Loading...I’ve gotten a lot of terrific questions over the years on the blog, and looking through old posts, I came upon this one dealing with two of them, both on Jesus and his immediate followers. I thought they were worth addressing again.
Both of these, as it turns out, deal with issues related to psychology and the early Christian movement: one has to do with why the followers of Jesus didn’t simply give up and disband when the end-of-the-world-apocalypse they had been anticipating didn’t happen (so that they were proven to be *wrong*) and the other about whether Jesus was, literally, crazy. Interesting questions! If you have one you would like me to address, just ask in a comment on any of my posts.
QUESTION
I get that when the Apocalypse didn’t happen as the apocalyptic Jesus had predicted that a kind of reinterpretation of events including the resurrection took place. But why? Why didn’t the fledgling fringe then Jesus-Jewish (my term) sect simply die out?
RESPONSE
Ah, this is a meaty question that someone could write a book about. In fact, people have written books about it! I won’t give a definitive answer here, but will instead mention just one book – now a classic – that addresses the issue, and in a very interesting way.
John Gager was for many years a professor of Religious Studies at Princeton University. He was there the whole time I was doing my graduate work across the street at Princeton Theological Seminary, but, idiot that I was, I never took any classes with him. I did meet him though, and came to know him a bit later after I came to Chapel Hill.
One of his most important books is called Kingdom and Community. It deals with just this question. Why didn’t Jesus’ followers disband when they realized that his predictions of the imminent appearance of the kingdom of God simply were not true? Jesus said the “end” would come within his generation, before the disciples had died (e.g., Mark 9:1; 13:30). But they died, and it didn’t come. So why didn’t the earliest Christians just realize that he, and they, had been wrong and revert to their original religious views (whether Jewish or pagan)?
Gager takes a very interesting approach to the question, one that might not occur to you. He appeals to an intriguing study of modern-day groups who expect the UFO’s to come.
There was a fascinating book, which everyone ought to read, written by Leon Festinger, called When Prophecy Fails. In it Festinger develops a theory of social-psychology that is called “Cognitive Dissonance.” Cognitive dissonance refers to a phenomenon that most of us have experienced: when something we deeply think proves to be completely wrong, rather than admit it, we refuse to think we were completely wrong (for psychological reasons) and argue more strenuously for it to ease the conflict between our views and our reality.
Festinger established the theory by looking at “UFO cults,” that is, groups of people who expected the world to be invaded by UFO’s. When the UFO’s didn’t appear as expected, what did members of the group do? Rather than disband, people in these groups typically re-explained the non-event to themselves and then expected it with even *greater* fervor. And they promoted their views even more vigorously. The “dissonance” (that is, the fact that reality did not coincide with their expectations) in their “cognition” (their thinking) led them not to reject their views but to affirm them more vehemently by getting others into their movement. This eased the discomfort of the dissonance because it showed them that others – even more people – shared their views
For cognitive dissonance to work, you need the following situation. A group of persons has a very firm view about something. The view is so concrete that reality can, in fact, disconfirm it (show that it’s wrong). Then the view is in fact disconfirmed. And that’s when cognitive dissonance (the mental confusion that comes when a firmly held belief is disconfirmed) kicks in. By becoming more evangelistic about the view, people in the group convince others to join them and adopt their views. The more who join, the more moral support the people of the group receive: Hey! All these other people agree with us! We must be right!
And so if the UFO’s don’t appear on February 3 the way you thought, you say that you made a slight miscalculation – they are supposed to appear on August 28. And you convince more people. And the support you get in the group allows you to believe it even more fervently the next time.
Gager applies this theory of cognitive dissonance to the early Christians. They thought the Kingdom of God would arrive in a cosmic display of divine power within the first generation. They really thought that. But it didn’t happen. Their belief was disconfirmed. And so what did they do? To resolve the psychological tension the non-appearance of the kingdom created, they became more fervently missionary, converting others to their cause. They did so by insisting that the end was still to come “soon” – and they came up with excuses for why it had not happened yet: for example, some of them might say: God had delayed the end to give people more of a chance to repent. Or: Jesus hadn’t really meant it would come while his disciples were alive, he meant it would come while their memory was still alive. Or: when God said it would come “soon” he meant by his divine calendar, not by a merely human calendar. And so on.
The failure of the kingdom to come, then, is what led to the growth of the Christian community. It was all a matter of cognitive dissonance.
I’m not saying I completely agree with this theory. But I think it is a brilliant take on the early Christian movement.
QUESTION
Long ago, I read Albert Schweitzer’s 1911 classic book entitled “The Psychiatric Study of Jesus.” One of the weaknesses of the book is that psychiatry was in its infancy in 1911 and diagnoses have markedly changed in the past 100 years. My question: Do current scholars ever discuss whether or not Jesus was mentally ill and, if so, who can I read about this matter?
RESPONSE
In a sense this question is along a similar line as the one preceding, but now the question is not about the psychological state of Jesus’ followers but of Jesus himself. Here I’ll give just a very, very brief response: to my knowledge there aren’t any serious scholars of the historical Jesus who have questioned his sanity.
I suppose one main reason for that is that the vast majority of historical Jesus experts (not quite all) are themselves Christian, and they simply are not going to go there. But there’s actually a much better reason. Everyone realizes that the historical Jesus cannot be understood unless you situate him fully within his own historical context, and understand his teachings in light of what people thought and believed in his day. That makes the most enormous difference to how one evaluates his psychological state.
The reality is that a lot of people today who are predicting the imminent end of the world may have a few screws loose. But the kinds of expectations that Jesus had about the coming kingdom of God in a cataclysmic display of divine force were not “weird” or “way out there” or “psycho” in his day. They were fairly common. Unless you want to say that all apocalyptic Jews were clinically crazy, I don’t think you can say that Jesus was.
