“Did Jesus Exist?” On the New Testament Review

[Ken Olson]

Ian Mills and Laura Robinson, doctoral students in New Testament at Duke University, address the question “Did Jesus Exist?” in the New Testament Review, now on YouTube. (Spoiler: They think he did).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HNZDLacqugo

[Paul the Uncertain]

That's the All England Summarized Proust version of the climax of the "Non-canonical bible study" they did recently on the Ascension of Isaiah:

https://youtu.be/fu9e0zDBnNA

In the waning minutes, they name Carrier and assert their views on the historicity of Jesus.

[Paul the Uncertain]

Ian and Laura bid fair to be the Bart Ehrmans of their generation, to be among the near-future media faces of the Guild.

To all appearances they are, like Ehrman, well-prepared, likeable and earnest. Therefore, it may be worth the 4 minutes for a historical-mythical Jesus debate fan to sample their product at the OP's link, as a glimpse into the future of the game.

Unfortunately, the actual presentation here isn't the pair's best work, IMO. They profess the historicity of Jesus to be "almost certain" and an "open and shut case." Neither seems true.

"Almost certain" is widely used to mean "the alternative isn't seriously possible, but only scrupulously possible." For example, when flipping a fair coin at a brisk pace until it lands heads, it is almost certain that the goal will be attained within a few hours (in fact, it's damned likely to happen within a few minutes).

If Jesus was a real man is your view, then that's peachy, but such a level of surpassing confidence needs some justification, and none is offered.

Open and shut? On other occasions, Guild lore holds that non-scrupulous doubt about a real Jesus was academically respectable as recently as about a century ago. Those holding doubts were supposedly rebutted back then after an extensive learned debate. That foundational hero-deed story, if true, would tell the opposite of an "open and shut" case.

Arguing the merits, Laura and Ian seem to focus on Carrier (without naming him), mainly addressing two of the weaker points in his case.

Galatians 4:4 born versus made: The matter is irrelevant to whether the birth-or-making occurred on earth or in outer space instead, or whether Paul thought of Jesus as a real person.

Brothers of the Lord: Carrier's insistence that the noun phrase means "any baptized Christian" doesn't exhaust the possible interpretations besides "a sibling of Jesus."

Laura seems to lose track of the thread of their side's argument here, in asserting (after Ian's prompt) that there is no evidence that Paul meant a distinguished category of church leaders. That's close to Carrier's view of the 1 Corinthians list of people whom Paul cites. The typical Guild view (which I share) is that these people get a church subsidy for missionary wives - on its face, a distinguished category of church leader. Carrier reportedly sees it as a statement that every Christian, distinguished and ordinary alike, is allowed to marry.

Apart from rebuttal of Carrier (who doesn't use the Gospels except to estimate Jesus's Rank-Raglan score): I simply did not follow Ian's argument about Mark 7:1-23. Jesus participates there in a debate about purity laws, including a pronouncement that all foods are clean. Ian apparently sees some mismatch between what Mark shows Jesus doing and what Mark says (thinks? ... thinks?) that Jesus is doing.

Given that Mark's Jesus cannot possibly do anything except what Mark shows or describes his Jesus doing, it is unsurprising that I can't locate the mismatch. Nor do I see how this could have anything to do with whether or not Jesus actually existed.* No explanation is attempted by Ian and Laura, so far as I can hear.

I think the pair's work is better represented by any episode of their podcast, or the "non-canonical bible study" I liinked to in my previous post.

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* It is not unusual for fiction authors to report that characters they create "take on a lfe of their own" and do things that surprise the author. Similarly, historical characters presumably do things that surprise their biographers. Authorial surprise, then, is an unreliable indicator of historicity. How Ian and Laura propose we can know or even guesstimate what did or didn't surprise "Mark" is unclear.

[Ken Olson]

Ian and Laura are friends, but that doesn't mean I agree with them on everything, though we agree on quite a bit. (Ian and I are in pretty solid agreement on source critical issues. And, of course, there are lots of things the two of them disagree on, but their disagreements are not the point of their podcasts and videos). So I'll share my opinions here in case anyone is interested.

I agree on Galatians 4.4. I think when Paul says Jesus was “born of a woman” in all probability he means Jesus existed as a human being on earth as human beings tend to. This does not exclude the possibility that he was born of a woman outside the terrestrial sphere, but such a thesis needs to show evidence for that beyond what is in the text at that point (Ian and Laura's point about “bark” and “novelization”).

I don't agree with them on Gal. 1.19. I think there is a reasonably good argument to be made for the brothers of the Lord being a group of Christian leaders distinct from the apostles, but who are not Jesus' siblings. Also, I don't think the understanding that it means “male siblings of Jesus” is all that solid from either Pauline usage or the history of interpretation in the early church.

