Was Jesus a philosopher?
- yes
- no
- maybe
0
voters
Well was he? If so, how so? If not, why not? I know this is a bit ambiguous, let’s try and disambiguate it.
Well, first we must define what it means to be a philosopher.
I would say that a philosopher is one who seeks knowledge. Jesus claimed to have had knowledge, so he wasn’t doing much searching. I would categorize Jesus as more of a preacher, and not as much of a philosopher in that aspect.
Is a philosophy teacher a philosopher because he teaches, or because of what he himself adds on to the bowl of understanding in what’s required for him to get a PhD? I’d say that a philosophy teacher is a preacher when he teaches, and a philosopher when he himself searches for new knowledge. In this regard, I define a philosopher one who not only seeks to learn what’s been said before(i.e. smoke the whole bowl), but one who also seeks to further add to it. In a way, scientists are the new philosophers.
He was a wisdom teacher. He taught in parables designed to challenge conventional wisdom and provoke thought and action. He also taught a simple way of living not unlike that of the cynics.
But what causes one to seek knowledge?
Dissonance. One perceives a conflict and needs a kind of solution, so information is sought that will rearrange one’s beliefs into a coherent, satisfactory whole. That way, a person can act without experiencing any tension at the thought that they are not acting righteously.
I would say Jesus was a philosopher. Although their appears to be a point where he “had all the answers”, I am guessing he still found issues that he had to think try to find answers to.
I agree with what Felix says, he was a wisdom teacher. That is what one is once they have developed a coherent interpretation of the world that suggests simple, clear suggestions on how one should act in certain situations, and begin spreading this interpretation to others in order to help the community.
Jesus was a philosopher, just not a very good one (if you believe what he apparently said). Either 1) he knew the truth and lied, or 2) he didn’t know the truth at all.
What exactly was the big deal about Jesus anyway? I know it’s supposed to be about believing and faith and all that, but I’ve just never had any need to. I know the basic story I think, but even as a small child I was always very sure that there were inconsistencies in the things I heard about him. I think my first confrontation with bad reasoning came to me in sunday school as a very young child. I remember being thouroughly confused.
This need for disambiguation seems to be one of my biggest hang-ups on the whole Jesus mythos. It is not just whether or not he was a philosopher, but plainly- who was he? I do not know that I trust the church as a reliable source. I do not dismiss what is said on whim; yet I certainly don’t feel that swallowing wholesale what is being presented is the only alternative. This has reduced most claims of Jesus to mere speculation for me.
So I voted maybe.
-anthony-
Before we pass judgment on the merits of Jesus’ teaching we would actually have to examine what he said and did. That’s something that hasn’t been attempted at ILP since I’ve been participating here. Say what you will to criticize, Jesus’ teaching have been one of the most important sources of hope, inspiration and ethics for over 2000 years. He taught and modeled compassion in a way that changed the course of history. Even though many of us would agree that most of his followers have not lived up to the standard he set, the traditional account of his life and words is still with us if anybody wants to pick it up and run with it.
I believe Deleuze and Guattari best summed up what a philosopher is: one who creates ideas and concepts. In that respect, Jesus was a philosopher. In the idea of Western philosophy (especially that which begins with Plato and ends with Hegel), no he wasn’t. In a few instances, people refer to him as a Rabbi, a “great one.” If we think of Rabbinic Judaism (which began after the fall of the Second Temple in 70 CE), we would also see that the rabbis (and subsequent Judaism) arose out of the school of Pharisees that were running around shortly after the Maccabean revolt in the 2nd century BCE. I don’t think it is a coincidence that people called Jesus the same thing that they later called the descendants of the Pharisees. Why? Because Rabbinic Judaism never solved anything (look at the Mishnah, Midrash, and Talmuds): it was all about the dialog. In other words, “theology” wasn’t about defining a system that would last all ages but rather about “keeping the conversation going.”
Oops!
Was he a terrorist?
He was born in Palestine right?
But he was born a Jew?
Is that some sort of racist comment?
=D>
Who isn’t a philosopher?
Raven.
Someone who doesn’t love wisdom.
If the Bible was historically accurate about the life of Jesus, then I’d agree that he was a good philosopher…but how many of his philosophies are actually his philosophies?
I would be interested to see how many of Jesus philosophies could be found in earlier texts…
Mm, I picked no. Seems to me that a philosopher is looking up at something bigger than him and trying to figure it out. Jesus is portrayed as being the presented of things that we then try to figure out. I bet some of the apostles were philosophers, though, or went on to be.
Actually very few. In fact, most of the philosophy and theology that centered around the Christian cult in that era was pretty novel. We do have instances of the Essenes starting to reinterpret the Hebrew Bible in a messianic way, but that is not really taken up by Judaism in general until the 3rd-4th century CE. Rabbi Akiba is one of the earliest proponents of this and the Mishnah actually makes reference to him as being “in the wrong.” It is after the Mishnah is written, but before the Talmud is compiled that we see this trend appear. Alain Badiou has a great book on Paul’s philosophy (titled Saint Paul: The Foundation of Universalism) and how it was a truly unique (anti-)philosophy that mixed both Jewish and Greek thought to form a third, unique substance.
If we think about the late antiquity period in Judaism, it is important to note that the “Pharisees” in the Christian texts were actually highly progressive compared to their Sadduccee and Essene counterparts. They did believe in the resurrection of the dead, as well as some others that do seep into Christianity before it reciprocates into Judaism as a whole (and this is largely because Rabbinic Judaism developed out of the Pharisees).