I have a question for Veeky Forums. Why did the historical Jesus develop the theology that he settled on...

I have a question for Veeky Forums. Why did the historical Jesus develop the theology that he settled on? What was going on in 1st Century Galilee that spawned the type of apocalyptic thinking that Jesus and John the baptist preached? M

My understanding is that he would have lived his entire life under Roman rule, and that 1st Century Jews awaited for a political leader in the messiah to liberate them from Rome. How did Jesus make the jump from that, to "Rome won't be in charge, God will be in charge because the end times are coming up ASAP"?

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>Why did the historical Jesus develop the theology that he settled on?

Orthodox Judaism? He was born one and never changed his mind, that's how.

because his theology is the truth

Well, I get that he was born and died a Jew. That's not what I meant. He clearly had a theology all his own expanding on the old laws and scriptures. I mean, it's obvious that the Gospels were written for a 1st-2nd century Jewish audience, all of his sermons are filled with references and analogies that a Jew at that time would have immediately understood.

His intention was to be an extension of the old laws of Judaism; my question is more why his new content teachings developed in the branch they did. Was there really no one else preaching a similar message? Why would a Galilean want such a massive role reversal as revering the sickly and poor and meek and powerless? Jewish life under Roman rule wasn't ideal, but it was a lot better than they'd had at other points in their history. I don't get why this moment in time is when this thinking emerged.

Okay, so this is my thoughts on this. I'm not an historian, just a regular guy.

We know that the bible was compiled in the Persian period. In the prophets, it makes pretty clear why God punished Israel: they were worshiping other Gods and not worshiping him correctly (specifically, they failed to remove the high places and centralize worship in Jerusalem). The prophets promise that if God is pleased with Israel, he will restore them to glory and defend them from all enemies.

So fast forward to first century Judea. The Israelites are doing all the things God asks for in the bible. They're not worshiping other gods. They've centralized worship around the temple in Jerusalem. So why are they still under control of an enemy power? It doesn't make any sense. Is God really in charge?

And this is where there are a lot of possible theological answers, but Jesus and John the Baptist's theology gives one explanation: God has temporarily ceded control - but only temporarily. He's still in charge, he's just allowed the enemies of Israel to take control, but any day now he's going to sweep in and overturn the existing social order and put Israel and her temple back as the focus of the world, as it should be. The first will become last and the last will become first, so to speak. The axe is at the foot of the tree.

That's my theory, anyway.

>Why did the historical Jesus develop the theology...?
He didn't

I guess that makes a lot of sense. I hadn't thought of the hopelessness the community must have felt keeping up their end of the covenant but feeling abandoned by God, of course they'd want to hear that the Kingdom of God was right around the corner.

This guy again My thinking is that if you think that the Roman forces (and the temple priests who collaborate with them) are in power because of the forces of evil then there is a sort of logic that when God returns and overthrows them, then their opposite - the poor, meek, and powerless - will be the ones who God puts in charge in their place.

There were end time prophecies before Jesus. Revelations weren't written or even concieved until after Jesus was dead. Jesus appeared in a vision to John.

And so to signal that the God is coming soon, Jesus' miracles represent all the things you'd see in the Kingdom of God? e.g. Feasting without want, healing of sickness, freedom from death. The only weird one is him walking on water. The others seem like a taste of what is to come, Jesus has access to them because it is imminent.


Jewish end time prophecies? I'm sure other cultures had them, but I doubt how much about the world at large a 1st Century Jew would have known.

He knew because He is God.

This, desu

Here OP. This is a pretty good series on the historical context and background of the new testament and the political and cultural attitudes of the hebrews of the time plus much more. I don't know if it's what your looking for but I hope it helps.

Shit sorry forgot link youtube.com/watch?v=dtQ2TS1CiDY&list=PL462B0F2345C29AFA

Gotcha, much appreciated, I'll give that a watch. I imagine it'll answer most of my questions.

>Why did the historical Jesus develop the theology that he settled on? What was going on in 1st Century Galilee that spawned the type of apocalyptic thinking that Jesus and John the baptist preached?

Treason against God and Pharaoh.

youtube.com/watch?v=rO-j9bOnX4s

> He clearly had a theology all his own expanding on the old laws and scriptures.
Did he?