I agree partly, but disagree significantly on Mark 7.19 and environs. The point is that Mark adds the interpretive comment “Thus he declared all foods clean,” but Jesus' preceding sayings don't really establish that. I take this to mean Mark did not have complete freedom to make up whatever he wanted. There was some sort of prior tradition. The same would be true of Matthew and Luke – they can add, delete, alter, and in some cases even contradict Mark, but they are still constrained to some extent by what Mark had written before them. But to say that there was a tradition before Mark with which Mark had to deal is not to say that the sayings necessarily goes back to Jesus himself.

Best,

Ken

[Ben C. Smith]

I don't agree with them on Gal. 1.19. I think there is a reasonably good argument to be made for the brothers of the Lord being a group of Christian leaders distinct from the apostles, but who are not Jesus' siblings. Also, I don't think the understanding that it means “male siblings of Jesus” is all that solid from either Pauline usage or the history of interpretation in the early church.

I would love to see more from you on "the brethren of the Lord" not (necessarily) being male siblings.

[Giuseppe]

I agree on Galatians 4.4. I think when Paul says Jesus was “born of a woman” in all probability he means Jesus existed as a human being on earth as human beings tend to.

When I hear this kind of argument, I wonder if who writes lives in a parallel universe where he/she has never heard about a man from Sinope named Marcion.

turpissimum Dei nativitas

(fragment of the book of Antitheses)

This does not exclude the possibility that he was born of a woman outside the terrestrial sphere, but such a thesis needs to show evidence for that beyond what is in the text at that point

The Book of Revelation preceded the Gospels, at any case.

[mlinssen]

Galatians 4:4But when the fullness of the time had come, God sent forth His Son, having been born of a woman, having been born under the Law,

Thomas logion 15. say(s) IS : when you(PL) continue-to behold to he-who not they beget he outward in the(F) woman bend-self you(r)(PL) upon your(PL.) face
or/and you(PL) worship to he he-who therein is(M) your(PL.) father

Thomas logion 46 say(s) IS : from Adam toward Johannes the Immerser in the(PL) beget of the(PL) woman not-to-be he-who exalted to Johannes the Immerser so-that : Shan't! break viz. his(PL) eye did I tell it however : he-who will come-to-be in you(r)(PL) he make-be of little he will know the(F) reign-of(F) king and he will be-high to Johannes

Galatians 1:19 ἕτερον δὲ τῶν ἀποστόλων οὐκ εἶδον, εἰ μὴ Ἰάκωβον τὸν ἀδελφὸν τοῦ Κυρίου

Thomas logion 12 say(s) the(PL) disciple to IS : we know : you will go from-the-hand-of we who? is(M) who/which will make-be great upward upon we say(s) IS behold : the place have you(PL) come therein you(PL) will go toward Jacob the righteous this-one have the(F) heaven with the earth come-to-be because-of he

Jacob the Righteous, Ïⲁⲕⲱⲃⲟⲥ ⲡ ⲇⲓⲕⲁⲓⲟⲥ. Paul takes the name, drops the alias, and gives him a purpose: he's the brother of Jesus! Crawled from under some rock, apparently, just like John B lived in the desert his entire life?

Whatever that may be, the only reason for Paul creating this sentence is to name-drop the Jacob of Thomas, whose character hasn't been developed at all. It is the existence of the name in Thomas that leads Paul to name him as well, and give him context: given the pedestal he apparently received in Thomas, he must be inner crowd; hence why Paul makes him the brother of Jesus. Brethren? I don't see any plural anywhere, what did I miss?
That is the direction, that is the driver. A mere theory of course, like most everything else I state out here.
The Gospel in 1:6 is the Gospel of Thomas of course, the exact same word, naturally: εὐαγγέλιον

And that is confirmed in 11 For I make known to you, brothers, the gospel having been preached by me, that it is not according to man.

Cf. http://www.gospel-thomas.net/scan0020.jpg, with the strange "the good news the according-to Thomas"

Mark 7:19 I'll address in next post, it simply is too much

[mlinssen]

A reminder: I firmly believe in Absolute Thomasine priority, and that is my working assumption here:

Brace yourselves for another lengthy commentary; what I hinted at during Mark regarding original sin is about to be revealed.
The best word to describe my state is bewilderment, when I first read Luke's verses 6:43-45, a complete literal copy of logion 45. The emphasis is on the shocking part alone:

(45a) Jesus said, "Grapes are not harvested from thorns, nor are figs gathered from thistles, for they do not produce fruit.
(45b) A good man brings forth good from his storehouse; an evil man brings forth evil things from his evil storehouse, which is in his heart, and says evil things.
(45c) For out of the abundance of the heart he brings forth evil things."

6:43 For there is no good tree that produces rotten fruit; nor again a rotten tree that produces good fruit. 44 For each tree is known by its own fruit. For people don't gather figs from thorns, nor do they gather grapes from a bramble bush. 45 The good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings out that which is good, and the evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart brings out that which is evil, for out of the abundance of the heart, his mouth speaks.