But what if he really thought he was God? Wouldn’t that be crazy? Yeah, it might well be. But I don’t think for a second that Jesus thought that about himself. He did think he had a close relationship with God. But so do billions of people today (many of them on a first-name basis with Jesus) – but they’re not all crazy. And he may well have thought (I think he did think) that he would be made the messiah in the future kingdom. That may have been a rather exalted view of himself, but I don’t think it makes Jesus crazy. It makes him an unusually confident apocalyptic prophet. There were others with visions of grandeur at the time. I don’t think that makes him mentally ill. It makes him a first-century apocalyptic Jew.
Anyone who is more interested in cognitive dissonance should read the book “Mistakes were made – but not by me.” by Carol Tavris and Elliot Aronsson. It’s worth noticing that cognitive dissonance is not something exotic; we all do it, constantly. The reason behind this is probably that constructing a worldview is difficult and time-consuming. It may be better to tolerate a world-view that’s a little inaccurate than to be in a constant state of confusion. Yeah, sometimes it locks us into deeply pathological worldviews, but on the whole the system works fine.
Phew! ‘Works fine’ if you downplay the ‘collateral damage!’ But I agree with you – it is how most of us humans roll; and most of us don’t stop to question it (only to question how others ‘dare’ differ!).
I think a relatable-to-most instance is when some guy goes through a traffic light as it turns from amber to red: He’s a dangerous lunatic endangering EVERYONE’S life! If WE go through in exactly the same way it’s ‘Oops! Am I imagining it or was that light a darkish amber? Anyway, no harm done.’
Interesting theories, but how would the Apostle Paul have fitted into the ‘cognitive dissonance’ idea? He wasn’t a Christian whilst Jesus was alive but maintained he had ‘seen’ him on the way to Damascus, so Paul didn’t have any ‘cognitive dissonance’. That would then rule out the apocalyptic end Jesus had expected in his day and move it further forward. Logically that would mean Paul didn’t really see the risen Christ. If so, what did he see because without Paul Christianity is nothing.
Good questions. I completely agree about being able to do psychological evaluations on ancient people whom we don’t even know.
They are often VERY difficult to make on people we actually see….
Paul could have been a nut case to be crude about it. A temporal lobe epileptic is another possibility, and that would explain the personal problem he alludes to, and the visionary experiences.
Mr. Ehrman, last night I listened to the June Gold member Q&A (by the way, the Brooklyn Nets failed to fulfill your prophecy I guess 🤣), and in it you talked about Paul and his meetings with Peter and James. I understand that
Paul and Peter died around roughly the same time (64 CE possible date for both?). But I wonder, since they both believed in the imminent Second Coming and that they were going to be alive during, how they reacted upon hearing the news of the other one’s death! It must have been really shocking (or pleasant, if we assume they didn’t get along 😂)! Can we know anything about this? Is there anything in any written source that sheds any light at how either received such news? Or we can only speculate?
Unfortunately we don’t know any of the circumstances of their deaths — only later legends that they happened under Nero in 64 CE;and we don’t have any record of either of them knowing about the death of the other. So who knows!
“The kingdom”,,,,,,,,,,,,,I have definitely problem with the sole understanding of an “external kingdom”. because I really don’t see it so clearly that this is what is meant.
If I look at the nearby worldviews around when Jesus lived (and for some also before Jesus), I don’t find proper supprt for that either, like in :
* Hinduism as explained in the Vedas
* In Zorotharism as understood by scholars today
* In platonic views
* Among the christians which belonged to the gnostic branch
* More esoteric christian views (hardly gnostic) like in the Gospel of
Thomas
etc
In all those there is more “internal” understanding/spiritual understanding of ones own “self”, soul and/or spirit and of “the kingdom”.
For my personal view, when I read the Hebrew bible, it has to be partly spiritual symbolic, and I read large sections of this as a spiritual tale, a tale of a fall from a devine present existence and the restoration of the soul/spirit. In my mind, looking biside the symbols it is also my opinion that the Prophets of the OT support that and write of it.
In addition to that, also when I read the new testament (in particular in the Gospel of John and the pauline letters) , I find less proof of an external kingdom than an internal kingdom.
And, also in additon, as a continuity of how I understand when I read the bible, also the Revelation talks about the same, a symbolic spiritual ascending story of the soul, using both symbols and views found in more eastern worldviews, for example the Hindu ascension story.
If I, as a bewildered non scholar, am right or not is one question, but that there were views like this in and around the time of Jesus seems evident for me with the reference to the ancient worldviews/religions mentioned above. These views are definitely present today, also seems popular in jewish esotrericism.
Different views on this topic would at least confuse what they were waiting for and in what form it would come!
I’ve never really found the “billions would be ‘crazy’ if that were true” argument to be compelling. In some ways, that’s the Occam’s Razor explanation for religion in general: most people are out-of-their-skulls susceptible to delusions. As a species, we are thousands of years away from becoming truly rational creatures, and we may destroy ourselves before we reach that point. There’s certainly no objectively determined percentage of people who are allowed to be labelled ‘crazy,’ and I think that number may be much, much higher than you are conceding.
Wow, thanks for addressing these questions! I’m going to see if the books you mentioned are available– I’d certainly like to read them. There seems to be little evidence that Jesus managed to “transcend his time and social milieu”. Take that one of two ways: if God assumes human form, then human limitations come with the territory. That’s what it means to be fully human– to be a victim of one’s time and circumstances. To be a “slob like us.” Or, it means that there was nothing godlike about Jesus because he really WAS a slob like us. And that’s ALL he was.
Jesus can certainly be schizotypal (John 16: 8-11) and even admitted his obscurity: “These things have I spoken unto you in proverbs: but the time cometh, when I shall no more speak unto you in proverbs, but I shall shew you plainly of the Father.” [John 16, 25.] Ummm……That time never came.
