SBrudney091941 said
What is your point?
First of all, my intention is not to be hostile or offensive to anyone on this blog who has a different view on the New Testament than I, and especially not against the owner of the blog, Mr Ehrman. I guess I must myself be considered a mythicist, although I personally dislike this term. I say this because I find that many mythicist behave unnecessarily patronizing. I guess every mythicist started up believing in a historical core, but eventually finds out that: Hey, these scriptures can be seen in a different light. Hey, these weird characters in the New Testament with their weird names can be understood as symbols of something else, perhaps as symbols of central events in the Old Testament. And thus allowed the ancient theologians – the early Christians – to perform a more in depth study of their holy scriptures. We know that such exegesis already existed in antiquity. Midrash and Pesher are only two of these tools ancient Jews used. This is my hypothesis.
My point of view is that the ancient Jews reflected upon whom Isaiah had in mind in his prophecy concerning the Lord’s Suffering Servant, and that they came up with different answers. I believe I see traces of two of these traditions. One track of a Suffering servant is rooted in Nathan’s prophecy that an offspring of David would reign forever, as a son of God. That is what I discuss in this thread. The Suffering Servant as Adonijah.
Another track of a Suffering Servant is Jahve him self from Exodus. This is the Jesus who feeds the hungry, and walks on water. After all, Yahweh was rejected by all the Israelites on the wandering through the desert. Only Joshua and Caleb were considered worthy to put their feet in the promised land.
What is the connection between these two narratives? The answer is: Blood and water! When the soldier pierced the side of Jesus, it came blood and water! When Benaiah pierced the side of Adonijah, blood came out. He was a human being. When Moses struck the rock with his staff, water came out. Now, this two storyes were stitched together as one.
1 John 5,6: This is the one who came by water and blood–Jesus Christ. He did not come by water only, but by water and blood. And it is the Spirit who testifies, because the Spirit is the truth.
Hey, these scriptures can be seen in a different light. Hey, these weird characters in the New Testament with their weird names can be understood as symbols of something else, perhaps as symbols of central events in the Old Testament. And thus allowed the ancient theologians – the early Christians – to perform a more in depth study of their holy scriptures. We know that such exegesis already existed in antiquity. Midrash and Pesher are only two of these tools ancient Jews used. This is my hypothesis.
And you manage to get to those conclusions in the same defective way that you fellow mythicists do. Why for example does either
” Midrash and Pesher” say anything about NT characters being symbolic and why does symbolism mean those people didn’t exist?
Another track of a Suffering Servant is Jahveh him self from Exodus. This is the Jesus who feeds the hungry, and walks on water.
Why!? Why is Jahve “Jesus who feeds the hungry, and walks on water”?
The purported rejection of Yahweh is substantially different than that of Jesus cast as the suffering servant. The idea that one story is to be understood as related to another purely because of some purported similarity is incredibly thin and viciously circular. After all, one could argue, as Dennis Mcdonald has, that NT writers were at least the recipients of a greek education and, therefore would have been more likely to use Greek- as opposed to Jewish- literary techniques and devices
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