I received no less than three emails on related questions within the space of a week or two, so I wanted to ‘out of order’ this in hopes of surfacing some considerations on these topics.
The questions/issues raised were:
Here we go………………………………………..
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The first is on Paul’s references to James as “the brother of the Lord” and the other ‘brothers’ of the Lord
“My question is a historical
one. I'm sure it's pretty stupid, but I
need help with it. I'm sure you know,
that it is very popular on the net to deny Jesus lived in atheist circles.. They typically say things like Paul didn't say
anything about Jesus' life, and so maybe didn't know anything. I point out these verses:
Galatians 1.19: I saw none of the other apostles—only James, the Lord's brother.
1 Corinthians 9.5: Don't we have the right to take a believing wife along with us, as do
the other apostles and the Lord's brothers and Cephas ?
I spoke with someone who alleged
that the idea that these verses speak of physical brothers is not at all
clear. But that they are speaking of a special
group called "brothers of the Lord".
Or that they mean "brothers in the Lord". As in, other Christians. I know that all 4 Gospels say Jesus had
brothers, and two of them mention James.
But is this just the skeptic taking the obvious meaning and twisting it
for their theories sake?”
My Response:
Well, I must say, it does seem a little odd to take it that way, but since ‘brethren’ and ‘brother’ are often used in a generic “Christians” sense, let’s check out the exegetical sense, Pauline usage and other non-Pauline data.
One quick way to test the “brother(s) of the Lord” = “Christian(s)” is to substitute the second term for the first in the passages and see if it still makes sense. So, we get:
At first glance, this really doesn’t fit the passages. To describe an apostle as a ‘Christian’ or ‘believer’—as a means ostensive identification—makes little sense. The Corinthians passage might be slightly less odd, if you took ‘Christians’ to mean ‘regular’ or ‘lay’(?) Christians. But since the passage is talking about traveling missionaries, this ‘laity’ meaning doesn’t make much sense either.
As for “Brothers of the Lord” being the name of some self-identified group, there is no evidence of such a designated sub-group in the early Church. In fact, the Corinthian letter actually shows evidence that such self-designated groups (e.g. “I (am) of Christ”, “I (am) of Apollos”, etc) existed, but the word ‘brother’ is not used. So, if this ‘of Christ’ group identified itself as ‘brothers of the Lord’, they have left no evidence behind to warrant us believing that.
But let’s also see how the substitution looks in the passages:
Again, there is not evidence that such a group existed, and I am not sure it really makes much sense in (or, contribution to) the understanding of these passages. Although it is not a strong point, the fact that James is identified as ‘the’ brother of the Lord, instead of something that sounds more like a group name (‘a Brother of the Lord’), would offer some evidence that the purpose of the definite article ‘the’ was ‘selective’. In other words, a ‘the’ in this phrase would more naturally be taken to ‘contrast’ this James with some other James (as below), as opposed to identify him by reference to some group. Circumstantial at best, but something that does need to be factored in.
The Galatians reference is generally taken to be an identification, and one necessary to identify which James Paul was talking about.
“James, “the Lord’s brother,” is in all probability the James named first among the four brothers of Jesus in Mark 6:3 (cf. Matt 13:55). He is not to be confused with Jesus’ two disciples of the same name, James the son of Zebedee and James the son of Alphaeus (cf. Mark 3:17–18, par.; Acts 1:13; 12:2). [WBC, in loc]
“Paul was anxious both then and throughout his
apostolic career to establish and maintain bonds of fellowship with the
But let’s go ahead and ask a few more questions:
1. Are Christians ever called ‘brothers of
the Lord’ by Paul (or would-be Pauls) elsewhere?
No.
2. Are Christians ever called ‘brothers of
the Lord’ in any of the other NT
epistles?
Well, almost. There’s a reference in Hebrews but it is Jesus (and not the author of the epistle) who does the ‘calling’ [Hebrew 2:9ff]:
But we do see Him who has been made for a little
while lower than the angels, namely, Jesus, because
of the suffering of death crowned with glory
and honor, that by the grace of God He might taste death
for everyone. 10 For it was fitting for Him, for
whom are all things, and through whom are all things, in bringing many sons to
glory, to perfect the author of their salvation through sufferings.
11 For both He who sanctifies and those who are sanctified are
all from one Father; for which reason He is not ashamed to call
them brethren, 12 saying,
“I will proclaim Thy name to My brethren,
In the midst of the congregation I will sing Thy
praise.”
13
And again,“I will put My trust in Him.”
And again, “Behold, I and the
children whom God has given Me.”
14
Since then the children share in
flesh and blood, He Himself likewise also
partook of the same, that through death
He might render powerless him who had the power of death, that is, the devil; 15
and might deliver those who through fear of death were subject to slavery all
their lives. 16 For assuredly He does not give help to angels,
but He gives help to the descendant of
Abraham. 17 Therefore, He had to be made like His brethren in all things, that He might become a
merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make
propitiation for the sins of the people. 18 For since He
Himself was tempted in that which He has suffered, He is able to come to the
aid of those who are tempted.
The passage emphasizes the human-nature connection of Jesus with his (especially Jewish) followers (i.e., flesh, blood, death, Abraham, high priest, suffering). The followers are called both ‘brethren’ and ‘children’ in the passage—simple family images, not sub-group designations. They are not called ‘Brethren of the Lord’—but since it’s the Lord speaking, that might be close enough(?). But again, there’s nothing here to suggest a ‘separate’ group of Christians (a la clique), nor that Christians were ever called “Brothers of the Lord” by anybody other that Jesus. [FWIW, in Romans 8:28-29, Paul refers to Christ being the ‘first-born among many brethren’, but this is even weaker than the Hebrews passage—we don’t have ‘of the Lord’ or ‘of Me (Jesus)’ in it.]
3. Are Christians ever called “brothers of
the Lord” in the Gospels/Acts?
Again, almost. We have the same pattern: they are only called ‘brethren’ by Jesus, never by others. Two passages are relevant here: Mark 3 and Matthew 25.
We have Jesus calling His followers ‘brothers and mother’ in Mark 3 (and parallels):
And His mother and His brothers arrived, and
standing outside they sent word to Him, and called Him. And a multitude was
sitting around Him, and they said to Him, “Behold, Your mother and Your
brothers are outside looking for You.” And answering them, He said, “Who are My
mother and My brothers?” And looking about on those who were sitting around
Him, He said, “Behold, My mother and My brothers!
But again, the usage is not specific enough: the believers are called
‘brothers’ AND ‘mother’! No suggestion of
either a subgroup or of a Christian identity designation (like ‘Nazarenes’ or
‘followers of the Way’ became). Christians are never called by others or by
themselves ‘the mother and brothers of the Lord’. In other words, when Mary is
called “the mother of Jesus” (as in Acts 1.14), ‘mother of Jesus’ doesn’t mean
she is a member of a clique called ‘the mothers of Jesus’ or that she is simply
a ‘believer’… [Generally, the ‘brothers’ are distinguished from the disciples: After this He went down to
The second passage is the Judgment scene in Matt 25. The Messianic King separates the sheep from the goats based on how they treated a third group:
“And the King will answer and say to them, ‘Truly I say to you, to the
extent that you did it to one of these brothers of Mine,
even the least of them, you did it to
Here the King is presumably talking about His followers, and He calls them “brethren of mine” (like the Hebrews’ reference: “my brethren”). And we have the same lack of specificity of the reference that we had in Hebrews and in the metaphorical reference in Mark 3. Obviously not a reference to a sub-group, and a generic usage that would include everyone. [In the Corinthian passage, btw, where ‘Christians’ would be the least problematic, they are distinguished both from apostles and Peter, so the term would not be inclusive enough to denote ‘all Christians’—it would have to refer to ‘normal non-clergy Christians’.]
4. Are Christians ever called ‘brethren’ in
the NT?
Of course—tons of times. Believers are constantly addressed as ‘brethren’ by everyone (including one case of ‘brethren IN Christ’), but never is a ‘regular’ Christian called ‘brother of the Lord’. We have several cases of “brother of X”, but they are all just physical brothers of a physical person (Mark 1.16; 3.17; 5.37; 6.3; Acts 12.2; Jude 1).
The biblical usage data is solidly against it…
…………………………………………………..
Pushback: “But didn’t
devotees in the Mystery Religions call each other ‘brothers’ even if they were
not related? Except by religions?
Of course they did—every “fraternal” organization does the same ‘by charter’!
But so what?
But they didn’t call themselves “Brothers of
Our phrase is different: ‘brothers of the Lord” (not even ‘brothers of Jesus’, but of the exalted figure the Lord! No one calls himself the ‘brother of God’ in ancient Judaism (!), but the “Lord” was a respectful (and theologically sufficient, btw) way to refer to the risen and victorious Jesus. (cf. John 21.7, where John tells Peter that the physical figure on the shore is “the Lord”)
In some of the Mysteries, a ‘union with god” was achieved ritually, but
the vocabulary of identification did not include fraternity. We
do not see a human being called ‘brother
of Mithras’ or ‘brother of
So, this data is not really relevant to the discussion.
…………………………………………………………..
Pushback: “hey, dude, you
left one verse out—Acts 12.17 makes a reference that looks suspiciously like
the Galatians’ one… and your FF Bruce fellow argues that it’s a sub-group…you
gonna skirt over that one?”
Well, actually, I was saving the best for last…smile.
Here’s the FF Bruce reference (I am surprised you knew about this…smile):
“James was perhaps already the leader of one group in
the
And here’s the passage in Acts 12.17: Peter is recounting his miraculous escape from prison and says this: “and tell these things to James and the brethren”.
Huh? This is no different than a score of other references to ‘the brethren’. Still not the “brethren of the Lord”! Just because the word ‘James’ is there? If it had said “James and the (other) brethren of the Lord” then we MIGHT have had something to discuss… and it's just a different group than the one that was with Peter at the time(!)—not a specially designated group. There’s just not enough evidence here to get that far… Otherwise, it’s just another case of “nothing here to see, folks, just move along…”
And I am not sure that Bruce’s cautioned-comment (“seem”) is strong enough to warrant much more discussion—nobody else sees a problem there…
“The brothers are probably, as at 1:15, the Christians in general. All (not leaders only) are to be informed. [Barrett, C. K. (2004). A critical and exegetical commentary on the Acts of the Apostles; The Acts of the Apostles (587). 2 v.: T&T Clark International]
(The Hermeneia commentary on Acts—which generally points out every little ‘bump’ in the text—doesn’t even comment on the term)
In fact, Bruce elsewhere says it just applies to the elders (without making any comment about “brethren” being some kind of technical term), and maintains quite a conservative view of the historicity of the account in Acts [including that James was the ‘brother of Jesus’:
“The description of Peter's anxious gesture, as he
beckoned to surprised and excited company to make less noise, is the authentic
touch of an eyewitness—whether Luke got the story from Mark (whom he later knew
in Rome) or from Rhoda, as Ramsay argued, or from someone else. … In addition
to the company
which met in Mary's house, there was evidently another
associated with James the brother of Jesus. They too must be told of
Peter's escape. The
"brothers" mentioned along with him probably include his
fellow-elders (cf. 11:30; 21:18). It appears that by this
time James had attained a position of undisputed leadership in the
So you cannot use Bruce to de-fraternize (smile) James and the other siblings of Jesus… Still nothing to see here…
…………………………………………………………..
So, the biblical usage gives no data to support such an ‘odd’ usage, and gives plenty of data against it.
Now let’s turn to non-biblical data.
……………..
Our major witness is Josephus—and
this really should put the burden for evidence back on the ‘odd asserter’ (
“when, therefore, Ananus was of this disposition, he thought he had now a proper opportunity [to exercise his authority]. Festus was now dead, and Albinus was but upon the road; so he assembled the Sanhedrin of judges, and brought before them the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ, whose name was James, and some others, [or, some of his companions]; and when he had formed an accusation against them as breakers of the law, he delivered them to be stoned”
There is nothing ‘religious’ here [nor is the text disputed], and the reference to ‘the brother of Jesus’ simply cannot mean (a) a regular Christian; or (b) a subgroup of Christians. This looks like an ostensive designation.
Now, let me make a general remark about the
blood-kin of Jesus.
Historians have a good deal of data to work with on this subject (even for this time period), even outside of the NT documents. Not all of it is good or ‘pure’ –most historical data isn’t (sigh)—but it has important force.
On my bookshelf, for example, are several full-length monographs and multi-author works (Jewish, Christian, and secular) which explore the rich vein of Palestinian traditions. Look at the titles (biblio is in the book abbreviations):
You see, the Palestinian church continued in existence long after the gentile population became dominant in the early church. Some of the Palestinian body remained in synch with the wider church, but some of the groups splintered off (e.g. Ebionites). The leadership of these various groups often were tied to the blood-line of Jesus’ family (or claimed to be tied to in, in polemical contexts).
