Mrs. Jesus
Earth-shattering news in biblical archeology:
JERUSALEM (AP) — Scripture scholars on Tuesday announced the discovery of a tattered but still legible Post-it Note that is at least 3,000 years old and appears to be a shopping list that includes the words “thick cut Canadian bacon” among the items.
The provenance and authorship of the list was uncertain and shrouded in mystery. But scholars say that if authentic, the document could upend the history of Jewish dietary laws and raise serious doubts about the authority of sacred scripture.
Wow.
Oh yes, and there was another interesting discovery today — a tiny papyrus fragment, maybe just possibly from the third century, of unknown ownership and provenance, that seems to be a “gospel” in which Jesus talks about his wife and says she could be a “disciple.” The good news, of course, is that at least he didn’t say she could be a priest.
From the NYT report about Karen King’s announcement, delivered in a paper in Rome at a Coptic scholars conference at the Augustinianum:
The provenance of the papyrus fragment is a mystery, and its owner has asked to remain anonymous. Until Tuesday, Dr. King had shown the fragment to only a small circle of experts in papyrology and Coptic linguistics, who concluded that it is most likely not a forgery. But she and her collaborators say they are eager for more scholars to weigh in and perhaps upend their conclusions.
Look, it isn’t like they unearthed a video of Jesus talking to a bunch of fundraisers. I don’t think it’s a game-changer for biblical studies and church teaching on celibacy. But still, ya know.
Interesting.
Does anyone really believe that Jesus was NOT married? His parents circumcized him, redeemed him, taught him Torah, and taught him a trade. Why would anyone think they would neglect the fifth of their duties and fail to arrange a marriage for him? (If parents were unable to provide a spouse for a son who had reached the age of 18, the community stepped in and did it.)
(Also interesting, imho, is that you felt the need to introduce the news item with mockery about bacon, etc. Is the notion of a first-century Jew being married as ludicrous as the notion of an Israelite eating pig meat?)
Gerelyn: We’ve already had this conversation on this blog, where, as you might remember, many said they really believe that Jesus was not married. When asked for some evidence that he was not, you did not produce anything other than the argument you advance here, which a good number of us do not find at all convincing.
Thanks, Joe. I am one of that “many” who believe that he was not married. And I, like you, find Gerelyn’s argument quite unconvincing
The NYTimes is on quite a roll. First the Ed Board inscrutably decides that it’s got both the moral authority and theological competence to assess which groups within the Catholic Church are more authentically living the Gospel: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/18/opinion/speaking-the-truth-to-the-vatican.html
Then it publishes this story that seems more in the vein of Newsweek’s recent series of deliberately provocative cover stories. From where I sit, this should barely register as a blip. It’s a fourth century Coptic manuscript of unknown origin that purports to contradict nearly every other text from the early Christian community… my (admittedly dilettantish) prediction is that most serious Scripture scholars will shrug and pay it little attention. Certainly not so much as the Times suggests.
In my view, one of the most persuasive pieces of evidence of Christ’s divinity is the fact that he doesn’t have a wife.
I can’t think of any mortal man who founded a viable religious movement without a wife behind him.
Abraham had one wife plus Hagar. Mohammed had about 11 wives. Brigham Young had as many as 50.
I have no opinion on this “finding”, not b/c I am for it or against it, or sceptical or not, but because for me it does not matter. Jesus, married or not married. I am saying what does it matter? What would change? That Jesus lived, taught about the kingdom of God, and gathered disciples around him who were convinced of his message. Jesus intuited that he was the son of god, and died with integrity and full submission to the will of his Father – why is the marriage question important and what would it really change?
There is too much at stake in the current status quo to EVER pursue the possible truth behind this claim. Just think of the ramifications. Just think of the sturm und drang. Just think of having to spin this to: “As the church has always taught …..”
Just think of the crowing and preening by Dan Brown!!!!!!
Whether this is true or not will never be seriously investigated by Catholicism.
