This is an interesting excerpt from the exciting new work A Man Attested by God: The Human Jesus of the Synoptic Gospels by Professor J.R. Daniel Kirk. It refutes recent work by scholars such as Richard Bauckham, Simon Gathercole, and Richard Hays. Kirk demonstrates that Jesus was understood to be solely a human being by the synoptic Gospel writers whose language is rooted in the religious and literary context of early Judaism. There are a number of key passages in the Jewish Scriptures where men such as Moses, David and Solomon play the role of God (sharing dominion, worship, and the throne of Yahweh) and are even called ‘God’ (Yahweh and Elohim). A must read for Muslims!
Categories: Bible, Christology, Gospels, Jesus, New Testament scholarship
How different was this from the Egyptian belief that the Pharaoh was a “god” deserving of worship? Perhaps this was the insidious pagan influence from Egypt creeping into the text even centuries after the Israelites left Egypt?