Master of Historical Jesus
Rev. Justin Oles
This course, Master of the Historical Jesus, is rather intriguing but is certainly not what I expected. I was expecting more of a scientific look at the life of Jesus. Instead it is a course that demonstrates the proof of Jesus’ existence through the gospels, both canonical and Gnostic, through analysis of the texts. The author goes through the various ancient texts and by comparison is able to show what Jesus may have actually said or done and not just what the Bible says he did. It also explains the different periods of learning and research (“quests”) during which Christ was studied and the rationale behind it.
The course begins by trying to help you understand the world Jesus must have lived in (historically, anthropologically and socially) during the first century of the Common Era (CE). Then it goes on to explain how common words or phrases had different meanings. For example, in Jesus’ day the word “time” meant something more like “age” or “era” now. That is to say that time was not a precise measure of minutes and seconds but rather a length of time during which a discernable and important even was taking place, a time for grieving for example. There is no set length of minutes and seconds during which one might grieve the loss of a loved one and everyone deals with its separately. Therefore when Christ said things like “the time of the Kingdom is here”, he meant not literally now, or even in the next few hours, days, weeks of months. He meant that this was the age or era in which it was to take place.
Further, the course explained where Christ might have gotten his ideas and why the translations should not be taken at face value. Christ lived during a time when almost all Jews, Christ was undoubtedly a Jew, fell into one of three categories (the Pharisees, the Sadducees, and the Essenes). Christ was most likely an Essenes based on the area he lived, his upbringing, etc. This would have influenced his beliefs. He also chronologically came after John the Baptist and was most likely a follower of his teachings or at least affected by them. Lastly, the gospels were originally written in Aramaic, Hebrew, and some Greek. Later these were translated into Hebrew, Greek and Latin and some information was lost or changed, this was further compounded when they were later translated into the modern languages.
Research on Christ has been broken into five difference periods or quests. The first period, called the “pre-quest”, occurred before 1778; the main theory behind this period was that the Jesus of the bible was the Jesus of history. People felt that although there were discrepancies in the gospels that this must be allegorical, or simply to test the faith of the believer. The “first quest” or “old quest” lasted from 1778 – 1906. This period falls into the lanes of conspiracy theory, it postulates that Christ never actually intended to die and did not expect it. It goes on to think that in all likelihood the disciples stole Jesus’ body off the cross and hid it in order to fake the resurrection. The third period is referred to the “no quest” period and went from 1906 – 1953. During this period went the opposite way from the last and simply said that since he had risen the historical story and context didn’t matter, all that mattered was the spiritual Jesus himself. The second quest went from 1953 – 1985 and never got very in-depth.
The theory being that while the quest was necessary all that was need was to prove the historical accuracy of the Christ sayings but that it fell solely on the historian to prove it was so. And the last period is referred to as the third quest and goes from 1985 to the present. This last quest follows the finding of the Lost Sea Scrolls and the gospels of Q and Thomas thereby leading to a more in depth historical analysis of the gospels with relationship to the time of each gospels creation as well as its interrelation with the other gospels. One can only guess where this might go from here or what further research might prove about the actual Jesus of Nazareth in the future.
Rev. Justin Oles
The course begins by trying to help you understand the world Jesus must have lived in (historically, anthropologically and socially) during the first century of the Common Era (CE). Then it goes on to explain how common words or phrases had different meanings. For example, in Jesus’ day the word “time” meant something more like “age” or “era” now. That is to say that time was not a precise measure of minutes and seconds but rather a length of time during which a discernable and important even was taking place, a time for grieving for example. There is no set length of minutes and seconds during which one might grieve the loss of a loved one and everyone deals with its separately. Therefore when Christ said things like “the time of the Kingdom is here”, he meant not literally now, or even in the next few hours, days, weeks of months. He meant that this was the age or era in which it was to take place.
Further, the course explained where Christ might have gotten his ideas and why the translations should not be taken at face value. Christ lived during a time when almost all Jews, Christ was undoubtedly a Jew, fell into one of three categories (the Pharisees, the Sadducees, and the Essenes). Christ was most likely an Essenes based on the area he lived, his upbringing, etc. This would have influenced his beliefs. He also chronologically came after John the Baptist and was most likely a follower of his teachings or at least affected by them. Lastly, the gospels were originally written in Aramaic, Hebrew, and some Greek. Later these were translated into Hebrew, Greek and Latin and some information was lost or changed, this was further compounded when they were later translated into the modern languages.
Research on Christ has been broken into five difference periods or quests. The first period, called the “pre-quest”, occurred before 1778; the main theory behind this period was that the Jesus of the bible was the Jesus of history. People felt that although there were discrepancies in the gospels that this must be allegorical, or simply to test the faith of the believer. The “first quest” or “old quest” lasted from 1778 – 1906. This period falls into the lanes of conspiracy theory, it postulates that Christ never actually intended to die and did not expect it. It goes on to think that in all likelihood the disciples stole Jesus’ body off the cross and hid it in order to fake the resurrection. The third period is referred to the “no quest” period and went from 1906 – 1953. During this period went the opposite way from the last and simply said that since he had risen the historical story and context didn’t matter, all that mattered was the spiritual Jesus himself. The second quest went from 1953 – 1985 and never got very in-depth.
The theory being that while the quest was necessary all that was need was to prove the historical accuracy of the Christ sayings but that it fell solely on the historian to prove it was so. And the last period is referred to as the third quest and goes from 1985 to the present. This last quest follows the finding of the Lost Sea Scrolls and the gospels of Q and Thomas thereby leading to a more in depth historical analysis of the gospels with relationship to the time of each gospels creation as well as its interrelation with the other gospels. One can only guess where this might go from here or what further research might prove about the actual Jesus of Nazareth in the future.
Rev. Justin Oles
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