Jesus and the Emperor Cult – Some Background Info

This is part 2 of my series of posts on adoptionist Christology in early Christianity. This post will focus on the Roman imperial cult and how Jesus can be seen as an alternative to emperor worship, with his narratives being modeled after stories of the emperor.

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As we saw in Part 1 of this series, there are notable similarities between the depictions of Jesus and those of the Roman emperor. In many ways it appears that Mark was modeling his baptism narrative, after a coronation ceremony of the emperor or king [1] It was also briefly mentioned that Jesus was seen by many followers as well as many pagans, as being in direct competition with worship of the emperor. As Ferguson notes, the Greco-Roman ruler cult is of particular importance to the study of early Christianity, “because it formed the focal point of the early church’s conflict with paganism.” [2]

The Development of the Ruler Cult

Following his assassination in 42 BCE, Julius Caesar was retroactively deified by decree of the Roman senate and was granted the title, Divus Iulius (the divine Julius). With his father becoming deified as ‘the god of Rome,’ Octavian, the adopted son of Caesar, assumed the title divi filius (son of god). [3]

After the deification of Caesar, both Antony and Octavian worked to promote the cult of the divine Julius which laid the framework for what would become the Roman Imperial cult (or emperor cult).

The emperor cult of Rome was greatly influenced by the Greeks who, beginning with Alexander the Great, provided the foundations for the divine monarchy of the west.

The Egyptian belief in the divinity of the Pharaoh also plays a role in leading to the development of the Roman ruler cult. The Pharaoh was believed by the Egyptians to have assumed divine status in some sense. Not necessarily in the sense that he himself was divine, but that he was the recipient of a divine office by the gods. Still, the claims of his divine status were taken very seriously by the Egyptians and he was certainly not seen as a mortal.

Even for the Yahweh cult, the king of Israel was recognized to be god’s adopted son at the moment of his enthronement ceremony. This is demonstrated in Psalm 2.7 where David is adopted as God’s son. Even in 2 Samuel 7 there is evidence of this theme:

12 When your days are fulfilled and you lie down with your ancestors, I will raise up your offspring after you, who shall come forth from your body, and I will establish his kingdom. 13 He shall build a house for my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. 14 I will be a father to him, and he shall be a son to me. […] 15 But I will not take my steadfast love from him […] 16 Your house and your kingdom shall be made sure forever before me; your throne shall be established forever. (2 Samuel 7.12-16)

There God is making a clear commitment to David that his family line will always be in God’s favor, and that his sons will rule as king and be the sons of God. It is for this reason that it was so important for Matthew and Luke to establish Jesus’ connection to the Davidic line.

From here it seems very likely that the Roman enthronement ceremony was influenced in part by the Egyptian, Judean, and Greek concepts of divine kingship. For after Octavian, it became through that family line that the emperor would come. To be the son of god from there on literally meant to be the son of the emperor. This is the same mode by which the Davidic line and the king of Israel was established. [4] This is crucial to understanding Jesus as a divine son of god and the messiah.

Before we continue, we need to further establish characteristics of the ruler cults and the story of Jesus, beginning with birth narratives and miracle stories.

Birth Narratives & Miracle Stories

Following the death of Alexander, all his divine titles (Pharaoh, King, etc.) were given to his successors, the Ptolemies and the Seleucids. While they were viewed and respected as gods, they obviously could not act as gods with any supernatural abilities to show for. Since miracle stories at the time did not circulate for kings, they had to manufacture them. This also served as a method legitimizing their rule. Other modes of legitimizing a king’s claim included faking genealogies, and creating miraculous birth narratives. [5]

Both Matthew and Luke, when trying to establish Jesus as a divine son of god and the Jewish messiah, modeled their narratives, not only after Old Testament infancy narratives of Israeli heroes, but also after biographies of Hellenistic heroes. However, one thing to note is that the ancients did not believe that these heroes were the sons of god because it said so on a birth certificate, but because of the “extraordinary qualities of their adult lives.” Thus, the infancy narratives about these perceived ‘miraculous’ heroes, were composed later in their life or after their death.

With that we can deduce that Matthew and Luke are using the same literary tools already in play in the Greco-Roman era to depict Jesus as a ‘miraculous hero’ by giving him a miraculous infancy narrative like the other heroes.

There are a few key characteristics of these Hellenistic birth stories. Notice how these are all at play in the infancy stories in the New Testament. [7]

#1. They were in some way fathered by a god, making them the son of god. (Matt. 1.18, Luke 1.34-35)

#2. They usually begin with a genealogy that traces the individual back to a deity or a royal family. These were pretty much all fake genealogies as well. (Matt. 1.1-17)

#3. There is an announcement from a god (in ancient Judaism, angels were seen as lower tier gods [5]) in which the parents learn about the divine nature and destiny of their new child. (Luke 1.26-38)

#4. There are descriptions of signs that mark the birth of the of the child. (Matt. 2.2, 2.9)

Again it is clear that both Luke and Matthew used the literary techniques of Greek myths and well known writings when writing their own. By that they could justify Jesus as being the son of god, and a miraculous individual. [8]

Summary

So that’s a little background information. To summarize: After his assassination in 44 BCE, Julius Caesar was declared god of Rome, given the title Divus Iulius. During his lifetime, Caesar had adopted Gaius Octavius (Octavian, later Augustus) as his son making him his successor. Octavian then assumed the title Divi Filius, or son of god. From there the successor to the throne became the son of the emperor, also making him the son of god. This was the case for the Roman empire or which Israel was under the rule of, during Jesus’ lifetime. The baptism story in Mark can well be interpreted as an enthronement ceremony of the emperor where he was made the son of god. In the Mark however it is Jesus’ baptism that makes him the son of god.

