An eclectic Jewish scholar is causing a media stir by claiming that Jesus and his disciples copied the idea of a messiah rising again after three days, basing his interpretation of scattered text found on a so-called ancient tablet. This idea fails to hold up when compared with the assessment of other Biblical scholars β many who say the relic is too badly preserved to even read.
The tablet is not a new find but is catching news waves because Israel Knohl, a professor of Bible studies at Jerusalem's Hebrew University, was slated to present his interpretation of the text on Tuesday at a Jerusalem conference marking the 60th anniversary of the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls.
The three-by-one foot tablet β dubbed "Gabriel's Vision" because it contains apocalyptic text ascribed to the angel β displays 87 lines of text on gray-colored stone. It is owned by a collector in Zurich who said he acquired it from an antiquities dealer in Jordan.
Knohl contends to The New York Times that his reading of the fragmented text of line 80 "should shake our basic view of Christianity" because it presents the resurrection of after three days as a motif developed before Jesus and not unique to Christianity.
The Jewish scholar takes his loose interpretation one step farther by arguing that "what happens in the New Testament was adopted by Jesus and his followers based on an earlier messiah story,β according to The Times.
But many respectable biblical scholars are rejecting Knohl's controversial reading of the text based on the fact that most of the text is missing.
Even Knohl's colleague, Moshe Bar-Asher, president of the Israeli Academy of Hebrew Language and also a professor at Hebrew University, finds his interpretation far-reaching.
"In crucial places of the text there is a lack of text. I understand Knohl's tendency to find there keys to the pre-Christian period, but in two to three crucial lines of the text there are a lot of missing words," said Bar-Asher in The Times article.
Ben Witherington, a reputable New Testament professor at Asbury Theological Seminary in Wilmore, Ky., weighed in on the topic, saying on his blog that it's not clear that the text is even talking about a risen messiah. In a Time magazine article, he additionally points out that the Gospel texts donβt just rely on the observed fact of the Resurrection but on testimonies of eyewitnesses to Jesus' post-Resurrection self.
"This stone certainly does not demonstrate that the Gospel passion stories are created on the basis of this stone text," Witherington concluded on his blog. "But what it does do is make plausible that Jesus could have said some of the things credited to him in Mark 8:31, 9:31, and 10:33-34."
Ada Yardeni, a Hebrew language specialist, who published an article on the tablet over a year ago in the Hebrew-language journal Cathedra, also agreed that line 80 was illegible.
In her review, she did note that the relic, thought to be dated sometime between the late first century B.C.E. and early first century C.E., bore some resemblance to the Dead Sea Scrolls but found the text "very hard to read" and the tablet "badly preserved." While she said the text was "intriguing," she suggested that it probably "only emphasizes the variety of Jewish movements at the turn of the era." Continue >>
Comments
mart, please go a little deeper with your view of Jesus as Lord, because if you mean did Jesus Christ exist as a human being that has pretty well been historically proven, but if you mean proving Jesus is God then I agree with you 110%. It's just too bad more Christians don't allow Him to be the Lord of their life!
marte,
Amen. But apologetics is sometimes necessary. 1st Peter 3:15 says But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts, and always be ready to give a defense to everyone who asks you a reason for the hope that is in you....
We must preach the Gospel untainted and boldly, but also be ready to give reason for our belief.
Prophet,
Thanks for giving the McDowell quote. I had said as much to eeee last night, but he never addressed it. Since he does not seem to be active today, we can hope he is reading McDowell and Stoebel and acquainting himself with the evidence. Let pray that he is and God's Spirit moves in His heart as He did in Stroebel's.
The Holy Spirit is the only Person who can prove the existance of Jesus as Lord. It is not a matter of personal debate. Either you chose to believe, or you don't. Why do we continue to think man can possible prove God?
Someone commented that Israel is an atheistic nation. Hmmm...doesn't seem that way to me. Sure there are atheists there. There are atheists everywhere. But just because atheists exist, doesn't make a country atheistic
eeee,
The life of Christ can't possibly be made up.