What are we to make of Luke 8:10 or Mark 4:11-12 explaining the deceptive parables away? In other words, Jesus, who said he came to save the world, concealed his meaning for fear some of his hearers should be converted and their sins be forgiven — which is exactly what he sought to bring about. I think I am leaning towards the “lunatic” option in the Trilemma. Hard to imagine his teachings being properly understood with the lower elements in society. The religious establishment and teachers were not on the whole impressed with his “wondrously clear and bracing intellect”. For instance, in John 10:19-21. So at least some people at the time apparently felt Jesus was “raving mad.”
> But I think it is a brilliant take on the early Christian movement.
Would it be wrong of me to think that it’s also a good way to understand certain current events? 😉
Cognitive dissonance reigns supreme….
“Interesting questions! If you have one you would like me to address, just ask in a comment on any of my posts.” Please comment on human sufferings.
Kindly list 3 reliable, historical evidence that show it was God who was literally directing human sufferings?
It is true that God is to be blame for the present worldwide Covid-19 sufferings of 182,000,000 people and almost 4 million deaths? Must the world accept that the unhygienic Chinese are not to be blame for creating this deadly virus but it should be God’s fault?
World recognize that mankind is responsible for the serious environmental problems – on land, sea, atmosphere, global warming, melting of snow, increase in the sea level, pollution, etc. which indirectly contribute to natural calamity. Should we blame God for these problems?
It is appropriate that God is to be blame continuously for all the sufferings or bad things that befall on mankind?
I’m afraid this blog does not deal with theological questions about what God does or does not do. There are no reliable historical sources that can answer that question.
Meat eating, particularly wild meat, brought us COVID. Cause and effect yields suffering, so also winning a lottery. Nothing to do with God. Everything to do with choices. We have all lived before, millions of lives, all types of incarnations. Eastern mystic teaching has the answers.
How could you possibly do a psychiatric diagnosis of a man who lived more than two thousand years ago based on documents of uncertain accuracy?
Right. But sociologists tend to use these kinds of theories to explain large movements more than individual psyches.
Bart, I have reached a milestone on the blog. I feel I’ve read as much of the archives as I want to, and I just checked to see how many posts I’ve read that were published *before* I joined, and it comes to within a hair’s breadth of 666. Portentious or what?
In acknowledgement of this I have just given you a once-off donation of one hundred American dollars.
At some point I will move on. I don’t intend to remain subscribed long-term. But for now, there is still plenty to do. For example, I’d like to revisit blog posts that I’ve already read and make some effort to record the information that fascinates me most. It would also make sense to read my copy of “How Jesus Became God” from cover to cover while I am still subscribed.
Any other suggestions for my bucket list of things to do while I’m here?
Sorry, 665 just doesn’t pass muster.
The main value of the blog is what *continues* to come out. If you don’t find that valuable, yup, move on!
Definitely valuable for now, and I read most new posts, but I don’t see myself still being here in three years’ time. Same as with many other things in life, we give them each a turn. Rest assured you will always have my sincere appreciation!
In three years time, possibly *none* of us will be here. But I, for one, am looking forward to the hours ahead of me….
Was there something special about Jesus’s active concern about the downcast and the despised that made him different from other prophets and itinerant teachers in Jewish or other societies of his time? If so, can it be separated from his Apocalyptic vision?
THere were certainly other advocates of social justice. And in his case, his social concerns were directly tied to his apocalyptic vision. Others could have the same concerns on other bases, of course. For the most part, I myself do.
It is always risky to put historical figures on the psychiatrist’s couch. (Of course, as long as that person is already long dead, he or she will not be one to complain.)
Hi Bart, I read Leon Festinger’s book many years ago and it was an incredibly illuminating experience. My take from Festinger is that upon experiencing disconfirmation of a strongly held belief people fall into three basic categories: 1.) Double Downers – these folks indeed, as you describe, double down on the original belief and extol it even more stridently. 2.) The New Narratives – these folks rationalize that they simply “misunderstood” the original message and now have a new correct clarity of understanding which must be preached (modern Christianity.) and lastly, 3.) “What Was I Thinking” group – these folks actually critically evaluate their belief in light of the disconfirming evidence and arrive at the difficult and painful conclusion that their belief was erroneous, terrifically so. They move on with their life, often more grounded and wiser for the process. In fact, many early Christians did end up in group 3. But, there is no record of them because they didn’t write about their experience, or leave any documentary evidence that admits that they had chosen “unwisely.” Few people like to admit this kind of failure.
You may be right, but I’m not sure I’d say that many Xns went that route if there is no evidence either way.
What I find more puzzling than the movement surviving the failed prophecies—it’s relatively easy to rationalize failed prophecies—is the survival of the “Jesus movement” after the crucifixion itself. That had to be pretty devastating. And how many followers said, “Oh, come on!! Seriously?” when the idea of a resurrection was put forward?
Oh boy I wish we knew….
“It makes him a first-century apocalyptic Jew.”
Since the majority of first-century apocalyptic Jews did not think they were going to be the future King of the Jews, what were their thoughts of someone like Jesus who did think this?
Well, the ones who said they were usually had followers, some of them large numbers of them (Josephus talks about a few)
Bart—what if they didn’t disband because the earliest Christians were not that concerned with the teachings of Jesus? What if—as NT scholar Stevan Davies argued in “On The Pentecostal Origins”—early Christians, like modern Pentecostals and serpent handling churches (I live in KY and have studied these groups closely), were centered around the *experience* of spirit possession by the Holy Spirit? Davies argument is very convincing (the book was favorably reviewed by Elaine Pagels, John Dominic Crossan, and several other prominent scholars) and he even references your work. He says NT scholars should pay closer attention to the anthropology of spirit possession and the role of alternate states of consciousness in religious formation. What do you think?
