Posted on 10/16/2017 8:57:59 AM PDT by Gamecock
Note: "Protestant/Evangelical Caucus" truncated due to space limitations
Protestant/Evangelical Caucus
When I was a kid, I always used to enjoy the “whack a mole” game at the local arcade (yes, we had to go to an “arcade” to play games). You had be quick to win that game. Each time you hit a mole, another would pop up, taking its place.
Of course, that is what made the game both fun and frustrating at the same time. No matter how hard you worked, it always seemed that the moles just wouldn’t go away.
Sometimes it’s like that in the world of biblical scholarship. Theories pop up, are quickly refuted by the academy, and then, just when you think they have gone away, they pop again. Some theories just keep coming back.
In 2003, Dan Brown’s best-selling fictional book The Da Vinci Code raised (again) the idea that Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene and that this fact had been cleverly suppressed by the church for thousands of years. Apparently it took a fictional author to uncover the “real” truth.
Brown was not the first to make such a claim, of course, but his book gave it new life. At least for a while. But, after a chorus of scholars showed the claim to be (again) without merit, the chatter about Mary Magdalene died down a bit.
But this particular mole will not go away. Filmmaker Simcha Jacobovici wrote an article for the Huffington Post on this very topic entitled, “Jesus’ Marriage to Mary the Magdalene is Fact, not Fiction.“
Now, I am all for bold, catchy titles. But, this one is pretty brash. If you go with a title like this, you had better have the facts to back it up.
But, not surprisingly, there are no new facts presented in Jacobovici’s article. Instead it is a reheated version of the same old material used by Mary Magdalene advocates in prior generations. There are half-truths, arguments from silence, and appeals to conspiracy theories. In the end, it simply doesn’t hold up.
Here is a quick look at some of his arguments:
1. “The fact is that none of the four Gospels say that Jesus was celibate.”
This is a bit of rhetorical sleight of hand. Yes, the Gospels do not explicitly say Jesus was celibate. But, Jacobovici overlooks the bigger issue, namely that none of the Gospels, nor any other New Testament documents, nor any other early Christian sources, tell us Jesus was married. None.
Given that historical claims–such as the claim Jesus was married–require actual, positive evidence, this is a noteworthy fact. This is why the best argument Jacobovici can muster is an argument from silence, namely that the Gospels do not state Jesus wasn‘t married.
2. “Rabbis, then as now, are married. If Jesus wasn’t married, someone would have noticed.”
This is simply a rehashed version of Dan Brown’s claim that Jewish men were expected to be married and that celibacy would have been unusual (Da Vinci Code, 245). But, again the facts don’t fit.
Though Jesus was called “Rabbi” by his followers, there is no indication that he held the formal, official office. His followers addressed him as such simply because he was their “teacher.” And we have a number of instances of Jewish men, teachers, and scribes who were single. The Essene community at Qumran, for example, was a group of mostly single, celibate males who were waiting for the kingdom of God to come.
Moreover, there is no evidence that all rabbis were married. On the contrary, it was not uncommon for rabbis dedicated to the special study of God’s word to remain single (see George F. Moore, Judaism in the First Centuries of the Christian Era, 2:119-120).
3. “Had Jesus been celibate, Paul would certainly have invoked him as an example when arguing for celibacy. But he doesn’t. Never once does Paul argue that Christians should be celibate, because Jesus was celibate. Not once!”
This is another argument from silence. We don’t know what Paul knew, nor do we know why Paul uses some examples and not others. Arguments from silence are regarded fallacious for precisely this reason.
Moreover, Jacobovici doesn’t bother to mention that Paul rarely invokes Jesus as a moral example for any of his teachings. The fact is that Paul tells us very little about Jesus’ historical life. That doesn’t mean he was unaware of it, but he simply doesn’t invoke many specific examples of Jesus’ behavior to back up his teachings. Thus, his “silence” on Jesus’ celibacy is not noteworthy in the least.
4. “Mary the Magdalene went to Jesus’ tomb to prepare his body for burial…Then and now, no woman would touch the naked body of a dead Rabbi, unless she was family. Jesus was whipped, beat and crucified. No woman would wash the blood and sweat off his private parts unless she was his wife.”
Again, this is utterly bogus. What historical evidence is there that only wives would care for a dead body? Jacobovici cites none.
In addition, Jacobovici fails to mention that other women went with Mary to the tomb to care for the body (Matt 28:1; Mark 16:1). Are we to think these other women were also married to Jesus? Is this now evidence for polygamy? These arguments just don’t work.
5. “In 1947, in Nag Hammadi, Egypt, the Gnostics got their revenge. At that time, several of their Gospels were found hidden in jars. They all tell the same story — Jesus was married.”
