community. 

What non-religious sources are there that speak about what Jesus taught while he was alive?  

[CV75]

9 minutes ago, bluebell said:

What non-religious sources are there that speak about what Jesus taught while he was alive?  

I don't know exactly what he is referring to; contemporary references are rare but they do exist. But I suppose the non-religious sources might include various theoretical, archaeological and sociological studies covering that historical period.

[bluebell]

1 minute ago, CV75 said:

I don't know exactly what he is referring to; contemporary references are rare but they do exist. But I suppose the non-religious sources might include various theoretical, archaeological and sociological studies covering that historical period.

I haven't studied the topic hardly at all, but I was under the impression that there were practically no non-religious historical records that record actual teachings of Jesus.  But maybe Gray knows of some.  They would definitely be relevant and interesting to discuss.

[mnn727]

Quote

For the sake of argument, let's say Jesus considered himself to be a prophet, not the son of God in any literal sense,

Shall we throw out the Bible also?

Quote

 

Luke 4:

⁴¹ Now his parents went to Jerusalem every year at the feast of the passover.

⁴² And when he was twelve years old, they went up to Jerusalem after the custom of the feast.

⁴³ And when they had fulfilled the days, as they returned, the child Jesus tarried behind in Jerusalem; and Joseph and his mother knew not of it.

⁴⁴ But they, supposing him to have been in the company, went a day's journey; and they sought him among their kinsfolk and acquaintance.

⁴⁵ And when they found him not, they turned back again to Jerusalem, seeking him.

⁴⁶ And it came to pass, that after three days they found him in the temple, sitting in the midst of the doctors, both hearing them, and asking them questions.

⁴⁷ And all that heard him were astonished at his understanding and answers.

⁴⁸ And when they saw him, they were amazed: and his mother said unto him, Son, why hast thou thus dealt with us? behold, thy father and I have sought thee sorrowing.

⁴⁹ And he said unto them, How is it that ye sought me? wist ye not that I must be about my Father's business?

 

He wasn't doing carpentry in the Temple. 

Edited September 27, 2017 by mnn727

[mnn727]

39 minutes ago, CV75 said:

I think @Gray is saying there are extra- or non-scriptural sources upon which we can base a historically accurate persona whom merits "honor." If we are religiously or spiritually inclined, we might attribute a divine hand to that. If we are not, we might use religious terminology ("worship" instead of "honor") anyway to introduce this viewpoint among the religious and find a degree of acceptance within that community. 

There are no sources that are contemporary to Jesus. Scholars agree that even Josephus (the earliest non scriptural source we have) was at the most 4 years old when Christ was Crucified.

[bluebell]

27 minutes ago, mnn727 said:

There are no sources that are contemporary to Jesus. Scholars agree that even Josephus (the earliest non scriptural source we have) was at the most 4 years old when Christ was Crucified.

I've also read that most historians doubt the parts in Josephus' work about Jesus were even written by him. 

[Maidservant]

3 hours ago, Bobbieaware said:

In other words, let's just throw the restoration scriptures out the window in favor of so-called scholarship.

Studying the New Testament deeply and in good faith as a religious document (not "scholarship") can bring someone to a much different conclusion than the restoration scriptures. I know that it has me.  It's very dismaying.  To understand one set of scriptures as having a much different meaning than another set.  Make a person try to figure out--what?  what are we supposed to be figuring out?

(Although, by the way, the Book of Mormon isn't a monolithic book, either, nor does it always one-to-one capisce with D & C for example, not even getting to King Follett.)

2 hours ago, JLHPROF said:

You would honor the mortal over the divine?
A curious approach to religion.

I would not even have two different categories because I think the scriptures (all of them) teach that.  To be a person is to be GOD and to be GOD is to be a person.

///

To answer the OP.

Here is my number one thing, Gray.

Jesus wrote nothing that we have in the New Testament.  So we are already one translation away (in the game of phone/gossip) from what did (or did not) happen.  That doesn't mean it is automatically discardable, of course.

