Marcus Borg’s Neotraditional Christianity

[Joykins]

In other words:

Jesus, the physical, corporeal man, did not walk out of the grave after a resuscitation from physical death. But following his death the disciples experienced him as a living principle that sustains them with hope and joy.

​

How is this different from saying that the resurrection did not really happen as it was described and believed, and the disciples were mistaken when they thought it did?

I don't think Borg asserts that the disciples were mistaken. Does he?

Either Jesus's liver, bones and hair rotted into dust in a grave, or it was all rekindled after all his tissues and mental processes had ceased functioning.

It is unclear to me what the relationship of the current human body is to the resurrected body but obviously there is a difference because:

1. people who will be resurrected have ALREADY rotted
and
2. current human bodies cannot walk through doors.

 

[Quick]

If Jesus resurrected, then there was no one hundred, eighty pound mass of flesh and bone that used to be "Jesus" that turned into powder in a grave. Instead, that mass walked out of the tomb and ultimately ascended off the face of the earth and now is located in some other place.

I don't think that Borg thinks any of this actually happened. I think Borg would say that if Jesus existed at all as a person, then his organs decomposed just like a deer in the forest does.

When Borg says that Jesus metaphorically rose from the dead and is alive and with us, he means that "the spirit of Jesus which is love" triumphed over despair among his disciples, and was held on by them as a source of inspiration and joy. Jesus continues to live in a real sense, the Post-Easter Jesus is alive, because he remains a living and active force of peace and reconcilliation among all those who "give their heart in loyalty to the spirit of Jesus."

I might be wrong, but it seems that when Borg says "Jesus Rose from the Dead," he means "Jesus* Rose* From* the Dead*" where each term means something different as it passes off Borg's lips than it does when it passes off anyone else's lips.

 

[Joykins]

Hm,

IF we take as given that Jesus's resurrection was the first of the general resurrection, then what of those who have already died and whose bodies are rotten? For the very old bodies, those atoms have since been recycled into other bodies etc. etc. Does that stop the resurrection from occurring? IT CAN'T.

** Clarification -- despite my attempt at defending Borg's ideas, I do believe the resurrection of Christ was literal. But even so, I don't know how it works on a molecular level and find it puzzling.

 

[Joykins]

I might be wrong, but it seems that when Borg says "Jesus Rose from the Dead," he means "Jesus* Rose* From* the Dead*" where each term means something different as it passes off Borg's lips than it does when it passes off anyone else's lips.

Kind of like this?

In one, (Matthew 16: 18)
holy, (1 Peter 2: 5,9)
catholic*, (Mark 16: 15)
and apostolic Church. (Acts 2: 42; Ephesians 2: 19-22)

I acknowledge one baptism for the remission of sins**. (Ephesians 4: 5; Acts 2: 38)
I look for the resurrection of the dead, (John 11: 24; 1 Corinthians 15: 12-49; Hebrews 6: 2; Revelation 20: 5)
and the life in the age to come. (Mark 10: 29-30)

AMEN. (Psalm 106: 48)

*The word "catholic" (literally, "universal") refers to the universal church of the Lord Jesus Christ and not necessarily or exclusively to any particular visible denomination or institution.

**This can be interpreted to mean that baptism is a matter of obedience and not a requirement for salvation or a regenerating ordinance.

Please take the above quotation as an example (as I intend), rather than any meta-comment on CF Rules, of common meanings of words being expanded in various ways to connect to others' understandings.

This kind of annotation is hardly unique to Borg, nor is he the only Christian who can recite the Nicene Creed sincerely while believing its truths to be spiritual/metaphorical.

 

[*Starlight*]

I like Borg!

 

[BarbB]

I think you misunderstand Borg. He doesn't believe giving his mental assent to certain aspects about God is important; trust in and loyalty to the relationship with God is much more important.

Which god, though? The one of his own making since he's had such a problem accepting the one of the Bible?

 

[jubilationtcornpone]

Is some ways I agree with Crossan.

