With palms together,
There is an interesting article in the N Y Times today about a stone tablet found amid the Dead Sea Scrolls. Apparently it suggests that the notion of a suffering messiah who would rise in three days was a common belief in the century prior to the Christian Jesus.
The article suggests:
If such a messianic description really is there, it will contribute to a developing re-evaluation of both popular and scholarly views of Jesus, since it suggests that the story of his death and resurrection was not unique but part of a recognized Jewish tradition at the time.
Hmmm. The death and resurrection myth prior to Jesus' birth? It would seem this adds to the notion advance some decades ago by a Jewish scholar suggesting this whole Jesus script was a scheme to get Jesus recognized as the Messiah, that Jesus was aware of the things that needd to happen before they happened in order to meet the criteria.
And later:
Mr. Knohl said that it was less important whether Simon was the messiah of the stone than the fact that it strongly suggested that a savior who died and rose after three days was an established concept at the time of Jesus. He notes that in the Gospels, Jesus makes numerous predictions of his suffering and New Testament scholars say such predictions must have been written in by later followers because there was no such idea present in his day.
But there was, he said, and “Gabriel’s Revelation” shows it.
“His mission is that he has to be put to death by the Romans to suffer so his blood will be the sign for redemption to come,” Mr. Knohl said. “This is the sign of the son of Joseph. This is the conscious view of Jesus himself. This gives the Last Supper an absolutely different meaning. To shed blood is not for the sins of people but to bring redemption to Israel.”
Strange.
Link
Be well
Only in the dream fantasies of revolutionary Jews then in Christ's day and today who refuse to accept Christ as the Messiah.
The book I vaguely pointed to was entitled "The Passover Plot" and suggested that Jesus deliberatly acted out the prosphesies so that he would be thought of as the Messiah, including giving himself a drug to make him appear dead only to later be "resurrected". Fanciful. Still, this tablet that my referenced article talks about, pretty much suggests that there was a ressurection myth going atround a century before Jesus was born. We must remember tht in the context of the times of Jesus the people were desperate to find a way to get out from under the despotism. The messiah wasn't a "personal" savior so much as a rebel leader who world save the people from despair. See ya.
I don't know if its so much despising Christianity as it is trying to make sense out of the mythos, while at the same time deflating and deflecting those who hold Jesus up to be something he was not, God.
Be well.
There were many hippie groups like Jesus' in Israel at the time. Watch "The Life of Brian", it's a surprisingly accurate portrayal of Israel around 30 CE.
There were lots of little extremist groups, lots of groups who thought they found a Messiah, lots of people who thought they were the Messiah, and several people who came closer to doing what the Messiah was thought to do than Jesus.
There were also many Jewish rebel groups at the time, fighting each other and the Romans. It was a big mess.
What made Jesus special, historically, was the fact that his followers, after his death, decided to evangelise non-Jews as well and the fact that Rome eventually took over the religion, making a Jewish sect into a new religion that specifically rejects Jewish traditions held in common by Jews and Samaritans and other followers of Jewish and related religions.
and then the one that Christ was the bastard son of a hairdresser named Miriam, who learned magic and then seduced people as the false prophet.
As opposed to the Christian story that Jesus was the son of Mary ("Miriam" in Hebrew), who was not the son of Mary's husband, was endowed with the ability to do miracles and then worked as a freelance prophet later in his life?
Yeah, I can see how the Jews had to lie to make up that story.
Lulapilgrim
Yes, MasonM called it like it is…..despising Christianity. Christ is the dividing line...one either hates Him or loves Him, is either with Him or against Him.
I do agree with you lulapilgrim that the play in question is anti-christian, however not all people who are not with Jesus are against him. Some of us find the amount of anti-christianity out there to be disturbing... hey if the left can take your churches down anyone else is fair game next.
Interesting discussion, as always.
I want to ask a question. Is it, from a Christian perspective, considered disparaging of Christianity to deny the divinity of Jesus? From my POV as a Jew it is not.
I consider much of what Lula has said about Judaism insulting and demeaning. She constantly disparages the rabbinic sages, the Talmud, and other non-Christian sources. Of course she has not studied Talmud, that would take years and a great deal of patience. Much of the "anti-Christian flavor of Jewish writing regards Christianity (of which there isn't a whole lot) is defensive against anti-semitic Christian attacks. Jews were attacked since Christianity was born for the crime of not accepting the divinity of Jesus. The thing is, in the United States, there is no state religion so all religious points of view should be respected and none enforced or funded by the government. As I see it, it is Christians who are constantly trying to stuff their POV down other people's throats with blue laws, school prayer, publicly funded displays of Christian theology, etc. The minute someone objects they are branded as "anti-Christian".
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