My second thing are things like the Sermon on the Mount, presented as Jesus' central message in the New Testament.  The Sermon of the Mount is not a list of "good actions".  It is a very deep, symbolic transformation template.  It's a map.  But no one teaches it that way that I know of--or not commonly because I haven't seen it.  So whoever wrote it--Jesus speaking it, or someone after for whom it would serve to come out of Jesus' mouth--was brilliant with human/spiritual nature and teaching people how to come to full stature of our potential. (It's also a politically subversive piece.) But it's just not used except as a bunch of proverbs--why?  Why believe in the New Testament at all if you are not going to feast on--and live from--the central piece of it?  (And does not forward the doctrine of an atonement; or at least not in the way we think of it.)

Then you have the four gospels which are presented very differently.  The differences are not haphazard.  They are very deliberate presentations, craftings.  I'm in awe!  Their purpose may NOT be primarily to provide a history of Jesus, but to be used together in esoteric ways to understand CHRIST.  (Which makes me wonder if it was someone else creating or inflating Jesus for their own reasons. Benevolent, I'm sure.)

Anyway, those are a few of the pieces that flabbergast me, but I expect them to yield treasures as well.

Edited September 27, 2017 by Maidservant

[bluebell]

5 minutes ago, Maidservant said:

So whoever wrote it--Jesus speaking it, or someone after for whom it would serve to come out of Jesus' mouth--was brilliant with human/spiritual nature and teaching people how to come to full stature of our potential. (It's also a politically subversive piece.)

Do you mean that it was politically subversive in regards to the Romans, or the Jews?

[RevTestament]

3 hours ago, Gray said:

To continue an off-topic thought from another thread:

What's the best way to honor Jesus? To follow the gospel he most likely taught? That is to say, the gospel of good works and of distributive justice culminating in the eschaton. Or to follow the theologies that were developed after his death about salvation through belief in Jesus and Jesus' divine status?

As someone coming from a Restoration tradition, my inclination is to go back to the source. There are of course counter arguments to that too. What makes the source better than things that came later? And so on.

I'm not going to flat out say Jesus thought this or that. From my understanding of the scholarship I think the following is reasonable, although not irrefutable by any means.

• May or may not have considered himself to be the Messiah - probably considered to be that by his disciples in Jesus' lifetime
• Was himself a disciple of John the Baptist, until John was murdered
• Likely born in Nazareth, no miraculous birth
• Likely did not think of himself as divine (whether that means God, son of God, an exalted angel, or some kind of figurative stand-in for God) . Almost certainly was not viewed as divine by his disciples until after his death - they began to see him that way in retrospect. Atonement theology also came about in retrospect.
• His family probably thought he was crazy
• Was as much a religious teacher as he was a non-violent activist against collaboration with Rome (as opposed to his more violent contemporaries)
• Was probably known as a healer/miracle worker
• Came from an area with a lot of gentile presence, embraced people considered to be ritually unclean
• Expected the eschaton to come soon, where God, in collaboration with humanity, would right all wrongs, giving justice to the poor and afflicted, and humbling the wicked/wealthy (God being the father or "householder" of humanity)
• Did some kind of demonstration in Jerusalem that resulted in his death
• Probably no witnesses among the disciples to his death
• Empty tomb story probably invented later
• The disciples had some kind of transcendent experience where they came to believe that God had raised/vindicated Jesus - and others who were not disciples, including Paul

For the sake of argument, let's say Jesus considered himself to be a prophet, not the son of God in any literal sense, and had no awareness of anything like the atonement or his own cosmic importance. That does not mean that he wasn't in fact the son of God, that his death didn't atone for this sins of the world, etc. Jesus can in fact be those things. That question outside the bounds of history and into the area of faith.

But I have to think, the traditional theological Jesus has swallowed up the historical Jesus. I feel a great sense of loss at the thought.

What a tragedy! Jesus' message gets lost behind these notions of divinity and atonement and Christology and theology. But in a sense they still work in leading us to the historical Jesus, but only in metaphor. Yes, he was divine - in that the divinity of God was visible in his teachings and his life. God is made manifest in the life of Jesus, in a very first century kind of notion. Yes, he gave up his life - not as a sacrifice for sin, but in order to advance the cause of justice in an unjust world. "Sacrifice for sin" almost works as a metaphor for the same thing, so long as we're not talking about penal substitution. But the metaphors take on life of their own and end up obscuring the subject.