Spirit possession is not a major topic of interest to most of the earliest Christian authors, and so I doubt if it is the main key to explaining the earliest Christian movement. Even in the books that mention it (1 Corinthians, Acts) it is not the driving issue; finding it in other books, in my view, is usually a bit of a stretch (in terms of “alternate states of consciousness)
There is that passage where his family say that he is out of his mind. However, according to the convoluted interpretations I’ve located on the web, they weren’t in fact saying that his was out of his mind. That said, I haven’t been able to locate the crux of their rabbit-out-of-a-hat argumentation. Mightn’t he have been a bit like the full-on tele-evangelicals we have today?
Do you think that Cognitive Dissonance might have played a part in the disciples original processing of Jesus’ execution?
“He can’t just be dead, so he must be coming back to see in the new kingdom. And to come back he must be the first of the general resurection.”
This may have helped set the expectations that for some manifested in visionary experiences. (I also wonder whether grief hallucinations might be related to this too. Just started reading about them. Very interesting phenomina)
Yes, that’s one of Gager’s other main points.
Well ,that’s why it is as interesting to read comments as to read the article itself !
It’s a very good idea, that’s led me to 1 Cor 15:5-8.
For Paul, Jesus ‘appeared(ὤφθη)’ to him in the same way he ‘appeared(ὤφθη)’ to ‘Peter, and then to the Twelve’,’to more than five hundred of the brothers at the same time’ and ‘to James, then to all the apostles’.
He lists all ‘appearings’ together with the same verb in greek (ὤφθη)!!.
How could it be? That is very (very) different from John 20:27.
Question for Bart:
“Do you think very first jesus followers claim that they saw a risen Jesus as a vision (like Paul) or as ‘real’ as to ask Thomas to ‘Reach out your hand and put it into my side'”
They appear to have believed Jesus’ body really came back to life and they then saw him.
Cognitive dissonance has nothing to do with how what Jesus was really saying didn’t come true. His “apocalypse” was INSIDE, not outside. The kingdom IS WITHIN YOU. It is not “on earth.” (John 18:36).
If everyone would just familiarize themselves with the mysticism that ‘Jesus’ really taught, all would become clear. That time and again orthodox corruptions of scripture have obscured the truth of the message, as told in the quotes of a real Master, whoever said them. John 9:4 and Codex Sinaiticus is illustrative: “We must do the works of him who sent US [not ‘me’] while it is day; night comes when no one can work” — including the Master, is what this Master SAID. It was corrupted to separate Master from disciple as needing to be living to ‘work’ or be saved. Disciple AND Master must be living for salvation. NIV “looks to” for ‘theoron’ –to SEE — is the same in John 6:40. YOU NEED TO BE ABLE TO SEE YOUR MASTER to be saved. This is taught by every single Savior who ever lived, and that includes whoever said this.
The apocalypse DID happen, within the disciples, privately — one at a time.
Thank you Dr Ehrman. Two most fascinating Q&As. You asked us if we had anymore such questions. One thing that’s always puzzled me is the fact that Christianity seems to have spread very rapidly throughout the Roman world almost from the get go. It got to Rome and other places before Paul and Peter and presumably the other original apostles and disciples did. So my question is how and why did it manage to do that?
It’s usually thought that it was spread by word of mouth; Rome had more people coming in and out than any other place in the empire, and so Christians probably showed up there, say on business or returning from trips abroad where they converted, and htey were the ones who probably started the church. But of course who they were is all shrouded in mystery.
I wonder if part of the reason is that the nature of Christianity (before it got hijacked by those in power) was aimed very much at the poor, the suffering and downtrodden, and there were (as there still are) lots and lots of those pretty much everywhere.
But didn’t his family or mother think he was crazy? I believe it’s in Mark. Do you think it is historically plausible that his family and neighbors in Nazareth may have thought he was crazy? Thus the defense that “a prophet is without honor in his own country”?
Yes, Mark 3:21 says that. It doesn’t seem like the kind of thing ealry Christian story tellers would make up, so I suppose it’s probably based on some kind of early tradition. Not that they had psychological evaluatoins of him, just that they thought he was, colloquially, “out of his mind.”
Bart: “He did think he had a close relationship with God. But so do billions of people today (many of them on a first-name basis with Jesus) – but they’re not all crazy.”
They’re not all crazy, but a very large proportion?
Bart: “And he may well have thought (I think he did think) that he would be made the messiah in the future kingdom. That may have been a rather exalted view of himself, but I don’t think it makes Jesus crazy. It makes him an unusually confident apocalyptic prophet.”
To what extent do you think it’s fair to say that the enormous success of Christianity in the West can be attributed to Jesus’ own genius and the profundity of his moral teachings? Or was the success of Christianity just an historical accident?
No, I don’t think most people who pray to Jesus and feel close to him are crazy. At least no more than the rest of us. My view is that Jesus’ personal genius had almost nothing to do with the spread of Christianity, since teh converts were people who had not access to his charisma. And I don’t think the spread was a result of his ethics or that it was an accident. The real explanations are more complicated and have to do with the nature of the faith as it was being propagated. That’s too big a topic for a blog comment, but it’s virtually the entire topic of my book The Triumph of Christianity, one of the few trade books I’ve written that I wish scholars would look at….
Bart: “I don’t think the spread [of Christianity] was a result of [Jesus’] ethics or that it was an accident. The real explanations are more complicated and have to do with the nature of the faith as it was being propagated.”
The ‘real explanations’ would thus still be ‘accidental’ or unrelated to the genius of Jesus’ teachings. I find that a little hard to accept. I would expect a more organic relation between the accidental founder and that which resulted. Perhaps naïve and idealistic, a relic of my own prior religiosity, but I want to see something of the personality of Jesus surviving in ‘his’ church. I’m reminded of the famous quote by Albert Einstein:
“As a child I received instruction both in the Bible and in the Talmud. I am a Jew, but I am enthralled by the luminous figure of the Nazarene. … No one can read the Gospels without feeling the actual presence of Jesus. His personality pulsates in every word. No myth is filled with such life. … no man can deny the fact that Jesus existed, nor that his sayings are beautiful.”
