Hawk recently started a thread that was partly about how to argue for and from Jesus' self-perception. Did he view himself as God? If so, what are the implications? How should we go about arguing for and from our answers to these questions? And so on.
One of the issues that came up was the validity of arguing for the historicity of Jesus' identity claims based on the general reliability of the documents that report the identity claims. And that is a valid approach and one that's sometimes neglected.
But we can, and sometimes should, appeal to more than the general reliability of the documents. We should be open to using every argument we have, though there's no need to use every argument on every occasion. It often makes sense to be selective, even highly selective (e.g., because of time constraints).
One question to ask, then, is what lines of evidence we have for Jesus' self-perception that meet multiple standards of evidence simultaneously. The more, the better. There's no need for the evidence we cite to meet multiple standards, but it is helpful.
I discussed an example in a post late last year. We have many, often significantly independent, lines of evidence that Jesus viewed himself as the messianic figure of Isaiah 9. And I've argued elsewhere (linked in the article cited above) that the figure in Isaiah 9 is God. The evidence for Jesus' identifying himself as that figure comes from all four gospels, both from Jesus' words and his deeds, in both subtle and explicit forms, with partial corroboration from early non-Christian sources, with partial corroboration from non-conservative modern New Testament scholarship, etc. I've written a lot about Isaiah 9 over the years, and I'll be discussing it further during the upcoming Christmas season. But even if we just take into account what I've already posted, I think there's a strong case that the figure of Isaiah 9 is God and that we have many, highly varied, and highly reliable lines of evidence that Jesus identified himself as that figure.
I encourage people to research the issues surrounding Jesus' self-perception, and develop arguments about the subject, in ways that take the multifaceted nature of the evidence into account. Don't just look at Jesus' words. Look at his deeds as well. Think about the Old Testament backdrop of his life and other relevant contexts. Look at the subtle assumptions and allusions in his other comments, not just his comments you're most focused on. Ask yourself if there are some ways in which the evidence is corroborated by ancient non-Christian sources or modern non-conservative scholars, for example. There will be different degrees of evidence for different conclusions, and you'll have different degrees of confidence accordingly. But it's important to gather a large amount of evidence, even if the levels of probability vary a lot.
Part of what's so significant about approaching the issues in this manner is that the cumulative effect adds to the credibility of the argument. If Jesus perceived himself in a certain way, especially if that self-identification was of a more central nature, there's a better chance accordingly that his identifying himself that way will be reflected in more places and more often. It doesn't follow that we can dismiss a claim about his self-image if there's only one line of evidence for it, it's only reflected in a couple of places, or something like that. For a variety of reasons, even the features of Jesus' alleged self-perception that are less evidenced can be credible (people aren't equally revealing of every aspect of their self-perception; our historical records are so partial; etc.). But there's especially good reason for accepting and arguing on the basis of portions of Jesus' self-perception that are evidenced in the sort of multifaceted manner I'm focused on here.
Jesus self-perceptions should be expressed by Jesus himself through his actual explicit teachings as recorded or written (without going beyond them) in the gospels especially when they are directed to common unschooled ordinary men (almost all his apostles) if his intention was NOT to mislead nor confuse them. The reasons for his deeds, subtle assumptions, and allusions in his other comments should not or cannot disagree with what he has explicitly stated. Unless of course you want to see or believe in something else implicitly taught by Jesus, as discovered through progressive revelation by these experts or authorities of the Bible aka the Roman Fathers (4th century)in the early triune ecumenical councils. If he believed himself to be divine, where are the actual explicit passages of him stating these claims to anybody?
ReplyDeleteBesides, when you say that "that the figure of Isaiah 9 is God" you actually mean God the Trinity, eh? Did you forget that in the blessed triune interpretation of the Bible, there are 3 divine subjects (God the Father, God the Son, God the Spirit) and 1 divine object (God the Trinity)? When triunes mention God, they have to identify who or what God they mean.
We are just trying to be precise here, triune.
Come on, Gil Christ. You're just repeating anti-Trinitarian / pro-unitarian stuff we've already dealt with in the past. Especially Steve Hays. Just search our archives. I'm sure you know this.
DeleteAs Steve said to you earlier this year:
Delete"don't bother commenting unless and until you have a serious comment."