Even in considering the historical Jesus, we're not free from faith-based proclamations. We can talk about probability and make good arguments from the text and the historical context, but we'll never have a solid conclusion. It's like listening to echoes of echoes of echoes and trying to catch what was said. So I'll say I could be totally wrong, but this is how I've come to see Jesus.

Why do I care? Maybe because I've always been fascinated with the Jesus of the gospels, and maybe because I belong to a church that was started as an attempt try to restore the "original" Christianity that had gotten lost over the years. I love Jesus, so I want to understand him better. In so doing I think he's more impressive and miraculous to me as a human being than as a God. But am I understanding him? I hope so. But there are other interpretations too.

My point isn't to start a huge multi-tiered debate. I understand the appeal of more traditional theological views, and I see their value too. This is just something I've been thinking about a lot.

You know where I come from Gray. I have a hard time with someone who believes they can honor our Savior while rejecting the key tenets of His teaching and gospel. 

The atonement - Jesus said He came to fulfill the law. How did He do that?

Leviticus 16:5 And he shall take of the congregation of the children of Israel two kids of the goats for a sin offering, and one ram for a burnt offering.

6 And Aaron shall offer his bullock of the sin offering, which is for himself, and make an atonement for himself, and for his house.

...

18 And he shall go out unto the altar that is before the Lord, and make an atonement for it; and shall take of the blood of the bullock, and of the blood of the goat, and put it upon the horns of the altar round about.

19 And he shall sprinkle of the blood upon it with his finger seven times, and cleanse it, and hallow it from the uncleanness of the children of Israel.

20 ¶ And when he hath made an end of reconciling the holy place, and the tabernacle of the congregation, and the altar, he shall bring the live goat:

 

Rejecting the atonement for the congregation is rejecting the Mosaic Law itself. It was Yeshua's mission, and you want to take that away and yet "honor" Him. 

Yeshua taught that one cannot take honor to Himself. Honor is given by others. The highest Honor you can give Yeshua is to follow Him even as He followed the Father and did whatsoever He had seen the Father do. Hence, He honored the Father, and the Father honored Him. You don't seem to understand this concept, but I testify to you that it is key to understand the innermost teachings of our Savior, and indeed it is His highest teaching. The greatest honor you can give to Him is to follow Him unto death, even as the goat Peter did.

I would also like to comment on your statement that His family probably thought he was crazy. I believe many have wondered how the teachings of Yeshua's birth got into the scriptures. I don't believe Yeshua taught these things about HImself. So how would anyone know? Lest any forget, James was one of Yeshua's brothers, and would have known these things. He would have known about Yeshua's teaching escapade at the temple as a young man. His parents would have told Him the stories about His older brother's birth. So these stories got told to new converts, and worked themselves into the gospels of Matthew and Luke. The fact that James was an apostle strongly indicates He did not believe His brother was crazy. Indeed, He became one of the foremost members of the Church.

You simply cannot believe the gospel without believing the key elements of it. There is no resurrection without Yeshua. Nor is there any salvation without His atonement. Nor will He accept any purported honor from anyone who rejects these key elements of His teaching, because in the end it is no honor to Him at all.

[Maidservant]

45 minutes ago, bluebell said:

Do you mean that it was politically subversive in regards to the Romans, or the Jews?

Well, I was thinking about the Romans, and specifically about turning the cheek, and giving the cloak, and going the second mile.  But it would have challenged the contemporary priestly situation as well.

Edited September 28, 2017 by Maidservant

[bluebell]

5 minutes ago, Maidservant said:

Well, I was thinking about the Romans, and specifically about turning the cheek, and giving the cloak, and going the second mile.  But it would have challenged the contemporary priestly situation as well.

It doesn’t seem like it challenged the Romans as much as it supported their edicts.   

Take the Romans declaration that any jew could be forced to carry a soldiers belongings a mile, for example. Jesus telling Jews that they should do that and more, wouldn’t  really be subversive from the Roman point of view. 

But it would be from the Jewish perspective. 

[phaedrus ut]

4 hours ago, Gray said:

I'm not going to flat out say Jesus thought this or that. From my understanding of the scholarship I think the following is reasonable, although not irrefutable by any means.

