Here are some interesting readers’ questions I’ve received that I think would be of some interest to other blog members, along with my answers which may or may not be of interest!

 

QUESTION

I often find that historians of early Christianity use the terms “historical Jesus/Paul/whoever” and “real Jesus/Paul/whoever” somewhat interchangeably, which I don’t love. I think there’s a difference between the historical Abraham Lincoln, who is an artificial human construct arrived at by following the rules of historical scholarship, and the real Abraham Lincoln, who is someone we have no access to. Perhaps I’m being too post-modernist though.

Perhaps somewhat analogous are Proto-Indo-European, an artificial human reconstructed language obtained by following the rules of historical linguistics to the best of our ability, and whatever was truly spoken by any particular speaker in the Pontic-Caspian steppe in, say, 6000 BCE. Or, as a looser analogy, Biblical religion as it existed in its ideal form in the mind of the priestly redactors of the Tanakh, and Israelite-Judean religion that any particular person in say 600 BCE would be engaging in, if we could build a time-machine and go observe them.

I’m curious if you think there is genuine value in emphasizing the difference between historical persons and real persons, or if this is post-modernism taken too far, and that given we have no time machine, the distinction is a not a useful one.

 

RESPONSE:

Yes, I basically agree. “Historical” anything is a scholarly reconstruction of what probably happened in the past (e.g., what a person actually [probably] said and did).  Even if it’s really close to reality, (a) we’d have no way of independently knowing that and (b) a reconstruction is not the real thing itself.

An analogy: you may be able to reconstruct a Tyrannosaurus, but it ain’t a real Tyrannosaurus. Even so, if you want to know what a real Tyrannosaurus looked like, you’re better off looking at a scientific reconstruction than a cartoon. And if you want to know what the real Jesus or Paul was like, you’re more likely to get close with a critical, historical reconstruction than a Sunday School curriculum for high school students.

QUESTION:

What was the reason/s why the nazis persecuted the Jews (among others)? I struggle to believe it was done purely for religious faction reasons
Were they a scapegoat or a threat for somebody?
Any read suggested about the nazis scholars/theologians? I never knew there were any, i thought the nazi ideology rejected Christianity and religions

 

RESPONSE:

It actually was not for principally religious reasons. It’s a very long story, but the Nazis were concerned to develop and promote a superior race of humans who would make the world a better (“better”!) and more noble place (in their opinion).  Based on race theories that had developed in the 19th century, and other social ideologies, they came to view non-Aryans as problematic, along with other outliers. These were to be eliminated.

They included therefore those of the wrong bloodlines (Jews) and others who were seen as “aberrant” (homosexuals, gypsies, etc.).

A Jew’s religion had no bearing on the question of their bloodline. Jews who were ardent Roman Catholics from Roman Catholic families were sent to the camps along with the orthodox.  A good book on the related topic of Christian theologians supporting the project is Susannah Heschel, The Aryan Jesus: Christian Theologians and the Bible In Nazi Germany.

 

QUESTION

Hello Bart. I had a question about Paul and the relationship with the Gospel of John in the New Testament.  Do you think there may be a closer relationship than some scholars recognize? Perhaps some direct line since John is clearly a sophisticated Greek author and Paul primarily preached in Greece?

I feel like there is more similarity between John and Paul than first appears. Both John and Paul have an extreme atonement theology (unlike Luke and is downplayed in Matthew who raises up the idea of keeping the Jewish Law).

Both also seem to preach an annihilationist view of the afterlife with Paul never mentioning hell (Contra the Synoptics with Gehenna and especially Luke).

Finally both have a very high Christology with specifically recognizes Jesus as a preexistent agent of creation (Contra Mark, and most likely Luke and Matthew) they recognize Jesus as divine with Mark saying he had the power of the Holy Spirit at the baptism but don’t seem to imply he was an agent of creation.

Just wondering if you think I’m onto something and you’re thoughts on this. Thank you for all your time and thoughtfulness.

 

RESPONSE:

In the mid 20th century and earlier, it was widely assumed that John had been influenced by Paul. The problem is that when you look more closely at what they actually say, they are so very different.

Just on the matter of “believing in Jesus” for salvation. That idea is not found in the Synoptics, but is prominent in Paul and John. But *what* you are supposed to believe is quite different.  Paul stresses that salvation comes by believing in the death and resurrection; John stresses that eternal life comes to those who believe Jesus is the one who has come down from heaven to reveal the truth.

So too, Paul thinks eternal life won’t start until Jesus returns and the resurrection occurs; John thinks it’s in the present. Thus Paul believes in an apocalyptic end of history; John rejects the apocalyptic view in favor of a heavenly existence being now.

There are indeed lots of similarities between the two, and readers need to make a judgment call: do these similarities make sense without a theory that one has borrowed from the other (especially since there are so many fundamental differences). My sense is that there were so many similar ideas, beliefs, understanding that were floating around in so many different Christian circles, that similarities of thought in and of themselves between two surviving authors is not sufficient to show that one whose writings we just happen to have must have gotten his information from one other that we happen to have.  Literary “dependence” needs to be based on otherwise hard to explain agreements (especially verbatim repetitions of more than a word or three – which you don’t get between Paul and John)