Chapter 9 Critiqued:

• Doherty wrote: “A strong monotheist like Philo-the most prominent philosopher of Hellenistic Judaism-stopped short of making his Son and Logos a personal divine being. Instead, he envisioned Moses as a man into whom the power and qualities of the Logos had been infused. But other Jews did not feel the same rigid restrictions toward God, and could envision their Son as a personal divinity beside God in heaven. From the Logos of Greek and Philonic philosophy to Paul’s Christ Jesus is scarcely a stone’s throw” (TJP:89).
• Doherty did not provide any examples of the “other Jews” he alluded to above.
• Doherty made an unsupported assertion in this instance.
• Doherty wrote: “In the above passages (1 Cor. 1:24; 2 Cor. 4:4; 1 Cor. 8:6), early Christian writers are presenting the Son as ‘the image of the invisible God,’ etc. They are describing a divine figure in terms of divine attributes. No identification with a human man is ever made, no writer gives us even a hint that an ‘application’ to an historical Jesus is anywhere in their minds. As suggested earlier, scholars are guilty of reading into the text things they find hard to believe are not there” (TJP:91).
• Identification with a human man is made on numerous occasions in other portions of Paul’s epistles, as the reader will learn in other parts of this critique.
• It only takes one example of Paul presenting Jesus in historical terms to disprove Doherty’s assertion that Paul did not believe in a historical Jesus.
• It is ironic that Doherty accuses scholars of reading into the text considering Doherty does the exact same thing in The Jesus Puzzle, as is evident in other parts of this critique.
• Doherty wrote: “Titus 3:4-6 tells us: ‘When the kindness and generosity of God our Savior dawned upon the world…he saved us through the water of rebirth and the renewing power of the Holy Spirit. For he sent down the Spirit upon us plentifully through Jesus Christ…’ [ NEB] The saving acts which have occurred in the present time are not the events of Jesus’ death and resurrection” (TJP:92).
• First, Jesus’ death and resurrection were the earliest and center teaching of early Christianity.1
• Second, Titus 2:11-14 states: “For the grace of God has appeared bringing salvation to all men, instructing us to deny ungodliness and worldly desires and to live sensibly, righteously and godly in the present age, looking for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our God and Savior, Christ Jesus; who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for Himself a people for His own possession, zealous for good deeds.”
• Note first that Jesus is also called God in this passage (Titus 2:13).
• Note secondly that Jesus “gave Himself for us that He might redeem us…”, which refers to Jesus’ atoning death, in light of the contents of Paul’s other epistles.
• Thus, the very book Doherty used to support his assertion indicates that Jesus’ death is a saving act that has occurred in the present time, contrary to Doherty’s assertion that Jesus’ death was not considered to be a saving act.
• Doherty wrote: “The scriptural ‘sayings’ are prefaced by a ‘he says’-in the present tense-showing that in the writer’s mind, the Son is an entity who is known and communicates now and today, through the sacred writings, not through any past career on earth” (TJP:94).
• Doherty’s reasoning is faulty in this instance.
• The fact that Jesus communicates with people through God’s Word (the view of the Bible from a Christian perspective) today, does not necessarily negate the possibility that Jesus also communicated with people earlier in history through a past career on earth.
• Doherty wrote: “Scripture was not the prophecy of the Christ event, but its embodiment” (TJP:94).
• This statement goes against Paul’s entire Gospel presented in most of Paul’s epistles in which Paul proclaimed that the Old Testament Scriptures had predicted that Jesus would come to earth to offer Himself up as an atoning sacrifice for sins and rise from the dead.

Notes/References:

1. See Mircea Eliade’s resurrection article in the Encyclopedia of Religion.