John Dominic Crossan is the co-chairman of the Jesus Seminar. For reasons that I presented earlier, their methodology is severely in question. Crossan himself claims that miracles do not happen, that Jesus was never entombed, that he was thrown into a common burial pit, and that Jesus never rose from the dead. Because Crossan does not believe in godly miracles, he is forced to dismiss the historical evidence to Christ's resurrection by stating that Jesus' followers all suffered from a mass hallucination. He likewise asserts that the gnostic Gospel of Peter was the primary source for all four NT gospels -- even though it was written a century after Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.

Crossan is not somebody that I would be proud to align myself with.

 

[BarbB]

....John Dominic Crossan, “Who is Jesus?”
"God sacrificed his own son in place of humans who needed to be punished for their own sins might make some Christians love Jesus, but is an obscene picture of God. It is almost heavenly child abuse, and may infect our imagination at more earthly levels as well. I do not want to express my faith through a theology that pictures God demanding blood sacrifices in order to be reconciled to us."
....

Ah, another man full of his own self-importance. I presume the phrase "types and shadows" has no meaning to him.

Actually it was God's offering up of his own son which caused my heart to break enough that God could mold it to his own purpose. And thus I was born-again - a new creature. But this is so old-fashioned. Sorry.

 

[Joykins]

John Dominic Crossan is the co-chairman of the Jesus Seminar.
[...]
He likewise asserts that the gnostic Gospel of Peter was the primary source for all four NT gospels -- even though it was written a century after Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.

Really? I read _The Birth of Christianity_ where he goes into detail about this and I did not notice any such assertion.

What he did make explicit was his use of both canonical and non-canonical gospels to try to come to some understanding of the early Christian traditions and stories.

 

[Quick]

John Dominic Crossan, “Who is Jesus?”
"God sacrificed his own son in place of humans who needed to be punished for their own sins might make some Christians love Jesus, but is an obscene picture of God. It is almost heavenly child abuse, and may infect our imagination at more earthly levels as well. I do not want to express my faith through a theology that pictures God demanding blood sacrifices in order to be reconciled to us."

C S Lewis agreed with Crossan and Borg (and Ingersoll, and MacDonald, and Farrar, and Clement of Alexandria, and Gregory of Nyssa, etc. etc. etc.) in his distaste for the Biblical theory of the atonement. C S Lewis spent his entire career trying to describe (create) a form of Christianity that did not include or involve the Biblical theory of the atonement. C S Lewis called the atonement "immoral" and "very silly:

C S Lewis, Letter to Arthur Greeves dated October 18, 1931,
I have so often ridiculed (‘propitiation’—‘sacrifice’—‘the blood of the Lamb’)—expressions wh. I cd. only interpret in senses that seemed to me either silly or shocking.

C S Lewis, "Mere Christianity"
Before I became a Christian I was under the impression that the first thing Christians had to believe was one particular theory as to what the point of this dying was. According to that theory God wanted to punish men for having deserted and joined the Great Rebel, but Christ volunteered to be punished instead, and so God let us off. Now on the face of it that is a very silly theory. If God was prepared to let us off, why on earth did He not do so? And what possible point could there be in punishing an innocent person instead? None at all that I can see, if you are thinking of punishment in the police-court sense. Now I admit that even this theory does not seem to me quite so immoral and so silly as it used to; but that is not the point I want to make. What I came to see later on was that neither this theory nor any other is Christianity.
​

Lewis never came to see any sense in "divine vengeance" or the Biblical theory of the atonement, or Biblical Soteriology. But in his books he was able to promote a "Christus Victor" only vision of Christianity. This is the vision that the "Emergent Church" movement is also teaching.

Christians are departing from the Biblical theory of the atonement en masse.

 

[Joykins]

I thought the blood sacrifice metaphor of the atonement was to speak to those who were performing them.

 

[jubilationtcornpone]

Really? I read _The Birth of Christianity_ where he goes into detail about this and I did not notice any such assertion.

Very few writers will describe all of their beliefs within a single book. Indeed, anybody who could do that wouldn't be much of a scholar.

If you want to learn more about what Crossan teaches, I suggest that you read about The Jesus Seminar. I would also recommend Crossan's debate with William Lane Craig for further insight into his teachings.