Surely something of his genius survived in the church and contributed to its growth, no?
I agree that most of us come into the study expecting a close connection between teh point of origin and the reasons for success. But when one examines the actual data and consider what the sources actually say, it turns out there isn’t much if any of a connection. “Feeling the presence of Jesus” in the text is not the same as the historical JEsus’ personality/charisma/etc. having any effect. It’s the text that is having the text.
I think its interesting that the two passages about the kingdom coming soon contain knowingly ambiguous language.
Matthew 16 “For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it.” The disciples are told they “will not taste death” rather than “will not die”.
Also Matthew 24 “this generation will not pass away … heaven and earth will pass away but my words will not pass away”. Nowhere in the NT is “pass away” used to mean “die”.
Couldn’t it be that the reason “this generation” will not pass away is because its a “wicked and adulterous” generation rather than because the kingdom is coming soon? ie this generation must experience the tribulations of the end-times because it is wicked and adulterous?
Of course “not taste death” is a common way of saying “will not die” in ancient texts. As to generations: they don’t die; only people do. Generations come and go.
Yes but in hebrews 2:9 Jesus is “crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death so that by the grace of God he might taste death for every one.”
Seems to suggest a difference between dying and “tasting” death.
John 8:52 has the Jews say “Abraham died and so did the prophets, yet you say that whoever obeys your word will never taste death.”
The disciples will experience physical death but enter into life – they won’t “taste” death.
The terms appear to be using synonymously there.
I do not see that the UFO cult analogy in any way explains the expansion of Early Christianity. Do you agree? or disagree?
What matters is not that Xty is like a UFO cult but that UFO cults show how cognitive dissonance can work. I do indeed think cognitive dissonance can explain a lot of things about early Christianity, and about a lot of religion today.
Interesting Bart. At what point,do you think, John the Baptist , and more importantly, come to believe/know, that Jesus was the chosen one ? And, what does Jesus mean in Matt.11: 11, ” Truly I tell you, among those born of women no one has arisen greater than John the Baptist; yet the least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he ? The least in the kingdom is greater than he ? Thanks.
My view is that John never came to think that. It’s a later retrojection on him by Jesus’ followers, some of whom were having to deal with followers of John (after his death) who thought that *he* was the one who understood the way of salvation.
What a very interesting topic.
About the ‘second coming’ I always think that there were many ‘revivals’ (as it happen today with the ‘end of world´)
In Paul times the ‘second coming’ was imminent.
In Ephesians-Colossians was not (i think were written by his immediate followers after his death/final prison/disappearing?)
Then with the destruction of the temple,the first revival of the ‘second coming’ came and Mark was written.
Another revival in times of John of Patmos and Revelation and 2 Thess(forged) were written.
My question to Dr Ehrman is :
What do you think triggered the sense of imminent ‘second coming’ in Revelations ?
Was a not well attested (but still probably) persecution in times of Domitian?
Revelation is participating in teh widely held view that the end was imminent. There is very little (almost nothing actually) to suggest that the views of Revelation were inspired by a persecution sponsored by Domitian. ANd you’re right, in fact we have no evidence of Domitian persecuting Christians.
Contrary to what scholars today maintain on the subject I do believe christians in their reports of ‘persecutions’ even when there is no ‘independent attestation’ (roman sources), my arguments about why I think so would need many many posts.
In particular I do believe John (of Patmos) was very badly treated, almost certainly tortured.
Why ? The stress in ‘revenge’ we found in Revelation and 2 Thess 1:5-9.
Particularly the depiction in 9:3-6 about the ‘locusts [with a] power like that of scorpions .. [not for] killing them, but only to torture them for five months’
‘the agony they suffered was like that of the sting of a scorpion when it strikes a man’
makes me think it could be inspired by something he himself experienced.
‘During those days men will seek death, but will not find it; they will long to die, but death will elude them.’ It sounds to me as something he himself felt when under torment.
Perhaps it didn’t qualify as a ‘persecution ’ but something really hard happened at least to John.
Reminds one of Hal Lindsey. “Hey, he’s coming in 1984.” “Oops, I was a little off.”
This apocalypse stuff is so totally misunderstood. The “every eye shall see” and “lightning from East to the West” is INSIDE, not outside. All the signs and wonders real spiritual Masters speak of are internal experiences. Whole books are written on this — much of the Old Testament, and nearly every classic story there. Mystic Bible, by Randolph Stone, is the classic account. When it comes up on Amazon it is usually over $400, it is so sought after.
I’m telling you, Bart, there is an entire universe of teaching of which you are unaware. The answers you seek– why is there suffering? — are all there. That is a relatively easy one: We have all lived before. We just don’t remember. You reap all you have sown, no exceptions.
Others are tougher: How did it all start? Dunno.
Believe this, though: there are real Masters — SAVIORS — here always. They say so, not just me. It explains everything. You do know the meaning of “SEE”? “It is the will of the Father that every one WHO SEES the Son …”
How about those “vast majority of historical Jesus experts” that are Christian? How do they deal with the fact that that Jesus was an apocalyptic Jew and the Apocalypse didn’t happen? And remain Christian?
Most of them insist that the “incarnation” means that Jesus REALLY was human, in every way; otherwise, well, he wasn’t human. ANd if he was human, he made mistakes based on his own historical and cultural context. He would not have known how the Big Bang happened and he woudln’t know when the end would come. He was human. (And they say you can’t counter that by saying, Yes, but he was GOD. He’s either human or he’s not. Some would say that he had to give up his perogatives as God at the incarnation — including his omniscience)
What do scholars think of Paul’s mental health? His visions and revelatory experiences sound, from a modern perspective, pretty unhealthy. Minimally, he seems to have an extremist personality, first as a Pharisee and then as a “Christian.” And he seems obsessive. But might one suspect that he was also delusional?
