in 09:05, more of less, it is said that the authors of the gospels were in favor or not of the testimony of 'frightened women'. But I did not understand the phrase. Can someone tell me what is said in the video.
He's talking about the early pagan critics of Christianity, men such as Celsus and Porphyry. They made the complaint that the gospel resurrection accounts aren't very credible, after all the earliest witnesses are a bunch of women! The testimony of women isn't reliable! Indeed, in both Jewish and Roman law, women were not even allowed to give testimony in a court of law. ''If you want us to take these stories seriously", these critics said, "have some credible witnesses, maybe have the Jewish and Roman authorities themselves be the ones who witness the resurrection. And in the second century, this is exactly what some Christians started doing, producing 'gospels' where the witnesses were people like Pontius Pilate, Nicodemus and others in positions of authority, so you have things like the Gospel According to Nicodemus and the Gospel According to Pontius Pilate and so forth.
So....given the fact that even people of the time noticed that having the women be the first ones to witness the resurrected Christ presented a credibility problem, the fact that all 4 gospels agree that women WERE the first witnesses is most plausibly explained if that is how it really happened and the writers felt themselves bound by the truth.
And it is interesting to note that the first Christian creed, namely the creed given in I Corinthians chapter 15, does not include the women as witnesses. It says that Jesus appeared to Peter and to the 12, and to 120 at one time.....but it doesn't mention Mary Magdalene, most likely because they knew the testimony of women would not be accepted. It is only when they sat down to record the actual historical account that they admitted 'okay, the first ones to see the risen Jesus were wonen', since they are trying to give a full account, they can't really skip over that part, even if they want to.
the gospels show some incredulity from the apostles, overturned by the presence of resurrected Jesus. I think that the feeling of the presence of Jesus is important, because, without it, no arguments do the trick.
I think that the video says: it is plausible to believe in Christ.
Well he's not really making an argument for the canonical gospels per se, he's simply trying to show why it is specious for some critics, such as John Dominic Crossan and the Jesus Seminar to pretend that these second century apocryphal gospels are actually first century documents that pre-date the canonical gospels.
In John Dominic Crossan's 'Jesus: A Revolutionary Biography' he actually places the Gospel of Thomas and the so called 'Secret Gospel of Mark' (which may not have actually even existed) in the first century and claims that they are the sources behind the canonical gospels, which he dates to the mid to late second century. And he does this on the basis of basically no argument whatever.
It is very interesting, for me, to know more about the different theories about Jesus. One day I saw a documentary with, I suppose, the intention to create doubts about the fidelity of the gospels, focusing a lot in the differences between them.
'He seems well prepared'....but his methodology is the problem, not his educational background. He probably does have the necessary education to be a serious scholar, but his methodology is severely flawed.
I think that maybe some times the results are not all not necessarily right, but the idea of studying Jesus in the light of other sources will help in the search of knowledge.
In my Bible classes, sometimes they said more controversial things about Jesus than Dominic did. My teacher who was an specialist, when asked about Jesus, she said with a little bit of disdain, "Jesus era un guerrillerito" (Jesus was a little guerrilla fighter).
But I learned some good things in that class. And that teacher had her pupils, who praised and loved her classes.
9 comments:
Hi,
in 09:05, more of less, it is said that the authors of the gospels were in favor or not of the testimony of 'frightened women'. But I did not understand the phrase. Can someone tell me what is said in the video.
thanks.
Hi,
I used close caption and solved it.
best regards.
He's talking about the early pagan critics of Christianity, men such as Celsus and Porphyry. They made the complaint that the gospel resurrection accounts aren't very credible, after all the earliest witnesses are a bunch of women! The testimony of women isn't reliable! Indeed, in both Jewish and Roman law, women were not even allowed to give testimony in a court of law. ''If you want us to take these stories seriously", these critics said, "have some credible witnesses, maybe have the Jewish and Roman authorities themselves be the ones who witness the resurrection. And in the second century, this is exactly what some Christians started doing, producing 'gospels' where the witnesses were people like Pontius Pilate, Nicodemus and others in positions of authority, so you have things like the Gospel According to Nicodemus and the Gospel According to Pontius Pilate and so forth.
So....given the fact that even people of the time noticed that having the women be the first ones to witness the resurrected Christ presented a credibility problem, the fact that all 4 gospels agree that women WERE the first witnesses is most plausibly explained if that is how it really happened and the writers felt themselves bound by the truth.
And it is interesting to note that the first Christian creed, namely the creed given in I Corinthians chapter 15, does not include the women as witnesses. It says that Jesus appeared to Peter and to the 12, and to 120 at one time.....but it doesn't mention Mary Magdalene, most likely because they knew the testimony of women would not be accepted. It is only when they sat down to record the actual historical account that they admitted 'okay, the first ones to see the risen Jesus were wonen', since they are trying to give a full account, they can't really skip over that part, even if they want to.
Hi,
the gospels show some incredulity from the apostles, overturned by the presence of resurrected Jesus. I think that the feeling of the presence of Jesus is important, because, without it, no arguments do the trick.
I think that the video says: it is plausible to believe in Christ.
thanks.
Well he's not really making an argument for the canonical gospels per se, he's simply trying to show why it is specious for some critics, such as John Dominic Crossan and the Jesus Seminar to pretend that these second century apocryphal gospels are actually first century documents that pre-date the canonical gospels.
In John Dominic Crossan's 'Jesus: A Revolutionary Biography' he actually places the Gospel of Thomas and the so called 'Secret Gospel of Mark' (which may not have actually even existed) in the first century and claims that they are the sources behind the canonical gospels, which he dates to the mid to late second century. And he does this on the basis of basically no argument whatever.
It is very interesting, for me, to know more about the different theories about Jesus. One day I saw a documentary with, I suppose, the intention to create doubts about the fidelity of the gospels, focusing a lot in the differences between them.
Thanks for the comment about Dominic.
Best regards.
Hi,
In wikipedia appears Dominic Crossan
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Dominic_Crossan
and he seems well prepared for Biblical studies. In the video, part of the criticism is to persons who not even know biblical languages.
'He seems well prepared'....but his methodology is the problem, not his educational background. He probably does have the necessary education to be a serious scholar, but his methodology is severely flawed.
Hi,
I think that maybe some times the results are not all not necessarily right, but the idea of studying Jesus in the light of other sources will help in the search of knowledge.
In my Bible classes, sometimes they said more controversial things about Jesus than Dominic did. My teacher who was an specialist, when asked about Jesus, she said with a little bit of disdain, "Jesus era un guerrillerito" (Jesus was a little guerrilla fighter).
But I learned some good things in that class. And that teacher had her pupils, who praised and loved her classes.
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