THE MYTHIC JESUS - AN INTRODUCTION

We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only Son of God, eternally begotten of the Father, God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not made, of one Being with the Father.  Through him all things were made.  For us and for our salvation he came down from heaven:  by the power of the Holy Spirit  he became incarnate from the Virgin Mary,  and was made man.  For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate; he suffered death and was buried.  On the third day he rose again  in accordance with the Scriptures; he ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father.  He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead and his kingdom will have no end.    

The second article of the Nicene Creed

* * *

Nothing encapsulates the mythic portrayal of Jesus of Nazareth better than the second article of the Nicene creed.  Jesus of Nazareth, the eldest son of Joseph and Mary, would be totally missing from one's awareness if one was not familiar with the Synoptic Gospels of the New Testament.  The Jesus of the Nicene Creed is the Jesus portrayed in the Gospel of John where Jesus is described as the Word Incarnate and the only-begotten Son of God.   Throughout the past eighteen centuries, the vast majority of Christians have been saying this creed as if it is an irrefutable fact.  The fact is that very little of the second article is fact.

What is likely to be factual is that Jesus had a mother named Mary and that Jesus was crucified on the order of Pontius Pilate, died, and was buried.  Beyond that, everything else is a matter of what people believe about Jesus based on teachings passed along through the centuries.  Setting aside the likely, leaves what can be identified as the myth based teachings about Jesus; namely, that Jesus is the only Son of God, eternally begotten of the Father, God from God, Light from Light, True God from True God, of one Being with Father.  Through him all things were made.  For us and for our salvation he come down from heaven, by the power of the Holy Spirit he became incarnate from the Virgin Mary. (After being dead and buried for two days) he rose again in accordance with the Scriptures; he ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father.  He will come again in glory to judge the living and dead and his kingdom will have no end.

Before proceeding further, I need to be clear by what I mean by myth.  What identifies a story as a myth is a lack of provability as a story that can be replicated.  That does not mean that myths are lies.  On the contrary, myths are used to expose truths for which there is little to no concrete evidential data or proof to support them.  Mythic truths are distilled and established into archetypal stories that offer meaning and context to the experiences we encounter.  All myths serve that purpose.

If you are a Christian, you are probably aware that there is a bias against the notion that myths exist in the scriptures of The Holy Bible.  This is due in part to both the First and the Second Letters to Timothy, where myths are said to be clever lies.  There is also a history of insisting that stories about Jesus are factual in spite of their lack of provability or possessing an ability to be replicated.  As a result the mythic stories about Jesus are taught as either concrete facts or as mysteries of faith.  I would suggest that mystery is a term used to bypass the notion of myth.  Whereas myths are stories told to bring meaning and understanding, mystery is a term used within Christianity to claim something is beyond comprehension and therefore must be accepted as a matter of faith without question.  

Personally, I prefer mythic explanations over unexplainable mysteries.  Faith is not enhanced by defining something as unexplainable that must be believed if there exists the possibility of a  mythic explanation.  The irony of things deemed to be a mystery in Christianity is that they are often connected to the mythic stories about Jesus. 

The myths of ancient Greece and Roman have influenced Western culture as they are archetypal stories that help us identify why we are the way we are and what we frequently struggle with as humans.   The same could be said of the myths found in both the Old and New Testaments of the Bible.  That they are not used in the way ancient Greek and Roman myths are used is due to the religions which are based on them insisting that they are not myths but are factual events.  This was probably true of the the Ancient Greek and Roman myths at the height of their polytheistic religious views.   The irony is when the ancient religions were supplanted in the late Roman Empire by Christianity their myths remained as guide into to the human psyche.  

The mythic imagination is evident throughout both the Old and New Testaments of the Bible.  What makes the Holy Bible unique is its blend of the mundane and the mythic.  Jesus as an itinerant rabbi who interpreted the scriptures of Judaism in new and meaningful ways possessed a mythic imagination as evidenced by his use of parables, which he used to enhance the meaning of what he was preaching.  The authors of the Gospels used their mythic imaginations to give context and meaning not only to Jesus's teachings, but also and more importantly, to his life and death.  

The question then becomes, what are the mythic stories of Jesus?  The following is a cursory list of stories in the Gospels that are myths or contain mythic elements.  