Your list is pretty right on to what historical Jesus scholars agree on. When I was having doubts about the BOM I tried to stay away from biblical scholarship that was causing those doubts.  That led me to my discovery of historical Jesus studies and the various quests.  One of my professors at Harvard Divinity school was Helmut Koester who studied under Rudolf Bultmann and was an acclaimed New Testament and Jesus scholar.  I found the subject endlessly fascinating and it's still something I try to stay current on.  

I would highly recommend anyone interested in the life of Jesus to study the various "quest" that have happened over the past century.  

 

Phaedrus 

[Maidservant]

35 minutes ago, bluebell said:

It doesn’t seem like it challenged the Romans as much as it supported their edicts.   

Take the Romans declaration that any jew could be forced to carry a soldiers belongings a mile, for example. Jesus telling Jews that they should do that and more, wouldn’t  really be subversive from the Roman point of view. 

But it would be from the Jewish perspective. 

I can see what you are saying and I haven't done my own studies, just read some cool article(s) on it.  One author said that a Roman soldier would get in trouble for having a Jew carry his pack for more than a mile.  So if a Jew carried the pack a second mile, he was actually getting the soldier in trouble, not helping him.  (The other suggestions were of a similar nature.)

Another perspective would be to have the Jews grant themselves their own dignity and freedom, despite feeling beaten down over the generations and losing that even in their own sight; because they were not free in that first mile, but they became free in the second mile and could choose what to do with it.  (Leaving would be following the Roman law still; staying would be following what they told themselves to do.)

Point is, it's not about "being helpful and doing service".  It's much deeper and more specific and encapsulates a much more interesting life approach than a religion heading toward an afterlife salvation.  In my opinion.

[Glenn101]

Faith vs. reason = tug of war.

Faith first, followed by reason = living with hope and at least in my case, peace of mind.

That is why I believe in the historical Jesus the Christ, the Great Jehovah. And why I believe what Isaiah said, which was echoed by Nephi:

Isaiah 29:14 Therefore, behold, I will proceed to do a marvellous work among this people, even a marvellous work and a wonder: for the wisdom of their wise men shall perish, and the understanding of their prudent men shall be hid.

2 Nephi 9:28 O that cunning plan of the evil one! O the vainness, and the frailties, and the foolishness of men! When they are learned they think they are wise, and they hearken not unto the counsel of God, for they set it aside, supposing they know of themselves, wherefore, their wisdom is foolishness and it profiteth them not. And they shall perish.

Glenn

[Robert F. Smith]

7 hours ago, Gray said:

.................................................

I'm not going to flat out say Jesus thought this or that. From my understanding of the scholarship I think the following is reasonable, although not irrefutable by any means.

• May or may not have considered himself to be the Messiah - probably considered to be that by his disciples in Jesus' lifetime
• Was himself a disciple of John the Baptist, until John was murdered
• Likely born in Nazareth, no miraculous birth
• Likely did not think of himself as divine (whether that means God, son of God, an exalted angel, or some kind of figurative stand-in for God) . Almost certainly was not viewed as divine by his disciples until after his death - they began to see him that way in retrospect. Atonement theology also came about in retrospect.
• His family probably thought he was crazy
• Was as much a religious teacher as he was a non-violent activist against collaboration with Rome (as opposed to his more violent contemporaries)
• Was probably known as a healer/miracle worker
• Came from an area with a lot of gentile presence, embraced people considered to be ritually unclean
• Expected the eschaton to come soon, where God, in collaboration with humanity, would right all wrongs, giving justice to the poor and afflicted, and humbling the wicked/wealthy (God being the father or "householder" of humanity)
• Did some kind of demonstration in Jerusalem that resulted in his death
• Probably no witnesses among the disciples to his death
• Empty tomb story probably invented later
• The disciples had some kind of transcendent experience where they came to believe that God had raised/vindicated Jesus - and others who were not disciples, including Paul

For the sake of argument, let's say Jesus considered himself to be a prophet, not the son of God in any literal sense, and had no awareness of anything like the atonement or his own cosmic importance. That does not mean that he wasn't in fact the son of God, that his death didn't atone for this sins of the world, etc. Jesus can in fact be those things. That question outside the bounds of history and into the area of faith.  ....................................................