The infancy stories about Jesus in Matthew and Luke are best understood as posthumous in their composition, modeled after miraculous birth stories of Jewish and Greek heroes. These stories use the literary devices of well known Greek stories and are employed as a way to justify Jesus’ titles of ‘messiah’ and ‘son of god.’

The next post will directly focus on comparing narratives of the emperor with narratives of Jesus and how the worship of Jesus can be seen as a challenge or alternative to the emperor cult.

References:

[1] for an extensive commentary on this, see Michael Peppard’s article “The Eagle and the Dove: Roman Imperial Sonship and the Baptism of Jesus” in New Testament Studies 56

[2] see Everett Ferguson’s Backgrounds of Early Christianity ch. 3 pp. 185

[3] see Dio Cassius, Roman History book 44

[4] to get a comprehensive survey of ancient concepts of divine kingship in Egypt, Syria, Judah, and Greece, see John and Adela Collins’ book King and Messiah as Son of God ch. 1 pp. 1-24

[5] Ferguson, pp. 190-191

[6] see Bart Ehrman, The New Testament pp. 63

[7] see Robert J. Miller’s Born Divine pp. 133-144

[8] Dennis MacDonald has a great section in his book Mythologizing Jesus: From Jewish Teacher to Epic Hero in which he shows the literary borrowing of Luke from The Homeric Hymn of Aphrodite. Here he displays a side by side analysis of the announcement of the birth of Jesus and the announcement of the birth of Aeneas.

[9] see Dio Cassius, History of Rome book 45

–M

2015 Favorites

Here’s a list of my favorite; books, tv, movies, and music of 2015.

Favorite Books–

Son of God in the Roman World by Michael Peppard

How Jesus Became God by Bart Ehrman

New Testament History and Literature by Dale Martin

Jesus: A Revolutionary Biography by John Dominic Crossan

Reading the Bible Again for the First Time by Marcus Borg

Misquoting Jesus by Bart Ehrman

King and Messiah as Son of God by John and Adela Collins

Born Divine by Robert J. Miller

Favorite Movies–

(note these are movies I watched for the first time in 2015. I don’t think I actually saw a single movie in theaters this year)

Insidious

Insidious II

The Babadook

The Conjuring

The Caller

From Jesus to Christ (Documentary)

that’s all i can think off for movies…I didn’t watch too many new (to me) movies.

Favorite TV Shows–

Pretty Little Liars

Supergirl

Scream: The TV Series

Scream Queens

Scandal

Once Upon A Time

Favorite Songs–

Sorry – Justin Bieber

What Do You Mean (remix) – Justin Bieber ft. Ariana Grande

The Feeling – Justin Bieber

Life is Worth Living – Justin Bieber

Adore – Ariana Grande

Decayer –Blessthefall

Drown – Bring Me The Horizon

The Sky is Falling – Even If It Kills Me

Communion of the Cursed – Ice Nine Kills

Satellite – All Time Low

We Like It Loud – Sleeping With Sirens

Kick Me – Sleeping With Sirens

Just Like You – Falling In Reverse

Could Have Been Me – The Struts

The Fourth of July – Fall Out Boy

LA Devotee – Panic! At the Disco

Hallelujah – Panic! At the Disco

2015 “Fight For Love” Mashup – Andy Wu

Jesus as a Greco-Roman Demigod

While reading Bart Ehrman’s New Testament textbook for Dale Martin’s Open Yale Course, Intro to the New Testament, I learned an interesting piece of information. While I’m sure I had learned this prior, I clearly had forgotten it. This would have been useful as a small point in my paper on adoptionism.

In Greco-Roman religions, people worshiped multiple gods. There were pretty much gods for everything from gods of the harvest to gods of foodstuffs, Penates. With that however, there was a hierarchy of gods in terms of which gods were seen as the most important. Note that this does not necessarily mean the most divine. The lower tier gods were still far greater than anything humans could comprehend, but what was different about them was their direct interaction with human affairs.

The hierarchy can be understood as a sort of ‘divine pyramid’ which Ehrman does in his book. On the top you have ‘the one god’ which was understood to be either Zeus (Greek) or Jupiter (the Roman version of Zeus), or some all-powerful unknown god who is beyond human comprehension. This should not be mistaken to mean that the one god was thought of in the same sense that God is thought of in modern Judaism and Christianity.

Below the one god, were ‘the great gods,’ the ‘Daimonia,’ and local gods, and then finally, ‘divine beings, demigods, immortals, and heroes.’ (Technically below that is humans). The last tier is what the rest of this post will focus on.