“The Relatives as Early
Christian Leaders. There is good evidence that a considerable number of members of the family of
Jesus, from the earliest period of the church down to the early
second century, were prominent leaders in the Jewish Christian movement in
“After James’s death (whether immediately or after 70
is unclear) his cousin Simeon son of Clopas
succeeded him as leader of the
“While James occupied the position of central
authority in
“Paul’s reference
correlates with the later testimony of Julius Africanus, who lived at Emmaus in the early third century and derived his information from a
Palestinian Jewish Christian source. He says that the relatives of Jesus, who were known as the desposynoi,
“from the Jewish villages of
“Among those who were prominent in the leadership of
the Christian movement at the end of the first century were the two
grandsons of Jude. This at least must be a reliable inference from
the somewhat
legendary account that Hegesippus gives about them. He says that, like
Simeon son of Clopas, they came under suspicion, since they were descendants of
David, and were brought before the emperor Domitian himself. As evidence that
they were not politically dangerous, they pointed out that they were merely
hard-working peasant farmers, farming only 39 plethra of
land (quoted in Eusebius Hist. Eccl. 3.19.1—3.20.7; 3.32.5–6). The precise
figure suggests an accurate knowledge of the size of the family’s small holding
in
There are consistent threads of Jesus’ blood-ties that show up in the various histories (even those critical of the ‘Church’):
“Hegesippus had access to
certain traditions deriving from the early
Most of the arguments over the ‘brothers of the Lord’ were over the
issue of virginal conception (are they are today!). Origen can report that the Gospel of Peter (mid-second century) had a record of Jesus’
brothers. The phrase ‘Brothers of the Lord’ is always
taken by the early church to refer to physical brothers and not some
special group:
“According to Origen (Comm. Mt. 10.17), the Gospel of Peter supplied evidence that the brothers of the Lord were sons of Joseph by his first marriage. This may indicate that the Gospel began with a birth narrative.” [DictJG]
“But some say, basing it on a tradition in the Gospel according to Peter, as it is entitled, or “The Book of James,” that the brethren of Jesus were sons of Joseph by a former wife, whom he married before Mary. Now those who say so wish to preserve the honour of Mary in virginity to the end, so that that body of hers which was appointed to minister to the Word which said, “The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Most High shall overshadow thee,” might not know intercourse with a man after that the Holy Ghost came into her and the power from on high overshadowed her. And I think it in harmony with reason that Jesus was the first-fruit among men of the purity which consists in chastity, and Mary among women; for it were not pious to ascribe to any other than to her the first-fruit of virginity. And James is he whom Paul says in the Epistle to the Galatians that he saw, “But other of the Apostles saw I none, save James the Lord’s brother.” And to so great a reputation among the people for righteousness did this James rise, that Flavius Josephus, who wrote the “Antiquities of the Jews” in twenty books, when wishing to exhibit the cause why the people suffered so great misfortunes that even the temple was razed to the ground, said, that these things happened to them in accordance with the wrath of God in consequence of the things which they had dared to do against James the brother of Jesus who is called Christ. And the wonderful thing is, that, though he did not accept Jesus as Christ, he yet gave testimony that the righteousness of James was so great; and he says that the people thought that they had suffered these things because of James. And Jude, who wrote a letter of few lines, it is true, but filled with the healthful words of heavenly grace, said in the preface, “Jude, the servant of Jesus Christ and the brother of James.” With regard to Joseph and Simon we have nothing to tell; but the saying, “And His sisters are they not all with us.” seems to me to signify something of this nature—they mind our things, not those of Jesus, and have no unusual portion of surpassing wisdom as Jesus has. And perhaps by these things is indicated a new doubt concerning Him, that Jesus was not a man but something diviner, inasmuch as He was, as they supposed, the son of Joseph and Mary, and the brother of four, and of the others—the women—as well, and yet had nothing like to any one of His kindred, and had not from education and teaching come to such a height of wisdom and power. For they also say elsewhere, “How knoweth this man letters having never learned? ” which is similar to what is here said. Only, though they say these things and are so perplexed and astonished, they did not believe, but were offended in Him; as if they had been mastered in the eyes of their mind by the powers which, in the time of the passion, He was about to lead in triumph on the cross. [the passage from Origen, from the ANF collection]
In James’ case, a number of apocryphal works were written in his name and he appears in several narratives. Here are a couple:
In the “Gospel to the Hebrews” [EvHeb]:
“And when the Lord had given the linen cloth to the servant of the priest, he went to James and appeared to him. For James had sworn that he would not eat bread from that hour in which he had drunk the cup of the Lord until he should see him risen from among those who sleep. And shortly thereafter the Lord said: “Bring a table and bread!” ’ And immediately it is added: ‘He took the bread, blessed it and broke it and gave it to James the just and said to him: “My brother, eat your bread, for the Son of Man has risen from among those who sleep” ’. [Klauck, H. (2003). Apocryphal gospels : An introduction (42). London; New York: T&T Clark.; Note that this ‘my brother’ could mean something non-physical [as in 1st Apoc of James?], but the discussion in the book argues that this passage was an attempt to place James the brother of Jesus at the Last Supper and as the first witness to the resurrection—to authenticate him as head of the Jerusalem church, and the self-proclaimed continuators of that church—the Ebionites. The EvHeb wanted to claim the authority of this closest relative to Jesus.]
In the Protevangelium of James (Protev):
“The name ‘Protevangelium’ (i.e. ‘first gospel’) was
first given to this text in the sixteenth century when it was rediscovered and
made accessible to the West by the French humanist Guillaume Postel. The name
seems to have been suggested by the idea that this text served as an
introduction to Mark, whose gospel begins rather abruptly in 1:1–8 with the
appearance of John the Baptist. In the oldest manuscript, PBodmer V (early
fourth century), its main title is ‘The Birth of Mary’, with an additional
secondary title: ‘Revelation of James’. This is not the son of Zebedee, one of
the twelve (Mk 3:17), but James the brother of
the Lord (Mk 6:3), although some scholars have preferred to identify
him as ‘James the younger’ (Mk 15:40). At any rate, this transparent authorial
fiction is found in the text itself: ‘Now I, James, who wrote this history …’ [(25:1).
The Protevangelium was composed between 150 and 200 in an unknown place;
“In the closing chapter, the narrator speaks in the
first person singular, before ending his book with a doxology and a blessing:
‘Now I, James, who wrote this history, when a tumult arose in Jerusalem on the
death of Herod, withdrew into the wilderness …’ (25:1), where he found enough
time and peace to compose the Protevangelium. The literary fiction probably
identifies him with one of the sons of Joseph
mentioned at 17:1f.,
so that he would be an eyewitness of some of the events related; and the
reference to the death of Herod the Great suggests that he is writing at a date
when Jesus himself was still only a small child. [p71, Klauck, H. (2003).
Apocryphal gospels : An introduction.
In the Nag Hammadi writings:
“In 2 Apoc. Jas.,
James’ mother is said to have suckled the Lord and
James, and thus the Lord calls her “my mother” (50.18–21)”. [Franzmann,
M. (2004). Jesus in the Nag Hammadi writings. Originally published:
The passage itself:
“Once when I was sitting deliberating, [he] opened [the] door. That one whom you hated and persecuted came in to me. He said to me, ‘Hail, my brother; my brother, hail’. As I raised my [face] to stare at him, (my) mother said to me, ‘Do not be frightened, my son, because he said ‘My brother’ to you (sg.). For you (pl) were nourished with this same milk. Because of this he calls me ‘My mother’” [50:5-20; The Nag Hammadi Library in English]
So, where are we?
So, in summary: we have a fairly large body of data (of varying quality and import) that supports the understanding of James as being related to Jesus as a family member. [The historical dispute is not over this, but over what KIND of family member he was to Jesus: foster-brother, step-brother, cousin, full/younger brother. ]
………………………………………..
Okay, next up is Paul’s knowledge (or lack of it) of the historical Jesus
Here’s how the question was worded:
“How can we be sure the Apostle
Paul is even speaking of Jesus of
My Response:
Paul gives plenty of details about the historical—I don’t see why people still really question this. Somebody needs to read the NT a little more closely…
I have already given a list of the teachings of our Lord that Paul knew/used (in Section One of https://www.Christianthinktank.com/muslix.html), but let’s look at a couple of statements by scholars on this:
First, from O’Connor:
“It takes neither imagination nor intelligence to
recognize how Paul must have reacted in the presence of one who had lived with
Jesus from the time that both were disciples of John the Baptist. The
centrality of Christ in Paul's conversion experience and his theology, and the
natural curiosity engendered by the hints he picked up during his three years
in the Christian community at
“A number of features in his letters tend to confirm this conclusion. The historical Jesus is fundamental to Paul's theology. The disciple who wrote Ephesians caught the Apostle's approach perfectly when he presents Jesus as the truth of Christ (Eph. 4: 21)." When his converts attempted to separate the Christ of faith from the Jesus of history, Paul resisted by insisting that the Lord of Glory was the crucified Jesus (1 Cor. 2:6), and by stressing that Christ had been received 'as Jesus the Lord' (Col. 2: 6). The implication that Paul preached the historical Jesus is formally confirmed by his condemnation of anyone 'who preaches a Jesus other than the one we preached' (2 Cor. 11: 4).
“There are two references to sayings of Jesus in First Corinthians, the prohibition of divorce (7:10-11) and the directive concerning the livelihood of pastors (9: 14). It is emphasized by some that these are not direct quotations but rather allusions or reminiscences. This is done in order to bring them into line with the rest of Paul's correspondence, where the situation has been rather precisely described by F. Neirynck, 'Possible allusions to gospel sayings can be noted on the basis of similarity of form and context but a direct use of a gospel saying in the form in which it has been preserved in the synoptic gospels is hardly possible.' The negative thrust of such a judgment should not be exaggerated. Formally attributed direct quotations were the exception rather than the rule in the age and world in which Paul lived. Use acknowledged value; one borrowed only from the rich. One should expect, therefore, that if Paul knew the teaching of Jesus it would have informed the Apostle's thought to the point where any distinction of source and personal elaboration would be, not only impossible, but meaningless.
“Recent studies, moreover, suggest that Paul knew not just the dominical saying but the context in which it appears in the synoptic tradition. One example must suffice. The theme of the support of pastors appears in Luke 10 and it has been shown that this chapter is linked to 1 Corinthians 9 by a whole series of shared terms: an 'apostle' who is ('to sow' and) 'to reap' has the 'right' to a 'reward' for his 'preaching the good news' because a 'workman' has a right 'to eat' and 'to drink'. The contacts are too numerous to make coincidence a credible explanation, particularly since the same type of contacts are to be found in other blocks of material. The influence of the historical Jesus on the Pauline parenetic tradition has also been demonstrated in Romans. 'The echoes of the Jesus tradition are not all of the same strength, but together they build into an impressive case for saying that Paul must have known a substantial amount of the Jesus tradition which was later committed to the present Gospel form by the Evangelists.'
“It has also been pointed out that, although Pharisaism was essentially an urban movement and Paul a city man, the Apostle uses an unusually high proportion of metaphors which reflect a rural environment and an agrarian culture. H. Riesenfeld has persuasively argued that these show that Paul was familiar with the language of Jesus' parables, because the contacts are too specific to be explained by common dependence on the Old Testament. [NT:PACL, 91ff]
Then, Eddy and Boyd:
“Pauline Allusions to the Jesus of History. From Paul's writings it is evident that he knew a significant amount of detail concerning the life of Jesus. He knew Jesus was born and raised as a Jew (Gal. 4:4) and that he was a descendant of Abraham and David (Gal. 3:16; Rom. 1:3). Paul knew Jesus had a brother named James (Gal. 1:19) and perhaps other brothers as well (1 Cor. 9:5). He knew by name a number of disciples who ministered with Jesus, and he knew that Jesus's disciple Peter was married (1 Cor. 9:5). Paul also knew that Jesus was betrayed (1 Cor. 11:23) and that he was executed by crucifixion (1 Cor. 1:17-18; Gal. 5:11; 6:12; Phil. 2:8; 3:18) with the help of certain Judean Jews (1 Thess. 2:14-15). Paul was aware that Jesus instituted a memorial meal the night before his death (1 Cor. 11:23-25), and that Jesus was buried after his death and was resurrected three days later, a fact he refers to frequently and places a great deal of weight on (Rom. 4:24-25; 1 Cor. 15:4-8; cf. Rom. 6:4-9; 8:11,34; 1 Cor. 6:14; 2 Cor. 4:14; Gal. 1:1; 1 Thess. 4:14). As we have noted, in a first-century Jewish context, this affirmation inherently implies the resurrection of a physical body in a historical sense.
“Moreover, Paul knew that Jesus's earthly life was characterized by meekness, gentleness, self-sacrificial love, and humble service (2 Cor. 10:1; Phil. 2:5-7). Paul's central passion was to know and be conformed to Jesus Christ (Phil. 3:8-10), and he consistently held up Jesus's life—and his own life as modeled on Jesus's life—as examples to be emulated (1 Cor. 11:1). In this light, it cannot be regarded as a coincidence that Paul's own thought, attitude, and conduct paralleled closely what we find in the Jesus of the Gospels. Nor can it be considered a coincidence that Paul's healing ministry, his welcoming of sinners, his life of poverty, and humble service closely paralleled Jesus's life and ministry as recorded in the Gospels. [NT:TJL, 209f]
That’s a bit concise, but surely it indicates that Paul knew a great deal about the Jesus of History.
[We can also add to the above the reference to Jesus being Jewish (in Romans 9.5) and of the Root of Jesse (in Romans 15.12). If you allow the Pastorals as Pauline, of course, you have yet another historical fact in I Tim 6.13: “Christ Jesus, who in his testimony before Pontius Pilate, made the good confession”]
Now, one question that invariably comes up here is why most of these references to Jesus are ‘allusions’ instead of ‘quotations’, or why there is not more about Jesus’ earthly life in Paul’s epistles (i.e., surely the recipients of the letters wanted to know more about the founder of their sect, right?).
