Talk:Brothers of Jesus

Pitre

Pitre is not a mainstream Bible scholar, he basically is a fundamentalist scholar. All mainstream Bible scholars, be them Christian, Jewish, agnostic or atheist, have shared assumptions. Fundamentalists don't share in those assumptions.

Modern Bible scholarship/scholars (MBS) assumes that:

• The Bible is a collection of books like any others: created and put together by normal (i.e. fallible) human beings; • The Bible is often inconsistent because it derives from sources (written and oral) that do not always agree; individual biblical books grow over time, are multilayered; • The Bible is to be interpreted in its context: ✦ Individual biblical books take shape in historical contexts; the Bible is a document of its time; ✦ Biblical verses are to be interpreted in context; ✦ The "original" or contextual meaning is to be prized above all others; • The Bible is an ideologically-driven text (collection of texts). It is not "objective" or neutral about any of the topics that it treats. Its historical books are not "historical" in our sense. ✦ "hermeneutics of suspicion"; ✦ Consequently MBS often reject the alleged "facts" of the Bible (e.g. was Abraham a real person? Did the Israelites leave Egypt in a mighty Exodus? Was Solomon the king of a mighty empire?); ✦ MBS do not assess its moral or theological truth claims, and if they do, they do so from a humanist perspective; ★ The Bible contains many ideas/laws that we moderns find offensive;

• The authority of the Bible is for MBS a historical artifact; it does derive from any ontological status as the revealed word of God;

— Beardsley Ruml, Shaye J.D. Cohen's Lecture Notes: INTRO TO THE HEBREW BIBLE @ Harvard (BAS website) (78 pages)

For Pitre such assumptions are from the Devil. And strictly speaking, books by Pitre are apologetics, not WP:SCHOLARSHIP. His victory over skeptical scholars is imaginary. His audience are people who are ignorant of modern Bible scholarship, and gullible enough to think it has been defeated academically. People who are gullible enough to think that the truth of the Bible has been re-enthroned at the Ivy League in all its pristine glory. tgeorgescu (talk) 15:46, 17 October 2021 (UTC)

"fundamentalist scholar" Isn't that an oxymoron? How can you be a scholar and hold a magical view of the world? These people are at best pseudo-scholars. Dimadick (talk) 16:30, 17 October 2021 (UTC)

Yup, Pitre is not really a scholar of religion, he is a fundamentalist Catholic indulging in cheap apologetics, which he tries to pass for scholarship.

Now, let's let the WP:RS written by mainstream Bible scholars speak:

Pitre's book will only convince the already convinced. Its basic argument is that an objective investigation by an honest researcher will discover a thoroughly Jewish first-century Jesus with a penchant for present-day Catholic teaching on the real presence. This is exceedingly difficult to swallow and shows an altogether naive confidence in the ability of modernist historical methods to deliver Christian doctrine.

In fact, Pitre's book is not a work that makes a compelling argument but one that uses some words from the New Testament and relatively or very late Jewish sources to re-present Catholic teaching for non-scholarly Catholics. Excavating the roots of Catholic teaching on the Eucharist is an important task, but it is not helped by books that use historical scholarship so naively.

— C. Kavin Rowe, George Washington Ivey Distinguished Professor of New Testament; Vice Dean for Faculty, Duke Divinity School

Rowe's books have been published by Yale University Press and Oxford University Press—he's obviously no lowly peon. tgeorgescu (talk) 00:33, 18 October 2021 (UTC)

Is it relevant to put the following in the article?

The gospels make up the second cluster of references. The general consensus of scholars is that Mark was the first to be written and dates from around 70 CE, with Matthew and Luke being written between 80-90 CE using Mark as their primary source.[36] Despite the traditional ascriptions the authors of all three are unknown,[37] and it is almost certain that none were eyewitnesses to the life of Jesus.[38]The gospel of Luke and the Acts of the Apostles together make up a two-volume work by the same author which scholars call Luke–Acts.[39] Together they account for 27.5% of the New Testament, the largest contribution by a single author.[40]

Despite being referenced, my question is if this is related to "the brothers of Jesus" article.--Rafaelosornio (talk) 01:01, 13 January 2022 (UTC)

I haven't made up my own mind yet whether it's relevant - I was on the point of deleting it when you did so. Could I ask you to be patient a little while I complete this section, which is about which NT passages contain references to the adelphoi? Then we can prune it back as needed. Achar Sva (talk) 01:27, 13 January 2022 (UTC)

Thank you for your patience. I've finished now to my own satisfaction, but of course, you'll have your own ideas. You'll see that I've relied on a single source, namely Bauckham's book, but I think this is just about unavoidable given that his is just about the only monograph on the subject - and in any case, the content is hardly controversial, simply a survey of where in the NT the references are to be found.Achar Sva (talk) 02:15, 13 January 2022 (UTC)

Was the Epistle of James written by someone else in his name?

