Transfiguration == original crucifixion in the Earliest Gospel

Discussion about the New Testament, apocrypha, gnostics, church fathers, Christian origins, historical Jesus or otherwise, etc.
Giuseppe
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Re: Transfiguration == original crucifixion in the Earliest Gospel

Post by Giuseppe »

Nasruddin wrote: Fri Feb 14, 2020 1:36 am It only has no distinction from our third party viewpoint, knowing what we already think we can interprete from the later passages in the Gospel. But at the scene at the Jordan these later revelations had not yet been given, so there is a clear distinction for the audience at this point between who Jesus was and who his father was.
Does not your view assume that the theology of the evangelist was going to be constructed in progress by himself, while he writes? I don't believe. The text is so much theological from first to last verse, that it can only explain a theology already formed.

The readers knew in advance that their Fourth-Gospel Jesus was one with the Father. In addition, the presence of the original Incipit where the Light was mentioned, and not the Word, makes it clear that the theology was there even before the rest of the gospel. The Light was God.

John the Baptist does not indicate that he is trying to reveal any new information about the God/Spirit that he claims directs his actions. It is the identity of an as yet unknown person (Jesus) that is the focus of John's mission.
It seems to me that John is addressing the curiosity of the Jews about Jesus, as opposed to the curiosity by the same Jews that was concerned in a first time about him.

9 Now this was John’s testimony when the Jewish leaders in Jerusalem sent priests and Levites to ask him who he was. 20 He did not fail to confess, but confessed freely, “I am not the Messiah.”
21 They asked him, “Then who are you? Are you Elijah?”
He said, “I am not.”
“Are you the Prophet?”
He answered, “No.”
22 Finally they said, “Who are you? Give us an answer to take back to those who sent us. What do you say about yourself?”
23 John replied in the words of Isaiah the prophet, “I am the voice of one calling in the wilderness, ‘Make straight the way for the Lord.’”
24 Now the Pharisees who had been sent 25 questioned him, “Why then do you baptize if you are not the Messiah, nor Elijah, nor the Prophet?”
26 “I baptize with water,” John replied, “but among you stands one you do not know.

(John 1:9-26)

Hence the Jews are moved to ask about the true identity of Jesus, as opposed to be moved to ask about the true identity of John.

Something as:
I (=John) am not the alien. The true alien is hidden among you. Please ask about him, not about me (because I am a Jew as you).

Which means that John is still an adorer of YHWH. The only difference between him and the other adorers of YHWH is that he knows that the Son of an alien God has just descended on the earth.
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
Giuseppe
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Re: Transfiguration == original crucifixion in the Earliest Gospel

Post by Giuseppe »

Nasruddin wrote: Thu Feb 13, 2020 1:48 pm
Giuseppe wrote: Thu Feb 13, 2020 7:17 am
I and Turmel disagree. "The Lamb" is an interpolation replacing the original "son of God". It is an interpolation meant to make proto-John more similar to Revelation to put catholically the two books under the paternity of the same author (John son of Zebedee). That is also the reason why the gospel of John was preserved (because otherwise, without sharing that paternity, it would have been lost).


And it is even doubt that John was a positive character in proto-John. You know what I have written in the thread on the Cathar tradition about John as a kind of instigator sent by the demiurge. In that case, John knows that Jesus is alien but his true mission is to point out falsely him as "Lamb of God" to move the Jews to kill him. As sacrifice for the demiurge.
You seem to be arguing that John saying the Lamb of God was not originally in Proto-John, and also that John was a negative character in Proto-John because he used the term Lamb of God.

You can't have it both ways.
true. Turmel argues for the interpolation, the original being "Son of God" (with John as positive character). But for a Gnostic, a John who says "Lamb of God" becomes ipso facto a negative character, even if he had said in a previous version "Son of God" and not "Lamb of God".

At any case, in both the versions, John seems to place himself in the Jewish field as addressing all the curiosity (about an alien) towards Jesus as opposed to towards himself.