One good answer to this is to surface the assumption
(in the question) of a literary
culture as background—instead of
oral/aural, as the first century would have been. In other
words, the assumption is that the way
people (of the first century church) would learn about Jesus was from written
epistles.
And it is this assumption that seems to be faulty. Contemporary scholarship knows that information dissemination in oral cultures is significantly faster/wider than in written cultures, and this fact is shedding much light on the relationship between the NT epistles' “lack” of historical details about Jesus versus the later gospels’ focus on them.
Dunn explains that—given an oral/aural culture, in which communities are defined by shared/remembered histories—the information would have already been known by the recipients of the NT epistles, because they were already existing churches (built already on the knowledge of Jesus the Messiah):
“When we apply this insight to the first churches, it again opens up new windows of potential understanding and insight. We can see at once why the letters of the NT, of James and Peter as well as of Paul, so little quote but appear often to allude to Jesus tradition. In churches already well versed in traditions of Jesus' teaching, repeated quotations and appeals to what Jesus said would have been unnecessary and ham-fisted. Much more effective in intracommunal and intercommunal communication would be allusions that sparked off particular and associated teachings within the communities' store of tradition and their communal knowledge of the Jesus tradition. It is no difficulty whatsoever to imagine the earliest disciple groups being reminded of something Jesus said or did and being similarly sparked to recall other similar teachings or events in Jesus' mission. [NT:NPJ,48f]
In his earlier work, he had also pondered the allusion-versus-quotation imbalance:
“The circumstantial and cumulative evidence cited
above is not usually given the weight I am placing upon it, because Paul in particular seems
to show so little
interest in the ministry of Jesus and so little knowledge of Jesus tradition.
We cannot assume that he ever encountered Jesus personally or had been in
“Does this evidence suggest Paul's own lack of interest in 'remembering' what Jesus said and that it was Jesus who said it? Those who argue for an affirmative answer seem to forget that the pattern we find in Paul's letters is repeated elsewhere within earliest Christianity, particularly in the letters of James and 1 Peter. Only occasionally is Jesus cited as the authority for the sayings quoted. Usually the teaching which echoes the Jesus tradition is simply part of more extensive paraenesis, without explicit attribution to Jesus.
“What are we to make of this? Given that James and 1 Peter probably take us into the second generation of Christianity, when the Synoptic tradition and the Synoptic Gospels themselves would be becoming known, it is very unlikely that in every case the authors were unaware that the teaching originated with Jesus. More plausible is the suggestion I have made elsewhere, that we see in these data one of the ways the Jesus tradition was remembered and used. It is generally recognized that when groups become established over a lengthy period they develop in effect their own identity- and boundary-forming language, that is, at the very least, the use of abbreviations, a kind of shorthand and code words which help bond them as a group and distinguish insiders from outsiders (who do not know the language). The whole point is that in in-group dialogue such in-references are not explained; on the contrary, it is the recognition of the code word or allusion which gives the insider-language its bonding effect; to unpack the reference or allusion (for a stranger) in effect breaks the bond and lets the outsider into the group's inner world. My suggestion, then, is that the Jesus tradition formed such an insider's language among the earliest Christian communities; Paul's use of it in Romans (to a church he had never visited) implies his confidence that this language was a language common to all Christian churches, given by the founding apostle when he/she passed on the Jesus tradition to the new foundation. In terms of the argument to be developed below, we have to assume a wider knowledge of the Jesus story among the recipients of Paul's letters, which his auditors would be able to draw upon to bridge the 'gaps of indeterminacy' in his letters. [Footnote here: ‘The growing recognition that Paul’s letters depend in at least some measure for their coherence on underlying ‘stories’ which he assumed is indicated by B. W. Longenecker, ed., Narrative Dynamics in Paul: A Critical Assessment’ (WJK:2002)”]
“In short, the fact that almost all the references to Jesus tradition in the writings of earliest Christianity are in the form of allusion and echo should be taken to confirm (1) that such letters were not regarded as the medium of initial instruction on Jesus tradition to new churches, and (2) that churches could be assumed to have a relatively extensive knowledge of Jesus tradition, presumably passed on to them when they were first established. [NT:CITM1, 181-184 (8.1.e)]
Fee can go on to make the even stronger statement:
“Indeed, in a basically oral/aural culture, it is well nigh unthinkable that knowledge about Jesus did not circulate in ever so many ways that it would have made it nearly impossible for Paul not to have known about Jesus’ life and teachings.” [NT:PC, 524]
Some may quibble over individual references, but overall, the conclusion is fairly strong: Paul certainly knew and referenced facts about the historical Jesus.
--------------------------- ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Then, Paul’s references to Jesus as “Lord”—were they really intending to refer to Jesus?
Here’s the phrasing:
“Try finding info about Jesus in
Paul's letters without using the Gospels or pretending we're in AD 50 before
they were written. Things like Jesus
teaching on divorce in 1 Cor. 7 would disappear. Besides Paul says this saying came from
"the Lord". Probably meaning
God, not Jesus.
And
“Then one about was Paul even
talking about the ‘historical Jesus’ when he used the term ‘Lord’, and did he
KNOW anything about the historical Jesus at all?”
My Response:
This is fairly easy to assess.
A simple concordance search of the Pauline epistles yields the following results:
Here’s some of the relevant passages (just from ROM, 1 and 2COR, Gal/Eph):
So, at least half the uses of the word ‘Lord’ refer to Jesus/Christ.
Together, these two sets of data strongly suggest that references to “the Lord”—when not qualified by Jesus/Christ—are actually references to “the Lord Jesus Christ”, except in the cases where the OT/Tanach is being quoted and “Lord” is being used of YHWH.
So, on a usage basis alone, the presumption should be opposite to the objection: solitary references to ‘the Lord’ would ‘default to’ being references to the risen Lord Jesus.
And in the case of ‘dominical sayings’ like the Divorce saying in 1 Cor, this fits the pattern elsewhere in Paul:
1 Thessalonians 4:2 2 For you know
what commandments we gave you by the authority of the Lord Jesus.
“what charges
(instructions) we gave you” (cf. the verb
παραγγέλλειν in v
11). There is an authoritative note about the word
παραγγελία. The apostolic
tradition is not to be treated indifferently; it is to be
accepted because it is the tradition of Christ, by whose authority the apostles
deliver it. This is indicated by the following phrase, dia tou
kuriou Iasou, “through the Lord Jesus” (for similar Pauline expressions with
διά especially strengthening
παρακαλῶ, cf. Rom 12:1; 15:30; 1 Cor
1:10; 2 Cor 10:1). The apostolic tradition does not derive from the apostles
themselves; it is “the commandment (ἐντολή) of the Lord” (1
Cor 14:37) and to be obeyed as such. [Bruce, F. F. (2002). Vol. 45: Word
Biblical Commentary : 1 and 2
Thessalonians. Word Biblical Commentary (79).
I urge you through the Lord Jesus Christ… (Rom 15.30)
Now I exhort you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ (1 Co 1:10).
If anyone thinks he is a prophet or spiritual, let him recognize that the things which I write to you are the Lord’s commandments (1 Co 14:37).
We might further note the evidence for specialized usage here. Martin Hengel writes:
“In respect of external form this fixed form for the name of Jesus has clear parallels in the Hellenistic and Roman world. The traditional form of the name, ho kurios Iasous Christos, which Paul is fond of using in ceremonial contexts, say at the beginning and end of letters, has a similar form to that of the Roman rulers:
Imperator Caesar Augustus
Autokrato Kaisar Sebastos
Or Hellenistic kings:
Basileus Ptolemaious Soter
Basileus Antiochos Ephiphanas
“Jesus was the real proper name, “Christon’ the cognomen and “Kyrios” the title. Further honorific designations could be added, like “Son of God” by itself (1 Cor 1.9; cf 2 Cor 1.19), or even “Soter” (1 Tim 1.10; Titus 1.4; 2.13; 3.6; cf. Phil. 3.20). In an analogous way the names and titles of Hellenistic rulers and the Roman emperor were also variable and could be either abbreviated or expanded… That despite all this Paul remained aware that ‘Jesus’ was the real proper name and Christ was originally a title is evident from the fact that the confession of the Pauline communities was kurios Iasous or kurios Iasous Christos, whereas the formula kurios Christos never occurs. Romans 16.18, which seems to be the only exception, can be explained from the context, which is about false service… When the form of the name is “Christ Jesus,” the “Kyrios” can never come first; it is always put afterwards.” [HI:BJP, 68f]
We should also note that “Jesus” is not a ‘title’ meaning ‘savior’ (in Greek). The Greek title-word for ‘savior’ is ‘soter’ (as shows up in the example above—“King Ptolemy Savior”. So the name “Jesus Christ” does NOT mean “the anointed savior”—it still contains a proper, untranslated, name (Jesus).
Also of interest is the fact that the more ‘mystical’ of the ‘competitors’ of orthodoxy (i.e., the Gnostics) routinely described their heavenly redeemer figure as both “Jesus” and “Lord”… the link between the historical, personal name ‘Jesus’ and the Messianic title (‘Messiah’) and the cosmic title (“Lord”) was preserved by ALL competing factions of the first two centuries.
So, again, the data supports the traditional understanding of Paul’s references to ‘the Lord’ as being references to ‘the Lord Jesus Christ’
------------------------------------------ -----------------------------------------------------------
Next is Paul’s reference to ‘born of a woman’ in Gal 4:4---does it really mean what the English translations ‘sound like’?
Here’s the email piece:
“Paul in Gal 4:4 has usually been
seen as saying Jesus was born from Mary.
But a skeptic tells me that the Greek word used does not mean a
"normal birth". That it means
more like, become rather than born. But, I suppose, even the statement,
"Become of a woman" carries the same connotations. What do you think?”
My Response:
I have no idea why the skeptic makes such an error. The words are essentially the same, and used almost as synonyms:
“γενόμενον
ἐκ
γυναικός, ‘born of a woman’; for this well-attested use of
γίνομαι as a quasi-passive of
γεννάω cf. 1 Esd. 4:16; Tob.
8:6;
“The first, “born of a woman,” emphasizes his true
humanity and representative quality. “The aorist middle use of γίνομαι
(“be,” “become”) for γεννάω (“beget”; in the
passive “be born”) was common in Jewish circles (cf. Sir
44:9; 1 Esd 4:16; Tob 8:6; Wis 7:3; Rom
1:3 [an early Christian confessional portion]; John 8:58; Josephus, Ant. 2.216; 7.21; 16.382; echoing ילור אשׁה yĕlûd ˒iššâ,
“born of woman”] of Job 14:1; 15:14; 25:4, as carried on in such passages as
1QH 13.14 and 1QS 11.21), with the participle γενόμενον
used in synonymous fashion to the adjective
γεννητόν (“begotten,” “born”). The
expression “born ἐκ
γυναικός” has often been seen as
implying a virgin birth. But ἐκ
γυναικός is a Jewish locution for a
human birth or idiom simply for being human—as, for example, Job 14:1, “For man
born of woman [βροτὸς
γεννητὸς
γυναικός] is of few
days and full of trouble”; Matt 11:1/ /Luke 7:28, “Among those born of women [ἐν
γεννητοῖς
γυναικῶν] there has not risen anyone greater than
John the Baptist” (see also Josephus, Ant. 7.21;
16.382). It provides, therefore, no clue of itself as to whether either early
Christians or Paul believed in, or even knew of, Jesus’ virginal conception.
Rather, as a qualitative expression “born of a woman” speaks of Jesus’ true
humanity and representative quality—i.e., that he was truly one with us, who
came as “the Man” to stand in our place. Furthermore, as an elaboration of the
formula “God sent his Son,” it suggests that God’s sending coincides with the
Son’s human birth, which is a notion comparable to the theme of God’s call,
commission, and sending of his prophetic servants from their birth that appears
elsewhere in Scripture (cf. Isa 49:1, 5; Jer 1:5; and Paul’s own consciousness
in Gal 1:15). … The second
participial clause at the end of v 4, “born under the law,”
lays stress on another factor involved in the representative work of “the Son.”
[Longenecker, R. N. (2002). Vol. 41: Word Biblical Commentary : Galatians. Word Biblical Commentary (171).
“The term
γίνεσθαι ἐκ refers
to the birth of a human being “out of” a human mother, while
γίνεσθαι ὑπό
defines the conditions of existence of a human being.”
[Betz, H. D. (1979). Galatians : A commentary on Paul's letter to the churches
in
“The sending is also interpreted in terms of the
predicate γενόμενος ἐκ
γυναικός. This is used
traditionally for all men, but does not occur
elsewhere in Paul.” [Theological dictionary of the New Testament. 1964-c1976.
Vols. 5-9 edited by Gerhard Friedrich. Vol. 10 compiled by Ronald Pitkin. (G.
Kittel, G. W. Bromiley & G. Friedrich, Ed.) (electronic ed.) (8:383).
