And here is part 2
Paul’s Efforts to Explain the Death of Jesus
It is also a believable scenario that such a person would run afoul of the powers that be and end up nailed to a cross. For those who thought of him as the Messiah or something like that this would have been a disaster. What happened to the Kingdom of God? And what about the Romans?
I see Paul going to great lengths to turn this disaster on its head and make it a victory instead. He grabs bits and pieces from here and there to turn the death of the supposed Messiah into an intentional self-sacrifice for the forgiveness of sins. Jesus is the blood sacrifice to forgive sins, Jesus is the Passover Lamb sacrifice, Jesus is the first fruits sacrifice.
However:
The blood sacrifice in Exodus 29 is for consecration of a priest. The blood sacrifice in Leviticus 4 is for the forgiveness of unintentional violation of one of the many mitzvoth. Both are performed by a priest according to very precise ritual. Nether involves a male lamb.
The Passover sacrifice, the strongest of Paul’s images, is not a sin atonement sacrifice
Sacrifices of any kind can only be performed by a priest who follows certain precise rules. They are performed in the Temple and must be painless and not involve mutilation.
Human sacrifice is strictly forbidden. So is cannibalism. So is drinking any kind of blood.
If Paul were introducing the idea that Jesus was crucified and that this was a sin atonement sacrifice, his audience would have thought he was insane. But if they already knew that Jesus was crucified and were troubled by it, Paul’s explanation would have been welcomed, as improbable as it might sound to anyone else.
If there had not been an unexpected and disastrous crucifixion of a real historic Jesus, why would any explanation at all be needed, and why would such a collection of lame excuses be so taken to heart?
The Empty Tomb
All the Gospels, even individualist John, agree that the tomb in which Jesus was laid was found to be empty and that stranger(s) said that Jesus rose from the dead and went someplace. They all have creatively divergent versions of what happened next, each according to his own agenda. But if the empty tomb were just a story, why such an unimaginative and suspicious sounding one? A risen Jesus would be proof that such a thing is possible and that the apocalyptic expectations of an imminent eschaton were justified. If the story were woven from whole cloth why not a really dramatic resurrection event with lots of witnesses? Later apocryphal accounts do offer such elaborate stories. But those nearest in time to the alleged event do not. When Jesus rising from the dead would take some of the sting out of Jesus getting killed, an empty tomb and a stranger’s strange story would not be all that surprising.
The Evolution of Parousia
Paul, and Jesus followers in general, seem to expect the eschaton to happen any day now. By the time Mark wrote his Gospel sometime after 70 CE, people were worried. If we take the death of Jesus to be about 30 CE and Mark writing not too long after 70 CE, those who heard Jesus would be getting old.
Mark introduces the idea that the appearance of Daniel’s Son of Man and the universal judgment would happen within the lifetime of some of the people who heard the living Jesus speak. He then has the destruction of Jerusalem be the signal that the Son of Man was about to arrive. In this way he revives hope in that fading expectation.
Matthew, writing 80 CE or so, continues Mark’s Olivet Discourse / immediate Son of Man meme but hedges his bet a little by adding that no one knows just when that will be. Luke, writing even after that, also includes the Olivet Discourse but adds his own hedge in the form of the parable of the king who has traveled to a far land and not yet returned. When he returns those who were unfaithful to him are killed, surprisingly bloodthirsty for the usually mild mannered Luke. Luke also introduces an idea not clearly presented in prior Gospels, that of reward or punishment immediately after death as in the story of Lazarus and the Rich Man.
John omits the Olivet Discourse entirely and makes no mention of any immediate expectations. Jesus will return but when? John subtly shifts the emphasis from a horizontal timeline to a vertical viewpoint – Jesus re-joining his Father in heaven from whence he came. John’s Gospel seems to end with chapter 20. Chapter 21 appears to even be presented as additional material. It refers to the previous story as originating from the ‘beloved disciple’ (traditionally called John) who has apparently died. The idea of Jesus returning before his last hearer passed away is turned inside out. It turns out Jesus never said any such thing. It was a misunderstanding!
Luke in Acts, written sometime down the road, has an even cleverer explanation. It is not that Jesus himself will return soon but the Holy Spirit will endow the church with heavenly authority. In Acts this happens on Pentecost a matter of months after Jesus is crucified. Jesus is off the hook timeline-wise and can stay away as long as he wants. That Luke in his own Gospel ties the highly visible return of Jesus in the clouds with angels to the same timeframe expectations as Mark and Matthew does not seem to bother him at all.
John of Patmos, author of Revelation, wants to reinstate the original short timeline belief. But instead of just mentioning it almost in passing, he builds an elaborate and exotic prophesy about the end of the world with the signs of its immediate arrival being veiled references to events that have already happened. His conscious adoption of the style and framework of Daniel, the origin of the Son of Man meme brings immediate apocalyptic expectations back around full circle.
This ongoing evolution of presentation makes sense if it is intended to explain and re-explain the passage of time since what was perceived as a historic event at a certain point in time.
The credible historic context, the credible original message of Jesus in the context of the times, Paul’s efforts to explain the death of Jesus, the empty tomb and the evolution of
parousia all suggest to me that a real historic Jesus is more likely than not.