Most say that there is no way to psychoanalyze someone from 2000 years ago whom we can’t talk with….
Have you made a blog post about Fascist Marcionism aka Positive Christianity? Many Nazis wanted to remove the Old Testament from the Bible, and were very sympathetic to Marcion. Pretty Interesting stuff.
I haven’t, but we’re going to be having a guest post soon from someone who will be dealing a bit with Nazis’ view of Jesus.
Dr Ehrman,
Totally of-the-topic-question but the Scribes mentioned repeatedly in NT along side Pharisees and Sadducees, were they a separate identity or a sect? Or a simple “record keepers or writers of what ever dictated to them”? Why were they considered so important to be rebuked along side Pharisees?
Most people don’t realize this, but the phrase “Scribes and Pharisees” is very strange. It’s kind of like saying “Scholars and Presbyterians” or “Electricians and New Yorkers.” Scribes were those trained in reading and writing, who were Scripture scholars; Pharisees were members of a specific group of highly religious Jews. There could of course be overlap.
So maybe when Jesus is rebuking Scribes, he is of the opinion that they might not record his words/parables/saying accurately?
I always think of them as an early form of Type Writers guys, who still sit outside the Judicial Courts, in Sub Continent, and type and draft petitions/applications for Illiterate fellas, in English to be presented to the Magistrate, for a small fee.
Their role becomes important if they do not type accurately or honestly as the whole petition is dependant upon that.
Would appreciate if you can elaborate “Scribes and Pharisees” a bit more?
If you look up Pharisees as a word search on teh blog, you’ll see a whole post on it. Scribes: most people were not literate. In Israel in Jesus’ day, those who were were either elite aristocrats or those trained to be Bible scholars — they could copy the texts and study them for themselves. These trained experts on scripture were the “scribes.” So far as we know, they did not have to come from one group of Jews or another. They presumably, though, would have come from wealthier families who could afford the education.
Scribes, then, because of their literacy and learning would have been seen (maybe) as an “educated elite” and therefore steeped in the wisdom of the world, and we know what Paul thought of the wisdom of the world. And of course among some modern Christians there’s a very strong anti-elite sentiment. I’d suppose that Jesus too would have scoffed at the wisdom of the world, as represented by a literate elite– maybe?? Maybe a case could be made that Jesus was anti-intellectual and that Christianity was anti-intellectual from the very beginning?? Lots of maybes…
My guess is that Jesus never ran across too many intellectuals…
never ran across too many intellectuals…
Almost certainly.
That’s why I do not get convinced with the ‘rejection of the crucified suffering messiah idea ‘.
What kind of messiah a peasant/fisherman of rural Galilee would expect??
How can we guess? ( I can’t figure out a way either for a one hundred highly trained professional scholars)
Did a cuban peasant have any idea about Marx’s concept of ‘revolution situation’ ? ( I think not even Guevara nor Castro)
Scholars in the 40th century could figure out what that cuban peasant could expect by an ‘exegesis’ on socialist literature?
Most uneducated Jews expected a messiah who would be a great warrior who destroyed the enemy. . That wasn’t an intellectual idea particularly.
¨Most uneducated Jews expected a messiah who would be a great warrior who destroyed the enemy.¨
Maybe but even so, that’s not mean a ‘crucified suffering messiah´ would be such a rejectable idea (we know it turned out to be a very successful one)
Socialism is both a stumbling block and foolish to me, sadly not everybody in LatAm agrees . People think differently .
Right. One has to look at the evidence that it *was* objectionable. I think if you read the ancient sources you’ll see that it was the major point of contention of Jews and Christians. (Paul speaks specifically to the point in 1 Corinthians 1; but the discussions go on of course — eg. Justin’s DIalogue with Trypho)
The point I was trying to stress with the examples is that even when a certain idea was rejected by part of a human group does not mean that the same idea could not be accepted as well by others in the same group.
About the socio-political situation in first century Palestine the only I know it’s what I had read in Josephus’ books 18-20 of Antiquities.
My ‘sensation’ (since I’m only a casual reader) is that in such a desperate situation jews would follow any leader , see Gamaliel’s speech in Acts., Theudas, Judas … Jesus.
What a weird list !!!
“because of their literacy and learning would have been seen (maybe) as an “educated elite” and therefore steeped in the wisdom of the world, and we know what Paul thought of the wisdom of the world”
1 Cor 1:20
Where is the wise? Where is the SCRIBE? Where is the disputer of this world? hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world?
I think Paul didn’t like people like Bart that wasted so many (really many) hours reading, learning and so trying to understand what Paul actually said !!!!!
I grew up a Jehovah’s Witness, and in this church you can see cognitive dissonance at work: In the 1980s, Armageddon was supposed to come before the generation of 1914 had died off (Matthew 24:34). So roughly by the end of the 20th century. That did not happen. Today, they claim that the “generation” is an overlapping generation of people living today who knew people who experienced 1914 (supposedly the year the ‘last days’ began). In the 1960s, they claimed that Armageddon would come in 1975, because that would be 6000 years after Adam’s creation, so the 7th millennium of human existence would begin and it would be the millennial kingdom. In the 1920s they claimed Armageddon would come in 1925, and orginally Charles T. Russell had claimed Armageddon would come in 1914, and before that in 1874. Older JWs alive today have experienced the failed predictions from the 60s and the 80s, yet they hold on. Also, the previous, failed predictions are swept under the carpet, so the next generation growing up in the church does not find out about them. Each generation in the church gets a fresh start with a new doomsday prediction.
I’m somewhere between the apocalyptic and proto-Marxist (Liberation Theology) interpretation of Jesus and early Christianity. Reading the “cognitive dissonance” description for some reason reminded me of the role of the “sign of Jonah” in Matthew. The story of Jonah has him in the belly of the fish for 3 days and that’s often thought to be what Matthew means, but what if he’s also referring to how Jonah ended with God sparing Nineveh? Maybe that is why the “failure” of the apocalypse didn’t give rise to disappointment, but to increased organization?
