Saturday, April 16, 2016

Did Jesus see his death coming?

JAMES MCGRATH: Philippians 2 and the Historical Jesus (Exploring Our Matrix).
One may be skeptical of whether Jesus spoke about his death in advance. Or one may be skeptical of the capacity of religious experiences to turn a failed messiah into one vindicated by God. Neither seems inherently more preferable or more critical than the other.
That sounds about right. For some of my own thoughts concerning the historical Jesus, see here and here and links. As for this question, I would say that Jesus may well have seen his death coming while he was still alive and given his disciples some perspective on it. But if not, he could just as well have done so (within the ancient social construction of reality) after his death as their shamanic mentor spirit.