I will pause for a moment to stress that when studying the New Testament, and Jesus, context is crucial. Using anachronistic approaches to try and turn Jesus into something he was not is not history, that’s theology. Now that that’s out of the way…

The lowest tier of gods in Greco-Roman religions, we’ll call them ‘Division 4’ for simplicity, essentially bridged the gap between mortals and gods. This tier included great heroes such as Heracles, who was thought of as being too great to be human and thus seen as divine in some sense. It also included great rulers such as Alexander the great. The Roman emperor too was see in this light. Of that, Ehrman writes:

He [the emperor] was not the one God, or even one of the Olympians. Indeed from the divine perspective he was very much a subordinate. But from the human point of view, he was fantastically powerful, himself divine, and for some inhabitants of the empire worthy of worship and praise. (Ehrman, pp. 48)

This is important for understanding the emperor cult which I will explore in a later post in relation to Jesus.

The D4 gods were also made up of demigods, individuals who were said to have been produced by the union of a god and a mortal. Also in D4 were humans who were divinized after their death and made immortal. Typically this was done for great men, philosophers, great warriors, and the like whose earthly actions were so extraordinary that it won them special favor from the gods and at thus they were exalted to a divine plane.

Those last two are especially important in terms of understanding Jesus. Jesus was a Jew in the Roman empire and as such his followers would have understood the polytheism of the empire and the levels of divinity. With that in mind, Pagans would have heard stories about Jesus and would have no trouble understanding them in this context. There was nothing special about a son of God in the Roman empire, there were many. There was nothing special in the Roman empire about a man produced from a divine father (God) and a mortal (Mary), there were numerous demigods. It’s not to say that Jesus was simply a copy of other divinities such as Dionysus, but more accurately that he was simply another one of those existing models. As I noted in earlier post, it is entirely likely that Christianity emerged as a mystery cult religion blending Hellenistic elements with Jewish elements. Mystery cults were popular during the New Testament era and share many characteristics with Christianity; a focus on individual salvation, belief in an afterlife, ritual meals, a savior god etc.

Seen in this Greco-Roman context, we can understand Jesus as a Division 4 god, on par with the emperor, Heracles, and Romulus. Simply put, Jesus can be understood as a Greco-Roman divine being who was believed by his followers to be a great man who’s deed placed him in a divine category. He was believed to have been divinized by god after his death. After his death, his followers and fans created infancy narratives about him (as was common among Greek divinities) to further legitimize his divine status. The stories (Matthew 1, Luke 1-2) were modeled after other well known Greek traditions and established him as a demigod since he was made from the union of a divine force and Mary.

While this is probably nothing new to anyone in the field of New Testament studies (and by probably, I mean it’s not new at all) it is certainly knew to me. I have had pieces of this that I have subscribed to but this is really the first time I have put them all together and stepped back to see what it all means. I now have a very different understanding of Jesus as a religious icon. Note this all has to do with Jesus as his followers understood him after his death. This is not the historical Jesus who despite my dabbling with Jesus Seminar writings I still maintain was an apocalyptic prophet.

For those think that this somehow makes Jesus less or dumbs down his religious significance, I assure you it does not. In the Roman empire, while D4 gods were certainly subordinate to the great gods or the one god, this does not diminish their status as divine beings. They were viewed with high respect and were worshiped and praised for their greatness. Jesus fits right into this mold and it is not a bad place to be at all.

–M

Tips for Beginning New Testament Studies

Recently, while discussing my studies to someone, I was asked “where do you even start with all that?” Interesting question. I have long been interested in Biblical studies and last year really began exploring the field. When I was younger I used to love watching documentaries about early Christianity, the development of the Christian canon, books “banned” from the Bible, the life of the historical Jesus, etc. I was a big fan of The Bible series that aired on the History channel a few years back. I’ve also now read several books in the field of NT studies and have taken a class on the Bible, Christian history and theology, and the relationship between Jews and Christians from antiquity to the present. So for me, it sort of evolved over time.

But for people who know absolutely nothing about the Bible (no, weekly Church attendance and daily devotions don’t count) I do have a few recommendations. Obviously I’m still an undergrad and am myself trying to sort everything out. Yet if I had to go back in time and start from the beginning, knowing what I do now (admittedly not very much in the grand scheme) I would suggest doing it this way:

Before you jump into scholarship, historical method and the wide world of New Testament studies, read Marcus Borg’s Reading the Bible Again for the First Time. This is a fantastic book to begin seeing the Bible in context and understanding the text in a deeper light, rather than just taking it at face value. Borg thoroughly in an easy to read fashion explains the origins of the Bible, and places it in its’ literary and social context. Before diving into scholarship and ideas about the Bible that may seem radical to some, read this.

Post Borg, move onto Dale Martin’s book New Testament History and Literature. Dr. Martin is a great writer for the general public and does an excellent job breaking down scholarship in way that is easy for laypeople and undergrads to understand. I would also recommend Bart Ehrman’s New Testament: A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings as a companion to Martin’s book. The two will overlap a lot, but Ehrman’s is far more in depth while still being easily accessible for laypeople. Martin’s book is a wonderful introduction to NT and will give you a great understanding.

Next, I highly recommend Ehrman’s Jesus Interrupted. This serves as a very good summary of scholarship on the New Testament. If you want to get up to speed on what the mainstream consensus is in NT scholarship, this is the book to go to. Again, it is written for a public audience so it’s very easy to read and follow.

