Jesus and Barabbas

[GreenMunchkin]

Have you all heard the theory that Jesus and Barabbas were one and the same?

A friend of mine tried debating it with me in the pub tonight, and it completely floored me. Apparently the reasoning is that Jesus Bar Abba would've translated as Jesus Son of God. It sort of made me go a bit panicky, and I looked it up when I got home to see if it's a bonafide theory, and it actually is!

Clicky

Am honestly disgusted that people would go so far to try to debunk Christ's divinity. How do you counteract this argument, besides saying "I believe the Bible and I know the Truth"? I mean, from an apologetics point of view, what do you say?

 

[nyj]

Define "bonafide".

 

[nyj]

Oh, BTW: Check out Tektonics.org sometime. He has this to say about this little factoid.

[SIZE=+1][FONT=Times, Times New Roman, Serif][SIZE=-0]Fall #3 -- Jesus and Bob. A final section we will note, briefly, makes issue thus: Was there a Jesus? Of course there was a Jesus – many! Humphrey Dumpty names several people named "Jesus" from the ancient Jewish world around the first century, and then pretends this is some sort of strange thing, too strange "to be a coincidence!" It isn't, in fact -- it is an artifact of the fact that Jews of this day didn't have baby name books. Just a few names (Simon, Judas, Jesus, etc) were given to the bulk of the male population; they were more common than Bob and James are today among men. Likewise "Mary" was the name given to at least a fourth and possibly a third of Jewish women. Thus Humphrey Dumpty marvels at the spectre of his own ignorance here. [/SIZE][/SIZE][/FONT]
[SIZE=+1][FONT=Times, Times New Roman, Serif][SIZE=-0]Offered as well in the same vein is a canard we have once addressed: [/SIZE][/SIZE][/FONT]

[SIZE=+1][FONT=Times, Times New Roman, Serif][SIZE=-0]According to the Biblical account, Pilate offered the Jews the release of just one prisoner and the cursed race chose Barabbas rather than gentle Jesus. But hold on a minute: in the original text studied by Origen (and in some recent ones) the chosen criminal was Jesus Barabbas – and Bar Abba in Hebrew means ‘Son of the Father’! Are we to believe that Pilate had a Jesus, Son of God and a Jesus, Son of the Father in his prison at the same time??!![/SIZE][/SIZE][/FONT]​

[SIZE=+1][FONT=Times, Times New Roman, Serif][SIZE=-0]Uh, yeah. For one thing, as noted, the name "Jesus" was as common as Bob today. For another, the name "Abba" (and therefore, "Bar-abba" as a patronymic) was a known, and indeed common, name among the Jews; it was even carried by rabbis (Samuel bar-Abba and Nathan bar-Abba are two examples; cited by Mann in his Markan commentary [637].) Brown [Brow.DMh, 799] even records a Talmudic joke about a man who enters a room "looking for Abba" to be told "there are many Abbas here." He then asks for "Abba bar Abba" and is told there are a bunch of those, too! In addition, a pre-70 burial records the name [800]. (Also note that "Bar-abbas" actually translates as "son of father" -- there is no article (a, the) involved.) So, nice try; it's a coincidence, sure, but no more stunning than that Kennedy was assasinated while in a Ford and Lincoln was assassinated in Ford's theater. [/SIZE][/SIZE][/FONT]
​

 

[GreenMunchkin]

Define "bonafide".

As in, not just my friend arbitrarily being contrary and difficult. Really, feel a little sick about it.

 

[nyj]

As in, not just my friend arbitrarily being contrary and difficult. Really, feel a little sick about it.

Well, he's wrong right out of the gate. Jesus bar-Abbas would translate as "Jesus son of father". And as JPH states at his website, there are a ton of rabbi's in antiquity with bar-Abbas as their last name. Are they all divine?

 

[GreenMunchkin]

Oh, BTW: Check out Tektonics.org sometime. He has this to say about this little factoid.

[SIZE=+1][FONT=Times, Times New Roman, Serif][SIZE=+0]Fall #3 -- Jesus and Bob. A final section we will note, briefly, makes issue thus: Was there a Jesus? Of course there was a Jesus – many! Humphrey Dumpty names several people named "Jesus" from the ancient Jewish world around the first century, and then pretends this is some sort of strange thing, too strange "to be a coincidence!" It isn't, in fact -- it is an artifact of the fact that Jews of this day didn't have baby name books. Just a few names (Simon, Judas, Jesus, etc) were given to the bulk of the male population; they were more common than Bob and James are today among men. Likewise "Mary" was the name given to at least a fourth and possibly a third of Jewish women. Thus Humphrey Dumpty marvels at the spectre of his own ignorance here. [/SIZE][/SIZE][/FONT]​

[SIZE=+1][FONT=Times, Times New Roman, Serif][SIZE=+0]Offered as well in the same vein is a canard we have once addressed: [/SIZE][/SIZE][/FONT]