In the context he appears to be referring to the three days — since he ties it to Jesus’ resurrection; but the preaching/acceptance motif surely played a role in early Christian thinking as well. Ninevites are better than Israelites! At least they listen when someone comes bcak after three days!
I wonder if you think the Mandela Effect influenced early Christianity?
Probably. It’s a pretty common phenomenon, even if the term is recent.
Dr. Ehrman,
Would Preterism help explain what Jesus was actually referring to with his statement in Mk. 13:30?
Thanks,
Steve
Preterism is meant to explain the statement, yes. But my view is the preterist views appeared principally after the imminent end didn’t come and people had to explain then what Jesus meant, since, in their view, he couldn’t be wrong.
1 Cor 1:20
Where is the wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the disputer of this world? hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world?
The KJV version as many spanish versions keep ‘scribe’ , other versions use ‘scholar’.
I think Paul didn’t like people like Bart that wasted so many (really many) hours reading, learning and so trying to understand what Paul actually said !!!!!
God became so angered (For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know him) that sent Richard, not even John in Revelation could imagine such a harsh punishment.
If this is not God’s wrath, what is?.
I thoroughly enjoyed the first post, since I’ve lived it. As a former Jehovah’s Witness this sounds eerily familiar. They have of course made numerous failed apocalyptic prophesies. When they fail, they just reinterpret the scriptures saying that they meant something else and move the goal posts further. One of their favorite is reinterperting what the “generation” Jesus mentioned means. The explanation gets crazier every time, but the congregants eat it because of how invested they are in the promises of paradise. And then the growth spikes again and the organization celebrates it as a proof divine blessing. This has been repeated several times since the 1880s when the movement started.
Another former JW here, with many family members still in “the truth”. Lassi, you are absolutely right. I think an important mechanism is for the older members to put the failed predictions out of their minds and just focus on the current prediction (it’s a bit like Orwellian double-think). And because the failed predictions are swept under the rug, the young people don’t find out about them. So to the young people, the current prediction seems to be what the Society has always claimed. I was a child in the 1980s, so “my” Armageddon prediction was the literal generation of 1914, i.e. people who had consciously experienced 1914, would not die out. As a child, I was not aware of the failed 1975 prediction! Noboby ever talked about that, and it had happened only 10 years earlier! Similarly, today I have some young adult former JWs in my family, and when we spoke about the religion, I found out that these people in their 20s have no idea about the original “generation of 1914” teaching. The sweeping-under-the-rug is an important part of the cognitive dissonance of the perpetuating of the religion by keeping yound people in the dark.
Some call it ‘Lyin’ for Jesus,’ but if you really analyse it, it’s ‘Lyin’ for the Collection Plate.’ The MOVEMENT (all of them, not just JW’s) needs to continue! Say ANYTHING to keep it going. And I don’t say the lying might not be subconscious, but I think more and more, as the movements get more sophisticated, (they all have lawyers and accountants) it’s very conscious.
On the explanation that “Rather than disband, people in these groups typically re-explained the non-event to themselves and then expected it with even *greater* fervor. And they promoted their views even more vigorously.” The susceptibility to believe, particularly in new recruits, despite failed prophecies by those passing these ideas off, is something to ponder. It may be oversimplified but the bottom line most frequently appears to be a dire need for humans to connect with something higher, special more significant etc. There’s a self-importance element to all this. Social media predilection exploits a similar mental fuel.
If jesus’ family thought that he went mad, and we’re going to have him arrested doesn’t this indicate one of two things? First, If Mother Mary truly believed this doesn’t demonstrate that Jesus wasn’t a virgin birth? If it was, nobody would know any better than Mary, and this alone, would prove his divinity and give no reason for her to think that he had gone mad. Secondly, if one wants to argue that this portion of scripture was a metaphorical story, then wouldn’t that display that the Bible wasn’t the inerrant word of God? For why would he want his only begotten Son to be seen as a mad man?
Yes, it would almost certainly count against both the virgin birth and the inerrancy of the Bible.
Jesus family thought he was “out of his mind” Mark 3 – 21 They must have known him pretty well. Does family opinion have any bearing on his sanity?
If it’s historical, it would at least mean they didn’t understand what he was up to and thought he had “lost it.” It’s hard to know whether it’s actually historical or not though.
When I was doing my internship for my Masters in Express Therapy, my supervisor gave me a book entitled, “The Power Tactics of Jesus Christ, and Other Essays” by Jay Haley. Jay was one of the founders of Brief Therapy, Family Therapy and Strategic Therapy in general. I recall that his book was a very fun read. Jay presents his material in a witty, sarcastic way which I found quite amusing. His main essay was a description on how to be a failure as a psychoanalyst. He then goes on to accurately describe every technique used by psychoanalysts and demonstrates how it is guaranteed to result in failure. His essay on Jesus’ power tactics (as I recall–read it almost 40 years ago) was less about mental illness and more a study as how Jesus might have been making a political ploy to start a successful revolution–but ultimately failed. Has anyone else read this gem?
Oh yes. It was the theory of the very first Enlightenment study of the historical Jesus by the German scholar Reimarus in the 1770s and is the thesis of the best selling book Zealot by Resa Aslan. If you want to see my evaluation, look up “Aslan” on the blog and you’ll see a bunch of posts on it.
I had a very sad experience last year where I think cognitive dissonance was in evidence. My friend Julie (early 40s with a young child) had to undergo high-risk surgery. She was in a coma for 4 weeks. Many friends posted on social media that they were praying for her recovery, praying that God would work a miracle on her behalf. Sadly, Julie did not survive. Immediately after she passed away, those same friends posted heartfelt messages about how Julie was now with God in Heaven and watching over her daughter from there. Of course we were all grieving, and I do no begrudge anyone their comfort. However, I found it striking how these friends pivoted so seamlessly from imploring God to save Julie’s life to rejoicing that she was now in the presence of this loving God, right after the same God had – unlovingly – refused to hear their prayers. Is that not cognitive dissonance?