Holloway, what it would change is how Christ-like celibate clergy could feel. For me, it would not change a thing. The reason for celibacy — do the history — has nothing to do with whether Jesus was married or not, but with problems with inheritance. Peter was married, apparently, and there is Biblical evidence for that, rather off-handed, as it happens. Pity Mother Church is so hung up on sexual matters.
prediction is that most serious Scripture scholars will shrug and pay it little attention
Michael Bayer,
Here’s a nice brief video of Karen King discussing the fragment and and a clear image of it.
Are New Testament scholars going to consider this an important find that will tell them anything about Jesus? No. But it certainly seems to me to be a significant find for scholars interested in Christianity in the second half of the second century.
Gerelyn: We’ve already had this conversation on this blog, where, as you might remember, many said they really believe that Jesus was not married. When asked for some evidence that he was not, you did not produce anything other than the argument you advance here, which a good number of us do not find at all convincing.
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Hi, Joseph!
No reason to avoid a topic because it’s been discussed before. I like talking about Jesus’ wife, siblings, descendants, etc., just as you like posting again and again about Augustine. (A woman hater.)
Not sure what you mean in your second sentence. (Typo? Freudian slip?) I haven’t provided evidence that Jesus “was not” married, because I think/believe he was. I think he married at 18 and worked as a carpenter until he laid down his tools and devoted himself to preaching and healing.
There’s a wealth of scholarship about the culture in which Jesus lived, was circumcized, was redeemed, learned to swim, learned Torah, learned a trade, married, worked at his trade, preached in the synagogue, etc. There are some, of course, who ignore, deny, distort aspects of Jewish and Christian history to buttress their anti-women prejudices, protect their livelihoods, etc.
Well, surely the bias isn’t all on one side…
You’re right: the second sentence was mistakenly written.
I’d love to be referred to the scholarship about Jesus’ learning to swim. I suspect it’s not any more impressive than the evidence that he married which, as far as you’ve let us know, amounts to the fact that males in his culture commonly married.
My point about this having been discussed before was not designed to forestall another discussion, but to remind you that you had evidence that there were people who really believe that he was not married.
Hi, Joseph!
I’ve just been reading the comments at Huff. You’re right! There are those who agree with you that Jesus could not have married. E.g., timcasto at 6:53:
that is one of the most stupidist things that anybody could put on the internet. why because Jesus was a rabi and rabis did not get married. so if you want to put good stories on here make sure you have all the knowledge, and put on here the good things that Jesus has done for us, and dont be stupid the next time
—–
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/18/the-gospel-of-jesus-wife_n_1891325.html?1347990916&icid=maing-grid10%7Chtmlws-main-bb%7Cdl1%7Csec1_lnk1%26pLid%3D207267
http://www.google.com/#hl=en&sugexp=les%3B&gs_nf=1&gs_mss=duties%20of%20a%20je&cp=50&gs_id=5i&xhr=t&q=duties+of+a+jewish+father+to+teach+his+son+to+swim&pf=p&output=search&sclient=psy-ab&oq=duties+of+a+jewish+father+to+teach+his+son+to+swim&gs_l=&pbx=1&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_qf.&fp=aadcb7321e3e3f6f&biw=1187&bih=512
(Four million leads to information about “duties of a Jewish father to teach his son to swim”.)
Do you think Joseph did not teach his sons to swim?
Finds like this are always interesting (to me) and important. I think, though, that when newspapers treat them as above-the-fold interesting and important, it is often because they anticipate drawing the attention of readers who are compelled by a desire to gain a richer knowledge of the historical Jesus–and that is something that won’t be gained from this fragment.
The media could always draw attention instead to what we can gain from these sorts of fragments, which involves the social and literary developments of early Christianity (and I think that that is a subject entirely more interesting than anything about the historical Jesus). It’s to the credit of Goodstein that she lets King (who is hardly a “I’ve got Jesus’ brother-in-law’s ossuary!” kind of scholar) point out why the papyrus is interesting, instead of trying to make the fragment’s importance reside in its quality as “proof” of something. (Nevertheless, my facebook feed has exploded with links to the article from people who otherwise don’t really go in for textual studies)
I’d be ok with a married Jesus. For me it wouldn’t detract from his divinity – it’s not as if he didn’t have any earthly loves and friendships, and he was in most ways the opposite of the ascetic Essenes. This reminds me of the Church’s insistance that Jesus had no sublungs in order to bolster the idea that Mary was a perpetual virgin.