MYTHIC STORIES

1. The virgin birth of Jesus 

2. Jesus Baptism in the Jordan 

3. Jesus' temptations in the wilderness

4. The feeding of the four and five thousand 

5.  Jesus walking on water 

6.  The story of the Transfiguration 

7. Jesus calming the stormy Sea of Galilee 

8.  The resurrection and ascension of Jesus 

9.  The Gospel of John  

This list may be strike some as shocking as it contains some of the most important "events" found in the Gospels; particularly, the story of Jesus birth, resurrection, and ascension, which are all central to Christian belief and teachings.  I've included in this list the entire Gospel of John, which I have explained in other posts is a work of theology, but John also employees and engages a mythic imagination regarding Jesus.  I left some questionably mythic stories out such as the raising of Jarius' daughter, the raising of widow's son from Nain or the casting out of demons from the Gerasene demoniac and other healings as these are events that have possible factual explanations and are not trying to convey a meaning beyond Jesus being a healer.  

In the posts that will follow this one I will address each of these mythic stories.

* * *

Until next time, stay faithful.

Norm     

  

ON READING THE HOLY BIBLE - Some Thoughts.

I have often thought, if offered the opportunity, how I would teach a class on The Holy Bible to a diverse group of Christians, non-christians, agnostics, and atheists.  It might easier to teach a class primarily consisting of non-christians, agnostics, and atheists simply because they would be more likely to approach such a class with a questioning and healthy skepticism which would allow for a critical, open-minded approach to its content.   Before one can study the Bible, one has to know how to read and identify its diverse literary styles. 

For Christians this could be a struggle who are given to understand it as a cohesive narrative about God.  Most Christians read the Bible through the doctrinal and dogmatic lens of the denomination they belong to.  Bible studies conducted in any number of churches rarely spend time talking about how to read the scriptures they are studying.  As such, Christians will vary on how they understand the Bible.  

If one believes The Holy Bible is God's Word one is likely to revere it as inviolable, directly inspired by God, and inerrant to the extent that it not only purveys God's truth but is also historically factual; that what it says happened has happened and what it say will happen will.   The problem with this perspective is the Holy Bible, itself, demonstrates through the narrative of its prophetic history that people rarely understand or accept what God is saying through the prophets and, in that sense, the Holy Bible becomes a narrative about how we humans react to prophetic insights about ourselves in relation to God and our frequent reluctance to embrace and understand them. 

The  Bible establishes the ineffable nature of God; that one cannot imagine God, much less, figure out God or make an image of God in stone or in words.  The ineffable nature of God is something Christianity has largely shoved aside in the New Testament through the auspices of the Gospel of John where Jesus states that if a true Christian "knows" Jesus then they know God, because Jesus and his "Father,"God, are one.  This is a major point of divergence between what Christians consider the Old and New Testaments as, in the Old Testament, God is ineffable, but in the New Testament Christians see God in the face and being of Jesus. The result is that Jesus eventually became understood as the second person in the tripartite God of the 4th century creeds.  [I have and will continue to offer a different understanding of Jesus of Nazareth that I believe is more consistent with the Holy Bible as a whole.]

To read the Holy Bible critically and from a fresh perspective, most Bible-reading Christians will have to let go of the indoctrinated lens they have been reading the scriptures through since their time in Sunday school or catechism classes.  The difficulty indoctrinated readers will face is becoming comfortable with questioning what they are reading.  From personal experience I can attest to the difficulty one has in picking up details of the Biblical narrative that are easily glossed over because they have been and are largely ignored in the Bible classes one has attended or the sermons one has heard. 

For many Christian; especially, Evangelicals, Fundamentalists, and Pentecostalist, the Bible is approached as something to be believed as literal fact.  Another approach is to read the Bible as a seeker of truths regarding God and humanity's relationship with God.  A third approach is to read and study the Bible as one would any other form of literature, which means being able to identify the type of literature one is reading, as the Bible contains a diverse amount of literary types.  The term, Bible, is by definition a collection of books and writings on related topics.  In that sense, the Holy Bible is unique amongst the literary holy books of the world's religions.  This third approach is what I believe is necessary to fully appreciate what the Bible has to offer. 

