The gospels as well were accounts written by men who did not know Jesus directly, and the desire to promote a religious ideal and to help shape the emerging church makes some of these suspect. Many existing writings and stores were brought together in the form we know today long after Jesus died, as was true of many of the Jewish writings cited by Powell, from the Babylonian Talmud. Much of what is known of the historical Jesus derives from the Epistles in the New Testament, notably the letters written by Paul, who has much to say about the teachings of Jesus as known at that time. These accounts have great value because they were written so early, some two decades before the gospels.
Also of great interest is the section Powell writes on how different sources are judged as to authenticity. He notes that writings such as the gospels are suspect because it is clear that they were written so the writers could convey what they wanted to say, which might not match with historical reality. Another way of putting this is that these writers were not themselves historians and had a different agenda than the objective historian.
Powell recognizes that there is no one portrait of Jesus that is accepted and that serves as the historical Jesus. His analysis shows the history of historical attention given to Jesus and some of the sources and methods used to develop different portraits of the man. He offers an in-depth discussion of six major historical accounts, offered by historians John Dominic Crossan, Marcus J. Borg, E.P. Sanders, John P. Meier, N.T. Wright, and the Jesus Seminar, a group founded in 1985 that has produced noteworthy and controversial writings on Jesus as a historical figure.
Before offering an analysis of these specific versions of the story of Jesus, however, he notes some of the trends and the images of Jesus produced by historians. Some agree with Horsely that Jesus was a prophet and fits in the prophetic tradition. Geza Vermes offers the view of Jesus as a Charismatic Jew, a holy man in the Jewish tradition more than a seminal figure in a new religious vision. Morton Smith sees Jesus as a magician, producing controversial miracles that gained followers and created disbelievers at one and the same time. Ben Witherington III sees...
Jesus' Teachings, Prayer, & Christian Life "He (Jesus) Took the Bread. Giving Thanks Broke it. And gave it to his Disciples, saying, 'This is my Body, which is given to you.'" At Elevation time, during Catholic Mass, the priest establishes a mandate for Christian Living. Historically, at the Last Supper, Christ used bread and wine as a supreme metaphor for the rest of our lives. Jesus was in turmoil. He was
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