What do you think about this?

Was there someone who had John himself as the alien?
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
Nasruddin
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Re: Transfiguration == original crucifixion in the Earliest Gospel

Post by Nasruddin »

Giuseppe wrote: Fri Feb 14, 2020 3:22 am true. Turmel argues for the interpolation, the original being "Son of God" (with John as positive character). But for a Gnostic, a John who says "Lamb of God" becomes ipso facto a negative character, even if he had said in a previous version "Son of God" and not "Lamb of God".

At any case, in both the versions, John seems to place himself in the Jewish field as addressing all the curiosity (about an alien) towards Jesus as opposed to towards himself.

What do you think about this?

Was there someone who had John himself as the alien?
This explanation just confounds the contradiction. John originally used "Son of God", which made him a positive character. Someone altered "Son of God" to "Lamb of God" to make John negative. Gnostics didn't care what he said, because they viewed him as negative because he used "Lamb of God" even when he didn't.

John deflecting the curiosity away from himself and towards Jesus has been commented upon by me in a couple of your threads. It happened as soon as Jesus seemed about to talk to John on some matter, and seems to have prompted Jesus avoiding future contact with him.

In the Synoptic Gospels it is Jesus who who uses this deflecting tactic to put attention onto John and away from himself. So perhaps here is the version of someone identifying John as 'alien', or at least as 'alien' as Jesus.

Luke 20:1-8 (and also Matt 21:23-27 & Mark 11:27-33)
One day, as he was teaching the people in the temple and telling the good news, the chief priests and the scribes came with the elders and said to him, “Tell us, by what authority are you doing these things? Who is it who gave you this authority?” He answered them, “I will also ask you a question, and you tell me: Did the baptism of John come from heaven, or was it of human origin?” They discussed it with one another, saying, “If we say, ‘From heaven,’ he will say, ‘Why did you not believe him?’ But if we say, ‘Of human origin,’ all the people will stone us; for they are convinced that John was a prophet.” So they answered that they did not know where it came from. Then Jesus said to them, “Neither will I tell you by what authority I am doing these things.”

Notice that Jesus made no effort to reveal the answer. Or was he, like the priests, equally unsure?
Giuseppe
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Re: Transfiguration == original crucifixion in the Earliest Gospel

Post by Giuseppe »

Nasruddin wrote: Fri Feb 14, 2020 10:07 am and seems to have prompted Jesus avoiding future contact with him.
Which is equivalent to give too much personality to Jesus. Very improbable, for a Gospel where Jesus is a bidimensional character, absolutely without human feelings.
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
Nasruddin
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Re: Transfiguration == original crucifixion in the Earliest Gospel

Post by Nasruddin »

Giuseppe wrote: Fri Feb 14, 2020 10:51 am
Nasruddin wrote: Fri Feb 14, 2020 10:07 am and seems to have prompted Jesus avoiding future contact with him.
Which is equivalent to give too much personality to Jesus. Very improbable, for a Gospel where Jesus is a bidimensional character, absolutely without human feelings.
Do you mean Jesus had no emotion in the Gospel of John?

John 11:5, 33-6 & 38
Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus.
...When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come along with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in spirit and troubled. “Where have you laid him?” he asked. “Come and see, Lord,” they replied. Jesus wept.
Then the Jews said, “See how he loved him!”
...Jesus, once more deeply moved, came to the tomb.
John 12:27
“Now My soul is troubled and deeply distressed; what shall I say?"
John 15:12
"My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you."

Where is the absolute absence of human emotion here?


