A while back, I linked to an article written by psychologist Bernard Starr on the topic of "Who Killed Jesus?" Starr argued that the best answer to this question is that God did. Joel L. Watts of Unsettled Christianity responds over at the Huffington Post.
-anthony
Watts seems to have forgotten (or never knew?) Mark's own interpretation of Jesus's death at 10:45,
ReplyDelete"...to give his life as a ransom for many."
My dear hobbit, wouldn't it be more hospitable to give the man the benefit of the doubt?
Delete-anthony
interesting perspective from Joel - "no-one killed Jesus - He died".
ReplyDeleteI wonder though, how much of this is literary play. After all, I take a literary interpretation of the Gospel accounts. For me, just as no-one killed Jesus, so "everyone" killed Jesus. It seems to me that he was the victim of violent contagion, sacrificial violent contagion. The same kind of killing has occurred over and over in human history. The "mob" killed Jesus not because there were individuals that spear-headed the violence, but because violence is contagious, everyone get's caught up in it, and therefore when the post-hoc accounting is done regarding who was responsible, no individual culprit can be found.
This is hwy scapegoat killing of this nature is so effective.
I know very well the interpretation! But even those words are an interpretation of anything remembered of what Jesus may have said.
ReplyDeleteFurther, "give his life" indicated himself. That's a point in my favor. Second, I follow Casey and a few others, namely Jesus, in saying that this is about Israel and not about the world. And sins are something different than our normal Protestant view. Sorta like a nationalistic thing.
So, it still fits well with my interpretation!!!!!
Mr. Watts,
DeleteI'm afraid that I'm just too dull-witted to understand your interpretation, so would you mind if I ask you a question or two: Are you saying that Mark did not recprd correctly what Jesus said in 10:45? Or in the wrong context? Or are you saying that Jesus saw himself as giving his life as a ransom for Israel only, but not for the rest of the world? Not even for a Syro-Phoenician woman and her child?
1.) I don't think Mark is recording anything so much as telling a story. While there is no need to think Jesus actually said something similar to the words in Mark's Gospel, we also don't know he didn't. Further, given the time frame and other external factors, it is likely that the statement said in 10.45 is from a similar vein an apocalyptic prophet may have said.
Delete2.) I would doubt that Jesus had a worldview-vision that included all people for all time, but instead — if he said what Mark says he said in 10.45 or something very similar — the prophet was to Israel, for Israel, about Israel. Since sins is a nationalistic enterprise anyway, I would find it rather difficult to believe Jesus saw himself as a martyr to other tribes of humankind.
3.) I'm not sure the Syro-Phoenician woman is a real event — and I am led to believe by suggested literary sources that it is a narrative creation by Mark to testify to something realized later.
Thanks for your answers, Mr. Watts. I tried continuing the conversation at your blog, but my comments never showed up.
DeleteThanks, Bilbo - I rescued your comments from spam. Thanks for letting me know!
DeleteFeel free to use the Jesus Blog to comment generally on anything that happens over at Unsettled Christianity. We'll just function as his overflow thread.
Delete-anthony
I think we should just stick to reading JesusWeBlog.com anyway!
DeleteAnyway, the spammed comments are rescued.
That's okay with me if it's okay with Mr. Watts. He put up a blog post in response to my first comment up above;
Deletehttp://unsettledchristianity.com/2013/02/mark-10-45-and-who-killed-jesus/
The comments I tried to leave were in response to that post.
But wasn't the execution of Jesus part of the divine plan? Didn't Jesus have to be executed in order for God to be able to save Mankind?
ReplyDelete