The Jesus Problem: A Restatement of the Myth TheoryRobertson, J. M. (John Mackinnon)
Religion
The Jesus Problem: A Restatement of the Myth Theory
Robertson, J. M. (John Mackinnon)
Jesus Christ
Once more, then, we turn for our first clue to the Judaic Teaching,
which on its face exhibits the gradual accretion of Jesuist elements,
beginning with an Ebionitic mention of the "Servant" Jesus, and
proceeding step by step from a stage in which wandering "apostles"
or "prophets" must subsist from hand to mouth and from day to day,
to one in which settled prophets are supported by first fruits, and
yet a further one in which bishops and deacons appear to administer
while prophets and teachers continue to teach. And as the "prophets"
constitute a class which in the third century has disappeared from
the church, as if its work were done; and as they bear the name given
to the chief producers of the sacred literature of Judaism, it would
seem to be the natural surmise that they were the primary producers
of special literature for the early Christian churches.
CHAPTER VI
EARLY BOOK-MAKING
§1. The "Didachê"
Evidently the Teaching (Didachê) of the Twelve Apostles was humbly
used by some of the early Jesuists as an authoritative Jewish manual
which supplied them with their rule of conduct, they only later
supplying (c. ix) their special rite of the "Eucharist" of wine and
broken [357] bread, and vaguely mentioning "the life and knowledge
which thou hast made known to us by Jesus thy Servant." There is
no mention of crucifixion, no naming of Jesus as Messiah. We are
confronted with a primary Judaic Jesuism which is not that of the
gospels, nor that of the Paulines, nor that of the Acts, though it
agrees with the latter in calling Jesus the Servant of the Lord. It
is even of older type than Ebionism; for the Ebionites carried their
cult of poverty and asceticism to the point of using water instead
of wine in the Eucharist; [358] whereas the Didachê specifies wine,
the older practice. The cup of the Eucharist is "the holy wine of
David thy servant, which thou hast made known to us through Jesus thy
servant"; and the thanks which follow (c. 10) are to the holy Father
"for thy holy name, which thou hast caused to dwell in our hearts,
and for the knowledge and faith and immortality which thou hast made
known to us through Jesus thy servant."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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