Oh Yeah. I have read his answers like: To explain the dual nature of Jesus (according to Steve RIP), the human Jesus should have went back in time to meet the divine God the Son. Wow. Are you that serious, Hawk? What happened to Jesus is the same forever (paraphrased Bible verse)? Didn't Steve RIP also argue that your fake Roman God the Trinity still accepts Muslims, unitarians like Dale Tuggy, and all the OT Jews who worshipped God the Trinity as one God and not three persons? What a God, eh? Hawk? Who cares if you delete my posts, Hawk? For as long as you read them first, I am happy. For your sake. You can still repent.
DeleteBy the way, did Steve RIP ever write a book about the Trinity? I would love to read it instead of going through all his posts here.
Besides, were you the one who argued that Hinduism must have been one of the true religions? Doomed CS Lewis argued that only the complicated religion (Roman Christianity) is the true one unlike the simple religions which are the fake ones. I should have let Steve RIP amend your post. I was laughing so hard you didn't know you were arguing for Hinduism as one of the true religions... Look it up. That is why I did not bother commenting on your post. I couldn't type straight from laughing. Unless of course, you were joking. As always.
Besides I kind of felt that Steve 8 months ago was nearing death or was ready to expire when he first played with me in this blog. I can read in some of his later posts that he was trying to answer some of the points I raised knowing that nobody of his caliber in triablogue would rise up to his level of sophisticated nonsense like the example above of the human Jesus and the divine God the Son separated in time. In a way he must have had known I was going to read them at some point. That was nice of him.
I am no unitarian, Hawk. They worship the right God person but the wrong Jesus. The bigger prize for me are the triunes of the Roman Christians tribe. Some of them are worth saving.
DeleteGil Christ, your arguments and objections are significantly inferior to Dale Tuggy's, but Steve Hays has already written scores of posts responding to Tuggy. Sorry to say but intellectually speaking you simply don't rise to Tuggy's level, nor is there anything new you're bringing to the table. So I don't see why one should take the time to respond to you when there are plenty of responses to Tuggy.
DeleteGil Christ wrote:
Delete"Who cares if you delete my posts, Hawk? For as long as you read them first, I am happy."
We don't need to read posts to delete them. Since you apparently need these things spelled out in order to understand them, and there's a larger audience we're posting for, I'll explain the situation. When a person behaves as you have, then keeps posting after being banned, that tells people something about your character. It gives them a better idea of what to make of your posts here and how to evaluate you and your claims when they see you active elsewhere. When your posts are blocked, they can still be seen, but it's more difficult to see them. By contrast, if your posts are deleted, they can't be seen. And the person who deletes the posts doesn't need to read them. He can delete them as soon as he sees your screen name attached. That's what I'm going to start doing if you keep posting. As I said elsewhere in this thread, it's understandable if you don't place much value on your posts. But the more you post after being banned, the worse your reputation gets and the less opportunity people will have to read what you've already written. If you want to waste your time and effort that way, that gives us the added benefit of knowing that you're pouring your resources down that drain rather than doing more harm somewhere else.
Similarly, I encourage you to keep peppering your comments with "hahaha". It gives people some idea of your mindset and how seriously to take you.
Depending on who you're responding to or dialoguing with, sometimes you can take for granted the authority of the entire Scriptures. For example, with Jehovah's Witnesses or many Unitarians. However, with skeptics and atheist you'll have to marshal a historical argument. In the Gospels, especially the Synoptics, Jesus' favorite self-designation is "the Son of Man". As I understand it, historical Jesus scholars consider it likely that Jesus really did refer to Himself on multiple occasions as the Danielic "Son of Man" because it meets the criterion of authenticity called "dissimilarity" or "discontinuity". Because if the self-designation were put into the mouth of Jesus by later Christians, then we would expect early Christians to refer to Jesus as "the Son of Man" just as often as it's found in the Gospels. Yet, the New Testament authors and Apostolic fathers outside the Gospels barely use it. And many Trinitarian apologists have shown how Dan. 7:13-14 imply the Son of Man is divine as well has having divine prerogatives. I've addressed this in my blog HERE. Even Jesus' additional teachings in the Gospels regarding the Son of Man has the personage having divine prerogatives (e.g. ability to forgiveness of sin, will judge and recompense the world on the last day, is Lord of the sabbath etc.).
ReplyDeleteOn this I recommend Mike Licona's introductory video Did Jesus Claim to be God? https://youtu.be/gT2TN6kA5kY
Another line of argumentation for Jesus' self-perception as divine [or at least as the God appointed supreme "Lord" (in some sense)] is His emphasis on His own person whereby He required an allegiance, devotion, love, commitment and preeminence that was inappropriate for a mere human prophet of God, or a mere human Messiah. The first time I saw this hammered home powerfully over and over and over again was in chapter 2 of John Stott's book Basic Christianity where he highlight's the EGOCENTRIC character of Jesus' teachings. It's so pervasive in Jesus' teaching that it's so easy to take for granted that we don't appreciate how radical His claims were. Stott's chapter condenses that in a way that's really eye-opening.