What is this now? Luke once more turns to the literal copy of Thomas, but didn't Mark do his best to twist and turn logion 45 into original sin by leaving out the so exceptionally essential and equitable 45b?

(Mark 7:17 When he had entered into a house away from the multitude, his disciples asked him about the parable. 18 He said to them, "Are you also without understanding? Don't you perceive that whatever goes into the man from outside can't defile him, 19 because it doesn't go into his heart, but into his stomach, then into the latrine, making all foods clean?"20 He said, "That which proceeds out of the man, that defiles the man. 21 For from within, out of the hearts of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, sexual sins, murders, thefts, 22 covetings, wickedness, deceit, lustful desires, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, and foolishness.)

That is what Mark did: intentionally leaving out 45b so he could build a case for original sin on top of Thomas. Is Luke spoiling everything by making himself known as a Thomas reader yet not a Mark reader, or is he missing Mark's deliberate twist, or is this just plain sabotage - or if none of those then what is it? Clearly Luke's verse 45 follows logion 45b and 45c to the letter, just as his verse 44 is a direct copy of logion 45a, although swapping fruits and changing the plants. This is not original sin, this is a Thomas-like subtle nuanced version that doesn't fit the Church's agenda at all.
What does Matthew have to say on this?

(Matthew 7:15 "Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly are ravening wolves. 16 By their fruits you will know them. Do you gather grapes from thorns or figs from thistles? 17 Even so, every good tree produces good fruit, but the corrupt tree produces evil fruit. 18 A good tree can't produce evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree produce good fruit. 19 Every tree that doesn't grow good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. 20 Therefore by their fruits you will know them.)

Nothing, or everything? Luke's message is there but in completely different metaphors: Matthew uses the fruits and plants of Thomas yet leaves out 45b entirely - in chapter 7, where he talks about false prophets. In his chapter 12 he has another go at it:

(Matthew 12:33 "Either make the tree good and its fruit good, or make the tree corrupt and its fruit corrupt; for the tree is known by its fruit. 34 You offspring of vipers, how can you, being evil, speak good things? For out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks. 35 The good man out of his good treasure brings out good things, and the evil man out of his evil treasure brings out evil things. 36 I tell you that every idle word that men speak, they will give account of it in the day of judgment. 37 For by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned.")

Nuance - again? From Matthew? The context in Matthew here, however, is prepping people for Judgment Day while at the same time addressing and rebuking the Pharisees, who are labelled as evil - part of the plan of course. So Pharisees are bad trees and evil persons, others are or can be good trees and good persons - fair enough then.
The context of chapter 7 is false prophets who can be recognised by their (bad) fruits and will be cut down and thrown into the fire at, presumably, a given point in time. There presumably are also good prophets so Matthew is in need of a comparison between good and bad - fair enough.
Matthew's rebound however comes in chapter 15 when he elaborates on his own 15:11, a literal copy of 14c which in Thomas also has no context in itself, just like 45c:

(Matthew 15:10 He summoned the multitude, and said to them, "Hear, and understand. 11 That which enters into the mouth doesn't defile the man; but that which proceeds out of the mouth, this defiles the man."
(...)
17 Don't you understand that whatever goes into the mouth passes into the belly and then out of the body? 18 But the things which proceed out of the mouth come out of the heart, and they defile the man. 19 For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, sexual sins, thefts, false testimony, and blasphemies. 20 These are the things which defile the man; but to eat with unwashed hands doesn't defile the man.")