For a contextual understanding of the New Testament, James Jeffers’ The Greco-Roman World of the New Testament Era is great for a beginning understanding. It deals with the social and political situations present during the first century in which the New Testament was written. The book explores daily life in 1st century Palestine, and how certain passages reflect societal themes. To truly understand the world in which the New Testament came from, this is a great read. Also, Everett Ferguson’s Backgrounds of Early Christianity is perhaps the best book to go to for undergrads and laypeople. It provides a comprehensive survey of the setting in which Christianity arose. It covers the history of Rome, Roman political, philosophy, the Dead Sea Scrolls, Judaism in the Roman empire…pretty much everything. Read these two books and you’ll have a firm understanding of NT era.

Once you get a good understanding the New Testament, its’ context, and good foundational understanding of mainstream scholarship, I would suggest looking at ntgateway.com. The website is edited by Mark Goodacre, a professor of NT at Duke. This is a great collection of resources to use to study the New Testament and is divided by topic. There are tons of links to really good articles, reviews, intro materials, and documentaries on topics related to the New Testament such as; the historical Jesus, the gospels, the synoptic problem, Paul, textual criticism, etc. I use this site frequently and find it great for finding references for papers. Dr. Goodacre also has a podcast where he breaks down a topic pertaining to NT studies in each episode. They are generally pretty short, around 15-30 minutes long.

From there I would say all that’s left is really diving into the material head on. By now there have been a ton of ideas and lots of scholarship thrown at you, and something is sure to have caught your attention. At that point you’re best researching what peaked your interest and using good discernment to select the best works on those various topics. To give an example, some of the earliest topics I researched were; historical Jesus studies, studies in early Christology patterns, the literary genre of the gospels.

It would also be good after Jesus Interrupted, to perhaps start reading some scholarly commentaries on the books of the New Testament. Try to avoid devotional style commentaries as they tend to be more theological and less historical. For a scholarly, yet accessible commentary series, I’ve heard great things about The Anchor Yale Bible Commentaries. NT commentaries are something I really I wish I had done immediately. To this day I still have yet to read commentaries on most of the NT (John, the Epistles, Revelation). So I would definitely, in hindsight, suggest doing that. For a more intense and scholarly commentary series, Hermeneia is topnotch.

So that’s about it. As I said, from there just run with that catches your interest. New Testament studies are full of fascinating topics to explore. This is not how I did it, but looking back, this is how I wish I had done it.

–M

Paul’s Use of the Life of Adam and Eve

Tonight I stumbled on something very interesting. While pruising through the internet I came across a few references in 2 Corinthians that appear to reference the pseudepigraphal text, The Life of Adam and Eve.

In this text we get a very different account of Adam and Eve from what is included in the book of Genesis. The story begins after their expulsion from paradise. Eve suggests to Adam that he go find food, hoping that God might have mercy on them and bring them back into the garden. So for seven days Adam journeys to find food, but finds nothing like what they had in paradise. Then Eve suggests that maybe Adam should kill her, thinking that God would then at least allow Adam back into paradise since it was because of Eve that he was kicked out in the first place. Adam declines.

So next Adam comes up with an idea, and suggests that he and Eve show penitence, in hopes that God would appreciate their penitence and give them “something by which we might live.” Adam proposes that the two stand in water up to their necks for an extended period of time to show penitence. Adam decides to stand in the Jordan river for 40 days, but tells Eve to stand in the Tigris for only 37 days because she is weaker than him.

After eighteen days, Satan, who was observing, got pissed off and disguised himself as an angel and went off to tempt eve yet again.

9.1 Eighteen days passed. Then Satan grew angry and transfigured himself into the brilliance of an angel and went off to the Tigris River to Eve.
9.2 He found her weeping, and then, the Devil himself, as if mourning with her began to weep and said to her: “Come out of the water and rest and weep no longer. Cease now from your sadness and lamenting. Why are you uneasy, you and your husband Adam? 9.3 The Lord God has heard your lamenting and accepted your penitence. All of us
angels have pleaded for you, praying to the Lord,
9.4 and he sent me to lead you forth from the water and to give you the nourishment which you had in paradise and for which you have grieved.
9.5 Now, therefore, come out of the water and I will lead you to the place where your food is prepared.”

Eve of course is fooled by the devil, who is disguised as an angel, and agrees to get out of the water and runs to Adam. When Adam sees her he doesn’t see the angel, but the Satan and he asks how she could have been fooled yet again. Eve then realizes what had happened and begins to cry out of shame.

Eve asks Satan why he is so adamant about persecuting them. Satan reveals that it was because of Adam that he was cast out of heaven, and thus he is working out of revenge to cast Adam and Eve out of the garden.

There is a bit more to the text, but the important part is the passage where it described the devil transfiguring himself as an angel. As I noted, while browsing the internet, I came across a post that posed that Paul actually makes a casual reference to this story, or a tradition similar to it at least, in 2 Corinthians 11.

Two passages are of note here:

for I promised you in marriage to one husband, to present you as a chaste virgin to Christ. 3 But I am afraid that as the serpent deceived Eve by its cunning, your thoughts will be led astray from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ. ––2 Corinthians 11.2-3

So here in 2 Cor. 11, Paul is talking about false apostles. Verses 2-3 references Satan deceiving eve as an example to beware of false apostles. Now, nothing there has any indication Paul is familiar with the Life of Adam and Eve. Paul could simply be referring to the Genesis account.