This is patently false. In fact, I am stunned that Jacobovici makes such a direct claim when there is no evidence to back it up. None of the Nag Hammadi texts say Jesus was married. None.
The closest one comes is the Gospel of Philip where we are told, in a very fragmentary and hard-to-decipher text, that Jesus “kissed” Mary, but there is no indication it was sexual in nature. Indeed, even Harvard scholar Karen King argues this kiss is likely asexual in nature. It was a kiss of fellowship that Jesus offered to his closest followers.
But even if this text refers to a sexual relationship between Jesus and Mary, the Gospel of Philip is of dubious historical value and is unlikely to tell us any reliable information about the historical Jesus.
6. “In 1980, in Talpiot, just outside of Jerusalem, archaeologists discovered a 2000-year-old burial tomb…”
Here Jacobovici appeals to the so-called tomb of Jesus which supposedly contains the famous James ossuary (with the inscription “James, son of Joseph, brother of Jesus”) and another ossuary that purportedly belong to Mary Magdalene (with the inscription “Mariamene”).
There is not space to enter into the merits of these claims here, but Jacobovici’s reconstruction of the tomb is highly problematic and has not been received by modern scholars. Even this CNN article regards Jacobovici’s Jesus tomb claim as “a story that doesn’t hold together.”
7. “Our Lost Gospel states that Jesus and Mary had two children and it witnesses to the idea that, for their earliest followers, Jesus and his wife Mary were co-deities embroiled in the politics of their times.”
The last plea from Jacobovici centers on a so-called “Lost Gospel” that tells us Jesus is married. But, the truth of the matter is that this “gospel” he refers to is not a gospel at all. Nor is it new.
On the contrary, this “gospel” is a Syriac manuscript, dated to the 6th century AD, that contains a pseudepigraphical story entitled Joseph and Aseneth. That story has been well known to scholars for years. And, despite the claims of Jacobovivic, it has nothing to do with Jesus at all. Indeed, the name of Jesus is never mentioned.
To read more about this last claim, see my prior article here.
In sum, this Huffington post article is an unfortunate exercise in “whack a mole.” It is the some old conspiracy theory of prior generations, fed to a new audience that perhaps wouldn’t know any better.
And that is the sad part of this whole story. The average person reading this article will probably accept it as fact. But, despite the bold claims of the article’s title, there are few real facts to be found here.
If He is both, then He also rose from the dead (as He promised to do) and it makes all the difference in the world.
I don’t know about that. I remember when I was just a kid, there was a best seller about somebody who had a grudge against the church. Spent his lifetime studying ancient languages, acquiring papyrus and parchment of the right age for carbon dating and writing his gospel on it.
Jesus didn’t die on the cross, He and Mary Magdalene went to Rome and He lived another 40-50 years. At least that’s the way I remembered it.
Here’s the kicker, he made Jesus into a human man, and a great revival of Christianity resulted. I was just a kid, many late teens, but that’s when I could suspend disbelief no longer.
If Jesus was just a man, then his opinions were no better than anyone else’s. So why did this revival take place. When the Church found out about, they covered up that it was a forgery, if I remember correctly.
Then there was the books Those Incredible Christians, and The Passover Plot. These were supposed to be non-fiction.
His fleece is white as snow. It wouldn’t be the only nursery rhyme with a religious theme.
“Why would God need a wife?”
Maybe he was hankering for a good nagging?
Are you just describing what this “best seller who had a grudge against the church” said, or are you, in an indirect manner, saying you’ve bought into it yourself?
How is saying that Christ may have been married a way of mocking Christians? I’m guessing that a certain group of Christians that are invested in priests not being able to marry (after hundreds of years of being able to marry) are deeply invested in Christ never being married.
I still say it makes no difference.
I’m simply telling you what their motive is. Their motive is to mock, and it’s both shameful and dishonest.
I agree completely with you. Mocking only affects the weak in their convictions. They have no power over me, and I doubt, you.
I like your attitude.
Luke said at the beginning of his gospel that undertook to compile a complete narrative of Jesus. It is unbelievable to think he would leave out such a significant fact as Jesus being married.
Mary did have other children. The Gospels and epistles state this as fact.
Uhhhh...what? Perhaps only according to the Prophet Dan Brown.
Most certainly does.
-Mark 6:3 and the Matthew 13:55–56 state that James, Joses (or Joseph), Jude and Simon were the brothers of Jesus, the son of Mary. They also refers to his sisters.
-John 7:3 is a quotation from Jesus' brothers.
-Galations 1:19 names James as the Lord's brother.