[SIZE=+1][FONT=Times, Times New Roman, Serif][SIZE=+0]According to the Biblical account, Pilate offered the Jews the release of just one prisoner and the cursed race chose Barabbas rather than gentle Jesus. But hold on a minute: in the original text studied by Origen (and in some recent ones) the chosen criminal was Jesus Barabbas – and Bar Abba in Hebrew means ‘Son of the Father’! Are we to believe that Pilate had a Jesus, Son of God and a Jesus, Son of the Father in his prison at the same time??!![/SIZE][/SIZE][/FONT]​

[SIZE=+1][FONT=Times, Times New Roman, Serif][SIZE=+0]Uh, yeah. For one thing, as noted, the name "Jesus" was as common as Bob today. For another, the name "Abba" (and therefore, "Bar-abba" as a patronymic) was a known, and indeed common, name among the Jews; it was even carried by rabbis (Samuel bar-Abba and Nathan bar-Abba are two examples; cited by Mann in his Markan commentary [637].) Brown [Brow.DMh, 799] even records a Talmudic joke about a man who enters a room "looking for Abba" to be told "there are many Abbas here." He then asks for "Abba bar Abba" and is told there are a bunch of those, too! In addition, a pre-70 burial records the name [800]. (Also note that "Bar-abbas" actually translates as "son of father" -- there is no article (a, the) involved.) So, nice try; it's a coincidence, sure, but no more stunning than that Kennedy was assasinated while in a Ford and Lincoln was assassinated in Ford's theater. [/SIZE][/SIZE][/FONT]

​

Cool. I knew there were fewer names back then, but up to a third of people were named Mary? Will check out that site, thank you

Also, Humphrey Dumpty is the singularly coolest name I've ever heard

 

[nyj]

I believe JPH fashions himself to be a modern day Jerome. He's a bit, shall we say, caustic. He doesn't suffer fools lightly, which (at least for me) makes for a funny read.

 

[Cromwe11]

Have you all heard the theory that Jesus and Barabbas were one and the same?

A friend of mine tried debating it with me in the pub tonight, and it completely floored me. Apparently the reasoning is that Jesus Bar Abba would've translated as Jesus Son of God. It sort of made me go a bit panicky, and I looked it up when I got home to see if it's a bonafide theory, and it actually is!

Clicky

Am honestly disgusted that people would go so far to try to debunk Christ's divinity. How do you counteract this argument, besides saying "I believe the Bible and I know the Truth"? I mean, from an apologetics point of view, what do you say?

This is a very interesting thing. Not the theory you present but the existence of BarAbbas.

The name Barabbas means "son of God". What is the significance of the fact that two "sons of God" stood before the people and one was crucified while the other was let go?

In order to understand it you have to go back to the old testament. On the day of attonement, the Jews offered sacrifice to God. Two lambs were brought forward and stood before the priest. One lamb was chosen by the priest to be sacrificed, and the other was chosen to be the "scapegoat". The priest than laid his hand on the head of the scape goat and transfered the sins of the people to the scape goat. The other lamb, the spotless lamb was then taken by the priest and sacrificed. The scape goat was allowed to go free and was sent out of the city, away from the people, symboliclly sent to destruction.

The image of Jesus and Barabbas standing before the people was the image of the two lambs before the priest. Jesus was selected as the sacrifice lamb, and Barabbas was the scape goat.

 

[icedtea]

Food for thought.

 

[BelindaP]

This is a very interesting thing. Not the theory you present but the existence of BarAbbas.

The name Barabbas means "son of God". What is the significance of the fact that two "sons of God" stood before the people and one was crucified while the other was let go?

In order to understand it you have to go back to the old testament. On the day of attonement, the Jews offered sacrifice to God. Two lambs were brought forward and stood before the priest. One lamb was chosen by the priest to be sacrificed, and the other was chosen to be the "scapegoat". The priest than laid his hand on the head of the scape goat and transfered the sins of the people to the scape goat. The other lamb, the spotless lamb was then taken by the priest and sacrificed. The scape goat was allowed to go free and was sent out of the city, away from the people, symboliclly sent to destruction.

The image of Jesus and Barabbas standing before the people was the image of the two lambs before the priest. Jesus was selected as the sacrifice lamb, and Barabbas was the scape goat.

I had never linked it to the scapegoat ceremony before. That gives me a whole other angle to do some Bible study. Thanks so much for that.

 

[ContentInHim]

Just to take the scapegoat "rabbi trail" (LOL) a bit further, by the time of the second temple, the priests no longer sent the goat to the wilderness to die but instead took it to a cliff and pushed it over to make sure it would die. Talk about hedging your bets.

 

[ContentInHim]

Belinda - think about the Great White Throne Judgment - with Jesus separating the sheep from the goats. Makes more sense in view of the sacrificial lamb and the scapegoat, doesn't it?

 

[Albion]

What I get from the article is that Barabbas and Jesus are supposed to be the same person. However, the Bible--the only source used by the article to make its argument about the sequence of events (and the only primary source document in existence that deals with this)--clearly speaks of two people.

There can be some question about the similarities, the name, and all that, but you can't contend for the two persons being one and the same unless you dismiss the only document on which you base your thesis. See how the Gospel even goes so far as to say that Pilate did X with one of them and did Y with "the other."