The first meaning
given in Baur: 1. be born or begotten—a.
lit., abs. (Dit., Syll.3 1168, 6; Epict. 2, 17, 8; Wsd 7:3; Sir 44:9) J 8:58;
w. ἔκ
τινος foll. (Diod. S. 3, 64, 1; Appian, Basil. 5 §1;
Parthenius 1, 4; Athen. 13, 37 p. 576c ἐξ ἑταίρας;
PPetr. III 2, 20; PFlor. 382, 38 ὁ ἐξ
ἐμοῦ
γενόμενος υἱός; 1 Esdr 4:16; Tob
8:6; Jos.,
Gennaw is related, but is the word emphasizing the agent’s action of generating the baby – not the one being born:
“The NT term used most frequently for “bear, born” is Gk gennáō — sometimes in the literal sense alluding to motherhood, but also in a figurative sense referring to the beginning of the spiritual life (e.g., Jn. 1:13; 3:3–8). [Bromiley, G. W. (1988; 2002). The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, Revised (1:442). Wm. B. Eerdmans.]
γέννάω, fut.
Med. γεννήσομαι in
pass. sense, D.S.19.2 (but
-ηθήσομαι Id.4.9):
(γέννα):—casual of
γίγνομαι (cf.
γείνομαι), mostly of
the father, beget, ὁ
γεννήσας πατήρ
S.El.1412; οἱ
γεννήσαντές σε
your parents, X.Mem.2.1.27; τὸ
γεννώμενον ἔκ
τινος Hdt.1.108, etc.; ὅθεν
γεγενναμένοι
sprung, Pi.P.5.74; of the mother, bring
forth, bear, A.Supp.48, Arist.GA716a22,
X.Lac.1.3, etc.:—Med., produce from oneself,
create, Pl.Ti.34b, Mx.238a. [Liddell, H. G., Scott, R., Jones, H. S., &
McKenzie, R. (1996). A Greek-English lexicon. "With a revised
supplement, 1996." (Rev. and augm. throughout) (344).
Overall. The difference can be seen to be one of focus: one focuses on the act of giving birth (the more ‘active’ word, emphasizing the parent) and the other focuses on the result of the birth (a human being). So, at the related passage in Romans 1.3:
“ἐκ σπέρματος Δαυίδ, “came into being, born.” Since γίνεσθαι (“become, come to be”) merges into εῖ̓ναι (“to be”), the participle phrase has in view more the state of man (= “born of woman”—Job 14:1; 15:14; 1QS 11.20–21; IQH 13.14; 18.12–13, 16) than the event of giving birth itself, for which γεννάω would be the more appropriate word” [WBC, in loc.]
So, the actual usage of the word in the pre-NT world supports a ‘birth’ understanding as being common. This regularly occurred in Hellenistic and Jewish contexts. So, the skeptics claim, in this case, is based on an incomplete knowledge of the language and idioms of the time.
But—I might add—your comment about ‘becoming of a woman’ meaning the same thing as being born is dead on. And, it is even stronger than that in this passage. The Greek actually uses the preposition ‘out of’ for what the English gives as ‘of’. Literally, it reads “born OUT OF a woman”! If that is not an explicit denotation of human, physical birth, I don’t know what is.
So, I think your intuitions are confirmed by the historical/linguistic data.
------------------------------------------- ------------------------------------------------------------
Then, The abnormal growth of Christ Myth-ers
Here’s the wording on that one (with part of the complaint):
“Recently I'm sure you know,
there has been a significant upsurge in Christ-Myth theories out there. (One
particular mythicist) case relies on embracing almost all of the fringe
positions in NT Studies. He relegates
all four Gospels and Acts to 100-150 CE.
He argues that Luke and Acts are not from the same author, he argues
basically that all of early Christian history was kind of a figment of the
ancient world's imagination! Alas, so
many skeptics now embrace his theory”
My response:
Actually, I am NOT aware of this growth in Christ-Myth theories, since I am barely able to read even a fraction of the scholarly, academic, and peer-reviewed/published literature in this area. I don’t have time to read popular stuff on the web and in print (which includes MY stuff, of course--!), and in the historical studies world, Christ-Mythers are like Flat-Earthers are in the science world—nobody takes them seriously anymore. [Of course, I don’t presume that anybody should take ME seriously either, up in the ‘aether’ –smile—and so I don’t get any ‘attention’ either. That doesn’t mean I am wrong, of course, but at least nobody ‘summarizes the data’ in a way against me (like they do the Mythicists below)].
Every now and then a scholar will treat it ‘outside of a footnote’, but the judgments are always the same: nothing to it. Consider some of the assessments of those who DO devote a little discussion to it:
Voorst gives the history of the Mythic position (and scholarship on it) in his work, and explains why it is no longer considered a real question in NT/history studies [HI:JONT, 6-16; I will cite a long excerpt—with a couple of footnotes embedded--so you can see how this is viewed by the academic/scholarly community]:
“Until recently, the mainstream of New Testament scholarship has not had a large influence on research into Jesus in sources outside the New Testament. However, one long-running and often noisy side current has had such an influence. This is the controversial question, Did Jesus really exist? Some readers may be surprised or shocked that many books and essays — by my count, over one hundred — in the past two hundred years have fervently denied the very existence of Jesus. Contemporary New Testament scholars have typically viewed their arguments as so weak or bizarre that they relegate them to footnotes, or often ignore them completely. [His Footnote here: “Two of the most influential histories of New Testament interpretation typify the lack of treatment of this issue. Werner G. Kummel, The New Testament: The History of the Investigation of Its Problems (Nashville: Abingdon, 1972), only mentions this problem in a footnote, because "the denial of the existence of Jesus . . . [is] arbitrary and ill-founded" (p. 447, n. 367). Neill and Wright, Interpretation, make no mention of this problem. And according to Bornkamm, "to doubt the historical existence of Jesus at all... was reserved for an unrestrained, tendentious criticism of modern times into which it is not worth while to enter here" (Jesus, 28).”] Thus, students of the New Testament are often unfamiliar with them. In this section, as a special follow-up to our sketch of the history of research, we will examine briefly the history and significance of the theory that Jesus never existed.
“The issue of the nonhistoricity of Jesus is indeed a side current in New Testament study. However, those who advocate it often refer to the work of mainstream scholars, so it would be well to characterize mainstream scholarship on the reliability of the Gospels and the existence of Jesus. Since the advent of biblical criticism, scholars have argued over the level of historicity of the accounts of Jesus in ancient Christian literature, both the events in Jesus' life and the wording and meaning of his teaching. On one end of the scholarly spectrum, some have concluded that the canonical Gospels are fully reliable historical accounts of Jesus with little or no later changes, so we can know much about him. Those who deny Jesus' historicity rarely refer to the work of traditionalists, except to label it as credulity. In the middle are scholars who see the Gospels as a mixture of authentic historical material and theological interpretation of Jesus as it developed between his time and that of the Evangelists. These scholars, the vast majority of researchers, work to understand the interplay of these two elements, and they discern "the historical Jesus" with some confidence and fullness. Those who deny the existence of Jesus, especially twentieth-century skeptics, seem to neglect this moderate position. They prefer, as radical revisionists often do, to deal with the extremes. On the other end of the spectrum, some have argued that the Gospels and other early Christian literature contain so much later theologizing and invention that we can know very little about Jesus' life and teaching. Despite reducing Jesus to almost a wisp of a person, none of this last group has argued that Jesus was a pure invention of the early church. Those who deny the historical Jesus have often used some of their arguments. However, the deniers reach a conclusion, that Jesus never lived, which this group does not. [His footnote here: “For example, Rudolf Bultmann, who doubted the authenticity of many Gospel traditions, nevertheless concluded, "Of course the doubt as to whether Jesus really existed is unfounded and not worth refutation. No sane person can doubt that Jesus stands as founder behind the historical movement whose first distinct stage is represented by the Palestinian community" (Jesus and the Word [2d ed.; New York: Scribners, 1958] 13)”.]
He then focuses somewhat on G.A. Wells’ theory (and those that essentially adopt the same arguments/reconstructions):
“However, Richard France's conclusion on his method is
also correct: "[Wells] always selects from the range of New Testament
studies those extreme positions which best suit his thesis, and then weaves
them together into a total account with which none of those from
whom he quoted would agree."
He then summaries the reasons for the ‘death’ of the question:
“On what grounds have New Testament scholars and other historians rejected the nonexistence hypothesis? Here we will summarize the main arguments used against Wells's version of this hypothesis, since his is both contemporary and similar to the others.
Another statement of this comes (but even with different views of the
gospel sources/dating!) from the revised edition of
“Wells claims that the four gospels were written c. AD
100 and that the evangelists largely invented their traditions about the life
of Jesus. But by this date Christianity was flourishing in
many parts of the Roman Empire: it had hardly survived at all in
“Today nearly all historians, whether Christians or not, accept that Jesus existed
and that the gospels contain plenty of valuable evidence which has to be
weighed and assessed critically. There is general agreement that with the possible exception of Paul, we
know far more about Jesus of
Just for examples of the point about 2nd century critics, here are summary statements about Celsus’s and Lucian’s ‘descriptions’ of Jesus (also from Voorst):
“Celsus mounts a wide attack against Jesus as the founder of the faith. He discounts or disparages Jesus' ancestry, conception, birth, childhood, ministry, death, resurrection, and continuing influence. According to Celsus, Jesus' ancestors came from a Jewish village (Against Celsus 1.28), and his mother was a poor country woman who earned her living by spinning cloth (1.28). He worked his miracles by sorcery (1.28; 2.32; 2.49; 8.41). His physical appearance was ugly and small (6.75). To his discredit, Jesus kept all Jewish customs, including sacrifice in the temple (2.6). He gathered only ten followers and taught them his worst habits, including begging and robbing (1.62; 2.44). These followers, amounting to "ten sailors and tax collectors," were the only ones he convinced of his divinity, but now his followers convince multitudes (2.46). The reports of his resurrection came from a hysterical female, and belief in the resurrection was the result of Jesus' sorcery, the wishful thinking of his followers, or mass hallucinations, all for the purpose of impressing others and increasing the chance for others to become beggars (2.55).” [page 66]
“During this period [Peregrinus] associated himself
with the priests and scribes of the Christians in
Even most of the most radical scholars out there don’t have a problem with Jesus’ existence—they argue about the meaning, interpretation, and influences on His life (e.g., how ‘Jewish’ was He?) and what ‘percentage’ distortion the disciples introduced into the stories (e.g. The Jesus Seminar).
Mainstream scholarship, then, no longer takes the Mythers seriously, largely because the Mythers of the past never took mainstream scholarship seriously, but rather spun out on tangents and ‘un-tethered by history’ speculations.
So, until the Mythers start ‘running with the big boys’, we are NOT gonna see any reduction in their output on the web/popular print…
[I will try to write up my own set of issues with the mythic theory of Markan invention, sometime, but let me point out one particularly sensitive point (IMO): the ‘invented’ Gospel of Mark cannot at the same time be (1) freely fabricated solely out of the Hebrew bible via midrashic-like procedures (e.g. Price? EarlD?); (2) freely fabricated solely out of Homer (e.g. MacDonald); and (3) the result of decades/centuries of orthodox ‘grooming’ [visualize a bonsai tree?] by the “Last Sect Standing” (e.g. Ehrman)…but more on this later…smile]
------------------------------ ----------------------------------------------------------
Paul’s references to incarnation
“And what verses in Paul
explicitly speak of the reality of the incarnation?”
My Response:
Well, incarnation means en-flesh-ment
(at least in the ancient world of the time), so just about any references to
‘bones’, ‘flesh’, ‘blood’, ‘hands’, ‘feet’, etc –in an obvious non-metaphorical
context—would count as data [since gods, daimons, spirits, souls (in the Greek
sense), etc do not have these]. Plus, to these we could add references to
things which can ONLY happen to earthly ‘flesh’, such as death, suffering, eating,
drinking, birth, resurrection FROM death, etc. And of course any technical references
to humanity (e.g., anthropos, aner,
We will have to be careful to exclude metaphorical uses (except where such uses imply a literal, underlying fact).