Speculating about Jesus’ “lost years” (from the finding in the Temple at age 12 to the time he started his ministry at age 30) is interesting, and writers better than Dan Brown have done it. Anthony Burgess’ “Man of Nazareth” speculates that Jesus was married and began his ministry after his wife died. Burgess made it clear he was writing only as an agnostic trying to make sense of the Gospel by filling in details from what he could glean about the life of a typical working-class Jew in Jesus’ time.
Such speculation is interesting, but I don’t believe Jesus was a “typical” Jew. If, at 12, he had learned to argue with scriptural scholars and sass his parents as he does in Scripture, I find it entirely believable that he was already on an atypical path, perhaps not likely to marry, perhaps even unmarriageable due to his religious fervor. His mother tried to rein him in by sending his “brothers” to remonstrate with him. Then he went ape all over the money-lenders. All of that, imo, points to an individual who was outside the norms of his society in several ways.
What is interesting to me is that this fragment comes from the Coptic community, who to this day are orthodox Catholics and who are rooted in the Catholic/Orthodox tradition (i.e. they are not like a quasi-Gnostic branch of Christianity).
Now, no doubt the Copts also had Gnostic offshoots. At the same time, reconstructing this period is important insofar about what it reveals about the communities understanding of the role of women in the church. We know that the role of women, then as now, was contested in the early Church.
This fragment is a bit later than any of the gospels but still, it shows some alternative readings and interpretations of the life of Jesus.
If further research is uncovered about Jesus calling and sending women apostles or disciples, and if it can be shown that, women exercised ministry in the community at the time, then the Church needs to seriously re-examine the basis for excluding women as priests as clearly there is evidence that it has not always been the tradition in the Church.
George D writes:
“If further research is uncovered about Jesus calling and sending women apostles or disciples, and if it can be shown that, women exercised ministry in the community at the time, then the Church needs to seriously re-examine the basis for excluding women as priests as clearly there is evidence that it has not always been the tradition in the Church.”
And if such research and evidence of women’s role is not found, then we maintain the exclusionary teaching regarding women?
The historically conditioned argument seems to cut both ways. That is a problem, I think. A kind of biblical originalism.
If you really want to be shocked check out the Infancy Gospel of Thomas. A young Jesus kills other children who spill his water or accidentally bump into him:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infancy_Gospel_of_Thomas
Pretty brutal Saviour. Does that bother anyone? Or everyone is okay with Jesus doing that?
What is so intriguing is how we know so little about the first three centuries of Christianity. We know more about Caesar and Cicero than we know about Jesus. Since the hierarchy presided over the preservation of documents since there was no other comparable scholarship around, deception does point to the bishops. With the obvious striking from the record of so many deeds of women in the church it is remarkable that what we have is retained. For example, at the end of Romans it is obvious that Paul is referrng to some very prominent women in leadership positions. And Apollos in Acts 18:26 is clearly learning from women. “and he began to speak out boldly in the synagogue. But when Priscilla and Aquila heard him, they took him aside and explained to him the way of God more accurately.” Mary Magdalene is the first at the resurrection while the woman at the well proclaims Jesus to the Samaritans. Junia is clearly an apostle.
So women are clearly prominent in the NT. It is just that the patriarchs did not allow this recognition.
Having said that it is clear that Paul was not married. So why not the same with Jesus?
At any rate, the discussion is interesting as we await clarification of the discovery.
And if such research and evidence of women’s role is not found, then we maintain the exclusionary teaching regarding women?
No, because in one case the role of women fits naturally in the cultural norms of the time and can be understood as simply the result of the customs that prevailed then, but in the other case it breaks the mold, presumably intentionally, and may have some meaning.
And among those 4,400,000 sites, is there one about Jesus’ learning to swim? I have no idea whether he was taught to swim, and you’ve given me no reason to think that he did. I don’t know anything about what Joseph taught Jesus. We don’t even know when Joseph died…. I don’t have much of a problem with people fantasizing about those hidden years; after all, the Gnostics did it all the time. Next to their imaginings, the Gospels are downright sober reports.
