jimwalton wrote:
> ὁράω...
So it can mean literal seeing, metaphorical seeing, or figurative seeing.
Okay and where does Paul indicate that the "seeing" was in a way other than a vision or a revelation? You'll recall in the original post from Reddit that Paul only indicates that the Risen Jesus was experienced spiritually i.e. through visions/revelations. Have you discovered another passage where Paul indicates something different? Because if not, then you must admit Paul gives no clear evidence for the "physical" type of seeing.
From N.T. Wright: The verb, occurring three times here, and then again with reference to Paul in v. 8, can in principle be translated either as “seen by” or “appeared to.” The term itself, however, is not the deciding factor. Its meaning here must be judged on wider criteria.
From Kirk MacGregor: The verb orao is an elastic term, which, just like its English equivalent “to see,” does not by itself specify anything about the character of what was seen, in this case, whether the resurrection appearances were bodily or visionary. This qualitative question can only be settled by appealing to already known information about the character of what was seen.
From Craig Keener: “Appeared” was used in antiquity both for visions and for actual appearances (often of God or angels).
Again, the appearance to Paul was an "inner revelation" - Gal. 1:12-16, also described as a "vision from heaven" in Acts involving a bright light and a voice which other people present don't see or hear properly. Paul places places this "vision" in the same list as the other "appearances" while using the same verb ὤφθη (Greek - ōphthē) for each one in 1 Cor 15:5-8. He does not indicate a difference in the nature of the appearances. If Paul can use ὤφθη for his own vision then why can't he use it to refer to other people's visions?
We have a number of sources and reputable scholars saying the term is flexible, depending on the context. This doesn't disagree with Bible Hub's definition, though Bible hub says, as you claim, "often" with metaphorical meaning.
By now, the "context" is crystal clear. Paul gives no evidence of the "physical" type of seeing.
N.T. Wright thinks it was physical. "The list of witnesses is a clear indication that Paul doesn’t suppose Jesus’ resurrection to be a metaphorization of an experience of the disciples. The great variety in times and places of the appearances makes it difficult to hold all the reports of appearances makes it difficult to hold all the reports of appearances to be legendary."
How about you ask N.T. Wright the same questions I'm asking you. Namely, where does Paul say the Resurrected Jesus was "seen" or experienced in a way that
WAS NOT a vision?
Kirk MacGregor thinks it was physical. "Since ὤφθη stipulates that Christ was seen, and the previous two lines clearly affirm that the same “he”—namely, his physical body—emerged from the grave, the context naturally indicates that the physical, bodily Jesus was seen by the witnesses listed in vv. 5-6a, 7. Therefore, we have extremely good grounds for concluding that the earliest disciples who composed the 1 Cor. 15.3b-6a, 7 creed both regarded the grave-emptying resurrection of Jesus as historical and attested that they themselves had seen the physically risen Jesus after his death."
MacGregor is just reading his own beliefs into the text. It does not say
"a body was raised from the grave, walked around on earth then floated to heaven while the disciples watched." No, it just says
"he was raised" which could mean a simple one-step spiritual exaltation to heaven.
"The important point is that, in the primitive preaching, resurrection and exaltation belong together as two sides of one coin and that it implies a geographical transfer from earth to heaven (hence it is possible to say that in the primitive kerygma resurrection is 'resurrection to heaven')". - Arie Zwiep, The Ascension of the Messiah in Lukan Christology, pg. 127
"the general conviction in the earliest Christian preaching is that, as of the day of his resurrection, Jesus was in heaven, seated at the right hand of God. Resurrection and exaltation were regarded as two sides of one coin…" - ibid, pg. 130.
https://books.google.com/books?id=QIW7J ... &q&f=falseMr. Kirk is guilty of the same offense as you are which is anachronistically reading in his knowledge of the later accounts into the earliest one which nowhere corroborates such things! This is just a fallacious approach to history because it does not follow that the earliest Christians shared the same beliefs.
Keener: "By all Jewish definitions of resurrection, especially the Palestinian tradition such as Paul sites here, Paul must mean a literal appearance."