What is possibly a reference to the Life of Adam and Eve, is later on in verses 13-15.

13 For such boasters are false apostles, deceitful workers, disguising themselves as apostles of Christ. 14 And no wonder! Even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. 15 So it is not strange if his ministers also disguise themselves as ministers of righteousness. Their end will match their deeds. ––2 Corinthians 11.13-15

Here Paul states that Satan transfigured himself as an angel just as it is written in the Life of Adam of Eve. No where in the Genesis account does it say that Satan disguised himself as an angel. So clearly Paul must be either a) creating his own interpretation or b) referencing the Life of Adam and Eve (or a similar tradition).

Another possible reference to the Life of Adam of Eve by Paul is in 2 Corinthians 12.2.

2 I know a person in Christ who fourteen years ago was caught up to the third heaven—whether in the body or out of the body I do not know; God knows.

Till now we have been dealing with the Latin translation of the text. There are other variants however, in Slavonic, and in Greek. In the Greek text, known as The Apocalypse of Moses, verse 37.5 mentions “the third heaven.”

4 And he stayed there three hours, lying down, and thereafter the Father of all, sitting on his holy throne stretched out his hand, and took Adam and handed him over to the archangel Michael saying: ‘Lift him up into Paradise unto the third Heaven, and leave him there until that fearful day of my reckoning, which I will make in the world.’ Then Michael took Adam and left
6 him where God told him.

So there are three pieces of textual evidence that seem to indicate that perhaps Paul was familiar with the variants of the Life of Adam and Eve. This is certainly an interesting discovery. I have been interested in this text since I saw it featured on the History Channel documentary, Banned From the Bible. That Paul is referencing these texts, has been supported by scholars; Frank J. Matera, William R. Baker, and David E. Garland in their respective works. Fascinating stuff.

–M

Adoptionist Christology in Early Christianity: Roman Sonship and Adoption

Since the term paper I wrote didn’t turn out how I wanted (I still got a 98% on it) I decided rather than uploading the whole thing onto my blog I would rewrite parts of it in individual posts. These will not be quite as in depth as the paper was but will do justice to the arguments being made.

This first post will focus narrowly on Roman sonship and adoption in relation to the baptism of Jesus and exaltation of Jesus to divine status.

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To understand the historical Jesus and how he was most likely viewed during his short life, it is important to place him in the Roman context in which he lived. On the surface, that a Jewish man from the backwaters of Galilee would become known as the ‘son of God’ and be thought of as a ‘divine’ being seems quite extraordinary and unprecedented. But in the context of the Roman Empire, and first century Palestine, it’s not unusual at all.

Throughout the ancient world there are numerous instances of ‘divine’ humans, from the tale of Philemon and Baucis, Alexander the Great, Asklepios, and Romulus. However, toward the beginning of the Roman empire, one group slowly gained a monopoly on claims to divinity. It is a historical fact that the Emperor of Rome was considered divine. There is widespread evidence of worship of the Emperor, and many of the titles and narratives regarding worship of Jesus can be linked closely to those of the Emperor. [1]

One of the more interesting and important understandings connecting Jesus to the Imperial Cult and Roman society as a whole for that matter, is the practice of adoption. Peppard argues that, “reading the baptism of Jesus through the lens of Roman culture and imperial ideology encourage one to see the baptismal scene as an adoption…” [2] In the first two centuries of the empire, Roman culture developed a very high value of adoption in society. [3]

The connection between Jesus and the emperor is crucial in understanding early adoptionist Christology. Immediately following Jesus’ death, he was viewed in Christological terms as being in direct competition with the emperor. Jesus was seen as an alternative to emperor worship. [4]

Perhaps the best example of this emulation is in the title ‘son of God’ itself. Following his death, Julius Caesar was declared the ‘god of Rome,’ and thus when Caesar adopted Gaius Octavius (later, Octavian Augustus)  to be his son, he literally become the ‘son of god’ and was referred to during his life as divi fillius.

Thus the question arises of when Jesus was called the son of God in the mid-first century, “was it referring to an actual process of imperial sonship, whether begetting or adoption, or was it merely one of the emperor’s titles of exaltation.” Again, it is key to understand that during the time in which Jesus lived, to be the son of god literally meant to be the son of the emperor (whether begotten or adopted). Further still, in the case of emperors like Octavian, he was “actually made ‘son of god’ through the act of adoption.” [5]

When considering this fact, it is key that the gospel writers secured Jesus in the Davidic line. David was also seen in Jewish contexts as the son of God as the king of Israel. In Psalm 2.7 God adopts the king as his son. Thus to bolster Jesus’ credentials as the son of God, he was placed in the Davidic line as a descendant so he could further claim divinity. [6]

Before going further, I must reiterate, that the notion of Jesus simply being ‘adopted’ as God’s son, as I will argue in this post and in posts to come, does not and should not necessarily diminish his divinity. As has been stated, the Romans had a very high value of adoption and adopted sons were frequently viewed in higher regard than biological sons. Case and point: Every Roman history class will make mention of Octavian, whereas Caeasar’s biological son, Caesarion, most people have never even heard of.