Why do I care? Maybe because I've always been fascinated with the Jesus of the gospels, and maybe because I belong to a church that was started as an attempt try to restore the "original" Christianity that had gotten lost over the years. I love Jesus, so I want to understand him better. In so doing I think he's more impressive and miraculous to me as a human being than as a God. But am I understanding him? I hope so. But there are other interpretations too.  ......................................

The problem with that view, which is not an unusual view today, is that it flies in the face of what documentation we have in the NT.  See for example Birger A. Pearson, “The Gospel According to the Jesus Seminar,” Religion, 25 (Oct 1995), 317-338, an expanded version of which is available online at https://www.scribd.com/document/179421926/1996-Birger-A-Pearson-The-Gospel-According-to-the-Jesus-Seminar .  I originally attended an early version of that lecture in Marina Del Rey, California.  Pearson is not a Mormon.

Edited September 28, 2017 by Robert F. Smith

[Hamba Tuhan]

7 hours ago, Gray said:

We can talk about probability and make good arguments from the text and the historical context, but we'll never have a solid conclusion. It's like listening to echoes of echoes of echoes and trying to catch what was said.

If one is writing a biography of a long-deceased person, this is an inevitable limitation. If however the person is still living and accessible, that's a very different situation.

I personally believe that the Restoration significantly alters which of the two scenarios better explains our access to Jesus, but I'm OK if others don't see it that way.

Edited September 28, 2017 by Hamba Tuhan

[Five Solas]

8 hours ago, Gray said:

To continue an off-topic thought from another thread:

What's the best way to honor Jesus? To follow the gospel he most likely taught? That is to say, the gospel of good works and of distributive justice culminating in the eschaton. Or to follow the theologies that were developed after his death about salvation through belief in Jesus and Jesus' divine status?

As someone coming from a Restoration tradition, my inclination is to go back to the source...

What does this even mean, Gray?  Jesus didn't write the Gospels.  They were written by his followers in the decades following his death & resurrection.  And the Gospel of John makes Jesus's divinity most explicit, culminating with Thomas's exclamation: "My Lord and my God" (John 20:28).  Will you argue we jettison John?  On the basis of what, a few more years in the context of millennia vis-a-via the Synoptic Gospels? 

And if, as you suggest, claims of Jesus's divine status come from misguided followers--well, what sort of prophet inspires his followers to get it so absolutely wrong?  Why should you (or anyone) take Jesus more seriously than, say, the prophet Balaam who rails against his donkey (Numbers 22).    

--Erik

[Physics Guy]

In between giving organ concerts and studying medicine to start a clinic in Africa, Albert Schweitzer took time out to write a landmark analysis about The Quest for the Historical Jesus. Schweitzer's own conclusion was that Jesus was an apocalyptic prophet, but he also noted that looking two thousand years into the past for the historical Jesus is like looking for something at the bottom of a well. What you see is your own reflection. I don't think there's any way to escape this problem. Even if you try to interpret Jesus entirely on his own terms without projecting later theories onto him, as Schweitzer did, you can be affected just as much by those later theories when you consciously reject them, as you would be if you accepted them instead.

You can decline to view Jesus as the incarnate Word of God, but that doesn't automatically make it plausible that he was a small-time preacher who only founded a world religion by posthumous accident. That's a conceivable scenario, of course; but it's hard to find clear examples of that kind of thing really happening. Most of the people who are still remembered thousands of years after their deaths seem to have been extraordinary people who were deliberately trying to change the world in big ways. No doubt they were also lucky, and for every Alexander or Confucius there were hundreds of wanna-bes who had the will, and perhaps even the talent, but not the luck to achieve their high goals. Stumbling into immortality, however, would seem to be rare.

At any rate it seems to me that founding a world religion by accident must be a lot rarer even than genius. So I figure that Jesus was probably some kind of genius. On the other hand, he got crucified in his early thirties. Among the tiny elite of world-historical figures to which Jesus belongs, that's a spectacularly anomalous failure. The other people in that tiny elite all made out much better than that. Growing up knowing the Christian stories—as most people alive today have, whether they're Christians or not—probably blinds us to the most striking thing about Jesus: that he was really bizarre.

Edited September 28, 2017 by Physics Guy