Loading...In my last post I began to enumerate the things that Paul said about Jesus. *Most* of what he says about Jesus has to do with the significance of his death and resurrection. But what if we wanted to know about the *life* of Jesus – the things that Jesus said, did, and experienced between his birth and his death? Paul doesn’t tell us a ton, as has frequently been noted. But he does tell us some. In addition to what I laid out in the previous post, there are the following bits of information, again taken from my fuller analysis in Did Jesus Exist?
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When he says, in1 Corinthians 15:3-4, “…in accordance with the Scriptures…”, does he mean as prophesied in the Old Testament. And, if so, where?
Yes, he does. But he doesn’t in this passage indicate where he is thinking of. Isaiah 53? Hosea 6:2?
From your vantage point as a scholar of early Christian history, do you believe it likely that when Paul, formerly a pharisee of pharisees, heard about the resurrection of Jesus, some lines from Isaiah or from Hosea popped up in his mind and he said to himself “OMG! This was prophesied in the scripture!”?
Or is it your opinion that, during the period when Saul of Tarsus was persecuting the Christians, they were already talking among themselves about how Jesus rising on the third day was a remarkable thing that had been prophesied somewhere?
Or is the allusion to the suffering servant, Isaiah or Hosea mostly a traditional piece of theology that has become entrenched over the last two thousand years?
I’m sorry to belabor the point, but it seems slightly odd to me that it this point was important enough to turn up in Paul and in the Nicene creed nobody troubled to mention which book gave us the prophesy.
I’m sure the earlier Christians were already thinking that Jesus’ had fulfilled Scripture. Whether Paul ever heard their Scriptural reasoning or not — I don’t know. And I’m afraid no one knows. But Paul himself almost certainly dug through the Scriptures and found more and more “evidence” of his view. He probably never mentioned this kind of thing simply because his letters were about other things and were being written to people who already agreed with him on such points.
Isaiah might work (I understand how you’ve said they misinterpreted it), but it doesn’t include a “third day” reference.
In Hosea, God is reflecting on the bad behavior of people he’s punishing. The “third day” reference seems peculiar – as if they had some prior reason for expecting forgiveness to come after that specific period of time. But the fact that he’s punishing them makes it hard to see a parallel with Jesus.
And the other possibility you’ve mentioned, Jonah, is also a case of punishment by God. Plus, the version in my Bible says Jonah was in the belly of the fish “three days and three nights.” Jesus was supposedly buried for a shorter period of time than that: one full day (Saturday), probably small parts of Friday and Sunday, but definitely only two full nights.
Isaiah has to do with the suffeirng of the Servant who is then vindicated. And I’m not saying that Christians *appropriately* interpreted these passages, only that these were the passages they appear to have referred to…..
But…do you think a man as well-educated as Paul could actually have convinced *himself* that any of those passages constituted a “prefiguring”? Or were he, and others like him, deliberately deceiving the illiterate majority of believers by citing out-of-context quotes?
No, I absolutely don’t think Paul was being deliberately deceptive.
Okay, so, Paul may have gleaned some little something from Hosea 6:2; but Isaiah 53?
I know, I know, it’s one of the most relied upon chapters of the Old Testament that Christians use to “prove” Jesus was Messiah Crucified, and God knows time was when I lived, breathed, believed and even taught it! But – here goes the “but” again:
Isaiah 53 can’t possibly be talking about Jesus!
3) “Despised and rejected by mankind; a man of suffering, and familiar with pain”
*Surely had Jesus been so rejected there would be no such thing as Christianity!
7) “He was oppressed and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth; he was led like a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before its shearers is silent, so he did not open his mouth.”
*Well, we know Jesus wasn’t silent!
10) Yet it was the Lord’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer, and though the Lord makes his life an offering for sin, HE WILL SEE HIS OFFSPRING AND PROLONG HIS DAYS, and the will of the Lord will prosper in his hand.
*Key words “WILL SEE” and that by no means applies to Jesus, and not by any stretch of the imagination.
To further my point, consider the prophet Jeremiah and what it was that he said:
“But I was like a gentle lamb led to the slaughter. I did not know it was against me they devised schemes saying, ‘Let us cut him off from the land of the living'”. Jeremiah 11:19
I could go on and on but instead suggest that any one who believes as strongly as I once did that Jesus is Isaiah’s suffering servant, carefully read Jeremiah with Isaiah chapters 40 and 53 close at hand.
