John the Baptist didn't see Jesus as the Jesus "called Christ"

[Giuseppe]

Along the speculation about an identity between Theudas and John the Baptist:

• it is evident that there is a particular interest by the Gospels to place John before Jesus, temporally and spiritually.

• it is evident that there is a particular embarrassment, in Mark, about John being a potential witness of the mere man Jesus as posseded by the Spirit (as deliberate Markan apology, the ball is thrown suddenly in the wilderness).

• Now, Theudas was expecting the coming of someone at the Jordan. It is only a defamation by Josephus the idea that that "someone" was Theudas himself, and not rather a celestial Joshua in the glory.

• Now, John is said expecting the coming of someone at the Jordan. He has to make it precise that that "someone" was not him, but a distinct being.

Assume only that Theudas was expecting the celestial Joshua (not a historical being) at the Jordan...

But you know the rest of the history: Joshua didn't come, but the Roman cavalry came in the his place. And Theudas was killed.

If "Mark" wanted to cast Theudas as precursor of the his invented man Jesus (by placing him temporally before Jesus), then he had to justify why also in the case of the his invented "John the Baptist", Joshua/Jesus was not witnessed by John the Baptist. If the latter saw him, it was only as a mere man. He didn't see Joshua as the one called Christ.


This opens an entire can of worms: John didn't see Joshua as the guy "called Christ".

The corollary : John saw Jesus only as one who was not called the Christ.

John didn't see Jesus called Christ. John saw the other Jesus, the Jesus Son of Father ("Bar-Abbas").

The point of "Mark" is that John was yes a witness of Jesus, only not of the Jesus called Christ.

[Giuseppe]

What I am saying is that "Mark" was remembering, in the his own way, the fact that (the baptism of) John was connected with a Jesus Son of Father who was not the Christ and who descended in Galilee already adult.

At any case, this is apart from the identity of John with Theudas.

[Giuseppe]

The Jesus the Son of Father was not baptized by John: he was not posseded by the Christ. He was not expected as the Jewish Christ.

John dies and goes to hell.

Jesus the Son of Father descends to Capernaum, meaning Sheol.

He meets John there (in the Sheol).

In the Sheol John asks him: are you who has to come? Or should we expect another?

"Another" is evidently the Christ who had to be baptized/expected by John. But the Jesus met by John in Sheol was not baptized by him. He was not expected by him. He came from an Alien God.