So, let’s go through the Pauline (and would-be Pauline literature) and see if there are any such references (leaving out the Church as His body, etc):
|
Romans |
1.3 |
Descendant of David |
birth |
|
Romans |
1.4 |
Risen from dead |
death |
|
Romans |
3.25 |
Shedding of blood |
blood |
|
Romans |
5.6,7,8,9,10 |
Died for the ungodly, death, blood |
death |
|
Romans |
5.6,7,8,9,10 |
Died for the ungodly, death, blood |
blood |
|
Romans |
5.15 |
‘One man' (anthropos) |
human |
|
Romans |
6.3 |
Baptized into his death |
death |
|
Romans |
6.4 |
Death, raised from dead |
death |
|
Romans |
6.5 |
Death , resurrection |
death |
|
Romans |
6.6 |
Crucified |
crucified |
|
Romans |
6.9,10 |
Raised from dead, cannot die again, death he died |
death |
|
Romans |
8.11 |
Raised Jesus from the dead |
death |
|
Romans |
8.34 |
Who died |
death |
|
Romans |
9.5 |
Human ancestry of the Messiah |
birth |
|
Romans |
10.7,9 |
Raised from dead |
death |
|
Romans |
14.9 |
Died and returned to life |
death |
|
Romans |
15.12 |
Root of Jesse |
birth |
|
1st Cor |
1.22 |
Christ crucified |
crucified |
|
1st Cor |
2.2 |
…and him crucified |
crucified |
|
1st Cor |
2.8 |
Would not have crucified |
crucified |
|
1st Cor |
5.7 |
Christ our Passover lamb has been sacrificed |
death |
|
1st Cor |
8.11 |
For whom Christ died |
death |
|
1st Cor |
10.16 |
Blood of Christ |
blood |
|
1st Cor |
11.23 |
Eating/drinking (Last Supper) |
eating |
|
1st Cor |
11.26,27 |
Lord's supper (death, body, blood, etc) |
blood |
|
1st Cor |
11.26,27 |
Lord's supper (death, body, blood, etc) |
death |
|
1st Cor |
15.3 |
Died, buried, raised |
death |
|
1st Cor |
15.3 |
Died, buried, raised |
burial |
|
1st Cor |
15.12ff |
Resurrection of Christ from dead |
death |
|
2nd Cor |
1.5 |
The sufferings of Christ |
suffer |
|
2nd Cor |
4.10. |
Carry in our bodies the death of Christ |
death |
|
2nd Cor |
4.14 |
Raised Jesus from the dead |
death |
|
2nd Cor |
5.14,15 |
He died for all |
death |
|
Galatians |
1.1 |
Raised him from the dead |
death |
|
Galatians |
2.20,21 |
Crucified, died for nothing |
crucified |
|
Galatians |
3.1 |
Portrayed as crucified |
crucified |
|
Galatians |
3.13 |
Hung on a pole |
crucified |
|
Galatians |
3.16ff |
The seed of Abraham (the promise) |
birth |
|
Galatians |
4.4 |
Born of a woman |
birth |
|
Galatians |
6.12,14 |
Cross of Christ |
crucified |
|
Eph |
1.7 |
His blood |
blood |
|
Eph |
1.20. |
Raised from dead |
death |
|
Eph |
2.13 |
His blood |
blood |
|
Philppns |
2.7-8 |
(both appearance words; one meaning actual) |
human |
|
Philppns |
3.10. |
Becoming like him in his death (also resurrection) |
death |
|
Philppns |
3.18 |
Cross of Christ |
crucified |
|
|
1.20. |
Peace through his blood on the cross |
blood |
|
|
1.20. |
Peace through his blood on the cross |
crucified |
|
|
1.22 |
Body of his flesh thru death |
flesh |
|
|
1.22 |
Body of his flesh thru death |
death |
|
|
2.9 |
All fullness lives in bodily form(?) |
body |
|
|
2.12 |
Raised him from the dead |
death |
|
1st Thess |
2.15 |
Killed the lord Jesus |
death |
|
1st Thess |
4.14 |
We believe that Jesus died and rose again |
death |
|
1st Thess |
5.10. |
He died for us |
death |
|
2nd Thess |
(none) |
|
|
|
1st Tim |
2.5 |
Himself human/anthropos (as mediator) |
human |
|
1st Tim |
3.16 |
Manifested in flesh (body?) |
flesh |
|
2nd Tim |
2.8 |
Raised from the dead, descended from David |
birth |
|
2nd Tim |
2.8 |
Raised from the dead, descended from David |
death |
|
Titus |
(none) |
|
|
|
Philm |
(none) |
|
|
If we add to these the references noted above to the brothers of Jesus, we get a fairly strong case that Paul (and his ‘school’) believed that Jesus had a human body, ate/drank at the Last Supper, and died a death under Roman execution.
Notice that most of these references are NOT to ‘flesh’ (sarx), so any discussions about the meaning of ‘according to sarx’ do not really affect this conclusion. Gods and daimons did not die—immortality was almost the definition of divinity. With the possible exception of the Epicureans, gods/daimons had no material substance which could experience these things or reliably be described in such anatomical forms.
So, if we are to judge from Pauline usage, we have to conclude that he certainly wrote as if he believed that Christ Jesus had a human body like ours…
……………………………………………………………………
Excursus: Flesh/Blood/Bones/etc
only apply to creatures on the earth—NOT
to creatures in the ‘air’ (as in sub-lunar realm of Mid-Platonism).
I think I read somewhere that someone had speculated that Paul might have thought Jesus had a human, flesh-and-bones-and-blood body, but that this never actually set foot on earth (and that, therefore, the ‘historical Jesus’ would not have even existed in ‘standard Galilee’, to be written about in the gospels, recorded in family genealogies, or remembered in oral tradition). That—as some kind of exalted Platonic/MidPlatonic daimon—Christ took a human body (to be able to die for us) but lived his incarnate life/time in the realm of the ‘air’.
This notion would actually be very strange (perhaps even incomprehensible) in Middle Platonist thought, because the discussions about the natures of the gods/daimons (as well as the generally inviolable principle of ‘uniformity of nature’—one doesn’t depart from one’s true nature, and be ‘honorable’) virtually exclude this possibility.
[Non-Platonic folk religion could conceive of this easily of course: ‘Combining these various aspects together, one begins to see the picture of what the concept of god meant to a Roman citizen. First, there was no theological barrier between divinity and humanity, as certain humans (Emperors or heroes) could aspire to be or become gods. Gods becoming human was not a problem either, though this was done simply for the amusement of the god. Roman citizens would not object to human beings of special lineage claiming to be gods or having others advocate divine status for them.’ (NT:PW, 78)—but this is not so in the more rarified air of the Platonic and MP philosophers.]
Although we will deal more with Middle Platonism (MP) at the end of this article, let me explain this here.
One. MP had several levels of being. Gods on ‘top’ (with aetherial bodies), daimons/spirits/heroes/ghosts (with aerial bodies), another unnamed class of beings (with water-based bodies), and humans-animals-(and maybe)-plants (with terrestrial bodies, made of earth). The divinities dwelt in the aether (up with the sun), the daimons in the air (under the moon—“sub-lunar”—but only extending to the ‘tops of the clouds’ in our atmosphere), and humans/animals on the earth.
“Besides these major figures, the Platonic cosmos was filled with subordinate, intermediate beings, the race of daemons. There are broadly two theories on the nature of daemons, one static, so to speak, the other dynamic, and both are represented within our period. Xenocrates already, as we have seen, had elaborated on Plato’s doctrine of the intermediate nature of daemons, expressing it in geometrical terms. Such daemons sound like permanent fixtures in the universe, though the question of their relationship with disembodied souls is unclear in the evidence available to us. The alternative theory, represented by Plutarch and by Apuleius, is one according to which daemons are in fact souls, either on their way up or on their way down the scale of being, either heading for complete purification (and thus divinization) in the Sun, or for embodiment on the Earth [note: there is no ‘embodiment/enfleshment in the air’ alternative mentioned]. For this theory Plutarch could appeal back to the authority of Empedocles (Is. Et Os. 361c). The theory is not presented by Plutarch with complete coherence, however; the static theory also appears. In particular, evil daemons are recognized, as they were by Xenocrates. Are these daemons permanent elements in the universe, or are they souls in the process of being punished for misdeeds during incarnation? Both possibilities seem to be entertained by Plutarch, as we shall see. Truly evil daemons, as opposed to avenging agencies of God, are not a properly Platonic conception, but rather a concession to popular belief, or perhaps an influence from Persian dualism. ‘Avenging’ daemons, on the other hand, are a more acceptable concept, since they are subordinate to God and their activity is ultimately beneficent. Even Philo finds such entities compatible with his monotheism. Besides daemons proper, there is also mention made of heroes and angels, the latter possibly in origin non-Hellenic but certainly accepted in Neoplatonism into the Platonic universe. Heroes are more respectable, but the distinction between them and daemons in the Platonic period is not quite clear. Posidonius wrote a treatise on the subject, but it is lost. One distinction can be that heroes are souls formerly embodied, but this distinction assumes a permanent class of unembodied souls, which is only acceptable on the ‘static’ theory. Whatever the differences in detail, however, it is common ground for all Platonists that between God and Man there must be a host of intermediaries, that God may not be contaminated or disturbed by a too close involvement with Matter. [PH:TMP:46f]
“The universe is divided into two parts, heaven and earth; the heaven is twofold, divided into aether and air, and the earth in turn is divided into water and land. Of these the highest is the aether, the second air, and third water and the fourth earth. All these four parts are full of souls, immortal souls in the aether and the air, mortal souls in the water and on land. From the highest circle of heaven to the circle of the Moon are aetherial souls, the stars and the planets, and these are not only known by our intelligence to exist, but are also visible to our eyes as heavenly gods. Then between the circle of the Moon and the highest region of clouds are aerial souls, perceived as such by the mind, not by the eyes. They are called heroes and lares and genii.” [Varro, cited in (PH:TMP:90f)]
Two. Of daimons, there are only three kinds—of which only one “has” a terrestrial body (the one that functions as our ‘conscience’). Daimons in the air have no ‘carne’ body, and daimons on the earth can be either in-carne or non-carne (as in a troublesome ghost)—but there is no category of daimon in-carne still ‘up in the air’. Embodiment is always spoken of as being ‘on earth’ and with a body ‘made of earth’.
“Xenocrates, Plato’s student, systematized demonology. He and later philosophers listed three classes of demons: permanently disincarnate beings, souls of the deceased, and the soul ‘in’ or intelligence accompanying us. He ascribed human passions to them and made the distinction that some demons were good and some bad.” [HI:BOEC,236]
“In his account of the types of daemon, also, Apuleius agrees with Plutarch. He distinguishes three types (chs. 15-16):
(1) The human soul itself may be regarded as a daemon. In this connexion Apuleius refers- to Xenocrates’ etymology of eudaimon (happy) as ‘having a good daemon’ (Fr. 81 Heinze)—a commonplace, admittedly, by this time, also used by Albinus (ch. 28,182, 2). The idea of regarding a man’s soul as his daimon finds support in Plato Tim. 90c, but must be distinguished from the concept of guardian daemons, who come under Apuleius’ third category.
(2) Souls which have left their bodies. There are two varieties of these, the good and the bad. Those who have graduated from the body with honours, so to speak, are entrusted with the care of definite parts of the earth, and even with individual households. Apuleius identifies these with the lares, perhaps in this following Varro, and gives such heroes as Amphiaraus, Mopsus and Osiris as examples. Those who have died in sin, on the other hand, wander over the world in a sort of exile, causing what havoc they can. They can be used as punishment for wicked men, ‘but should not cause alarm to the good’. These he identifies with the larvae, or malicious ghosts (sect. 153).
These two types of disembodied soul correspond to those described by Plutarch in Def. Or. 416Dff. (Amphiaraus, indeed, is earlier used as an example, 412b.) Plainly there is not much difference in doctrine between Plutarch and whatever authority Apuleius is following, except perhaps on the question of inherently evil, permanently discarnate daemons, which Apuleius does not recognize.
(3) Daemons who never enter bodies, who are in fact the most exalted type of daemon (154). As examples Apuleius first mentions Eros (from Symposium 202E) and Hypnos (Sleep), who is not mentioned by Plato, but may be brought in here as presiding over dreams, which are one chief means by which the Gods communicate with men. What he is primarily concerned with, however, since it is with these that he proposes to link the daemon of Socrates, are the guardian daemons mentioned by Plato in the myths of the Phaedo (107Dff) and Republic X (617DE, 620DE), who accompany a man through life, know his inmost thoughts and most secret actions, and after death act as his advocate (or accuser) before the throne of judgment. The emphasis laid on the intimate knowledge of and care for the individual by his daemon is not found in Plato, but is found in Plutarch (De Gen. 593Dff., above, pp. 219f), and in late Stoic writers, such as Seneca (Ep. 41, 2; 110, 1), Epictetus (1 14, 12ff.) and Marcus Aurelius (v 27). The distinction between this daemon and the rational soul or nous viewed as daemon is in danger of becoming obscured, but Apuleius definitely makes this guardian daemon a distinct, transcendent entity, while the nous-daemon is immanent in the individual.
…
“We have here, then, in the De Deo Socratis, the most complete connected version of Middle Platonic demonology extant, distorted somewhat by Apuleius' highly-wrought epideictic style, but none the less extremely valuable for our purposes.” [PH:TMP,319ff]
“The alternative theory, represented by Plutarch and by Apuleius, is one according to which daemons are in fact souls, either on their way up or on their way down the scale of being, either heading for complete purification (and thus divinization) in the Sun, or for embodiment on the Earth. For this theory Plutarch could appeal back to the authority of Empedocles (Is. et Os. 361c). [PH:TMP, 46f]
Three. Daimons can be punished for misdeeds [they are subject to human passions, in varying degrees], and this punishment consists of being incarnated (again) in terrestrial bodies (animal, human, and possibly plant). All human bodies (risen or otherwise!) are useless or evil and impediments to the progress of the pure soul (even called ‘tombs’). Incarnation was only envisioned as a punishment for a supra-human daimon.