Here’s a draft of a Harvard Theological Review piece on the fragment: http://www.hds.harvard.edu/sites/hds.harvard.edu/files/attachments/faculty-research/research-projects/the-gospel-of-jesuss-wife/29813/King_JesusSaidToThem_draft_0917.pdf.
As when the Da Vinci Code came out, I’m intrigued by the vehemence that the subject of Jesus’ possible marriage elicits. After all, the first-written gospel begins with Jesus’ baptism, not his earlier life at all. When Paul, writing the first canonical Christian texts, describes celibacy, he uses himself as an example, not Jesus. Curious. Not definitive. But the whole topic of Jesus’ early life in Scripture is either
[Oops--hit the wrong button...]
The whole topic of Jesus’ early adult life in Scripture is basically skipped over. Again–curious.
I admit I loved the Da Vinci Code. Not as a work of theological scholarship, which it never claimed to be, but as a way of opening up conversations about how we imagine Jesus in his pre-ministry life. So perhaps here again. Why on earth would anyone think less of Jesus, like us in all things but sin, if he were married? If he were a father? What is undignified, or unGodly, for that matter, about loving a spouse or a family?
The idea of human offspring of the divine Savior starts a lot of hares running… hereditary divinity anyone? A sinless race by the flesh? Yes, I would have a problem with this.
“hereditary divinity anyone? A sinless race by the flesh? Yes, I would have a problem with this.”
Well, they’d only be half sinless unless Jesus’ wife was also sinless. Unless the sinless gene was dominant. (And as a former Unitarian, I thought I’d heard just about every possible permutation about the nature and life of Christ anybody could dream up.)
I hate to revert to my happy dumb state on this topic, but I believe Jesus was the incarnation of God made flesh, that he loved us and suffered because of us, and that in forgiving us for killing him, he saved us all.
God gave us everything necessary to salvation in Scripture and holy tradition. You may want to know whether Jesus had a wife, or learned to swim before he could walk on water, or whether he did rough carpentry or cabinet work and whether he was any good at it–and maybe those things will be revealed. But probably not in this life.
As our old priest used to say, a mystery is something that invites us to enter into deeper communion with God. It’s not a problem to be solved so somebody can be right.
For those who didn’t see, The Atlantic has weighed in:
http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2012/09/the-bible-refers-to-jesus-wife-too/262545/#
That Jesus has a Bride has been known as a matter of fundamental doctrine for 2000 years now.
And it is a far more interesting, far more astounding in its implications, far more revealing about who and what God is and who and what we humans are, and a far more dynamic spousal relationship than any of the frankly quite boring and tedious theories of Jesus having this person or that person for a wife, having kids, etc., reducing Him to merely some average, run of the mill guy who had a few useful teachings, rather than Someone who is life-changing. To paraphrase Flannery O’Connor, if that is the kind of guy Jesus was, to hell with it.
This is what I know about the Infancy of Jesus.
One day he came back from school, and for his snack his mother gave him a slice of bread with chocolate. But he saw a child who was hungry and gave him his snack. He went back inside and told his mother he was still hungry, and she gave him some bread and cream. But he saw another child who was hungry and gave him his snack. He went back inside and told his mother he was still hungry, and she gave him some bread and cheese. But he saw yet another child who was hungry and gave him his snack. He went back inside and told his mother he was still hungry, but she refused to give him more to eat and told him he’d have to wait until dinner. And so Jesus went without a snack.
That rings much more true to me than the Infancy Gospel of Thomas.
Why would the possibility that Jesus married or had children necessarily *”reduce him to merely some average, run of the mill guy who had a few useful teachings, rather than Someone who is life-changing.”* ?
He had other human relationships …. a mom, friends that he loved like Martha, Mary and Lazarus, a disciple he was so close to that he gained the nickname “the beloved disciple”, and siblings if you believe the gospels … none of those relationships reduced him in any way.
“whether he did rough carpentry or cabinet work”
A carpenter at the time of Joseph and Sons was more of a general contractor, more likely to work in tile and stone, readily available and easily affordable. Jesus probably spent most of his “hidden” life working on the massive construction site at Sepphoris. (The tile portrait of the “Mona Lisa of the Galilee” may have been his work. Maybe a picture of his wife.)