 

[jubilationtcornpone]

Well if Borg believes the Bible is a historical product than I would assume he does not believe Paul was inspired by God to write what God wanted to say.

That's just nonsense. There is no contradiction between saying "The Bible is an historical product" and "Paul's writings were inspired by God." In fact, Paul himself made historical claims about the Resurrection (1 Corinthians 15:3-8). Clearly, Paul say no conflict between historicity and inspiration!

 

[Quick]

At College, one of my Religion professors was a member of the Jesus Seminar. One day, in his office, he said a very curious thing to me. He told me:

If the phrase "blood atonement" had never been attached to the name "Jesus" -- if, rather, the name "Jesus' was attached to the idea that God punishes always to reform and never to ruin its object, I don't think you would see nearly so many people rushing in to say things like:

"Jesus was not God incarnate!"
"Jesus did not rise from the dead!"

​

If Jesus came and taught of a wise and virtuous God who punishes non-believing humans only to correct them (and not to destroy them), and if his followers stuck with the story and did not explain his death in terms of divine revenge, then I think that people would be quite happy to believe that Jesus rose from the dead. Why not? Such a story in that case would actually be good news.

As it is, behind the name of "Jesus" shall always lie a malignant and partisan deity whose touch spreads creeping death to sacrificial lambs and to the incredulous. Thus, the incarnation and resurrection of Jesus are just smaller parts of a larger whole which is a waking nightmare. We wish to deny the nightmare, and thus we wish to deny its parts, including the incarnation and resurrection.

​

When he told me this, the only thing I could think of was:

Romans 9:20-23 (New International Version)
Who are you, O man, to talk back to God? "Shall what is formed say to him who formed it, 'Why did you make me like this?' " Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for noble purposes and some for common use? What if God, choosing to show his wrath and make his power known, bore with great patience the objects of his wrath—prepared for destruction? What if he did this to make the riches of his glory known to the objects of his mercy, whom he prepared in advance for glory?

​

 

[jfer45]

Rather, they are historically unverifiable events.
From what I remember, Borg does believe in the resurrection but he believes it is spiritual and metaphorical rather than historical, but acknowledges that the disciples perceived it as happening (correct me if I'm wrong on this)--which he would call their experience of the post-Easter Jesus.

I would say that is an short, but accurate description of what Borg believes about the resurrection.

 

[march56]

For those not familiar with the lens in which he views Christianity, I will summarize.
The Bible is not the Word of God, but rather a historical product from ancient communities.

John 1:1
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.


Hmmmmm.....

 

[Quick]

John 1:1
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.


Hmmmmm.....

Do you mean to say that you believe the Bible is God? Do you honestly think that the Bible created the universe? Do you worship the Bible? I know that this is done in certain Protestant denominations in the Midwest, but I've never actually met someone with this theology until now.

 

[CaDan]

The Bible teaches that God enforces his violated law by destroying the wronger. The death of Christ propitiated the wrath of God. By believing this theology ("faith"), we will be pardoned of a divine curse of ruin ("justification"):

You have one of those new-fangled talking Bibles? The kind that teaches?

Or are you redefining a verb to help you along in your argument?

 

[CaDan]

And jfer:

Welcome to ChristianForums!

 

[PaladinValer]

If Marcus Borg does believe in the Incarnation and the Resurrection, then he doesn't do so in any traditional sense of these terms. Heck, Marcus Borg doesn't even believe that an objective God exists! Here is what Borg says, in his own words,

"I realized that God does not refer to a supernatural being 'out there'... Rather God refers to the sacred at the center of existence, the holy mystery that is all around and within us." - Marcus Borg, Meeting Jesus Again for the First Time (San Francisco: Harper San Francisco, 1994), page 14.

​

Marcus Borg may appear to be Christian, but this merely shows that appearances can be deceiving. Remember, Satan himself can appear as an angel of light, and false teachers can sound like wonderfully profound Christians indeed.

To be technical, God is Substance. So therefore, what he says is true. And God is most certainly the center of existence, for existence exists because of Him.

Sorry, but this objection is false.