Through a Roman lens, it is clear to see Mark depicting Jesus’ baptism scene as a comparison with the adopted Roman emperor. Again, this is not a ‘low’ Christology necessarily that many scholars paint adoptionist Christology as being. Quite the opposite, in Roman society, adoption is how the most powerful and worshiped man in society received his authority. Thus, Jesus being adopted by God in Mark to emulate the emperor should be viewed as a ‘high’ Christology.

Jesus was adopted by God as his son at his baptism in Mark 1.11, “And a voice came from heaven: ‘You are my son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased,” which is commonly taken to be a reference to Psalm 2.7, “You are my son; Today I have begotten you.” If Mark wanted to establish Jesus as a divine and powerful alternative to the emperor, it is not surprising to see that he would model his narrative after a Roman adoption––The method of making the emperor the son of god.

Furthermore, Mark’s use of the dove is especially interesting, since bird symbols and omens in Roman society were almost always associated with a rise to power. Suetonius documents; Domination’s win over Antonius, the accession of Claudius, and perhaps most importantly, the accession of Tiberius, all marked by birds.

All these birds as omens have a common theme of accession to power. Just in that sense the adoption of Jesus and Mark’s imagery of the dove can be interpreted as a parallel. Yet we can be even more specific. Suetonius give us one omen in which a bird, specifically a dove, is connected to an adoption.

As Julius Caesar was felling a wood near Munda in Spain to clear a site for his camp, he noticed a palm-tree and ordered it to be spared, as a presage of victory. The tree then suddenly put out a new shoot […] What was more, a flock of doves began to nest in the fronds […] This was the immediate reason, they say, for Caesar’s desire that his grand- nephew, and no one else should succeed him. [7]

Since imperial power was transmitted by adoption in the Roman empire, by setting up this baptism scene Mark is establishing Jesus as a counter emperor. Just as a dove is used in regard to Caesar adopting Octavian, the dove is used by Mark in regard to God adopting Jesus. In Mark’s narrative, Jesus is an adopted heir to power and the dove represents the transmission of power just as birds commonly did throughout the Roman world.

Conclusion–

Mark, in his narrative is creating an alternative to the emperor, and thus is using the common themes of adoption and the bird omen to indicate transfer of power, to establish Jesus status as son of God. In the light of Roman contexts, and the Roman practice of adoption, Mark 1.11 can be interpreted as an adoption whereby Jesus is exalted to a divine plane and is made God’s son. This should not lessen Jesus title as son of God, since in the Roman world, adoptive relations usually ended up being valued as more important. With that in mind, we can certainly see how Jesus may have been viewed prior to Mark’s composition; as someone who was exalted to divine status and was adopted as God’s son during his life. Thus it is reasonable to say that an adoptionist Christology may have been the earliest belief regarding Jesus’ nature.

This is just one element but is by no means conclusive to determining that adoptionism was the earliest Christology. This does however establish a model by which humans were viewed as becoming divine, during the time period that Jesus lived.

References–

[1] see D.L. Jones, ‘Christianity and the Roman Imperial Cult’

[2] see M. Peppard’s ‘The Eagle and the Dove’ in New Test. Stud 56

[3] Recommended: Suzanne Dixon’s The Roman Family

[4] See Ehrman’s chapter ‘Divine Humans in Ancient Greece and Rome,’ in How Jesus Became God pp. 28 and also pp. 34

[5] same Peppard article as above

[6] regarding the king as ‘son of god’ in Judaism, see Collins and Collins’ book King and Messiah as Son of God

[7] see Suetonius, Augustus

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

Today on this wet and rainy afternoon, I decided I would go to Starbucks and do some work on my laptop.

While standing in line to oder my drink, I noticed the man behind me dropped his card. He was unaware that it had happened. So, being the kind person that this season turns me into, I reached down and handed him his card. He was very appreciative and thanked me, saying otherwise he would have been looking all over for it.

When I was up to order I started to hand the barista my Starbucks card, and to my surprise, the man whose card I had picked off the ground, reached over and offered to pay for my drink. “He picked up my card, I’ll pay for him,” he said as he smiled graciously.

The lesson here, is that even the smallest of actions, can go a long way. What seemed like a no brainer for me, giving the man the card he dropped, turned into a free drink. Honestly, I don’t care so much that I got a free drink (frankly, I wanted to use my gold card so I could get reward points for it). I’m more glad to have in however small a way, helped make someone’s day just a little better. And he also, in his own way then returned the favor.

It’s small things like this that really capture the spirit of Christmas. This time of year can be so crazy at times with all the shopping, the last minute wrapping, the decorating, the cooking, and the chaos the holidays bring. Often we forget what this season is truly about. While giving and receiving gifts is a fun part of spreading Christmas joy, at the end of the day, what this season is really about is spreading kindness to one another. This is a time for friends and family to come together and celebrate with each other. The spirit of Christmas isn’t found in the brand new car sitting in the drive way on Christmas morning with a giant red bow across the windshield. The spirit of Christmas can be found in something as simple as a man buying a coffee for the gawky college student who just picked up his credit card.

While ABC Family’s 25 Days of Christmas, Mariah Carey’s All I Want For Christmas Is You, and sight of endless presents under the tree are all reasons that I love Christmas, it’s little things like this that truly make this my favorite time of year.

