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The Problem With Christ
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Thanks David. Did your friend make any attempt to distinguish christos and basilieu, or did he simply state that they were different? I have found that the scholars I have spoken with consistently conflate Christos and Christ, and messiah and messia, unless explicitly pushed into a corner. (I would not want to offend your friend but his title and subtitle, at least seems on the surface to do that.)(Edit:I now see it was his professor.)In English Christ means Jesus. Jesus implies king, but king does not imply Jesus is a true statement. That christos and basilieu imply each other can be demonstrated to any open minded person by the way they were used in both biblical and extra-biblical sources. New ones keep coming to light all the time. The quote at the head of chap.3 was brought to my attention after the ebook was published; the one at the end of #246, just last week.
Most people understand that Pharaoh is a peculiar word that means king, so there is no need to translate it. Few today see the same meaning in christos, so it must be.
I have delineated what I believe the fine point of distinction is. Christos implies legitimacy. What do you (and the rest of you) believe is the qualitative difference between christos and basilieu (and messia for that matter)that renders king untenable as a translation?
I think you misunderstand, my friend did not write the book I linked to, his prof did. The book supports your view that Christ is not a name.My friend just moved back from Scotland, started a new job and bought a house so he didn't have much time to respond in any substantial way. Heck, he even missed the fantasy football draft!
I think your Lactantius quote makes sense - Christ is a title of power and dominion, it is what the Jews called their kings. But there are lots of "kings" who aren't "Christs". To merely equate the two is to empty Christ of some of his grandeur; he is not just a king or the king, he is the king of kings.
I don't think "king" is an untenable translation. Like I've said over and over, I just think it is not a silver bullet and translating it king will lead to other questions and probably other blind spots. Whatever word you use needs to be explained well and understood.
My goof David, I realized when I reread your post that it was his prof. I was hoping my edit made it before you read my post. Oh well. :-(I think we are inching closer to understanding each other. I finally see that you are saying "king" is not untenable. So I guess my next question is (I hope all readers will jump in here) can you suggest a better one?
I still see a problem in your third paragraph (#255). It is not your fault, it is inherent in the fact that I am dependent on other's translations for the quotes I am giving. I presume that Lactantius used the word christos rather than Christ.
Again (sigh) the English dictionary, Greek reference, and text books, and common usage all treat the English word "Christ" as a name which means NOTHING more than "Jesus." After all our discussion, in which (I now see) you agree; you still do the same when you say "To merely equate the two is to empty Christ of some of his grandeur..."
This (I trust) unrealized conflation of christos and Christ is what is causing the dissonance. What you should say (IMHO) is "...to empty Jesus of some of his grandeur..." Please give me an example of a king who was not a christos in the Greek sense.
In the quote by Pseudo Clement we find that he equates pharaohs, caesars, and arsaces with christoi. He does NOT equate them with Jesus whom he places ontologically higher.
Yes Jesus IS king of kings and lord of lords. Interestingly that terminology is never used in reference to His direct subjects. It is addressed to his conquered foes who preside over their own nations. There is no statement that I have been able to find in the N.T. which addresses Jesus as our king if we exclude the term christos!!! Yet the common complaint of His and His followers enemies is that they were proclaiming another king. Where is that proclamation if we remove the word christos?
Christopher, now that I have received the hard copy of your book from CreateSpace, I read it again and I thought I'd give you a synopsis of my current thinking.(1) I think you did a good job of relating Christ to Mashiach (messiah) and relating how this often denoted king to the Jews.
(2) I'm not convinced by your argument dismissing BDAG's contention (or Vines for that matter) that Christ was used both as a title and as a proper name. Looking for a gradual progression in the usage of the word in the NT to me is a straw man test. I think it was naturally used by the gentiles as a title and a name right away because "anointed" was such an odd title in Greek. To me having christos as both name and title does not diminish the significance of Christ's kingship.
(3) I am distressed by how much weight and urgency you put on making the transition from Christ to king. By labeling the current state as a deception of the enemy, it becomes (to my mind) a false dichotomy -- either be obedient and make the transition or keep the current usage and aid the enemy's stratagem (am I misreading this?).
(4) The name Christ has forever changed our language. When you say the word, people know who you are talking about (even if the don't know the origin of the word). Replacing that word with "king" would cause us to lose so much. Think of all the books, poems, hymns, songs that would become meaningless if you succeeded. It would cause a major detrimental break with our past.
So where does that leave me? I think I'm with that group you footnoted on page 65 (footnote 43). Your delineation of christos is most helpful, but I can fully appreciate his kingship without deleting Christ from the NT or from our literature. I plan on using the word Christ as both a proper name and as a title, imbuing it with all the significance of it's usage history.
I mentioned your book to my friend who just finished his PHD in New Testament. Ironically, one of his profs wrote a book showing that "Christ" was not seen as a name:
http://www.amazon.com/Christ-among-Me...
It is quite pricy though.
He also said what I have been thinking the whole time - Christ and King are not merely interchangeable; Christ implies King but king does not imply Christ. This is why i think there would be problems in simply taking two different Greek words with all their nuance and shades of meaning (basileus and christos) and translating both king, end of story.