“But with some of these souls it comes to pass that they do not maintain control over themselves, but yield to temptation and are again clothed with mortal bodies and have a dim and darkened life, like mist or vapour. [Plutarch, De Defectu Oraculorum 415C]
“These monsters, however, at least the Giants and Titans, could be regarded, despite popular views as to their origins, as 'fallen' daemons confined for punishment in bodies, and this is how they are regarded at De Fac. 945b, even Typhon being included in the list. For such daemons as these it is confinement in bodies that constitutes their punishment, 'and even these in time the Moon takes back to herself and reduces to order' (loc. cit.). … We find also, however, evil daemons in a permanently disembodied state, and that indeed is how Greeks in general would normally think of them. Xenocrates is quoted at Is. 361b as an authority for the view that there are 'great and strong natures (physeis) in the atmosphere, malevolent and morose, who rejoice in (gloomy sacrifices), and after gaining them as their lot, they turn to nothing worse'.” [PH:TMP, 218]
“It is apparent that Celsus' objection to the resurrection of Jesus and to that envisioned in Christian eschatology is based on fundamental values in Greco-Roman philosophy — values that affirmed the importance of the immortal soul, but had no use for any kind of risen body. Celsus' philosophically based objections to the resurrection are perhaps clearest in 6.72 (141,30-142,14 Koet.) where he creates doctrines for the Christians that are more in line with his own: ‘Since the son is a spirit from God born in a human body, the son of God himself would not be immortal. [Then he confuses the doctrine for himself pretending that some of us (Origen is the writer here) do not confess that] God is spirit but only his son. [And he thinks he can refute this by saying:] It is not the nature of spirit to always remain ... [Then again of his own accord he takes up something not said by us:] It is necessary that God breathes in his spirit. From that follows the impossibility of Jesus rising with his body, for God would not have taken the spirit back that he gave when it was soiled by the nature of body.’” [HI:INTGRP,61]
"Platonists did not abound in the time of Paul, but their conviction that the body was the tomb of the soul and thus of little importance seems to have affected many people." [NT:ACL,32]
“Yet not forever do the daemons tarry upon the Moon; they descend hither to take charge of oracles, they attend and participate in the highest of the mystic rituals (teletat), and they flash forth as saviours manifest in war and on the sea. [A reference to the Dioscuri in particular.] For any act that they perform in these matters not fairly but inspired by wrath or for an unjust end or out of envy they are penalised, for they are cast out upon the earth again confined in human bodies.” [Plutarch, DeFac 944CD, cited at [PH:TMP, 217]]
Four. Daimons (including souls in humans/animals) cannot be killed/crucified (they are immortal, or at least almost-eternal.. but see below)—only their terrestrial bodies can die in this way. For a daimon to die would require them taking a terrestrial body, and IT dying. But some of them are confined to cycles of rebirth on earth–to purge the passions of the flesh—ascending and descending among these levels. [Note: they might appear as in-carne, but they could not be—they could be appearances, phantasms, epiphanies, etc, but the MP system just did not allow them to be real flesh/bones/blood (it was reserved for punishment and debasement)…]
“As one surveys the range of Plutarch's utterances on daemons, certain problems become evident. First of all, how do we reconcile the doctrine of daemons with the doctrine of the ascent and descent of souls set out in the myths of the De Facie and the De Genio? Necessarily, daemons are souls, but are all souls now incarcerated in human bodies potential daemons? I think Plutarch would have to say that they were, but, perhaps, that only a small proportion are active in human affairs for good or ill. Then what of those evil daemons that are disembodied? Are they on their way to incarnation, or are they established permanently in the air below the moon? On Plutarch's theory of punishment for daemonic misbehaviour, they cannot be permanently disembodied; they must be on their way to birth. And yet that seems unsatisfactory. If birth is the punishment, it should surely take effect immediately. … Thus it would seem that some daemons bring with them a large measure of to alogon from a previous incarnation, though we are not told why this should be. They have plainly not been purged adequately by their exile in the body. But perhaps, rather, these are not daemons sent down for punishment, but souls who descended in the ordinary course of 'necessity', and behaved badly while in the body. These now become wicked and irrational daemons in the interval before descending again. Certainly they are credited with the same delight in gloomy and cruel sacrifices as were the Xenocratean daemons referred to at De Is. 361b, who sounded permanently established. It does seem as if there is an incoherence here in Plutarch's thought, resulting, perhaps, from a clash of Persian (and popular) influences with more purely Platonic ones. … Again, what of the pure minds who die the 'second death' and ascend from the moon to the sun, leaving behind their souls? Surely they are necessarily now divinized? And yet we have a description of their being sowed again into the moon (though with no suggestion of punishment for misbehaviour, De Fac. 945 BC), and thence descending again into bodies. These, it could be said, are men who have become gods, and vice versa. All this is possible, but one would like to hear how and when, if at all, one breaks free from the cycle of rebirth. Plutarch seems to envisage a continual ascent and descent, though with the suggestion (particularly at Def. Or. 415b) that only a select few in fact achieve the 'second death' which raises them to godhead. [PH:TMP:223f; note: descent to the Moon does not involve bodies, but descent to the earth does.; also ‘descent again into bodies’ = “gods becoming MEN”, i.e. terrestrial beings.]
Five. Terrestrial bodies are always on the ground because they are ‘heavy’ and subject to gravity. Daimon aerial bodies are up in the air because they are ‘lighter’ and yet not so light as to ‘float up’ into the aether (where the divinities are). If a daimon got a terrestrial body, therefore, it would ‘sink’ down to where terrestrial bodies belong—on the earth.
“Apuleius next (chs. 9-12) adds a proof that daemons are formed of air (cf. Epin. 984c; Varro ap. Aug. CD VII 6; Philo, Gig. 8-9), albeit of the purest quality; otherwise they would rise into the aether! As regards their moral nature, they are subject to passions (ch. 13), can be roused to anger and pity, placated by gifts and prayers, and enraged by abuse. He sums up their nature in the following formula: Daemons are beings of genus animate, of mind rational, of spirit passionate, of body aery, of duration eternal. The first three qualities, Apuleius points out, they have in common with ourselves, the fourth is peculiar to them, and the fifth they share with the gods. [PH:TMP:318]
Here’s the extended section from Apuleius, with my notes embedded (On the God of Socrates, cited in The Unknown Socraties, [PH:TUS, 258ff]):
“…why should nature allow
only the fourth element, that of air, which is situated in such a great
expanse, to stand devoid of everything, empty of its own inhabitants?
How could animals of the air not be produced in it,
as flaming ones are in fire, fluid ones in water, soily ones
in earth? For you would very properly say that someone who would
attribute the birds to the air is false in that opinion,
seeing that none of them rises beyond the
[IX] But if reason manifestly demands that
characteristic animals ought to be understood as existing also in air, what remains
for us is to examine
what, after all, they are and of what nature. So they are not at all
terrestrial, for they would sink under their weight; but neither are they
fiery, otherwise they would be pulled upwards by their heat. Therefore, we must
keep their nature intermediate in accordance with their intermediacy of
location, so that the inhabitants' nature conforms with the nature of the
region. Come now, let us
form with our mind and produce with our intellect a class of bodies which are
woven, which would be
neither as heavy as the terrestrial nor as light as the ethereal, but somehow separate from both or in fact made up
of a mixture of both; that is, either removed from or formed by a sharing of
both substances. But they will be more easily understood as arising from both
rather than from neither. Grant then that the bodies of these daemones
possess both a modicum of weight, so that they do not ascend to the
supernal regions, and some lightness, so that they do not fall to the infernal
ones. [The infernal ones
being earth and water, obviously]
[X] So that
I do not seem to you to be fabricating unbelievable things in poetic fashion, I
will give you a prime example of this balanced
intermediacy. For we see that clouds similarly come together in a diffuse
consistency. And if they were as light as those things which lack
mass entirely, they would never wreathe the peak of a high mountain like some
winding necklace, brought down below the heights by weight, as we very
frequently notice them doing. On the other hand, if they were
so heavy by their very nature that no admixture of a more active lightness
could raise them, they would, inclined to fall from their own force, certainly
be dashed against the earth, no differently than a hunk of lead or stone.
But as it stands, hanging freely and mobile, they are driven this way and that
on the sea of air by winds, in the same way as ships, changing a little bit in
nearness and distance. In fact, if they abound with any moisture they sink
downwards as though to produce offspring. And for this same reason the moister
clouds go lower in a dark mass and with a more plodding motion. But the course
of the dry clouds is more lofty and, when they are driven along like fleecy
tufts of wool, they move in a white mass and with a swifter flight. You have
heard what Lucretius most eloquently says about thunder, haven't you?
First, the blue expanse of heaven is shaken by
thunder Because the ethereal clouds
flying high in the sky Collide when the struggling winds fight each other.
(De Rerum Natura 6.96-98)
[XI] But if clouds, whose every rising and turning back down to the earth is
terrestrial in nature, float about on high, what then will you think of the bodies of the daemones, which
are a so
much more diffuse condensation? For they are amassed
not from this particulate cloudiness and moist mistiness, as the genus of
clouds is, but
they are coalesced from that purest liquid and clear element of air, and for that reason, unless they reveal their
appearance by divine will, they are not readily seen by any man, because no earthly solidity takes the place of light in
them, which might
intercept our vision and on which solidity our eyesight would necessarily delay
when met with. Rather,
they possess fibers of substances which are diffuse, brilliant, and delicate to
the point that they allow all the rays of our sight to pass through by their diffusion, repel them by their
brilliance, and trick them by their subtlety. From this comes Homer's portrayal
of Minerva when she comes into the middle of the Greek assembly to restrain
Achilles. [Note: here are cases
where the airy daimons appear to and interact with men, but do not require/use
a terrestrial body for that.] If you wait a bit, I will deliver the Greek line in Latin — and I'm
doing this on the spot. So Minerva, as I was saying, arrives on Juno's order to
bring Achilles under control:
"Obvious to him alone, none of the others sees
her.”
Also from this comes Vergil's Juturna, who, in
order to aid her brother, moves among thousands of soldiers:
"And she mixes with men but is not seen by
any,"
doing, in short, what Plautus' soldier brags about
doing with his shield,
"Dulling the keenness of his enemies'
eyes."(Miles Gloriosus 4)
[XII] And so I do not go through the rest of the
examples at greater length, the poets, by no means far from the truth, are
accustomed as a general rule to fashion from this category of daemones gods who hate and love certain
men: they lift up and give some success; others, on the contrary, they oppose
and cast down. They feel pity and they feel anger, they are
distressed and they are glad, and they experience every aspect of the human mind. They toss about to every tide of thought because of a similar
stirring of the heart and swelling of the mind. But all of these squalls and storms are banished far
from the tranquility of the celestial gods. For all of the heavenly gods always possess the same state of mind with
an eternal dispassion, and that mind is never moved from its limits either
toward pain or toward pleasure, nor is it removed in any way from its eternal
mode of existence to some unexpected state, neither by an external force—for
nothing is more potent than a god—nor by its own will—for nothing is more
perfect than a god. After all, how can it be viewed as having been perfect when
it moves from a previous state to a different and better one, especially since
no one willingly pursues what is new, unless the old has displeased him? For
that changed principle cannot arise without an invalidation of the preceding
ones.
Wherefore, a god should endure no temporary exercise of hate or love and therefore
should be touched by neither anger nor pity, should be bothered by no distress
and should become excited by no enthusiasm. No, free from all passions of the
mind, he should not ever grieve nor should he rejoice in anything, [note: “God so loved the world that He sent his beloved Son…” and “God
rejoices in good” and “God is compassionate” has no place in this system…] and he should not wish something unexpected to
occur nor wish that it would not.
[XIII] But all these traits and others of the same
sort are properly consistent with the intermediacy of daemones, because they are positioned between us and the gods
as much in the nature of their intelligence as in the location of their realm, having immortality in common with the gods above, emotion in common with the mortals below. For
just as with us, they can undergo every consolation or agitation of the mind,
such that they are roused by anger and swayed by pity, induced by gifts and
assuaged by prayers, irritated by affronts and soothed by offerings, and in
every other context they change in a manner similar to us.
So that I might define them comprehensively, daemones are a class
of animals, rational in nature, subject to emotion, airy in body, and eternal
in time. Of these five factors which I have listed, the first three are the
very ones we possess, the fourth is their own, and the last
they share with the immortal gods, though they differ from them in
feeling emotion. For this reason I have not, to my way of thinking,
inappropriately called them "emotional," since they are liable to the
very same disturbances of the mind that we are.”