Besides, in the Gospel Jesus frequently moves himself away from awkward encounters, so it would be the same with moving away from John the Baptist.
John 1:29, 35-36 & 43
The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him and said, “Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!
The next day John was there again with two of his disciples. When he saw Jesus passing by, he said, “Look, the Lamb of God!”
The next day Jesus decided to leave for Galilee.
John 4:1-3
Now Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard that he was gaining and baptizing more disciples than John— although in fact it was not Jesus who baptized, but his disciples. So he left Judea and went back once more to Galilee.
John 6:2-3, 15
and a great crowd of people followed him because they saw the signs he had performed by healing the sick. Then Jesus went up on a mountainside and sat down with his disciples.
...Jesus, knowing that they intended to come and make him king by force, withdrew again to a mountain by himself.
John 7:1
After this, Jesus went around in Galilee. He did not want to go about in Judea because the Jewish leaders there were looking for a way to kill him.
John 10:39-40
Again they tried to seize him, but he escaped their grasp.Then Jesus went back across the Jordan to the place where John had been baptizing in the early days.
John 11:53-54
So from that day on they plotted to take his life. Therefore Jesus no longer moved about publicly among the people of Judea. Instead he withdrew to a region near the wilderness, to a village called Ephraim, where he stayed with his disciples.
Giuseppe
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Re: Transfiguration == original crucifixion in the Earliest Gospel

Post by Giuseppe »

Nasruddin wrote: Fri Feb 14, 2020 3:04 pm Do you mean Jesus had no emotion in the Gospel of John?
his love for beloved disciple(s) is not a human love. Even that Jesus is without personality.
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
Nasruddin
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Re: Transfiguration == original crucifixion in the Earliest Gospel

Post by Nasruddin »

Love, weeping, deeply moved, distressed, avoiding embarrassment - you see these as non-human emotions and a lack of personality????
Giuseppe
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Re: Transfiguration == original crucifixion in the Earliest Gospel

Post by Giuseppe »

Nasruddin wrote: Sat Feb 15, 2020 2:12 pm Love, weeping, deeply moved, distressed, avoiding embarrassment - you see these as non-human emotions and a lack of personality????
in the case of the Gospels, and especially of that Gospel, it doesn't seem a surprising thing to be said. I wonder about the your surprise, at contrary. The Fourth-Gospel Jesus is a very cold character. If John was recognized by all as the earliest gospel, then the case for mythicism would be even more persuasive. That is the reason why a lot of Christian scholars insisted so much on the Mark's priority and were the first to interpret any later Gospel as based on Mark and only on Mark. By his separationism, Mark gives at least the possibility that the mere man Jesus could be existed. The Fourth Gospel can't concede even that possibility: his Jesus is a god who walks. Period.
Nihil enim in speciem fallacius est quam prava religio. -Liv. xxxix. 16.
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Joseph D. L.
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Re: Transfiguration == original crucifixion in the Earliest Gospel

Post by Joseph D. L. »

Nasruddin wrote: Sat Feb 15, 2020 2:12 pm Love, weeping, deeply moved, distressed, avoiding embarrassment - you see these as non-human emotions and a lack of personality????
Giuseppe doesn't have emotions. He's a bot programmed with the idiot A.I., or I.A.I..
Nasruddin
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Re: Transfiguration == original crucifixion in the Earliest Gospel

Post by Nasruddin »

Giuseppe wrote: Sun Feb 16, 2020 12:19 am
Nasruddin wrote: Sat Feb 15, 2020 2:12 pm Love, weeping, deeply moved, distressed, avoiding embarrassment - you see these as non-human emotions and a lack of personality????
in the case of the Gospels, and especially of that Gospel, it doesn't seem a surprising thing to be said. I wonder about the your surprise, at contrary. The Fourth-Gospel Jesus is a very cold character. If John was recognized by all as the earliest gospel, then the case for mythicism would be even more persuasive. That is the reason why a lot of Christian scholars insisted so much on the Mark's priority and were the first to interpret any later Gospel as based on Mark and only on Mark. By his separationism, Mark gives at least the possibility that the mere man Jesus could be existed. The Fourth Gospel can't concede even that possibility: his Jesus is a god who walks. Period.
This is a true indication of how you refuse to see the evidence before you because it does not fit your need.

Jesus in the Gospel of John clearly expresses emotion. Whilst you might argue that he showed more emotion in the Synoptic Gospels, this does not mean he didn't show any in John.
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