Keener's just wrong. First of all, the New Testament makes it quite clear that the "appearance" to Paul was a vision, not a physical encounter with a revived corpse on earth. Secondly, there was no consensus view in regards to resurrection in Second Temple Judaism. A resurrection had no necessary connection to a person's tomb being empty. There are some sources which exclude the resurrection of the body - Jubilees 23:31, 1 Enoch 103-104 and some that are ambiguous in regards to what happens to the physical body - Daniel 12.
https://books.google.com/books?id=z-VcB ... &q&f=falseAnd Paul's experience? As I mentioned (just so I don't need to write it all again), Paul does not consider his "seeing" of Christ to have been figurative or spiritual.
What is the terminology he uses to describe the appearance again? He uses the words "visions," "revelations" and a Greek verb for "appeared" which was commonly used to denote the "spiritual" type of "seeing." So let there be no ambiguity. All Paul gives evidence for are spiritual encounters, not physical ones.
Paul is claiming to have physically seen the risen Christ, though not before his ascension.
Where does Paul make a distinction between pre and post ascension appearances? Aren't you getting that from Luke/Acts which most scholars places after 85CE indicating that it was a later development in the story?
For instance, when Mary saw the angel Gabriel, was it a spiritual vision or was the angel there with her? I would claim there with her. She saw him with her eyes, not just in a dream (as Joseph did). So also with Joshua in Joshua 5.13-15. I would claim so also with S/Paul. Paul's terminology is not specific enough in Acts to help us. Acts 9.1-9 (also Acts 22.6-10; 26.13) speaks of a light from heaven that flashed around him, but it's not specific about what he saw. The word used in Acts 26.19 is ὀπτασίᾳ, and it can mean "a vision; a sighting; an appearance," so it also is inconclusive.
So Paul's vision wasn't a
vision then? Wow! That sure is a new radical interpretation of the road to Damascus story! Are you saying Paul met the physically resurrected Jesus on earth before he ascended to heaven? Which translation renders Acts 26:19 as something other than "vision"?
http://biblehub.com/acts/26-19.htmAppearances from heaven are, by definition, visions.
More to the issue, it seems, is not the terms Paul is using but what he means by them.
He means exactly what he says! They're visions/revelations from heaven i.e. spiritual (not physical) encounters. These type of experiences don't necessarily have anything to do with reality.
I disagree. The context suggests the opposite. As Kirk MacGregor writes, "Notice that Paul does not follow up the 3-fold sequence of hoti ophthe…epeita ophthe…epeita ohthe with either “and last of all he was seen also by me” or “and last of all he was seen also by me, as to one untimely born.” If Paul had wanted to imply that his appearance was identical in character to those of the original disciples, then he surely would have used one or the other. … Instead, Paul intentionally breaks the diction of the 3-fold ophthe by writing “and last of all as to one untimely born he was seen also by me,” thereby separating his experience from that of the previous disciples. This observation rules out the possibility that Paul is here attempting to convey that he experienced Christ in a manner qualitatively identical to those listed in the creed.
Again, we've already established that you or MacGregor don't have any evidence from the earliest source to claim that the other appearances
were not visions so I'm afraid your objection is groundless. Paul does not, in any way, indicate that the
nature or
type of appearances were different. He just uses the words "untimely" and "last of all" which are indicators of
timing. That is not enough to warrant a "qualitative difference." Paul does not say
"I only had a vision of Jesus while the appearances to the others were more physical." No such distinction is made. Macgregor's straining of the text to mean what he wants it to is just a desperate attempt to avoid the obvious implication - Paul is equating the appearances.
"But Paul moves one step further. By placing 'he was seen also by me' after 'as to one abnormally born,' Paul explicitly shows 'as to one abnormally born' to be a qualifying phrase that modifies 'he appeared to me also' rather than a temporal indicator. Hence Paul uses 'as to one abnormally born' to explain how the character of his appearance was qualitatively distinct from those recounted in the primitive tradition. While the previous disciples 'saw' Jesus in the normal fashion, Paul admits to have 'as to one untimely born seen' Jesus—namely, to have seen him in an abnormal fashion. This is one reason why Paul asserts in the next sentence, 'For I am least of all the apostles, who does not deserve to be called an apostle.'
