Why Jesus had to be crucified among two robbers?

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Giuseppe
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Why Jesus had to be crucified among two robbers?

Post by Giuseppe »

The reason is always the same:

All who have come before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep have not listened to them.

(John 10.8)

If Jesus was crucified among two robbers, then there is not more a drastic dualism ''new versus old'': the robbers are also in the present time and Jesus has no embarrassment to be counted among them.

Against the Gnostic embarrassment that Jesus was counted among the old prophets.
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
Martin Klatt

Re: Why Jesus had to be crucified among two robbers?

Post by Martin Klatt »

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Last edited by Martin Klatt on Fri Aug 03, 2018 4:38 am, edited 7 times in total.
Giuseppe
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Re: Why Jesus had to be crucified among two robbers?

Post by Giuseppe »

Tertullian returns the offence:
Then the things which the Father delivered to the Son are good, and the Creator is therefore good, since all His things are good; whereas he is no longer good who has invaded another's good (domains) to deliver it to his son, thus teaching robbery of another's goods
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
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Joseph D. L.
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Re: Why Jesus had to be crucified among two robbers?

Post by Joseph D. L. »

The use of two robbers who are crucified side by side with Jesus is likely indicative of Rev 11:3-4 and 7-8...

And I will appoint my two witnesses, and they will prophesy for 1,260 days, clothed in sackcloth.” They are “the two olive trees” and the two lampstands, and “they stand before the Lord of the earth.”

...

Now when they have finished their testimony, the beast that comes up from the Abyss will attack them, and overpower and kill them. Their bodies will lie in the public square of the great city—which is figuratively called Sodom and Egypt—where also their Lord was crucified.

Why they are considered thieves is likely an internal tradition, that the two likely participated in zealous acts of theft and insurrection.
Giuseppe
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Re: Why Jesus had to be crucified among two robbers?

Post by Giuseppe »

No the zealot interpretation is entirely failed in my view. The robbers are definitely the OT prophets.


Matthew 24:43 :

43 But know this, that if the master of the house had known in what part of the night the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and would not have let his house be broken into
Was all this emphasis on Jesus as "thief", on Jesus as counted among 2 robbers, a direct reaction against who placed Jesus in direct contrast against the "robbers" of the OT?

Probably yes.
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
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Joseph D. L.
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Re: Why Jesus had to be crucified among two robbers?

Post by Joseph D. L. »

They are not called thieves or robbers in John. Only in the Synoptics.

Simon of Cyrene isn't a thief or robber, yet in the tradition of Basilides he is crucified in place of Christ.

In all of the canonical Gospels, Jesus makes these statements:

And who ever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me.

Then Jesus told his disciples, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.

And calling the crowd to him with his disciples, he said to them, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.

And he said to all, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.

Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple.

Under such requirements, this makes the two robbers crucified along with Jesus worthy of being his disciples.

There may be an interference with the pseudo-Josephus figure, who probably imposed the robbers rampant during the time of Claudius into the Jesus story. Making all theological musings about their significance entirely meaningless.
Giuseppe
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Re: Why Jesus had to be crucified among two robbers?

Post by Giuseppe »

The best disciple of Christ is who suffered in the his place. This is mere separationism: the man Jesus is a "wise man", and Christ possessed him only for a short time.

I don't see how this view could be a Gnostic idea, when even Ireneus hoped that just in virtue of the man Jesus being considered a "wise man", there was a good chance that the original readers of Mark could become catholics.

So the adoptionism was only an anti-marcionite reaction.
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
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