TRANSLATING A TRANSLATION

Having a good translation is important.   When obtaining a Bible, one must be able to differentiate between a translation and a paraphrased or amplified Bible which will present a biased theological or doctrinal viewpoint.  For English readers of the Bible, the King James Version, the Revised Standard Version, The New Oxford Annotated Bible, and The New Jerusalem Bible are helpful.  I have found the King James version to be the most reliable when I find discrepancies between other translations.  Every language in which the Bible is translated from its original Greek and Hebrew sources will encounter running into difficulties trying to capture the flavor of the original texts.

One of the difficulties with studying the New Testament, for example, is that it was originally written in Greek.  Greek was not the language Jesus spoke.  Jesus spoke Aramaic.   Languages are extremely nuanced  and in many cases it is difficult to translate an original comment or thought precisely into another language.  The Synoptic Gospels are largely a translation of a translation of the Aramaic language Jesus spoke into Greek and through the additional filter of peoples' memory of what Jesus said and taught.  Since Jesus never wrote anything down, the authors of the New Testament had to rely on their sense of Greek terminology that best captured Jesus' use of his native Aramaic.   

It is always wise to keep the problem of accurate translating in mind when studying the Bible.  As such, we should have a healthy sense of curiosity when it comes to what we are reading; particularly, if something one reads doesn't make sense after reading different translations of a  passage.  The probability is that it reflects a difficulty in translation. That would be a good time to research the original language on-line or through a lexicon to see if there exists other ways to translate a particular passage.

IT'S LITERALLY LITERATURE

For the past two hundred years, most Christians have been taught to treat the Holy Bible as the literal Word of God.  In fact, many mainline Christian denominations, even those who don't take a literal view of the Holy Bible, like to end a Scripture reading with the words, "The Word of the Lord" to which the congregation is prompted to respond with, "Thanks be to God."  Viewing the Holy Bible as the inspired Word of God can cause a listener or reader to become wary about questioning something one does not understand or that sounds a bit off.  To obtain a fuller appreciation of the Holy Bible is to read it literarily, as literature, in order to grasp a fuller meaning of what one is reading.  

The Holy Bible contains a variety of literary types; such as, full-blown metaphorical stories and myths, historical and legendary narratives, poetry, prophetic writings, wisdom literature and apostolic letters.   Certain books of the Bible contain multiple literary types.  It is inadvisable to ascribe anything written in the Holy Bible as literally being God's Word, as God's Word, as described in the Bible, is the very creative force of God and cannot be seen or heard in its purity.  It is the idea of God that is the inspiration that guided humans to write the Bible that, however, does not mean what is written within its pages reflects direct dictation from God.  The Bible is completely written through an intuited and inspired human perspective.    

IS IT ALLEGORICAL, EDITORIAL, METAPHORICAL, OR  MYTHICAL?

By and large most Christian readers tend to avoid identifying whether something is a myth or an editorial comment (something non-christian readers are likely to have a problem with).  Biblical literalist are particularly obstructed by their literal understanding of the Bible when they take editorial comments and myths to be fact.   Nevertheless, it is of utmost importance that one is able to identify allegory, metaphor, myth, and editorial comments in Scripture.  

It is also important to have a historical understanding of the times and culture in which the various "books" of the Bible were written.  Much of the Bible was written in times different from the time in which the events described took place.  As such, they often reflect an interpretation of an event placed in a past time based on the perception of the times in which such an event was being written about.  

It is important to keep in mind that while an historical understanding of when something in the Bible was written may seem unimportant to some (as they consider the Bible history in its own right) the Holy Bible's purpose is not to provide an accurate, unbiased, historical account of events that took place since the dawn of time.  It can, at times, be very biased about certain subjects that may conflict with a more unbiased perspective today.  

Editorial comments like, "Jesus said this" or "did this to fulfill what was written in the scriptures" are editorial comments.  Editorial comments of any kind are always biased comments forwarding a particular agenda the writer or author is promoting.  When encountering an editorial comment, try avoiding the conclusion the writer or author is offering and see if there is another reason why Jesus or anyone else in scripture did something that merited an editorial explanation.  If you can think of one, stick with that understanding for a while to see if it holds up.