This has already been pointed out to you in another thread:
"The remark that Jesus appeared "last of all" is not evidence that he distinguished the type of appearance he was granted from those of Peter and the twelve. On the contrary, it marks his experience as the last in a series of the same type of experiences. The remark that Jesus appeared to him "as to one prematurely born" (v. 8) does not imply that the nature of the appearance was any different. It was Paul who was different - he was not even a disciple yet. This interpretation is supported by the remark in the following verse that he was persecuting the church of God (i.e. even at the time that Jesus appeared to him)." - Adela Yarbro Collins, The Beginning of the Gospel, pg. 124.
"The extraordinary metaphor of ‘aborted foetus’ (ektrōma) caused endless trouble to commentators until Nickelsburg worked it out. It presupposes that Paul was called like a prophet from his mother’s womb (Gal. 1.15-16), and was as it were ‘born’ when he became the apostle to the Gentiles. Thus he was as it were ‘an aborted foetus’ when he was persecuting the church before his vocational ‘birth’. As was well known, the appearance of Jesus to him on the Damascus Road marked the point at which he ceased to persecute the churches and began to fulfil his vocation as apostle to the Gentiles." - Maurice Casey, Jesus of Nazareth, pg. 458.
https://books.google.com/books?id=nOiRB ... &q&f=falseSo I'm afraid Macgregor doesn't have the final say on the matter.
"Far from alleging that his experience possessed the same character as the resurrection appearance recounted in the creed, then, Paul goes to great pains to insist that his experience differed in character from the appearances to 'those who were in Christ before I was” (Rom. 16.7).'
There's nothing about Resurrection appearances in there. How do you know he's not referring to the earthly ministry before his death?
In other words, Paul's point and purpose is not temporal ("The only distinction he makes is in the 'timing' of the appearance").
Yes it is. That is literally the only distinction he makes. He uses the same terminology for each appearance in list and gives no evidence elsewhere for "physically" seeing Jesus.
I've already explained this. When Paul speaks of his seeing Christ, he speaks of it in a way that implies he was the last to see Christ in this way. Visions and spiritual experiences will continue, but Paul belongs in the group of those who saw Christ physically.
Huh? The appearance to Paul was a vision where no physical body was actually "seen" but rather a bright light and a voice from heaven was experienced! Stop contradicting what the New Testament says the appearance to Paul was like! This is also avoiding the question. The correct answer is that there's absolutely nothing precluding Paul from using ὤφθη to mean visions! If Paul can "see" Jesus in a vision and claim apostleship as in 1 Cor 9:1 then why couldn't the other apostles have had a vision and claimed the same thing?
Absolutely not ("you are being willfully dishonest" and "we can leave it there"), and I don't appreciate the accusation.
Ok. Type
"consensus dating of the gospels" into Google and tell me what you find. You're dishonestly trying to claim your early fringe dating has more sway in scholarship than it actually does. You'll quickly see that I am correct that there is a consensus view in regards to dating of the gospels. It's fine to disagree with it but to deny that it actually is the case is not intellectually honest.
As I have already briefly covered, Acts doesn't mention the fall of Jerusalem (AD 70), Nero's persecutions (65), the martyrdoms of Peter (65), possibly Paul (64) or James (61), nor the Jewish war against Rome from 66 on.
All arguments from silence. The gnostic gospels don't mention those things either. Should they be dated early too?
There is reason to believe it was written before AD 61. Also, many of the expressions in Acts are very early and primitive, suggesting a date earlier than 60. In addition, Acts deals with issues that were especially important prior to Jerusalem's fall. There are very good reasons to believe it was written possibly in the early 60s, which means Luke was written before that. Mark would have been before that.
Nope, Luke shows clear knowledge of the destruction of the temple and Acts was written after Luke. Most scholars agree that Matthew, Luke and John were all written post 70. Mark may have been written as early as 65 but most hold to post 70 as well.
Mark preserves Aramaic expressions that Matthew and Luke do not, suggesting a very early writing. It was also written with an atmosphere of theological understanding about the message and ministry of Jesus that is still inits primitive and elemental form (no info about virgin birth, nothing about sightings of Jesus after resurrection; it's main concern is Jesus at war with Satan, etc.). Papias claims Mark was with Peter in Rome in the late 50s; Clement of Alexandria says Mark was written was Peter was still alive. Some Marcan material seems to stem from the controversy over the status of Gentiles in Christianity, a concern from the 30s to the 50s, but not after (and a completely dead issue by AD 70).