Here’s the extended quote from Plato’s Epinomis, 1524ff:
“athenian: And solid bodies from which things can best and most fairly be molded are, by the most probable account, of five sorts, while the whole of being of the other kind has one single type. For nothing can be incorporeal and wholly and always devoid of color, save only being of the divinest type, soul, and 'tis the proper and exclusive function of this to mold and make’. To body it pertains, as I say, to be molded, be made, be seen, but to the other—we may repeat it, for it needs to be said more than once—to be unseen, to know, to be apprehended by thought, and to have its part in memory and computation of the interchanges of odd and even. Now as the number of these forms of body is five, they should be enumerated as fire, water, third air, fourth earth, and fifth aether. It is as they predominate that all the creatures are fashioned in all their multitude and variety. The matter should be expounded in detail as follows. We may take the earthy first as one single type comprising all mankind as well as all creatures with many feet or with none, alike those which travel from place to place and those which are fixed to one spot, fast bound by their roots; their unity, so we should hold, lies in this, that though all five forms of body are found in the structure of them all, their principal stuff is earth, the hard and resistant substance. [note: Plato here asserts that all bodies have some level of all five elements in them, but that each is distinguished by the relative levels.] Then secondly we must assume another kind of creature, likewise visible because it mainly consists of fire, though it contains some small portions of earth, air, and all the rest. From these constituents, then, we must hold, there arise visible creatures of many kinds, whom we must further take to be the kinds of creatures which people the skies. Collectively, of course, we must call them the divine host of the stars— endowed with the fairest of bodies and the happiest and best of souls. And we are fairly bound to assign them one or other of two lots. Either every one of them is imperishable, immortal, and divine, and that of utter and absolute necessity, or each of them has his sufficient term of life, covering many ages, beyond which there is nothing more for him to desire. ... We will begin then, as we say, by conceiving these two sorts of creature, both, to repeat ourselves, visible—the one composed, as might be imagined, wholly of fire and the other of earth, the earthy sort moving in disorderly fashion, that of fire with utter uniformity. Now the sort which moves in disorderly wise—as the kind of creature which includes ourselves mostly does—we must take to be unintelligent, but as for that which holds its course uniformly through the sky, we should count this abundant proof of its intelligence [OMITTED: argument for the souls/intelligence of the stars/planets] We maintain, first, that there are two sorts of being, soul being one and body the other; that there are many of either kind, all different from one another, and either sort from the other; that there is no tertium quid common to both; that soul is more excellent than body. [OMITTED: discussion of images of gods]. Now that we have discovered two kinds of creature, both visible, the one, so we say, immortal, the other—that made of earth—mortal, we shall try to give the most faithful account warranted by reasonable conjecture of the three intermediate sorts out of the five, which lie between these extremes. Next to fire we will place aether, assuming that soul fashions from it creatures which, as with the other kinds, have in the main the character of its own substance, though with lesser portions of the other kinds as bonds of union, and that after aether soul fashions another sort of creature out of air, and a third from water. By the fabrication of them all, we may suppose, soul has filled the universe throughout with living things, making all possible use of all the kinds of body, and communicating life to all; the series of creations begins with the visible divinities, and has its second, third, fourth, and fifth terms, closing in ourselves, mankind. As for such gods as Zeus, Hera, and the rest, a man may give them any rank he pleases, so long as he conforms to this law of ours and holds fast to our principle. But, it is, of course, the stars and the bodies we can perceive existing along with them that must be named first as the visible gods, and the greatest, most worshipful, and clearsighted of them all; after them and below them, come in order the daemons and the creatures of the air, who hold the third and midmost rank, doing the office of interpreters, and should be peculiarly honored in our prayers that they may transmit comfortable messages. Both sorts of creature, those of aether and those of air, who hold the rank next to them, we shall say, are wholly transparent; however close they are to us, they go undiscerned. Being, however, of a kind that is quick to learn and of retentive memory, they read all our thoughts and regard the good and noble with signal favor, but the very evil with deep aversion. For they are not exempt from feeling pain, whereas a god who enjoys the fullness of deity is clearly above both pain and pleasure, though possessed of all-embracing wisdom and knowledge. The universe being thus full throughout of living creatures, they all, so we shall say, act as interpreters, and interpreters of all things, to one another and to the highest gods, seeing that the middle ranks of creatures can flit so lightly over the earth and the whole universe. As for the fifth and last of our substances, water, the safest guess would be that what is formed from it is a demigod, and that it is sometimes to be seen, but anon conceals itself and becomes invisible, and thus perplexes us by its indistinct appearance.
Six. As ‘mixtures’ of the divine and the non-divine, these are said ( or ‘alleged’) to be able to experience some forms of pain/pleasures without requiring a terrestrial flesh-and-blood body. And since daimons can fight against each other, presumably the MP system would let daimons ‘hurt’ (but probably not kill—but compare the slaying of Python by Apollo?) other daimons—without even needing a human body like Jesus had. [However, some of the stories are clearly doubted by the MP’s as being ‘somatically real’, such as the castration of the god Uranus by his demigod son Cronus.]
“Better, therefore, is the judgment of those who hold that the stories about Typhon, Osiris, and Isis, are records of experiences of neither gods nor men, but of demigods, whom Plato and Pythagoras and Xenocrates and Chyrsippus, following the lead of early writers on sacred subjects, allege to have been stronger than men and, in their might, greatly surpassing our nature (physis), yet not possessing the divine quality unmixed and uncontaminated, but with a share also in the nature (physis) of the soul (psuche) and in the perceptive faculties of the body (somatos), and with a susceptibility to pleasure and pain and to whatsoever other experience is incident to these mutations…” [Is e Os, 360ff]
“Such also, he said, were the stories about Typhons and Titans; battles of demigods against demigods had taken place, followed by the exile of the vanquished, or else judgment inflicted by a god upon the sinners, as, for example, for the sin which Typhon is said to have committed in the case of Osiris, or Cronus in the case of Uranus…” [De Def, 421]
Seven. There seems to be some disagreement on the eternity of the daimons, within Middle Platonism. The quotes above generally refer to them as ‘eternal’ or ‘immortal’ (certainly not capable of being killed), but there are a couple of references to ‘death’ and ‘dissolution’ of daimons, although it doesn’t seem to be either strongly or widely held. For a daimon to be killed, or crucified ‘above the clouds’, would not fit into even these constructions of non-immortal daimons, though.
Plutarch, for example, reports a conversation over whether the ‘final end of daimons is death’, and the data advanced in favor of their mortality is twofold: (1) an oracle that ‘Great Pan is Dead’; and (2) stories from small islands around Britain, using the terms ‘passing’ and ‘dissolution’ to describe their death. [De Defectu Oraculorum, 418-420] . The group in the passage seem to accept this conclusion, and other related (although perhaps stated tentatively) cases such as Python might be adduced as evidence for this. But we will note when we look at Plutarch’s accounts of Isis/Osiris/Horus that an MP perspective will not really admit much of the visceral content of the myths… see below.
Eight. But no matter how we conceive of these ‘divine beings’, one cultural fact also strongly militates against assimilating daimons with the Crucified Lord—the incomprehensibility of crucifixion (I have written more on this elsewhere in the Tank, e.g., copycat.html). In any segment of G-R society, noble death was accepted, but crucifixion could never, ever count as ‘noble death’—it was explicitly a death of ‘shame’:
“By comparing the word of the cross with the expectations of the Jews and Greeks, and the understanding of worldly wisdom, Paul's use of the term moria is more akin to the understanding that worshiping a crucified God was inconceivably backward, rather than being a comical idea. Although Christians would be ridiculed for worshiping a crucified God, this is not the perspective that Paul presents. That God could be crucified was inconceivable in the minds of the ancients. To them, a god was powerful and had honour and would never allow themselves to be subjected to crucifixion. It would have been mind-boggling to them and would have had the appearance of foolishness. Paul and the Christians were liable to be mocked and rightfully fearful of death by the Roman state, because their master Jesus, by definition of his title "Christ," was someone who rebelled against the state, and as his followers they would have agreed with his teaching and message. Likewise, "an alleged son of God who could not help himself at the time of his deepest need (Mark 15.31), and who rather required his followers to take up the cross, was hardly an attraction to the lower classes of Roman and Greek society." In fact, people were too eager to get away from the cross. Such a backward concept in the minds of the ancients could have only been incomprehensibly foolish.” [NT:PW, 128; this event is not something one would ‘invent’ to out-shout a rival religious faction, or to ‘boost attendance at the Sunday morning service’.]
Nine. The closest image I can find (in the MPish lit of the period) to a daemon ‘taking on our nature to save us’ turns out to be not one of incarnation after all. In Plutarch’s On the Sign (Daemon) of Socrates, is this passage:
“The gods, then, order the life of but few among men,
such as they wish to make supremely blessed and in very truth divine ; whereas
souls delivered from birth and henceforth at rest from the body—set quite free,
as it were, to range at will— are, as Hesiod ' says, daemons that watch over
man. For as athletes who from old age have given up training do not entirely
lose their ardour and their love of bodily prowess, but look on with pleasure
as others train, and call out encouragement and run along beside them, so those
who are done with the contests of life, and who, from prowess of soul, have
become daemons, do not hold what is done and said and striven after in this
world in utter contempt, but are propitious to
contenders for the same goal, join in
their ardour, and encourage
and help them to the
attainment of virtue when they see them keeping up the struggle and all but
reaching their heart's desire. For daemons do not assist all
indifferently, but as when men swim at sea, those standing on the shore merely
view in silence the swimmers who are still far out and distant from land, whereas they help with hand and voice alike such as have come near, and
running along and wading in
beside them bring them safely in, such too, my friends, is the
way of daemons…
The ‘wading in’ image could suggest ‘incarnation’ (perhaps), but the rest of the passage shows that it is nothing of the kind:
“…wading in beside them bring them safely in, such too, my friends, is the way of daemons : as long as we are head over ears in the welter of worldly affairs and are changing body after body, like conveyances, they allow us to fight our way out and persevere unaided, as we endeavour by our own prowess to come through safe and reach a haven ; but when in the course of countless births a soul has stoutly and resolutely sustained a long series of struggles, and as her cycle draws to a close, she approaches the upper world, bathed in sweat, in imminent peril and straining every nerve to reach the shore, God holds it no sin for her daemon to go to the rescue, but lets whoever will lend aid. One daemon is eager to deliver by his exhortations one soul, another another [sic], and the soul on her part, having drawn close, can hear, and thus is saved ; but if she pays no heed, she is forsaken by her daemon and conies to no happy end." [On the Sign of Socrates, 24, 593D-594A]
The daimon is still just a bystander, teaching and urging the struggling soul on, while the soul has to listen, be guided, and continue the horrible struggle to ‘reach the shore’. No incarnation, no sacrifice, no real ‘redemption’.
And what a contrast to the New Testament Savior--!—who ‘carried our weaknesses’, whose love ‘took our place in the execution line’, whose body ‘bore our stripes’! We do not struggle—He did. We do not suffer for our crimes, He did. And His ‘spotless flesh’ stood in the stead of our ‘sinful flesh’. This is NOT an MP daemon!
A great example of this is in the MP version of Osiris (more detail immediately below). For all the talk about Osiris ‘body’ being torn apart, when Plutarch says his last on the subject, the Osiris envisioned is immaterial, without any connection to matter/flesh, and also only becomes the soul’s leader and king AFTER the souls have reached perfection!
“78. This idea at the present time the priests intimate with great circumspection in acquitting themselves of this religious secret and in trying to conceal it : that this god Osiris is the ruler and king of the dead, nor is he any other than the god that among the Greeks is called Hades and Pluto. But since it is not understood in what manner this is true, it greatly disturbs the majority of people who suspect that the holy and sacred Osiris truly dwells in the earth and beneath the earth, where are hidden away the bodies of those that are believed to have reached their end. But he himself is far removed from the earth, uncontaminated and unpolluted and pure from all matter that is subject to destruction and death ; but for the souls of men here, which are compassed about by bodies and emotions, there is no association with this god except in so far as they may attain to a dim vision of his presence by means of the apperception which philosophy affords. But when these souls are set free and migrate into the realm of the invisible and the unseen, the dispassionate and the pure, then this god becomes their leader and king, since it is on him that they are bound to be dependent in their insatiate contemplation and yearning for that beauty which is for men unutterable and indescribable. [On the Sign of Socrates, 78(382E-383A).
Okay—sorry for dragging through all the source material, but I thought it would show a couple of basic points:
So, at least within MP ‘proper’ [we are NOT talking about ‘Mystery Religions’ or other cults of the period, remember] , the thesis that Christ (understood in this system as a daimon) took on flesh/blood/bones of his own free will, lived a real ‘terrestrial’ life up in the stratosphere, and was somehow ‘crucified’ up there by other daimons, finds ‘no purchase’ in Middle-Platonism, purely considered. [There could be bizarre hybrids of MP, mystery religions, and mythologies which might (I guess) concoct such a strange anti-Platonic, pro-body doctrine, of course—like Plutarch for example(?!)—but it would not be ‘real’ MP]
…………………………………………………………………
Now, about this Isis/Osiris thing
of Plutarch’s…
Pushback: “Dude, you just
argued that MP daimons don’t/can't have terrestrial bodies, do not die, and that
if they DID have terrestrial bodies, they would NOT live up in the air—their
proper domain. But you KNOW Plutarch was a MP, and surely you know that he
describes how Typhon tears apart the body of Osiris, and Isis puts him back
together again, right? Doesn’t this sort
of show that an MP daimon could have a body, suffer bodily harm—and all of this
happen ‘up in the air’?”
Not at all, friend—
You are confusing Plutarch the would-be ethnographer of
Plutarch the would-be ethnographer of
“These are nearly all the important points of the
legend, with the omission of the most infamous of the tales, such as that about the
dismemberment of Horus and the decapitation of
So, as a story about the ‘gods’ (theon) he rejects it outright.
But then Plutarch the Mystery Religion enthusiast, using the popular daimon category which was common to the Hellenism of the day, re-interprets the Egyptian ‘outlandish opinions’ (after ridiculing Euhemerus in 23):
“Better,
therefore, is the judgment of those who hold that the stories about Typhon,
Osiris, and Isis, are records of experiences of neither gods nor men, but of
demigods, whom Plato and Pythagoras and
Xenocrates and Chyrsippus, following the lead of early writers on sacred
subjects, allege to have been stronger than men
and, in their might, greatly surpassing our nature (physis), yet not possessing
the divine quality unmixed and uncontaminated, but with a share also in the
nature (physis) of the soul (psuche) and in the perceptive
faculties of the body (somatos), and with a susceptibility to pleasure and pain
and to whatsoever other experience is incident to these mutations…” [Is e Os,
360ff]
He then gives a standard MP account of daimons in general (26). But
when he turns to Typhon and crew in 27, there is only mention of doing terrible
deeds and bringing confusion and ills upon the whole earth. The battles between Typhon and Isis are not explained or
described in details, and Isis recounts her experiences in ‘holy rites’, as an
‘encouragement for men and women who find themselves in the clutch of like
calamities’. The phrase ‘like calamities’ probably doesn’t
refer to wives whose husbands have been dismembered and scattered all over the
world… All we get in the passage are unexplained ‘virtues’ and
‘vices’. The details of the myths have disappeared, in favor of more
generic concepts.