I think you’re confusing what an original author said (2 Isaiah) with what he could later be interpreted as saying. That’s a HUGE difference.
Okay. I’m going to get this. Are you referring to the possibility of at least two authors of the book of Isaiah/Deutero-Isaiah theory which, as I understand it, attributes only chapters one through thirty-nine to Isaiah. Certainly John 6:9-10, 12:37-38 wouldn’t agree, which isn’t to say that John and I agree on this. Still, doesn’t the book of Lamentations better define and describe the suffering servant of Isaiah 53, beyond 39? That servant being Jeremiah? Granted, there is some question as to whether Jeremiah actually wrote the book; however, it’s commonly believed that he did.
Beat it into my head if need be, please.
Most critical scholars are convinced that Lamentations could not have been written by Jeremiah. Maybe I’ll post on that at some time. The author of John — like everyone else until the 19th century — simply assumed there was one author for the entire book. But for well over a century scholars have recognized that there had to be at least three authors, writing at different times. The evidence is really quite compelling. And yes, Lamentations and 2 Isaiah both do describe personal and national suffering. But I don’t think that gives us any indication aboutwhom they were referring to or who wrote them.
Why Paul doesn’t tell us more about Jesus is a question that interests me a lot. Keep going. I know the Gospels were written after Paul died, but it seems like Paul would have learned more about Jesus from the disciples than what he seems to have learned. Also, having read Paul in a Greek version, I find his long sentences impossible to grasp. Is his writing style unique for the first century or did a lot of others write the same way? One would think that “God” would have inspired clearer writing.
Actually, his Greek is easier to understand than others who were more rhetorically advanced….
Hmm? Thanks. I often found that Paul’s Greek sentences seemed to drift off in mid-sentence to nowhere. Of course, I was no expert.
That “handed over” reference… It could refer to Judas’s action, with the implication that there was no “betrayal”: Jesus knew what was going to happen, wanted it to happen, and Judas was acting on his orders. Is it possible Paul believed that?
Does his placing the Last Supper at “night” strengthen the argument for its being a Passover meal – or at least, his believing it was? A meal the men were careful not to consume till after sundown, because the day on which it was being eaten was important?
I think most of the dinners were eaten after sunset, so no, I don’t see it as being an argument in itself atht is was a passover feast. And when Paul uses “hand over” language, it’s usually in reference to what God did….
Bart, do you plan on reading Carrier’s book? In a weird thought experiment, what would it feel like if you were convinced his theory is true?
Ha! I’d have to write another book then. And the mythicists would be sure to buy it!!
You noted
” In this case, we have a tradition about Jesus’ Last Supper, which Paul obviously knows about. The scene that he describes is very close to the description of the event in the Gospel of Luke (with some key differences); it is less similar to Matthew and Mark.”
Knowing that all the gospels were written long after Paul’s letters how does the similarity in the gospels suggest that Paul got his information as to the symbolism from leaders in Jerusalem.
Other reasons that I suggest that Paul did not get this symbolism from the existing leadership is that all the churches, including the ones in Jerusalem were NOT eating a symbolic meal, but a very real supper. The members in Corinth were over eating and getting drunk. The equivalent story in Acts is that the members in Jerusalem were not equitably distributing the meal among the Jews and Gentiles.
There is no evidence that there was a rite of eating bread as symbolic of Jesus flesh not drinking wine as Jesus’s blood prior to Paul’s announcement in the Corinthian letter. The fact that later gospel writers mined this information from Paul’s churches does not stretch ones credulity. Whereas suggesting that Jesus, a fully observant Jew, would come up with this symbolism is bordering on ludicrous.
The earliest Christians – -including those in Paul’s church — did not eat the symbolic foods simply as a wafer and a sip; it was an actual *meal*.
Is it true that Jesus would have never instituted a “lord’s supper” as mentioned in 1 Corinthians 11:22-24 since Jews would not consider eating human flesh or blood even if meant in a symbolic way? This appears to be more like a pagan mystery religion ritual.
I’m afraid we don’t really know much of anything about rituals in the mystery religions….