Merry Christmas

–M

Festivus Airing of Grievances

It’s finally December 23rd! Not just Christmas eve eve, but the day of Festivus! And as tradition goes; festivus begins with the airing of grievances.

So here are all the things I’m angry about from 2015:

#1 The fact that KU doesn’t have a Starbucks on campus is incredibly lame.  The Roasterie doesn’t cut it.

#2 Parking in downtown Lawrence is a complete and total disaster. Like, do y’all want my business or now?

#3 People who got all pissed off over the Pretty Little Liars mid-season finale back in August need to sit down and get over it. They’re all just butthurt that their theories were wrong.

#4 Netflix is lame as hell for taking both LA Ink AND Keeping Up With the Kardashians off of streaming.

#5 Another year, and Michigan takes another L to Ohio State. I know things will change with Harbaugh, but I’m really sick of losing to them.

#6 I REALLY hate pretentious grad students. Yes, we get it. You’re in grad school. Would you like a cookie?? Oh by the way I looked up the average pay for your field, it’s $50,000/year.

#7 People who don’t believe in climate change are dumber than rocks. It’s been in the 60s and 50s for most of December in Kansas. I got to Minnesota, and there’s NO SNOW. With two days till Christmas. Just a coincidence i’m sure.

#8 Jeb Bush should drop out of the race. He is the lamest candidate I’ve ever seen. He’s totally low energy and is getting decimated in the polls.

#9 For that matter, Ben Carson shouldn’t be in the race either. He has no charisma, no leadership skills, and has no idea how to run a country. He’s the epitome of what Bill Maher calls, “stupid smart person.”

#10 I’m fine with biblical scholars who accept the Q theory. And while reconstructions may be entertaining, let’s remember, it’s a completely hypothetical document. Stop citing things like “Q 5.3-6”

#11 People who drink cheap beer need to stop. I can’t tell you how many times someone has walked into my apartment with a bag full of bud light, miller light, or some other equally terrible beer. And Especially now that Jagermeister is the same price as a 30 pack of bud light, there’s no excuse.

#12 I HATE professors who think their credentials should automatically make them amazing. Like no, you actually suck at teaching. I don’t care if you’re book has amazing reviews on Amazon, you’re Ratemyprofessor ratings are awful.

#13 I literally cannot stand how media demonizes conservatives and distorts pretty much everything they say, and then gives a pass to liberals when do something bad or say almost the exact same thing.

and #14 If you’re a liberal arts major, and it’s not economics, math shouldn’t be required. I want to go into biblical studies and ancient history, why do I need to know logarithms and matrices??

Annabelle Review

Last night, I watched the 2014 horror film, Annabelle. The movie is set up as a prequel to The Conjuring. Since I really liked the Conjuring and am looking forward to the sequel when it comes out this summer, I thought i’d give Annabelle a shot. Typically, I’m not a fan of prequel films and find them to be vastly underwhelming. Case and point––Dominion: The Prequel to the Exorcist (in all fairness it was made 30 years after the original was released). Even the prequel to Insidious, Insidious III was really underwhelming in comparison to the first two installments.

The trailer for this movie I think does a good job at hyping it up and making appear far scarier and more intense than it actually is. The first 30-40 minutes are about as good as it gets. The whole plot line with Annabelle and her boyfriend killing Annabelle’s parents and then attacking John and Mia is actually pretty well done. Once Annabelle kill’s herself, a part of her blood rushes down and hits the doll she is holding. From there we assume the doll becomes the holder of the evil forces that haunt John and Mia. That’s about all there is to it.

The rest of the movie is an extended time killer that really goes down hill. There was a lot of potential for this movie but it just didn’t get there. The only scene post murders that was worth while was the scene shown toward the end of the trailer of the little girl running to the door (see trailer to get the gist). Even then, it’s far scarier when you watch the trailer for the first time than it is in the movie.

The ending seems really flippantly done. It’s pretty lame, and it just feels like it was rushed. So the ending is by far the worst part of the movie and you finish feeling like you just wasted an hour and a half.

Basically, I wouldn’t recommend this movie unless you one of those people that absolutely has to see every installment of a movie series. I think they were trying to capitalize on the popularity of the Conjuring and it did’t work. Granted Annabelle was decently popular but as far as I’m concerned it’s a very subpar movie. That being said, I’m very much looking forward to the Conjuring II and hope it’s more like the Conjuring and less like Annabelle.

Rating: 3/10

No, Women Don’t Actually Make Less Than Men

Of all the talking points espoused by liberal-feminists, perhaps none is more frustrating and misleading than the gender pay gap. The story goes, “for every dollar men make, women only make $0.77.” The moral of the story, men make more money than women and we should implement laws to guarantee equal pay for equal work. I’m feeling the need to take a shot of vodka for just typing that. But perhaps they’re on to something, do women make less than men?

The reality is, this stat is incredibly simplistic, grossly misleading, and vastly blown out of proportion such that the original meaning of the statistic is lost.

Basically, how they arrive at this conclusion is by taking the average female full-time earnings for the year, and dividing it by the average male full-time earnings for the year. As a result you get around a 20% discrepancy. Case closed right?

Wrong.