Dr. Ehrman, in “God’s Problem”, you describe how crucial your belief in the power of prayer was for you. Would it be fair to say that it was this cognitive dissonance catching up with you that caused you to lose that belief?
I’m sorry to hear about your friend Julie. That is a very sad story indeed.
Yes, the issue of God answeirng prayer was a big deal for me. In part because it seemed very obvious to me after a while that prayer made zero difference in the outcome of a natural event, despite my sanguine hopes and claims and the claims of others. And then to say that God answered by saying “No, I have a better plan,” began to lose it’s comfort to me. I really didn’t think it was a better plan for a wonderful young person to die in an accident. It was a horrible plan. Some people recognize the dissonance and then try to do something about it, as painful as changing can be. Others hold tight. I try not to encourage people to follow my path, but if they want to know about it or talk about it, I’m happy to do so.
It also seems the Jesus Movement had some robust leadership that a core of believers could rally around to carry forward despite inevitable dropping out and splintering.
Wow, this is a highly commented post!
Much respect for responding to so many with your quality brain.
Do you think Jesus’ brother James might have had something to do with the band sticking together? Maybe James’ *pugnacious personality*
He did not have the level of “buy-in” at the beginning that others did. So it’s not a total case of doubling-down in cognitive dissonance, in that one instance.
I do know you think the Book of James was not written by him. But since it’s written in a specific sparky style, I think at least the expectation was that it fit his personality.
Thank you if you choose to respond to this.
INtersting thoughts. I wish we did now something about James’s personality (and far more about Jesus’s and Paul’s). Unfortunately we have almost no record of what he was like, on the personal level, as is true of all of JEsus’ early followrs. A real shame!
Well, If the early apocalyptic Jews thought the end of the age(world) happened when Rome destroyed Jerusalem in ad70, then their view was proven true, and the judgment of God on Babylon the great(Jerusalem) HAD occurred, and afterwards they were living in the kingdom of god. And the account given in Acts 2 ( true or not) backs up the statements of Jesus about sending his comforter, himself, to his followers, the second coming; who found themselves in direct conflict with the temple authority, the mother of harlots…you see where I’m going. No future far away 2025 events as predicted by so many evangelicals today.
Probably why they didn’t just disappear, they proved their prophet correct, the future view didn’t have any ground until Darby and Schofield. And I noticed, Dr Ehrman even as a scholar, you still give evangelical answers to theological questions. But, I may be wrong!
I don’t know of any indications that apocalyptic Jews did think the end of the age happened in 70 CE. What are you refering to? And no, I don’t think I give evangelical answers to theological questions. I don’t have answers to theological questions. That would be something that theologians (whether professional or not) would do, and I’m not one.
“Or: when God said it would come “soon” he meant by his divine calendar, not by a merely human calendar. And so on.”
My estranged evangelical father has tried to reconnect with me by asking me to listen to a “Messianic Jewish” study of the New Testament, and it is painful how much weight they place into the poetic “A day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years is like a day” to support their ultra-literalist ideas.
I have truly enjoyed having your blog (and a couple of your books) to cross-reference as I’ve gone through this experience. Truly feels like drinking poison sometimes to listen to this homophobic, islamophobic apocalyptic jerk, and if it weren’t a possible road to repairing the relationship with my father, I don’t think I could have stuck with it past the first few sessions.
So there’s no reason to think that Jesus and his 12 disciples were “mentally unstable”? It’s just that they were apocalyptic Jews in the first century. They were most likely mentally stable? There references to people calling Jesus mad, and people saying Jesus was under the control of a demon.
We can’t psychoanalyze them one way or the other, but there’s nothing in the stories about them that make them particularly unusual for the time.
I see, that would make sense for someone who lived 2000 years ago. Just 2 question then:
A) These studies that claim him to have a mental illness normally do it on the basis that Jesus called himself God in the gospel’s (which he historically didn’t), that he performed exorcism and miracles (which he probably didn’t), and that his family called him crazy in John 10:20. Commentaries say this specific verse is more literal than the other references as Jesus being called “insane”. Thoughts?
B) Did this issue disturb you much as a liberal Christian? I’ve always wondered if the possibility of this being true would’ve disturbed you a bit. There have been many prophets in the OT that suffered from mental problems such as suicidal thoughts, depression among others things. This would just make Jesus’ humanity more significant. Wouldn’t take anything away from his messianic claims.
a. Since I also don’t think Jesus called himself God (you find that nly in the later Gospel of John, not in the earlier ones) I don’t think it can be evidence that he was crazy. And his family was not made up of licensed psychologists. They just thought he was askigng weird. b. No, I’ve never thought Jesus did anything to suggest he had mental problems.
I see. Sorry for bothering you with my curious mind. I just don’t trust my own research results.
You said that to say Jesus was mentally unstable, you’d have to say that for every first century apocalyptic Jew. But not every apocalyptic Jew thought they were the Messiah. The future king of Israel. That wasn’t very common thinking in his day right? For someone to think that about the self. Again, sorry for bothering you. 😓
OK, fair enough.
Ah I meant that as a question. I don’t think Jesus was mentally ill. I was asking if someone calling themself the messiah would’ve been “crazy” in 1st century Palestine? You said that would’ve just made Jesus overly-confident, plus there were others who claimed to be the messiah.
Nope. There were others who thought of themselves as messianic figures. It just means they thought God would appoint them to be king. Kinda like to day when people are pretty sure they’ll be appointed president, thank God.
I see. So that’s why you maintain that Jesus and his followers were not crazy? There’s nothing abnormal about their actions and thought process in the *First century Palestine Jewish Apocalyptic* setting.
Yes, that’s my view.