But we do know that Jews would not even symbolically eat bread as if it were flesh or drink wine as if it were blood?
Not that I’m aware of.
Bart,
To break bread and drink wine was very common during Jewish (celebratory?) meals, no? So it’s not like Jesus invented something very original there? Assuming he did not, since he was Jewish, actually equate eating the bread to eating his flesh and drinking the wine to drinking his blood. Such a quite cannibalistic image doesn’t really fit into a Jewish framework, does it?
I personally doubt if he talked about the bread and wine as his body and blood.
“Paul knows that Jesus had a Last Supper with his disciples in which he predicted his approaching death, the very night he was handed over to the authorities.”
When you talk about Paul describing an historical event, do you mean an historical event that Paul heard about and believes to be historical even though Jesus did not talk about bread and wine as his body and blood and even though he did not predict his own death?
Yup, that’s what I mean.
I certainly agree with you there. That appears to be a later tradition invented by someone other then a Jew. As a former writer here commented. A Jew would not have eaten bread as a symbol of the body of Jesus and certainly would not have drunk wine as a symbol of his blood. I am amazed that today’s Christians would even buy into such a tradition if they were aware of the laws governing such things to the Jews.
Paul was not a Jew. The symbolism in the Corinthian letter is the earliest reference that we have of this equation of the bread and wine to the body and blood of Jesus. It is also of note that the gospel writers were not Jews either.
Why would you say that Paul was not a Jew? He talks quite explicitly about being a Jew.
Dr Ehrman –
Question regarding the lord’s supper tradition from Paul:
– the verb he uses is received (likely in the “passed down” sense)
– he’s pretty specific about the contents of the tradition
– Paul had met with Peter and James
I know we lack much in the way of evidence around what Peter and James actually believed. That said, is it not probable that such a ‘core’ belief as this would have been received and at least cross-checked with Peter and/or James. Not so much is the content itself true/historical, but is it probable that, given the eye witness-like account of such a saying (which seemingly had to derive from within the inner circle, otherwise it’s too flimsy to be core), Paul has run this past one of the pillars?
Thanks much!
I don’t know if it’s probably — one can think of other solutions – but I certainly would say it’s reasonable.
Understood, and thank you. Is there a piece of work (one of yours, preferably) you’d recommend that grapples with the topic and its range of potential solutions? Short of that, are there general directions you’d think alternative solutions could take (even if just off the cuff)?
Thanks a ton!
I can’t think of any prolonged discussion. But it’s not hard to imagine alternatives. Maybe Paul heard it from others who *said* they heard it from the actual disciples. He didn’t spend much time with Peter and James themselves, and in his account they were talking mainly about what to do about the gentiles, not about the earthly traditions of Jesus. So possibly they just didn’t think to get there. That may seem remarkable and implausible, but I think it’s only because if *we* had some time with Peter and James, that’d be just about the only thing we’d want to talk about. Paul, on the other hand, shows almost no interest in the matter.
Many thanks!
Dr Ehrman –
Are there passages in Paul’s epistles that come to mind wherein it would’ve made sense that he at least would have alluded to the early followers’ reports of the empty tomb, if he had known of / believed the tradition? 1 Corinthians 15:3-4 seems like a reasonable candidate to me. Thanks much!
I’m not completely sure. He’s never writing to provide proof that Jesus was raised, but is assuming it (along with his readers) as something they all know as Christians. His reason for citing the “appearances” in 1 Cor 15 is to make his point that the resurrected Jesus was in a *body* — as the believers themselves will be in their own, future resurrection. I suppose an empty tomb may have helped his point, but I’m not sure it necessarily would have. And I’m not sure I can think of other passages wehre he would have had an occasion to mention it. There are, of ocurse, thousands of things he firmly believed that he never mentions just because there wasn’t any reason to at the moment….
Thank you! Yeah, it’s a bit of a head scratcher sometimes on what Paul chooses to trot out versus just doesn’t touch on. That, in Paul giving voice to his christology, Jesus was born of a woman was important to mention, but not so much that the miraculous bodily resurrection was accompanied by (key) people finding a tomb empty – different occasions for different purposes, but still… Seductive to psychologize, but more historically prudent to not speculate – that said, that’s a pretty big chasm between things that counted to Paul as important enough to mention. Many thanks as always!