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/religion/jesus/sepphoris.html
If Jesus was a sexual being in a relationship, the better argument to be made, based on the earliest evidence, is that he was gay. But that’s not likely to gain much traction, for a number of reasons, not least of which is that — as Schweitzer et al always said — we like to make Jesus in our own image. And that would be a straight middle class married guy in the ‘burbs with a couple of kids. “Oh my God! Jesus was just like US!” That must make us pretty divine…
If Jesus was “gay”, he still would have been married.
Interesting how close to the surface hatred and fear of women is in some (many? most?) men. In the other thread, e.g., see the coarse references to Henny Youngman and Rodney Dangerfield.
And in this thread, see the comment by a man who can’t imagine Jesus “reducing” himself by having a wife.
I’m with Crystal and David G. on this one. Whether Jesus worked in stone or wood, whether he walked on water or swam in it, whether he liked his eggs sunny-side up, whether he gave his cheese sandwich to another kid, or whether he thought Jerry Lewis was a comedy genius–all of these are our own attempts to remake Jesus in our own image.
If I were staging the story where Martha comes in to bitch out her sister for not helping in the kitchen, Jesus would get up and say, “Martha, you worry too much, so you don’t see what’s imporatn.” And he would take the dish towel from her, move into the kitchen to help with the clean up as he continued teaching. That runs counter to rules of hospitality and gender roles at the time of Jesus. But Jesus did a lot of surprising things, so it could have happened that way. And it’s my story and I’m stickin’ to it.
A friend once suggested that Scripture invites us in in the same way Shakespeare does. Because there’s so much missing.
“Interesting how close to the surface hatred and fear of women is in some (many? most?) men.”
I am more than willing to buy into the notion that male scholars injected holy tradition (probably unwittingly because that’s how most men do things) with misogynistic attitudes.
However, PBS shows and a recently-discovered fragment of papyrus are not proof that Jesus was married, had children, and the priesthood of the RCC is founded entirely on lies and conspiracies.
Cuz I think that’s where this is going.
I’ve just always found it interesting that when people (like Mother Teresa) give up worldly possessions, we call them saints. When they give up sex we call them nuts. Hey, if Jesus had been married and we had some evidence of that, cool. It would shake up a lot of stuff. But we seem to selectively highlight things — that are put out there in a very deliberate PR way, with no scholarly review (blowback sequence is already starting) — that fit our worldview. It’s the same dynamic that allows Paul Ryan to claim Jesus as a libertarian.
That said, yes, I am a man and I am terrified of the vagina, which is natural given all those teeth.
I was understandably relieved when Naomi Wolf’s unauthorized biography of her privates was given the treatment by a women, Toni Bentley:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/16/books/review/vagina-a-new-biography-by-naomi-wolf.html?pagewanted=all
David G., this is one of the truest and funniest things I have ever read. When I got to the thump at the dump, I laughed so much I started wheezing and had to get out my inhaler.
Jean, it really is great. I mean, there’s nothing better than a great negative review, and the New Yorker does them (of movies and everything) better than any place. But this was damned fine, I thought.
Then again, I’m a misogynist. So I would like it…
I’ve just always found it interesting that when people (like Mother Teresa) give up worldly possessions, we call them saints. When they give up sex we call them nuts.
When people give up worldly possessions, other people get to enjoy them in their place. If they gave up their possessions, not by giving them away, but by destroying them, we would also call them nuts.
(I started reading that review in the NYT the other day, but it was too long and too predictable.)
Jonathan Turley joins you in mockery, David. But even your bacon was better than this limp attempt.
http://jonathanturley.org/2012/09/19/a-marriage-made-in-heaven-ancient-papyrus-fragment-refers-to-jesus-wife/
David, it’s not just a negative review, but does readers, particularly women readers, a service for blasting Wolf for shoddy scholarship, for trying to flog life into some tired ideas, and generally obfuscating understanding about female sexuality by perpetuating the notion that it’s mysterious and complicated, requires a lot of special props (flowers, candles, music, eye-contact)–all of which makes it sound like too much trouble as far as men are concerned, and a bunch of disengaged, discouraged-before-they-start partners are hardly conducive to the sexual happiness of heterosexual women.
