V
v1gilbert
Guest
My cousin is in dialogue with his friend who has fallen away from faith in Jesus. The friend is a big fan of citing the Jesus Seminar as something that has reassured him of his already pre-existing doubts in the veracity of the Bible.
If it would be okay I would like to copy the email and ask for advice in a response. Many Thanks.
*First of all, the idea that all of the words attributed to Jesus in the new testament were not literally and factually things that he said is not an idea that I remember borrowing from anyone, or at least not anyone in particular, and definately not the Jesus Seminar. Before I had ever heard of the Jesus Seminar or marcus borg, i was thinking that it seems obvious how in many parts of the new testament where Jesus is speaking there is a slim chance that his factual words have been preserved for us. For example, when he prays in the garden by himself before his capture, how could his exact words (or even similar words) could have been recorded? since there was nobody else there to hear them? Or the story of him being tempted by the devil to throw himself down from a cliff or whatever. Again…nobody else there to record his words. Those (and a few other) examples are clearly cases of the authors, or the community of followers, inventing a story of his words to match whatever image of him they had developed. And in the cases where there were other people around to hear him speak, it is quite probably that none of those words were written down until about 30 yrs after he was crucified. 30 years is plenty of time for oral traditions to develop a few exaggerations or errors. I definately can’t remember anything accurately that was said or done 30 years ago…especially if there is an evolving community of faith-based people (we know how ridiculous these can get - radical islamists…branch davidians…etc) who are fine-tuning and altering my own memories of what was said or happened.
So when I DID read something from Marcus Borg, his thoughts on the development of christianity were very much in harmony with what I had been thinking for a long time. But I agree, I should do some more research on what he, and the other seminar people are all about…find out their motives, etc. Since borg is a big influence on my spiritual views, I really need to do that.
Oh, but there’s one important error in your interpretation of my interpretation of the early development of christianity. believe it was JESUS whose agenda was primarily (and possibly entirely) sociopolitical change. But once that sociopolitical change didnt occur, the message and purpose of Jesus gradually shifted into one of personal salvation in the afterlife, rather than social salvation in this life. I will admit that the part of history about Jesus disciples and followers risking and sacrificing their own lives for christianity is hard for me to figure out. But I guess many people over the years have done the same thing to effect sociopolitical change…and possibily thats what they were still working for in those early years of the movement.*
If it would be okay I would like to copy the email and ask for advice in a response. Many Thanks.
*First of all, the idea that all of the words attributed to Jesus in the new testament were not literally and factually things that he said is not an idea that I remember borrowing from anyone, or at least not anyone in particular, and definately not the Jesus Seminar. Before I had ever heard of the Jesus Seminar or marcus borg, i was thinking that it seems obvious how in many parts of the new testament where Jesus is speaking there is a slim chance that his factual words have been preserved for us. For example, when he prays in the garden by himself before his capture, how could his exact words (or even similar words) could have been recorded? since there was nobody else there to hear them? Or the story of him being tempted by the devil to throw himself down from a cliff or whatever. Again…nobody else there to record his words. Those (and a few other) examples are clearly cases of the authors, or the community of followers, inventing a story of his words to match whatever image of him they had developed. And in the cases where there were other people around to hear him speak, it is quite probably that none of those words were written down until about 30 yrs after he was crucified. 30 years is plenty of time for oral traditions to develop a few exaggerations or errors. I definately can’t remember anything accurately that was said or done 30 years ago…especially if there is an evolving community of faith-based people (we know how ridiculous these can get - radical islamists…branch davidians…etc) who are fine-tuning and altering my own memories of what was said or happened.
So when I DID read something from Marcus Borg, his thoughts on the development of christianity were very much in harmony with what I had been thinking for a long time. But I agree, I should do some more research on what he, and the other seminar people are all about…find out their motives, etc. Since borg is a big influence on my spiritual views, I really need to do that.
Oh, but there’s one important error in your interpretation of my interpretation of the early development of christianity. believe it was JESUS whose agenda was primarily (and possibly entirely) sociopolitical change. But once that sociopolitical change didnt occur, the message and purpose of Jesus gradually shifted into one of personal salvation in the afterlife, rather than social salvation in this life. I will admit that the part of history about Jesus disciples and followers risking and sacrificing their own lives for christianity is hard for me to figure out. But I guess many people over the years have done the same thing to effect sociopolitical change…and possibily thats what they were still working for in those early years of the movement.*