Matthew sets the record straight, according to the Church agenda - all words that leave the mouth are evil because they come from the heart that is all evil. And he does make a highly significant other point which I'll address at the end of this paragraph.
It has been a rocky ride, however, with a messy result.
Luke doesn't help much with his beatitudes, which sometimes are hard to correlate and connect to one another: the context in which he makes the literal and balanced copy is difficult to sketch although Luke's verses seem to belong to a wider set of instructions about the teacher-disciple paradigm.
Nonetheless, the gospel-writers once more show their true nature here, selectively quoting and misquoting when and where it befits them. Matthew deliberately leaves out the balanced sentence when he wants to make the case for original sin (all men are evil because all hearts produce evil); yet when he wants to single out the Pharisees from the crowd, or distinguish between false prophets and true ones, suddenly there appear to be also good people with good hearts?
And in order to make both cases the exact same logion suffices, simply by also quoting that one sentence that purposely got left out before?
How extremely unlikely is it that Thomas was last here?
Once again we see a completely coherent narrative in Thomas that starts beautifully unbiased: the grapes and figs sentence in 45a shows that some objects inherently belong somewhere, and 45b elaborates on that while switching from the allegory of plants to humans: good men have a good storehouse, evil men an evil one, and the storehouse is in the heart. So far so good - but the rest of the logion is extremely one-sided, ending with the context-free last sentence in 45c that is very much unlike Thomas. Can I offer an explanation for 45c? No. Will I try to wiggle my way out of this by making up editorial changes or additions by evil scribes and translators, or come up with other conspiracies? No. Even with the last phrase of 45b naming 'evil', had logion 45c not contained that same single word, it all would have been perfectly Thomasine.
Still, if Thomas would have stolen from the gospel-writers it is completely inconceivable that he would have missed the opportunity to reuse the magnificent phrase of Luke: 'for out of the abundance of the heart, his mouth speaks'.
In any case, this is an example of very bad gospel management and orchestration. In the current official canonical order, people will first read Matthew and read a nuanced version in chapter 7 (the false prophets), then another nuanced version in chapter 12 (the Pharisees), and then suddenly all nuances disappear and original sin gets thrown in their faces in chapter 15 (people in general). Then Mark will reassure their sense of original sin by repeating the last verses of Matthew's chapter 15, yet Luke will end it all with his clean and honest, and beautifully nuanced, almost literal copy of Thomas - that even surpasses that of Thomas...

Which is the highly significant point I mentioned? It is Matthew fixing a grave error of Mark:

(Mark 7: 18 He said to them, "Are you also without understanding? Don't you perceive that whatever goes into the man from outside can't defile him, 19 because it doesn't go into his heart, but into his stomach, then into the latrine, making all foods clean?")

With one stroke of the pen the overenthusiastic Mark tosses aside all the Jewish laws on food, making them null and void - that must have made a gigantic impact. Matthew hurries to control the damage, and turns it into:

(Matthew 15:19 For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, sexual sins, thefts, false testimony, and blasphemies. 20 These are the things which defile the man; but to eat with unwashed hands doesn't defile the man.")

No need to wash your hands before eating - that is an infinitely insignificant sacrifice compared to ruthlessly abolishing all the numerous and intricate food laws of the Jews, all of them delicately detailed directions directly from God himself. Matthew doesn't just save the day here, I think this comes close to saving the planet from a Christian-Jewish point of view: declaring all foods clean could have lead to people interpreting it as forbidding every observation of the Jewish food law, and that would certainly have created an impossible barrier for every Jewish convert

[Giuseppe]

Another reason Ken is wrong about Gal 4:4: Hebrews is a pre-70 epistle where Jesus is said to be without neither father nor mother, à la Melchizedek.

[maryhelena]

I agree on Galatians 4.4. I think when Paul says Jesus was “born of a woman” in all probability he means Jesus existed as a human being on earth as human beings tend to.

Best,

Ken

I have a little niggle with the expression 'born of a woman' - somehow it just seems demeaning to woman. Who would go around saying that the child Johnny was born of a woman....The language, surely, suggests it's not a physical birth that is being referenced. Particular so as Paul goes on to speak about ''the other woman corresponds to the Jerusalem above; she is free, and she is our mother''. Children of the heavenly woman..... children of the spirit.

Paul, so it seems, is philosophically in tune with Philo:

Philo: Allegorical Interpretation, I

XII. (31) "And God created man, taking a lump of clay from the earth, and breathed into his face the breath of life: and man became a living soul." The races of men are twofold; for one is the heavenly man, and the other the earthly man. Now the heavenly man, as being born in the image of God, has no participation in any corruptible or earthlike essence. But the earthly man is made of loose material, which he calls a lump of clay. On which account he says, not that the heavenly man was made, but that he was fashioned according to the image of God; but the earthly man he calls a thing made, and not begotten by the maker. (32) And we must consider that the man who was formed of earth, means the mind which is to be infused into the body, but which has not yet been so infused. And this mind would be really earthly and corruptible, if it were not that God had breathed into it the spirit of genuine life; for then it "exists," and is no longer made into a soul; and its soul is not inactive, and incapable of proper formation, but a really intellectual and living one. "For man," says Moses, "became a living soul."

The mind - that's where it's all at for Philo and Paul. Intellectual evolution, the life, death and rebirth of our intellect capacity; as intellectual evolution pushes forward our understanding of our human nature.

No need for cosmic adventures, however much pure imagination might beguile us. Its the everyday life of the mind that facilitates our needs for living on tera-firma.

Paul and his followers are the Men of the Mind - goodness - Ayn Rand would be turning in her grave...

Seriously though - the Men of the Mind don't go walking about as disembodied spirits - Body and Spirit are the dual aspects of our human nature....so, methinks, time for some mythicists to leave the cosmic heavens behind them and deal with that gospel story. Paul, dealing with the spiritual man of the mind does not, cannot, cancel out the man of the earth. In other words; it's not all in the mind.....flesh and blood matter, history matters.