How in hell did we get to this on this thread, anyway??
Good points, Jean.
Claire, interesting comment. But I think it is about what we choose to renounce. Under your reasoning, the better path would be to make money in order to give it away. When you renounce material things you have nothing to give to others except yourself; you are not destroying worldy possessions because you don’t have any to destroy. Similarly, with celibacy, it’s often said that with no spouse and kids (and no draining discouraging regimen for pleasuring Naomi Wolf to distract us) one can devote oneself more to serving others.
I don’t want to be seen as encouraging people that the physical is bad and ascetic is good. But is it a matter of “giving up” (money, sex, stuff) or a matter of moving on to embrace something else which renders the others unnecessary?
‘…one of the most persuasive pieces of evidence of Christ’s divinity is the fact that he doesn’t have a wife.’
Geez, and I would have thought rising from the dead was something only God could accomplish. I know plenty of bachelors and I’m pretty sure none of them are gods.
David, it’s a tangent, but when on Ash Wednesday the priests recap what Lent is for, their explanation of sacrificing material things is primarily to give them to other people who can benefit from them. It’s for sharing. Their explanation of fasting is to be of one mind with those who go hungry perforce because they’re poor; they usually try to link the two by suggesting donations to the poor of amounts equivalent to what is saved by fasting. Generosity, sharing, and solidarity: they are relatively clear motives that can be respected even by non-religious people.
But I have yet to hear a homily suggesting that we should give up sex for Lent. Just imagine!…
Maybe that’s an idea for the Vatican: after the Year of Faith, how about a Year of No Sex?
Claire, frankly I’d opt for the Yer of No Sex over the evangelical megachurchy promotion of sexing up your man 365 days a year. Yeah. Google it.
How about another approach to “giving things up”? I have nothing against moderate asceticism, but I prefer greatly the idea that we measure all spiritual practices according to whether they help us to become better people, more joyful, loving, kind, just, etc. In sum–more free to be Christians.
E.g., in Franciscan tradition, as I read it, poverty isn’t merely the “giving up” of stuff, no matter how extreme. Poverty should create joyful gratitude (“All is gift!”) solidarity (the rich and the poor share their stuff,) and freedom from the burdens of stewardship, where such stewardship is, in fact, burdensome. (Not all possessions or relationships are burdensome.)
So–it is not clear to me at all that celibacy in fact makes people more available for service, unless such is measured crudely in terms of hours per day. Some are simply made selfish. Likewise, evangelical poverty may or may not yield that Franciscan harvest. It depends on the individual, the practice and the community, as with every other spiritual practice.
“But I have yet to hear a homily suggesting that we should give up sex for Lent.”
Isn’t sex included as a proscribed activity on Abstinence Fridays? That’s what we were told in RCIA: One meal, no booze, no sweets, no sex, no cigs. We were also told that weddings are not supposed to be scheduled in Lent because of the no-sex rule.
The Times article says, “She [Professor King] repeatedly cautioned that this fragment should not be taken as proof that Jesus, the historical person, was actually married. The text was probably written centuries after Jesus lived, and all other early, historically reliable Christian literature is silent on the question, she said.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/19/us/historian-says-piece-of-papyrus-refers-to-jesus-wife.html?hp
All she claims, supported by other expert papyrologists and Coptic linguists, is that the fragment is very likely a genuine document from the fourth century, not a late forgery. That does not mean that what it says is true. Or false.
Bill Mazzella, Aquila is a male name, and so is Junias (according to Origen).
In the traditions about the Buddha, his wife is mentioned rarely. One could read thousands of pages of the Pali Canon without suspecting that he was married and a father.
The traditions about Jesus are less voluminous, and they are simply silent about his marital status. If his lifestyle seems that of an unmarried man, so does that of Peter and the other apostles. Yet we know that Peter was married.
Sam Kinison had a hilarious routine that proves that Jesus was not married. Language a bit rough…..but funny.
“Isn’t sex included as a proscribed activity on Abstinence Fridays? That’s what we were told in RCIA: One meal, no booze, no sweets, no sex, no cigs.”
In my pastoral opinion, they need a good, penitential kick in the dupa.