-1 Corinthians 9:5 asks about the Lord's brothers in reference to marriage.
The Catholic church is foolish to deny this fact and frankly, stupid in their denial of the truthfulness of scripture, undermining its authority in favor of their unholy worship of Mary.
Regardless of whether or not he was married, he still is who he is and did what he did.
I believe people are doing wrong to dig up so called facts to try and prove their point on any thing unless the facts are there in plain words.
By the way, the book was called The Word by Irving Wallace.
My point, though, was that if Jesus wasn't the divine Son of God, then He was just a man, no more worth listening to than,say, John Kerry. That is if He was anything like the people who push these theories think that He was. So why would anyone be revived in their faith by believing this?
Thanks for clearing that up for me.
“Dan Brown is full of it, and I don’t mean the Holy Spirit.”
Ha, ha.
As your premise is false (that "rabbi" was strictly a formal term used at the time of Christ, and that The Lord Jesus was one, and was under a law that required him to be married by the time of His death) then so also is your conclusion. Which would also require the "rabbi" John the Baptist to be married.
Then Jesus turned, and saw them following, and saith unto them, What seek ye? They said unto him, Rabbi, (which is to say, being interpreted, Master,) where dwellest thou? (John 1:38)
And they came unto John, and said unto him, Rabbi, he that was with thee beyond Jordan, to whom thou barest witness, behold, the same baptizeth, and all men come to him. (John 3:26)
Dr. Michael Brown states,
In one sense of the word, then, it is right to say that Jesus was a rabbi. On the other hand, official rabbinic ordination (called s’mikha) had not yet been established in Jesus’ day and so, there was no way to become arabbi in any formal sense of the word. The term rabbi was an informal title of honor and esteem used in Jewish circles, reflecting the way in which a disciple would address his teacher, rather than signifying a formal title associated with public ordination. In that sense of the word, there were no rabbis in Yeshua’s day. - https://askdrbrown.org/library/was-jesus-really-rabbi
Catherine Hezser The social structure of the rabbinic movement in Roman Palestine 1997 -Page 59 "
– Rabbi as an Honorary Address ... Since Jesus was called "Rabbi" but did not conform to the traditional image of post-70 Jewish rabbis, and since pre-70 sages do not bear the title "Rabbi" in the Mishnah,29 most scholars assume that the meaning and usage of the term "Rabbi" at the time of Jesus differed from the meaning which it acquired after the destruction of the Temple: in pre-70 times, "Rabbi" was used as an unofficial honorary address for any person held in high esteem; after 70 it was almost exclusively applied to ordained teachers of the Law." More here if needed on "did the bible lie about Jesus not being married ?"
Summing up what other research testifies to, a poster writes, ''
I can answer you that, by the time of Jesus, the title "rabbi" and correlates were not exclusively used in a formal manner as it is today in judaism in reference to authorized clergy. On the contrary, it was sometimes used in reference to non-clergy and non-pharisaic individuals who had acquired a religious following as a means of attributing honor. Also, not all recognized pharisaic authorities (that time's rabbis) had the rabbi title attached to their names, as was, for example, the case for Hillel The Elder. Later rabbinc authorities also don't always have the title, as is the case for the Sage Shmuel, and many others./a/62040
All this to say that: even if it could be proven that in rabbinic judaism historically one would have to be married to be a recognized rabbi, it does not follow from it that Jesus was married just because he was called a rabbi, since the title was not exclusively used in this formal manner by that time, being some times attributed to religious leaderships independent of formal training, recognition and, needless to say, any other requirement for official ordination as a rabbi. - user5223 https://judaism.stackexchange.com
Also of note,
Simeon ben Azzai or simply Ben Azzai (Hebrew: שמעון בן עזאי) was a distinguished tanna of the first third of the 2nd century. His full name was Simon ben Azzai, to which sometimes the title "Rabbi" is prefixed. But, in spite of his great learning, this title did not rightfully belong to him, for he remained all his life in the ranks of the "talmidim" or "talmide hakamim" (pupils or disciples of the wise)...His love of study induced Ben Azzai to remain unmarried, although he himself preached against celibacy, and even was betrothed to Rabbi Akiva's daughter, who waited for years for him to marry her, as her mother had waited for Akiva.[3] When Eleazar ben Azariah reproved him for this contradiction between his life and his teachings, he replied: "What shall I do? My soul clings lovingly to the Torah; let others contribute to the preservation of the race".[4] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simeon_ben_Azzai
No
The Mormons like to lie about the LORD Jesus Christ...
:)
I was under the belief that Mary M was not a prostitue. Or at least that was being challenged.
So much speculation about people who lived in a backwater 2,000 years ago!
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