In fact, the Epistle of James is traditionally attributed to James the brother of Jesus and not was written by someone else in his name; and about the Epistle of Jude is traditionally attributed to Jude the apostle, and not an unknown author borrowing the name of the brother of Jesus. I think this paragraph requires additional references or check if the writing agrees with the sources given:

Most scholars believe that James was written by someone else in his name (it first appears in a citation by [[Origen c.227),[41] and there is widespread, although not unanimous, support for the view that Jude was composed in the early part of the 2nd century by an unknown author borrowing the name of the brother of Jesus.[42] --Rafaelosornio (talk) 04:56, 13 January 2022 (UTC)

I don't pretend to know anything about this subject. I think it's worth mentioning the two epistles, as they do at the least bear the names of two of the brethren, but it needs to be kept brief - this article isn't the place to enter into discussions of authenticity. What I'd like to do is have some subsections on each of the named brethren (and maybe the sisters), and this para could be split and placed in those. So, put it in the to-do basket for now. Achar Sva (talk) 06:10, 13 January 2022 (UTC)

With the brothers, it is relatively easy. Jesus' sisters are not named in the Gospels. Dimadick (talk) 08:39, 13 January 2022 (UTC)

For the sisters I want to do a subsection saying exactly that and then surveying the later traditions (within reason of course). Achar Sva (talk) 10:26, 13 January 2022 (UTC)

New Testament references

I rewrote this section because I felt it needed to focus more on the brothers themselves, and less on the passages of scripture where they're mentioned. I haven't introduced any new material or sources, but I've shortened a little to make the section more readable - we need to remember that we're catering to an audience which probably knows little or nothing and wants no more than a broad introduction. Comments welcome. Achar Sva (talk) 08:36, 25 January 2022 (UTC)

This family tree from Frontline is wrong - it says Joseph was Jesus' father

I'm sure it doesn't mean to say Joseph was Jesus's father, but it does. We need a better source.Achar Sva (talk) 08:34, 3 February 2022 (UTC)

Mary

Joseph

Clopas

another Mary

Jesus

James d. 62

Joses

Simon

sister

sister

Jude

Simeon successor to James as head of the Jerusalem Church d. 106

?

?

Bishop Judah Kyriakos fl. c. 148–49

You seem to be taking it as self-evident that this is an error, rather than a conscious choice. Agricolae (talk) 16:01, 3 February 2022 (UTC)

The charge that Frontline is wrong is meaningless without historical (not Biblical) evidence that someone besides Joseph was Jesus' father. Sundayclose (talk) 18:33, 3 February 2022 (UTC)

If we talk about historical evidence there you have Eusebius of Caesarea or many others, it would be important to see what the other historians say. You already take for granted that there is no historical evidence that Joseph was not the father of Jesus, that is just your personal opinion. If we follow your personal opinion, there is also no historical evidence that Joseph was the father of Jesus. As far as I know, just we have biblical evidence but not historical evidence. Rafaelosornio (talk) 19:43, 3 February 2022 (UTC)

If you see the table in the link, clauses a,b,c,d are the sources they use to say that Joseph was the father of Jesus. These clauses correspond to Mark 6:3, Matthew 13:55, Galatians 1:19, Mark 15:40. The only thing they used to say that Jesus was the son of Joseph was pure biblical evidence. (Although in reality Joseph was the putative father of Jesus) Perhaps the table is wrong. Rafaelosornio (talk) 20:03, 3 February 2022 (UTC)

Perhaps the table doesn't reflect the authors' beliefs, perhaps it does. It is not uncommon for published genealogical charts to have errors, and it is also not uncommon for genealogical charts to intentionally contain controversial material that is not well documented in the chart (or even in the accompanying text). I don't think we can presume what their intent was based on what we see on the Frontline site - yes, it only cites biblical verses, but you can't exactly cite 'human reproductive biology' (if that is their reasoning). I can't see the original work online to tell whether they even discuss the question, or perhaps attribute their charted reconstruction from another source. Obviously, if it clearly is an error - if the text directly contradicts the chart - then we don't want to propagate that error, but if it is just a question of the reconstruction disagreeing with certain dogma, that is not sufficient reason to reject it when it is presented as an example of how 'some' view it rather than as a consensus, and it might better represent the full diversity of opinion to include such a non-parthenogenesis viewpoint among those shown. Agricolae (talk) 20:58, 3 February 2022 (UTC)

Siblings would be more accurate

I had read somewhere that JoN had siblings, both brothers and sisters, so wanted to find out more. Found this article's title imprecise in that regard with the sisters getting lumped in as brothers in the copy. An effect of cultural practices combined with lack of historical data, I get it. Still feel the subject positioning is a bit lopsided. Title: Siblings of Jesus (Greek word) This would help the writers structure the article and would help readers not steeped in Christianity (many ethnic Christians included in this category) to find the article. OrangeCounty (talk) 12:31, 7 February 2022 (UTC)

Siblings of Jesus already redirects here, so finding the article isn't really an issue that this proposed name change would help. Agricolae (talk) 13:42, 7 February 2022 (UTC)

OK, agreed. And I realized that reason wasn't super well supported after posting as I had found the article without too much trouble. Face-palm. I'll stick to a simpler issue and that is the article conveys information about what is known about sibling relations generally to include both sexes. So Brothers as the focus causes the writer to struggle and to this reader seems an unnecessary distinction. OrangeCounty (talk) 16:45, 7 February 2022 (UTC)

Hong Xiuquan

Maybe mention the guy somewhere.