The problem with this shoddy math is that it doesn’t take into consideration that full-time for men and women are not statistically the same thing. On average, men actually work more hours than women do. Full-time simply means more than 30 hours/week.

According to the Department of Labor’s own survey, men work an average of 40.7 hours/week, while women work an average of 38.75 hours/week. Other studies have men working closer to 45 and women working closer to 35, creating a 10 hour discrepancy. People who work more, tend to make more, that’s just math (which I’ve never been good at, so that’s really saying something). As Forbes notes, that alone covers 25% of the wage gap right there. If women really want ‘equal pay for equal work,’ they could start by actually working equal hours as men.

So right away we have reason to doubt this dubious claim of a gender-pay-gap. Even the 2014 BLS report on women’s earnings, which found that women make 82% of the median earnings of men, explicitly stated;

It is important to note that the comparisons of earnings in this report are on a broad level and do not control for many factors that can be significant in explaining earnings differences.

Oops.

Another huge factor in this alleged pay-gap, is education and career choice. In general, women simply choose to pursue fields of study that lead to lower pay. This is not systemic discrimination, this is supply and demand, and personal choices.

By and large, men tend to gravitate toward STEM fields that pay higher, while women gravitate towards liberals arts fields such as sociology, communications, and psychology. Even the AAUM’s study that promotes heavily the idea of a gender-pay-gap, concedes that engineering majors, are prominently men. Engineering has a median pay of $75,000 annually. Conversely, education majors are predominantly women. Education has a median pay of $42,000 annually.

Take for example some of the common majors for men and women:

Women–

Major: Art History. % Women: 83%. Median Pay: $42,700

Major: Education. % Women: 88%. Median Pay: $35,800

Major: Fashion Design. % Women: 95%. Median Pay: $38,900

Major: Psychology. % Women: 72%. Median Pay: $40,700

Major: Social Work. % Women: 88%. Median Pay: $36,100

Men–

Major: Mechanical Engineering. % Men: 92%. Median Pay: $70,400

Major: Chemical Engineering. % Men: 76%. Median Pay: $81,400

Major: Construction Management. % Men: 93%. Median Pay: $60,100

Major: Physics. % Men: 89%. Median Pay: $68,100.

Major: Computer Science. % Men: 85%. Median Pay: $69,700

Looking at college majors, you see quite clearly, that women choose fields that on average pay less. Again, this is just math. (Interestingly enough one of the few liberal arts fields that is by and large dominated by men, is religious studies––my major.)

According to the Wall Street Journal, eight of the ten highest paying college majors are over 70% male, while nine of the ten lower paying college majors are dominated by women.

These lower paying jobs do have other benefits though such as extended time off, and lack of travel, which appear to be more favorable to women than to men.

In a paper by sociologist, Donna Bobbit-Zeher, found that when accounting for variables, college major choice makes up 19% of the gender-pay-gap.

Occupation is a driving force in the pay-gap and it has nothing to do with sexism or discrimination. In fact, a report for the Department of Labor, cites literature by  Erica Groshen, in which she found that, “[…] the pay of men and women who work in the same category is almost equal.”

Other choices to consider are marriage and children. Today women still are predominantly in charge of child-care and take time off when having kids, and reduce hours once they have kids to take care of them. This is a contributing factor to the wage-gap that also has little to do with actual discrimination. According to a paper by economists, June and Dave O’neill;

There is no gender gap in wages among men and women with similar family roles. Comparing the wage gap between women and men ages 35-43 who have never married and never had a child, we find a small observed gap in favor of women

So when looking at single women who have never been married, there is not wage-gap. Thus, personal choices are to blame, not sexism. Younger women who have never married, actually make more on average than their male counterparts in the same situation.

Ironically, the area with the largest disparity, is Atlanta, where women without children earn 121% of what men earn.

In conclusion, the idea that women make less than men is easy to explain away, and when comparing apples to apples, is simply not true. The problem with the static comparison the media gives us is that it is apples and oranges and doesn’t account for crucial factors. Yet feminists today would rather not pay attention to facts such as these (which is interesting because a lot of the studies i’ve cited were done by women) and would prefer to blame it all on discrimination. Victim’s complex at its’ finest.

For these reasons and others, the paper commissioned by the Department of Labor concluded;

the differences in the compensation of men and women are the result of a multitude of factors and that the raw wage gap should not be used as the basis to justify corrective action. Indeed, there may be nothing to correct. The differences in raw wages may be almost entirely the result of the individual choices being made by both male and female workers.

so to answer the question, do women make less than men? No, not really.

–M

Sources (ignore the repeats, for some reason WordPress is being weird)

http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052748704421104575463790770831192

http://www.forbes.com/sites/realspin/2012/04/16/its-time-that-we-end-the-equal-pay-myth/

http://www.wsj.com/articles/the-wage-gap-myth-that-wont-die-1443654408

http://www.nber.org/papers/w11240.pdf?new_window=1

http://www.payscale.com/career-news/2009/12/do-men-or-women-choose-majors-to-maximize-income

https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2009/08/10/majors

Click to access Gender%20Wage%20Gap%20Final%20Report.pdf

Click to access highlights-of-womens-earnings-in-2013.pdf

Click to access Gender%20Wage%20Gap%20Final%20Report.pdf

Click to access Gender%20Wage%20Gap%20Final%20Report.pdf