"And it was not only friendly eyewitnesses that the early preachers had to reckon with. There were others less well disposed who were also conversant with the main facts of the ministry and death of Jesus. The disciples could not afford to risk inaccuracies (not to mention willful manipulation of the facts), which would at once be exposed by those who would be only too glad to do so. Had there been any tendency to depart from the facts in any material respect, the possible presence of hostile witnesses in the audience would have served as a further corrective." Josh McDowell
Once again, Christianity is under fire. And once again the critics are left looking like fools.
Check out this news bit
http://www.israeltoday.co.il/default.aspx?tabid=178&nid=16549
Jews are prepping their priests for the rebuilding of the temple and the "first" coming of the Messiah.
So far things are going according to the Bible
Hey, Prophet, glad the night shift got here. I'm off. Yes, he's gone from cc to dddd to eeee, mellowing somewhat each time. Passez un bon temps, mes amis!
eeeee or ddddd,
You say that you used to be a Christian. I believe you, because your hatred for Christianity could only come from someone who is running from the truth that they already know. I do not know what happened to you that caused you to become so disillusioned with the truth, but it must have been pretty bad to have caused you to reject God so utterly. There is plenty of evidence all around you, but in your current state, you simply can't see it. I hope that someday, whoever wronged you will make it right and that you will be able to open your eyes to the truth once more.
I see that cccccc is back. He seems more mellow this time.
And eeee, when I say consequences, I was not referring to hell. Refusing to grant others the courtesies you expect for yourself will only result in posters treating you as an irrelevant poseur. I hope you will look at the evidence suggested below; then we can discuss what you think about it.
The only evidence I have ever heard of for the Resurrection are witnesses. Witnesses who have been dead a long time. Witnesses who may have been invented. Witnesses who lived at a time when people were willing to believe any nonsense.
There's a big difference between beliefs in supernatural magic and the acceptance of proven scientific facts.
People accept scientific facts because they have REAL evidence. People believe in miracles not because of some flimsy evidence. They believe in miracles because when they were small gullible children they were taught that faith is a virtue. Faith means believing in things that have no evidence, like the Resurrection, heaven, hell, Jesus, God. Faith is not a virtue at all. Faith is an excuse to believe what you want to believe, no matter how impossible and disgusting it is.
eeee,
"The movies are made up stories, just like your entire Bible."
Obviously you never looked at the evidence which supports the rest of the Bible either. Evidence is evidence - why should anyone look at your evidence if you're unwilling to look at ours? (Which, BTW, I have done; remember my discussion of Acanthostega + Tiktaalik with agentorangex?) So you can look at the hard evidence suggested, or you can keep making blind claims ignoring said evidence. The choice (+ the consequences of that choice) are yours.
"do you believe everything you see in the movies?"
I enjoy zombie movies, including the Night of the Living Dead.
Zombies like to eat brains. The only way to eliminate zombies is shooting them in the head, or burning them with fire.
Zombies are fictional, just like the story about Jesus returning to life. The movies are made up stories, just like your entire Bible.
There's a big difference between your wanting me to study evidence for a childish disgusting belief in a supernatural zombie, and my suggestion that creationists should study evidence for a natural process that's accepted by virtually all biologists.
Nobody wants to talk about my idea that they're insulting the God they believe in, when they claim He performs cheap and repulsive magic tricks like the Resurrection on an insignificant planet in the middle of nowhere.
"However, they know enough now to say with great confidence that if conditions are right, life can develop on its own."
"Now who believes in unsubstantiated myths!!"
Instead of complaining about the research that's been done to explain the development of the first living cells, why don't you do look it up and learn about it. This is another problem Christians have. They would rather waste their time praying than learning about modern science.
cc/dd/ee,
Also, you keep talking about zombies - do you believe everything you see in the movies? How scientific is that?