The following statement from the US bishops refers specifically to days of fasting and abstinence during Lent, but notice how those terms are defined: “Ash Wednesday and Good Friday are obligatory days of universal fast and abstinence. Fasting is obligatory for all who have completed their 18th year and have not yet reached their 60th year. Fasting allows a person to eat one full meal. Two smaller meals may be taken, not to equal one full meal. Abstinence (from meat) is obligatory for all who have reached their 14th year”
http://www.usccb.org/prayer-and-worship/liturgical-resources/lent/catholic-information-on-lenten-fast-and-abstinence.cfm
Canon 1250 from the Code of Canon Law notes that we are expected to observe Fridays throughout the year as days of penance. Canon 1249 notes, “The divine law binds all the Christian faithful to do penance each in his or her own way.” I spend many Fridays watching the Chicago Cubs as a form of self-mortification.
OK, well, must be just a tradition in the local parish, Jim. Also leaves me with one less rule I have to feel guilty for not following (though there are so many many others that I doubt that’s going to make a lot of difference …)
From the Jewish Virtual Library:
Marriage is vitally important in Judaism. Refraining from marriage is not considered holy, as it is in some other religions. On the contrary, it is considered unnatural. The Talmud says that an unmarried man is constantly thinking of sin. The Talmud tells of a rabbi who was introduced to a young unmarried rabbi. The older rabbi told the younger one not to come into his presence again until he was married.
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Judaism/marriage.html
Claire, if someone gives up sex, the person’s sexual partner is indeed available for somebody else.
Gerelyn, your confidence that Judaism is unchanged and unchanging, and that on the basis of Judaism today we can deduce sure facts about Jesus, is touching.
Saint Paul didn’t know how to swim, and he was a Jew.
Jean, I very much like your summary of the core truth of salvation, and I’m with you and David both when you point out that making Jesus out to be just like us is, well, a temptation to be resisted.
Gerelyn, your confidence that Judaism is unchanged and unchanging, and that on the basis of Judaism today we can deduce sure facts about Jesus, is touching.
I’ve said nothing about deducing “sure facts about Jesus” based on “Judaism today”.
Explain why you felt the need to say something so odd/untruthful.
I think that the gospels are silent on the physical appearance of Jesus so that we can see him in others, whether they are white or black, short or tall. Maybe they are silent on his marital status so that we can see him in other people, whether they are married or single. It is maybe unfortunate that they are not silent on his gender.
Saint Paul didn’t know how to swim, and he was a Jew.
–Rita
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42 The soldiers planned to kill the prisoners to prevent any of them from swimming away and escaping. 43 But the centurion wanted to spare Paul’s life and kept them from carrying out their plan. He ordered those who could swim to jump overboard first and get to land. 44 The rest were to get there on planks or on other pieces of the ship. In this way everyone reached land safely.
–Acts 27
So did St. Paul swim or float in on a plank?! I need to know ASAP cuz my faith in Holy Tradition and Scripture is riding on this.
Q.: Why did the soldiers plan to kill the prisoners?
A.: To prevent them from swimming away.
Q.: Why did the centurion prevent the soldiers from carrying out their plan?
A.: To save Paul’s life.
Q.: If Paul could not swim, why would the centurion bother putting a stop to a plan designed to prevent swimmers from escaping?
A.:
Jean — Take your pick. The most significant contribution of the King fragment to modern thought to date has been to reveal the readiness of a great many people to argue to definitive conclusions on the basis of the absence of evidence.
In the absence of evidence to the contrary, I believe line 4 was ]……” Jesus said to them, “My wife is a fiction invented by my enemies to mislead you about what I do in my spare time.” Unfortunately, the ancients didn’t use helpful scare quotes as many do today.
Lacking all words that began and ended 8 lines of text and, therefore, lacking clear antecedents (referents) of me, my, it, them, she, me, and her, we have no information whatsoever from the fragment about who “she”, the potential disciple, is, much less about that odd swelling up of people. Maybe the picture will change when we find out how old the ink is.
Jack – in case you didn’t catch Jon Stewart last night, he provides some alternative possible readings.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/21/jon-stewart-jesus-wife-video_n_1903105.html?utm_hp_ref=comedy