>I mean, it's obvious that the Gospels were written for a 1st-2nd century Jewish audience, all of his sermons are filled with references and analogies that a Jew at that time would have immediately understood.
Then why are there so many geographical, cultural, scriptural, and thelogical errors in regards to contemporary Judaism at the time? Why does he admonish wives not to divorce their husbands (separate from his admonishment for husbands not to divorce their wives) when they weren't allowed to in the first place? Why do a bunch of "Pharisees" get mad at Jesus for healing on the Sabbath, something that would only be considered actionable under Sadducee interpretations? Why does the supposedly sinless Jesus screw up the whole thing to be involved in an offering for a Paschal sacrifice, only showing up to eat at some guy's house? Why does Mark have the onlookers to Jesus's cry of "Eloi Eloi Lama Sabachtani" confuse it for an invokation of Elijah, a misconstruction only possible in Hebrew, not the Aramaic quoted?

It sounds very little like what actual Jews would have written about a Jewish reformer and a hell of a lot more like a foreigner trying to slap a veneer of Jewishness on it.

>Orthodox Judaism
>1st century

There were about half a dozen sects at the time

Out of curiosity, has anyone every found a cartouche of Jesus Christ translated into Ancient Egyptian Heiroglyphs?

I don't know, you tell me. I don't know shit about the Abrahamic religions and I'm trying to learn more.

The gospels were written decades after Jesus' death, so it's not surprising there's inconsistencies. How many countless hands in the authoring groups worked on each gospel over the centuries?

What precisely Jesus taught is unclear, but a big driver of the religious tensions was disgust among the general populace with the Sadducees - the priest/aristocrat class. They were the sole administrators and operators of the Holy Temple, and as a result ordinary Jews had to deal with them whenever they wished to perform a sacrifice or other duty.

The Sadducees had already garnered dislike for corrupt practices and general aristocratic degeneracy, and were making a killing from their monopoly on religious practice - the reason there were moneychangers in the Temple for Jesus to drive out is that the Sadducees refused to accept any currency but their own, and had a real racket going on charging the worshippers obscene rates to exchange their "pagan" coins for Temple approved ones. On top of that, the Sadduccees sucked up to their Roman overlords massively, acted as their local proxies, and rapidly embraced Hellenisation/Latinisation. The collaboration further discredited traditional religious authorities, and paved the way for alternative forms of Jewish religious expression and development. The Pharisees are but one example of less Temple-centric forms of Judaism that grew in popularity as a result.

You couldnt be farther off. He was apolitical, and told his followers not to get involved in affairs of the state but give to Cesar what was Ceasars. He was a reaction to the politics of the Jewish religion, specifically of how money was involved. He was offended by the commercialization of his religion, and those selling access to heaven.
> and Jesus went into the temple of God and cast out all them that sold and bought in the temple and overthrew the tables of the Moneychangers and the seats of them that sold doves and said unto them it is written my house shall be called The House of Prayer but ye have made it a den of theives

>preaches of a Kingdom of Heaven/God being created on this earth in the near future
>says that his 12 disciplies will each be earthly rulers and run tribes
>tells people he's exorcised a demon literally named "Legion"
>followers carried hidden weapons
>draws thousands of followers
>first act on entering the local capitol is to beat the crap out of the Roman's local lackeys
>constantly condemns the ruling classes

He and his movement were political as hell; the "render unto Caesar" line was him carefully dodging a trap set by local authorities to provide justification for arrest.

Nah, hieroglyphic text stopped being used for anything but temple inscriptions/documents in the first few centuries BC. Literary and vernacular writing was done in Demotic by the time Jesus showed up.

Also, only pharaohs get cartouches. Other names are just written normally.

What does it matter? And on Thursdays, he wore blue socks, in memory of his mom. He loved her.

"Or did he? I don't understand why..."

I believe you are missing the point. His Word is great. Can you hear that? Then understand.

We know jack shit about the Sadducees. We have absolute none of their own writings and all we know about them are what their enemies said about them.

>preaches of a Kingdom of Heaven/God being created on this earth in the near future
A day is as a thousand years
>says that his 12 disciplies will each be earthly rulers and run tribes
Specifically tells the apostles that they shouldn't be following him for earthly gain, and implies their judging will be leading in the new earth
>tells people he's exorcised a demon literally named "Legion"
"We are legion" the point was it was a unit of demons
>followers carried hidden weapons
Two swords was enough, told Peter to fuck off when he tried to use it
>draws thousands of followers
Irrelevant to his goals. I'll give you that many of those who followed him, apostles included, thought of him as an earthly king, a misconception that was a point of agony for Jesus
>first act on entering the local capitol is to beat the crap out of the Roman's local lackeys
Political affiliation is irrelevant here, it was a religious action
>constantly condemns the ruling classes
Condemns the Pharisees and Sadducees for religious hypocrisy, tells his followers to follow Roman law.