The Bible offers a unique account of our evolving relationship with God and one another. One can trace an evolving understanding of God; from a god who is personal, family god, like the God of Abraham to the God above all other gods and from a mountain top God to the God of all creation.  To that end, it relies on allegory, editor comments, metaphor, and myth to discuss such truths it attempts to reveal.  

UNDERSTANDING THE HOLY BIBLE IN LIGHT OF THE TIMES IN WHICH WE LIVE

The Holy Bible, like all literature, is written from an anthropocentric perspective. The ineffablility of God is countered by imbuing the creative force we call God with human traits to make God relatable to our human experiences, thus God is depicted at times as being good, angry, vengeful, compassionate, remorseful, caring, forgiving, patient, faithful, etc., just as we humans are.  Yet the ineffable nature of God is underscored at various points within scripture to keep us mindful that what we describe as God is beyond human description and comprehension.    

The Holy Bible depicts and promotes an evolving understanding of God as it addresses the human experience in the light of God's being in each and every age through its narrative, whether it is the telling of historical events, its myths, its allegories and metaphors.  In turn, the events of each and every age offer a new perspective to what is written in its pages.  These perspectives are part of the process of an ever-evolving understanding of God and human nature.  It is this sense of an ever-evolving understanding of God that maintains The Holy Bible's relevancy in each age because each and every age brings new understanding of it garnered from our accumulative experiences that are encountered in the times in which we live.  

As such, the Bible, allows us to examine the human experience set against the paradox of the ineffable.  Trying to pin down God, even within the pages of Scripture, is an ever-elusive undertaking.  God is whatever God is or God will be what God will be as Moses discovered in the allegorical mythic story of his encounter with a burning bush that was not consumed by its fire.  On the other hand, we humans, with all of our abilities and disabilities, potential creativity and destructiveness, and our strengths and our weaknesses, are on full display set against the consistent paradox of God in whose being we experience our being. 

As with any well-written pieces of literature, there is a timelessness to the Holy Bible.   It has  maintained its relatability because of its applicability to the human experience of God on which it is based.  A question this raises is how each age has influenced an understanding of the Holy Bible.  As some will note, one can find anything or something within the Bible to justify the current behaviors or reactions to human behaviors or our time.    

We live in a much different age than when the books of the Bible were written.  Today, we know more about our historical and scientific beginnings than at any other time in history.  As in the relatively recent past of the last two or three centuries, there has been push-back by Christian denominations against the discoveries in both history and science that conflict, not so much with the scriptures of the Bible themselves, as with the traditional doctrines and dogma that theologians and doctors of the Church have derived from their understanding of scripture. 

The Church as a whole, as I have describe in past posts, continues to struggle with how to deal with long-standing doctrinal positions that are increasingly challenged by recent discoveries in history and science.  For example, where do the discoveries of lost Gospels and other Christian writings find a place within the discussion of Christian faith?  Do we continue to ignore them or do we study them and consider their value in understanding the Christian experience?  

What of the increasing number of scientific discoveries regarding the universe in which we live which seemingly contradict the Biblical accounts of past events?  What about the progress made in scientific technology and medicine; such as, the potential use of AI and nuclear fusion?   What impact does such discoveries have on our understanding of Bible as opposed to what impact that Bible has on our views of them?  Have we learned anything from past regarding the Church's persecution of those whose discoveries, thoughts, theories were seen as a threat to the Christian faith; such as, those made by Galileo, Giordano Bruno, and Pierre Teilhard de Chardin?

Currently, within the United States, there is a persecution of literature itself with the banning of certain books in schools and public libraries, a mere step away from actual public book burnings; all in an effort to erase certain aspects of modern history on the ironic premise of keeping children from being indoctrinated and traumatized by indoctrinating them as to what literature they and their parents should consider dangerous.  Given the literature and rhetoric found in the Holy Bible, it is remarkable that it hasn't been banned.  Given the current political temperature regarding literature as a whole, it is important for readers and students of the Holy Bible to maintain an open and skeptical mind regarding its depiction of our relationships to each other in the light of an ineffable God whose only applicable description is not that of a noun (a thing, in and of, or unto itself) but a loving, enlightening, and creating verb, BEINGNESS, that sees only the goodness of that which is created.

* * *

Until next time, stay faithful.

Norm