Jesus from Outer Space
Posted: Fri Aug 14, 2020 2:18 am
Amazon: The earliest Christians believed Jesus was an ancient celestial being who put on a bodysuit of flesh, died at the hands of dark forces, and then rose from the dead and ascended back into the heavens. But the writing we have today from that first generation of Christians never says where they thought he landed, where he lived, or where he died. The idea that Jesus toured Galilee and visited Jerusalem arose only a lifetime later, in unsourced legends written in a foreign land and language. Many sources repeat those legends, but none corroborate them. Why? What exactly was the original belief about Jesus, and how did this belief change over time? In Jesus from Outer Space, noted philosopher and historian Richard Carrier summarizes for a popular audience the scholarly research on these and related questions, revealing in turn how modern attempts to conceal, misrepresent, or avoid the actual evidence calls into question the entire field of Jesus studies--and present-day beliefs about how Christianity began.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1634311949/ ... _lig_dp_it
Written for 'a popular audience'. Jesus from Outer Space. The title is probably from the book's publisher. However, it's a title that might just make the casual bookshop browser shake their head and walk on....The very idea that Christianity is nothing more than some science fiction type scenario is weird not engaging.
Both the 'outer space' Jesus story and the baby in a manger gospel story are allegories not history. What Richard Carrier should be doing is not putting a 'bodysuit of flesh' on his 'outer space' Jesus - a shape shifting story if ever there was one - but turn to philosophy. Philosophy, after all, is about thinking things. For instance, ' the Word became flesh' reflects how modern people often talk about putting flesh on ideas i.e. put some substance on ones ideas. Ideas become 'flesh' when given some identifiable reality i.e. anything from building great cathedrals to creating the digital world of today. Ideas, as it were, come down to earth. They live amongst us. That's our lived reality. 'Outer space' Jesus putting on a 'bodysuit of flesh' has no relevance for that lived experience. Richard Carrier needs to get real....
However, Carrier is right to focus on 'outer space' as the primary focus of the NT story. It's our intellectual world that contributed to where we are today. But that NT primary focus does not exclude the flesh and blood reality we also inhabit. The gospel story still has to be dealt with. It's a story, like our own, placed within a historical context. That historical context remains - even though the gospel Jesus character that inhabits that historical context is a literary figure.
Two allegories - 'outer space' Jesus and baby Jesus in a manger. Read at face value both stories are fantasy. Read as allegories: Jesus in 'outer space' is a philosophical allegory. The baby Jesus in a manager story is a political allegory. In other words; the reality behind both stories is bound up with a historical context that lead to a new philosophical world view. Yes, we can run with the new philosophical 'outer space' Jesus - but we won't run very far. Our feet have to retain a foothold on terra ferma. History, especially for those interested in early christian origins, has a role to play. A literary Jesus figure does not, as it were, give Jesus ahistoricists a pass card for historical enquiry.