You're not even trying, man

He was adopted by the wise men from the east and taken to India to study Buddhism which informed his teachings on his return.

>"Boy guys, what made Jesus and his crew so darn Apocalyptic."
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apocalyptic_literature

There were plenty of other similar Jewish preachers

The authors were probably very culturally hellenized. Plenty of hellenized Jews didn't even speak hebrew at the time.

Brah have you read the OT? Its full of messianism, litteral prophets and the coming day of retribution.

If anything Jesus was a bit atypical because he message was that he was bringing an additional law opposing the pharisaic conception of Judaism. If you really think about every Jew prophet after Moses was not really unique, it really boils down to:

1. Jews have drifted from the law of God, and they will be punished
2.Jews are punished and the go back to God's law and into listening to the prophets.
3. The arrival of the Messiah is at hand and the enemies of the Jews will be punished, since the Jews are good and faithful to YHWH.
4. ???
5. Profit

This shit just repeats ad infinitum until Jesus presents some novelty, the kingdom of God is within you, stop thinking you are unique with regards to God's plan, and the good news are already here. This is why Christianity became so popular among the early christianised Jews.

Well, my conclusion runs in the opposite direction. They are not written either by or particularly for Jews. They are almost certainly products of post-Pauline Greek audiences, with Greek as their language and Greek notions as to what a proper religion looks like.

Given their rather glaring mistakes about Judea, we can conclude that none of the Gospel authors were natives; and given that, we can conclude that none of them personally knew Jesus. Using them as an example of "What Jesus really taught" is not indicated, and in all likelihood, we have lost whatever original teachings Jesus really offered.

But you'd think Jews living in Judea, even Hellenized ones, would know things like women can't initiate divorce, that there is nothing ritually impure about entering a Roman governor's house (unless there was a dead body laying around that nobody thought to mention) or the basics of Aramaic, which was the usual cradle language of the area.

The gospel authors were most certainly hellenized and educated Jews and most of the gospels were written some time during the time of Paul, we do know what Jesus did and how he lived his life, there is just such an enormous consensus that it could not have been a historical fabrication. In all probability the transmission of christian doctrine was oral at first and started becoming textual at the time of Paul. Paul's epistles sometimes sound word for word like the gospels:

>1 Corinthians 11: 23-26

>"For I received from the Lord what I also handed on to you, that the Lord Jesus, on the night he was handed over, took bread, and, after he had given thanks, broke it and said, “This is my body that is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” In the same way also the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.” For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the death of the Lord until he comes."

>The gospel authors were most certainly hellenized and educated Jews
Then why do they make such glaring errors regarding basic Judaica?

>most of the gospels were written some time during the time of Paul,
I'm not so sure of that. Paul is usually thought to have died AD 60-65 or so, with Mark, the oldest Gospel, usually thought to have been written a few years after that, and the younger gospels, like John, decades after that.

> we do know what Jesus did and how he lived his life, there is just such an enormous consensus that it could not have been a historical fabrication.
That has absolutely nothing to do with what I'm saying. There is a HUGE difference between

>Jesus existed
and
>We know Jesus was of the opinion X.

I am arguing against the latter, not the former; the closest evidence we have to what Jesus actually taught is the Gospels, and the Gospels are full of shit.

Dosen't matter if it was actually an "official" one from the time peroid; I'm just curious what it would look like if it was written as one.

>So why are they still under control of an enemy power?
I don't remember, but wasn't it because Solomon fucked up and God told him that his kingdom will be brought to ruin, but not then because of David. Then Solomon married the Pharaoh's daughter, and a sandbank formed somewhere which would later be where Rome was found?

jesusneverexisted.com
Go prove this guy wrong then and win your name immortality.

Technically speaking, nothing existed before I was born. Prove me wrong, I bet you can't.

youtube.com/watch?v=a2krXq8fw90

youtube.com/watch?v=hou0lU8WMgo

>A Universe from Nothing; the Big Bang.