In an account of Philo (In Flaccum 6.36–41), which is often cited in the interpretations of Mark, the pagan populace of Alexandria dressed up a certain Carabas as a mock king, and “young men carrying rods on their shoulders as spearmen stood on either side of him in imitation of a bodyguard.” In Mark 10:35–37, when James and John ask Jesus to allow them to sit, one at his right and the other at his left, their request implies closest participation in his royal glory. The seats to the right and the left of the king are of the highest rank and honor after the king (see, e.g., 2 Sam 16:6; 1 Kgs 22:19; Ezra 4:29). The most plausible explanation of the Golgotha scene is accordingly that the Romans considered Jesus to be the leader of the men crucified with him.20
Bermejo-Rubio, Fernando. They Suffered under Pontius Pilate: Jewish Anti-Roman Resistance and the Crosses at Golgotha (p. 345). Lexington Books. Kindle Edition.
Bermejo-Rubio, Fernando. They Suffered under Pontius Pilate: Jewish Anti-Roman Resistance and the Crosses at Golgotha (p. 345). Lexington Books. Kindle Edition.
The incongruities of the Passion accounts, the vestiges of a different report in which the arrest was carried out by the Romans, the convergent evidence of an anti-Roman stance in Jesus’ group, the collective nature of the execution at Golgotha, and the reasonable surmise that the prefect had information sources at his disposal are elements that, taken all together, make exceedingly unlikely—not to say incredible—the bulk of the Gospel narratives. And when the apologetic and polemical interests of the first Christians in fashioning those accounts in order to exonerate the Romans and blame the Jews are added, the critical reader should adopt a most skeptical stance toward the extant sources. Irrespective of whether that reshaping was carried out in good conscience or not, the obvious result is an unmistakable distortion of the actual events. Such an odd state of affairs, however, triggers the historian to think about it and to advance a most compelling hypothesis.1 Fortunately, the surviving traces of an alternative story allow us to provide a by far more likely historical reconstruction.
Bermejo-Rubio, Fernando. They Suffered under Pontius Pilate: Jewish Anti-Roman Resistance and the Crosses at Golgotha (p. 355). Lexington Books. Kindle Edition.
Bermejo-Rubio, Fernando. They Suffered under Pontius Pilate: Jewish Anti-Roman Resistance and the Crosses at Golgotha (p. 355). Lexington Books. Kindle Edition.
In fact, the evidence to condemn Jesus and the other men must have been, from an imperial perspective, overwhelming. Since opposition to the Empire can be drawn from several aspects of the Gospel story, if there is a meaningful question to be posed about Jesus’ death it is not why was he crucified but which, among the many reasons why he could be crucified (preaching of an imminent kingdom, royal claim, opposition to payment of tribute, hostility to the Herodian ruler, incident in Jerusalem surrounded by an armed entourage . . . ), had the greatest influence on the decision of the Roman prefect.14 To search for another reason for his crucifixion is a sort of intellectual conjuring trick that violates all sound reasoning and spreads confusion.
As we have seen, a lot of convergent evidence indicates that Jesus was condemned by Pilate because of his subversive activity, and in the first place for his kingly-messianic claim. Unlike many scholars’ fanciful pretense, he was not condemned for “speaking truth to power”; nor was he executed by accident, just because he inadvertently got caught up in a riot that had nothing to with his plans. His claim entailed a crimen maiestatis, or attack against the authority of the emperor and the Roman people, in the specific kind of aspiration to royal power. The ironical usage of the titulus crucis “king of the Jews” makes sense only if it reflects a claim actually harbored by him.
Bermejo-Rubio, Fernando. They Suffered under Pontius Pilate: Jewish Anti-Roman Resistance and the Crosses at Golgotha (pp. 363-364). Lexington Books. Kindle Edition.
As we have seen, a lot of convergent evidence indicates that Jesus was condemned by Pilate because of his subversive activity, and in the first place for his kingly-messianic claim. Unlike many scholars’ fanciful pretense, he was not condemned for “speaking truth to power”; nor was he executed by accident, just because he inadvertently got caught up in a riot that had nothing to with his plans. His claim entailed a crimen maiestatis, or attack against the authority of the emperor and the Roman people, in the specific kind of aspiration to royal power. The ironical usage of the titulus crucis “king of the Jews” makes sense only if it reflects a claim actually harbored by him.
Bermejo-Rubio, Fernando. They Suffered under Pontius Pilate: Jewish Anti-Roman Resistance and the Crosses at Golgotha (pp. 363-364). Lexington Books. Kindle Edition.
Jesus’ central role was emphasized by the explanatory tabella that, according to the Gospels, was put on his cross, identifying him as “king of the Jews.” Mark does not say a word about who prepared the titulus, but in this section of the account the subjects of the actions are soldiers; they would have prepared the inscription, of course, upon the orders of the prefect. It is important to emphasize this point, because most scholars go on endorsing the Gospel Passion narratives, according to which “king” was not a self-designation of Jesus but an epithet exclusively hurled at him by outsiders.
Bermejo-Rubio, Fernando. They Suffered under Pontius Pilate: Jewish Anti-Roman Resistance and the Crosses at Golgotha (pp. 366-367). Lexington Books. Kindle Edition.
Bermejo-Rubio, Fernando. They Suffered under Pontius Pilate: Jewish Anti-Roman Resistance and the Crosses at Golgotha (pp. 366-367). Lexington Books. Kindle Edition.
Perhaps I'll simply say what I said over 10 years ago - to a post on FRDB:
.... ''public' knowledge. Because without that the gospel story could not run. Literary invention, if it contains a re-telling of public knowledge in a creative storyline, has a far better chance of success than pure imagination. Being able to connect the dots has more going for it than a storyline with no obvious beginning, no connection to what is publicly known. So, a man is crucified. The story tells about the notice above his cross - King of the Jews. And public knowledge will lead where? To a carpenter from wherever who had notions above himself? That story can lead to only one place in history. Antigonus in 37 b.c. - and to that Herodian Jew who paid a Roman assassin. ''
Bermejo-Rubio is keeping alive the seditious Jesus gospel elements. The seditious elements are there - the question now is whether they belong to a supposed historical Jesus (for which there is no historical evidence) or are they simply a reflection of prior history. If this is the case, then the gospel writers were not denying past history in their endeavour to promote a Prince of Peace aspect to the gospel literary Jesus figure. After all, sedition would get one hung on a cross - for gospel writers, those days were gone, they were over. They wanted to tell a different story without denying the past. Hope for a Hasmonean kingdom was not on the table. A Davidic type messiah figure, a Man of War, would have to give way to the reality of Roman occupation - and a Prince of Peace messiah figure could be viewed as a way forward.
Bermejo-Rubio needs to keep wearing his historians cap but start to think outside the assumed historical Jesus box. Achieving all he has achieved with identifying the seditious gospel elements - these elements are useless unless the rebel against Rome can be named, can be identified. That is impossible to do for any variant of the assumed historical Jesus. The gospel seditious elements don't establish historicity for the gospel Jesus. These seditious elements are reflecting past, not present history under Pilate and Tiberius. The historian cannot confine himself to the box that is the gospel Jesus story.
Statistics: Posted by maryhelena — Thu Feb 15, 2024 8:52 am