In 30, he returns to Isis/Osiris/Typhon. I+O are promoted from demigods to full-gods, while Typhon (no longer fighting I+O but rather fighting ‘extinction’!) is mollified with sacrifices (instead of being fought by I+O):
“Now Osiris and Isis changed from good minor deities into gods. But the power of Typhon, weakened and crushed, but still fighting and struggling against extinction, they try to console and mollify by certain sacrifices”
He then discusses various cultic legends about various demigods, and then, in 32, he seems to reject ALL of it and re-interpret the whole lot—Plutarch the Middle Platonist comes to the fore:
“Such, then, are the possible interpretations which these facts suggest. But now let us begin over again, and consider first the most perspicuous of those who have a reputation for expounding matters more philosophically. These men are like the Greeks who say that Cronus is but a figurative name for Chronus (time), Hera for Air, and that the birth of Hephaestus symbolizes the change of Air into Fire. And thus among the Egyptians such men say that Osiris is the Nile consorting with the Earth, which is Isis, and that the sea is Typhon into which the Nile discharges its waters and is lost to view and dissipated, save for that part which the earth takes up and absorbs and thereby becomes fertilized.”
What were daimons interacting earlier are now simply symbols of natural phenomena. The Osiris
which was dismembered and scattered by Typhon, now becomes
the
The story of Typhon’s bloody treachery becomes almost unrecognizable (38-40), in a serious bit of ‘de-mythologizing’:
“As they regard the Nile as the effusion of
Osiris, so they hold and believe the earth to be
the body of Isis, not all of it, but so much of it as the
“The outmost parts of the land beside the mountains
and bordering on the sea the Egyptians call Nephthys. This is why they give to
Nephthys the name of "Finality," ' and say that she is the wife of
Typhon. Whenever, then, the Nile overflows and with abounding waters spreads
far away to those who dwell in the outermost regions, they call this the union
of Osiris with Nephthys, which is proved by the upspringing of the plants.
Among these is the melilotus, by the wilting and failing of which, as the story
goes, Typhon gained knowledge of the wrong done to his bed. So
“39- The insidious scheming and usurpation of Typhon, then, is the power of drought, which gains control and dissipates the moisture which is the source
of the Nile and of its rising ; and his coadjutor, the Queen of the Ethiopians," signifies
allegorically the south winds from Ethiopia ; for whenever these gain the upper
hand over the northerly or Etesian winds which drive the clouds towards
Ethiopia, and when they prevent the falling of the rains which cause the rising
of the Nile, then
Typhon, being in possession, blazes with scorching heat ; and having gained complete
mastery, he forces the Nile in retreat to draw back its waters for weakness, and, flowing at the bottom of its almost empty
channel, to proceed to the sea. The story told of the shutting up of Osiris in the chest seems to mean nothing else than the vanishing and disappearance of water. Consequently they say that the disappearance of Osiris occurred in the
month of Athyr at the time when, owing to the complete cessation of the Etesian
winds, the
“40. When Isis recovered Osiris and was watching
Horus grow up as he was being made strong by the exhalations and mists and
clouds, Typhon was vanquished but not annihilated; for the goddess who holds sway over the Earth would not permit the complete annihilation of the
nature opposed to moisture, but relaxed and moderated it, being desirous that
its tempering potency should persist, because it was not possible for a
complete world to exist, if the fiery element left it and disappeared. Even if this story were not current among them,
one would hardly be justified in rejecting that other account, to the effect
that Typhon, many ages ago, held sway over Osiris's
domain ; for
Egypt used to be all a sea and, for that reason, even to-day it is found to have shells in its
mines and mountains Moreover, all the springs and wells, of which there are
many, have a saline and brackish water, as if some stale dregs of the ancient
sea had collected there.
“But, in time, Horus overpowered Typhon ; that is to say, there came on a timely abundance of rain, and
the
But it gets worse… as Plutarch the MPer gets into high gear, the entire Isis/Osiris/Typhon story loses all resemblance to daimons, gods, and even symbols. The next time we have a mention of the body of Osiris and the “Typhon Chain-Saw Massacre”, it is totally transformed into something immaterial (54):
“It is not, therefore, out of keeping that they have a legend that the soul of Osiris is everlasting and imperishable, but that his body Typhon oftentimes dismembers and causes to disappear, and that Isis wanders hither and yon in her search for it, and fits it together again; for that which really is and is perceptible and good is superior to destruction and change. The images from it with which the sensible and corporeal is impressed, and the relations, forms, and likenesses which this takes upon itself, like impressions of seals in wax, are not permanently lasting, but disorder and disturbance overtakes them, being driven hither from the upper reaches, and fighting against Horus, whom Isis brings forth, beholden of all, as the image of the perceptible world. Therefore it is said that he is brought to trial by Typhon on the charge of illegitimacy, as not being pure nor un-contaminated like his father, reason unalloyed and unaffected of itself, but contaminated in his substance because of the corporeal element. He prevails, however, and wins the case when Hermes, that is to say Reason, testifies and points out that Nature, by undergoing changes of form with reference to the perceptible, duly brings about the creation of the world. The birth of Apollo from Isis and Osiris, while these gods were still in the womb of Rhea, has the allegorical meaning that before this world was made visible and its rough material was completely formed by Reason, it was put to the test by Nature and brought forth of itself the first creation imperfect. This is the reason why they say that this god was born in the darkness a cripple, and they call him the elder Horus; for there was then no world, but only an image and outline of a world to be.”
Plutarch has moved into the rarified air of Platonism here, equating various daimons/mythic figures with VERY abstract notions. Real bodies, real souls/psyches, real dismemberments, and real battles are long gone.
Look at some of the summary statements by Dillon [PH:TMP] on what Isis and Osiris ‘mean’ to Plutarch the Middle Platonist, and see why this has nothing to do with a daimon taking a fleshly body and being killed up in the air(!):
“God, thus established, must relate to the world
through suitable intermediaries, of whom the first is, not surprisingly, the
Logos. The Logos has, of course, two aspects, the transcendent and the
immanent. In a passage of the De Is. (373AB),
the two aspects, or moments, of Osiris are distinguished as his soul and his
body. His soul is 'eternal and indestructible', whereas his body is repeatedly torn asunder by Typhon and is constantly being
reassembled by
“In Plutarch's metaphysics, in place of the more traditional Platonic triad of principles—God, Matter, and the Ideas or the Logos—we seem to have as many as five entities: a pair of opposites, God (Monadic Intellect) and an evil principle (Indefinite Dyad), represented for Plutarch by the Persian pair Ahuramazda and Ahriman (De Is. 369E), as well as by the Soul of Osiris and Seth-Typhon; then the immanent Logos, represented by the Body of Osiris, and the World Soul-cum-Matter, Isis; and, finally, their offspring, the sensible cosmos, Horus. Plutarch does indeed speak of three Platonic entities (ibid. 3732), the Intelligible (noeton), Matter, and the product of these two, but he speaks of these as being elements of 'the better and more divine nature', which as we have seen is not a complete description of reality (p206; note that Isis et. al. are no longer daimons at all—they are very basic principles, the world, etc… remember also that the ‘immanent Logos’ was simply the Forms/Ideas ‘scattered about’ and embodied in things.)
We should also note that Plutarch actually presents the myth and the daimonic versions in terms of ‘what they say’. He allegorizes them early, but eventually Plutarch the Middle Platonist has moved Isis/Osiris/Typhon out of the daimon category altogether and into something more like ‘first principles’ of the Platonic universe.
BTW, Plutarch is not an ‘odd duck’ here—reinterpretation of these ‘embarrassing myths’ was the norm of the period:
“In any case, if one were made too uncomfortable by
inherited worship and mythology, escape into beliefs less
gross and more intellectually satisfying could be had through reinterpretation. Menander the rhetor in the
third century, describing how to write prose hymns suitable to whatsoever
deity, calls attention to one useful device: the discovery of ainigmata, riddles. He means a
sort of decoding, whereby the speaker detects, or pretends to detect but
actually invents, hidden intents in
traditional material. By this trick everything can be spruced up:
the older hymns and rites, now outmoded; cult objects at initiations that
offend prudery or common sense; local images and lore; stories of deities that
tell too much or too little. In the same century, Porphyry takes up a stretch of an Orphic hymn for illustration: Zeus, as
commonly portrayed, "is seated, the firm seat of his power being shown
through riddle (…), for his upper parts are unclothed because he is visible
through his thoughts and in the celestial portions of the universe, but the
parts to the fore are covered because he is invisible among the things hidden
below." And Menander again interprets Apollo as the Sun, Hera as the
air, because of the resemblance of her name to the word in Greek. Rather
elementary examples. The stories of Kronos
eating his young bewildered and revolted anyone who stopped to think of them;
but they could suggest cryptically that mind turns in upon itself.
So says Sallust the philosopher. Pausanias worried about them, too, but "grew to hold a more thoughtful view
of them. In olden times those Greeks who were considered wise spoke in riddles,
not straight out. Accordingly, it is my supposition that these legends about
Kronos are a piece of Greek wisdom." … Reinterpretation
had a long history before the period of our study. The art found favor among Jews and
Christians as well as pagans. Seneca thought it nonsense, Dio Chrysostom
scorned its exculpations of Homer; but their respective contemporaries Cornutus and Plutarch made frequent, reverential use of it in defense of existing
religion—even Egyptian. The tearing apart of Osiris could be understood in a new and most unobvious light; so also the same fate suffered by Dionysus; and passages in
Homer and Hesiod could be enriched with marginal commentary pointing out, for
example, the former's confirmation of Empedocles. [HI:PTRE, 77f]
In other words, the period was increasingly ‘embarrassed’ by these stories of anthropomorphic (and might we add “sarx-o-morphic”) aspects of their gods/daimons/myths in general. They ‘rebutted them’ by reducing them to symbol or philosophical concepts. They were no longer ‘personal beings’ but ideas, seasons, natural forces. [And people want to say that “Paul the Middle Platonist” wanted to re-invent one of these ‘embarrassing tales’—of an incarnate daimon—during this time?!]
Plutarch the Middle-Platonist does NOT, therefore, have an Osiris with a fleshly/terrestrial body up in the air, which is literally dismembered by Typhon. Plutarch, the Mystery Religion enthusiast might have this—but he is vague on it in the relevant passage—but the Middle Platonist does not.
So, Plutarch’s use of Isis/Osiris/etc does not constitute a counter-example to the position above (that Middle Platonists would simply not countenance a daimon—especially a good one—with a human body, living their existence up in the air, and suffering a shameful crucifixion).
I should also point out that Apuleius’s later ‘account’ of Isis saving poor Lucius (Metamorphoses 11.6, 24f) has nothing of this ‘body baggage’. When [HCNT] contrasts this story with Pauline salvation theology in Romans 5.1-11, differences emerge—specifically dealing with incarnation issues:
“Three of several significant differences: (1) The savior in Apuleius is
the deity, who remains deity without anything
like incarnation. (2) The saving act is the communication
of saving information from the deity, not a this-worldly act of
love; there is and can be nothing
like suffering and dying in the
------------------------------- -----------------------------------------------------------------------
And, Earl Doherty’s reconstruction of Christian origins
“My question is specifically on
the one promoted by Earl Doherty. He has
basically taken Wells's theory and taken it to new height. He argues that not only does Jesus have no historical
roots in Paul's letters, but that Paul
didn't even believe Jesus was a human.
He realizes passages like Rom 1:3 and Gal 4:4 pose a problem to his theory. But he argues that these passages sound like
human traits, but must be understood in terms of Middle-Platonism. He calls the world where Paul believed Jesus
died the "fleshy sublunar realm".
Now, I know others have pointed out that Doherty seems here to have
ad-hoc invented a non-existence Middle Platonic world.
My response:
I really can’t say much here, since I haven’t read much of Earl’s work. I don’t have his book, and I have only glanced at some of his webpages. I read Carrier’s couple-of-paragraph summary of Earl’s book, but there is no mention of “Middle Platonism” in the thumbnail. I don’t have time to work through Earl’s stuff, so I am gonna have to confine myself to the other questions in this ‘thread’.
[Of course, to the extent Earl’s positions correspond to the other questions in this piece (e.g., Paul not believing that the Jesus he referred to was a Jewish person with a genetic family or Paul holding to an MP metaphysic), then to that extent my data/arguments would interact with his—but I cannot know at this point which positions discussed herein actually are held by Earl.]
--------------------------------- --------------------------------------------------------------------
Then, the ‘fun’ one—from my perspective (smile): Paul the Middle-Platonist?
“From your perspective, is there
any reason we should see Paul as using middle-platonic philosophy?”
My Response:
… is in the next
section (muddleplatonismx2.html)