Just as a teaser, we don't see Jesus saying "thus saith the Lord/YHVH" like OT prophets did. Rather, Jesus could say, "you have heard it said......BUT **I** say unto you". As if He has an authority higher than the prophets. Or He'll say, "truly, truly **I** say unto you". Not what many rabbis at the time would say. They would often quote other rabbis [past and contemporary], "rabbi X said A, and rabbi Y said B, and this [Z] is my take on the topic".
DeleteI highly recommend reading that 2nd chapter in Basic Christianity.
My final comments. Not everything offered as evidence in chapter 2 of Stott's book would pass the various historical "criteria of authenticity" that many historical Jesus scholars would use to sift through the Jesus traditions that have come down to us. Especially those evidences found in GJohn, but I think there's enough material that do pass one or more of the criteria that make the point that Jesus' self-perception was very high, even divine. BTW, Mike Licona has pointed out that the degree of usefulness of the various "criteria" are now being questioned by contemporary scholars.
DeleteHere's a link to William Lane Craig exposing Bart Ehrman's misunderstandings and misapplications of the criteria of authenticity: https://youtu.be/70yS6sxi4p4
Page 22 of my copy of Stott's book says:
//...This immediately sets Him [Jesus] apart from the other great religious teachers of the world. They are self-effacing; He is self-advancing. They point away from themselves and say, 'That is the truth, so far as I perceive it; follow that.' Jesus says, 'I am the truth; follow Me.' The founder of none of the ethnic religions has dared to say such a thing.//
Technically, other leaders in various cults/religions have sometimes made similar claims Jesus did. But often they are people who lived after Christ and arguably are mimicking Christ. The difference is that Jesus was among the first, or THE first to do so. AND Jesus was doing it in a 2nd Temple Jewish context that taught exclusivist monotheism. Monotheism that strictly reserved worship to the one God of Israel. Yet, Jesus and His early Jewish follower had no problem placing Jesus on par with His Father at the risk of their lives because of perceived violations of monotheism. See Larry Hurtado's works for more on this. I highly recommend his introductory book How On Earth Did Jesus Become a God?
Page 25 in Stott's book says:
//The most remarkable fact about this self-centred [sic, British spelling] is that it is uttered by One who strongly recommended humility in others. He rebuked His disciples for self-seeking and was wearied by their desire to be great. Did He not practice what He preached? He took a little child and set him in the midst as their model. Had He a different standard for Himself?//
The point is that Jesus did have a different standard for Himself because He knew He was more than mere man.
Page 32 says:
// We cannot any longer regard Jesus as simply a great Teacher, if He was so grievously mistaken in one of the chief subjects of His teaching, namely Himself. There is a certain disturbing 'megalomania' about Jesus which many scholars have recognized. 'These claims', wrote Dr. P. T. Forsyth, 'in a mere man would be egoism carried even to imperial megalomania.' Again, 'The discrepancy between the depth and sanity, and (let me add) shrewdness, of His moral teaching, and the rampant megalomania which must lie behind His theological teaching unless He is indeed God, has never been satisfactorily got over'.
Was he a deliberate imposter? Did He attempt to gain the adherence of men to His views by assuming a divine authority He did not possess? This is very difficult to believe. There is something so guileless about Jesus. He hated hypocrisy in others and was transparently sincere Himself. //
He must have been one hell of a great teacher if all of his actual teachings were all assumptions, allusions, common knowledge, and the like...
DeleteHahaha.
Good points, ANNOYED PINOY. Thanks!
DeleteGil Christ,
DeleteIf you haven't noticed yet that you've been banned, or you're not concerned enough about the rules of the forum where you're posting to abide by those rules, then the next step is to delete your posts, including ones you put up previously. If they get deleted, you can blame yourself. But I can see why you'd value your posts so little that you wouldn't mind having them deleted. There isn't much there to value.
typo correction in bold:
Delete//The most remarkable fact about this self-centred [sic, British spelling] teaching is that it is uttered by One who strongly recommended humility in others. //
Moreover, it literally should not matter if something passes one or more of the "criteria of authenticity," because we can have lots of other evidence that it really happened anyway. Even undesigned coincidences cannot be shoe-horned into the criteria of authenticity.
ReplyDelete