Irenaeus and the Anti-Marcionite prologue say Mark wrote after Peter and Paul's deaths in 65. This is the earliest church tradition. Again, the consensus view is that Mark was written around 70. You can just acknowledge that you're in the fringe here.
Albright, Moule, Dodd, Robinson, and many others contend that there may be little in the entire NT later than AD 70.
And that's a fringe view.
Papias wrote that Mark was the interpreter of Peter, and wrote down what he taught. It is believed that Mark wrote from Rome. T. W. Manson argues that Peter was in Rome between 55-60; Justin Martyr and Eusebius suggest that Peter arrived in Rome "shortly after" AD 54. If we accept the first Clementine tradition as genuine, and put it alongside the testimony of Justin, Hippolytus, and Eusebius, we are left with the date of AD 55 for the first draft of Mark.
Again, Papias does not indicate anything about Mark's date. So you'll have to go with the earliest church father who does and that is Irenaeus. Therefore, the lower limit from the external evidence is 65CE. Mark cannot date any earlier than that.
This is not true at all.
Ok, where does Paul say that the Risen Jesus was experienced in a way other than a vision or a revelation? Last chance.
The Gospels indicate that that the claims to have seen Jesus physically started within 48 hours of his death.
Those are later accounts written in third person. Paul is the only firsthand source we have.
The creed of 1 Cor. 15.3-7 has its source within 2-5 years after Jesus' death, proving that the teaching of Jesus' physical resurrection had solidified into a creed within this short amount of time.
No, there's nothing about physical corpse revivification in there. Sorry, you're reading that in.
Paul's testimony of his conversion, which was probably AD 35-37. And remember that Paul's testimony is coming from a "hostile," not a follower.
And remember Paul had a "vision" of Jesus, not a physical encounter with a risen corpse.
Strongly disagree. We haven't yet had this conversation. The evidence is stronger for the traditional authorship of the Gospels than for alternative explanation, and the evidence is substantial that the Gospels (Mt & Jn) are firsthand accounts, that Mark is a second-hand account, and Luke is a well-researched account. But that's a different discussion. Your cavalier statements like "which are not firsthand sources" and "Legendary growth takes the cake here" are pre-conversation conclusions rather than post-conversation. We have much to talk about here, but I obviously disagree strongly with you. I don't know where you've gotten your information, so we can have this conversation as you wish. Just don't draw your conclusion before the research is explored.
You can disagree all you want but the fact remains that Paul's report is the only firsthand source you have. The gospels are all written in third person and show obvious legendary growth that evolves from visions to physically touching a resurrected corpse that flies to heaven! This is not history.
For a variety of possible reasons, though it's all guesswork. Most probably it didn't fit their agenda. Each Gospel writer had a purpose in creating their account from the vantage point they chose. They honed in on specific resurrection accounts to serve their purposes. The sighting by 500 at one time fit Paul's thesis, but not theirs. I have no problem with that. I read the news accounts about Trump, Chuck Shumer, Nancy Pelosi, the Russian "collusion," neo-Nazis, the Antifa movement. Each writer is quite selective about what they choose to record. Editorialists and journalists are that way. All historians are selective as well, though not to the extent of journalists.
Considering that the evangelists main objective was conversion and preaching the truth then you'd think that an amazing appearance to 500 people would be worth mentioning...
It doesn't still stand. I have answered it with texts and information. Paul experienced the risen Christ in a physical sight sense, not in a spiritual, figurative, solely visionary, or metaphorical sense.
Uh-huh. Let me know when you find that source that says the appearance to Paul
was not a vision. I think you'll be looking for a long time then after that you'll have to convince all the churches to update the Orthodox view that Paul's "vision" wasn't actually a "vision." Let me know how that works for you.
The words he uses and the way he couches them in 1 Cor 15 reveal that he claims to have seen the risen Christ like the disciples did (with physical eyes), but qualitatively differently than the disciples did (not before his ascension). He claims to have been the last of a sequence, separating himself from those who see Christ merely spiritually or in a vision.
This has been decisively refuted. Paul gives no evidence for the physical type of seeing with the eyes. According to the Acts reports, Paul was blinded meaning his experience of "seeing" must have happened internally. Moreover, we know that no physical person was there since Acts 9:7 says the others didn't see anyone.