Would you have recognized Jesus (Yeshua) on the streets of Jerusalem?

Question

Elhanan Ben-Avraham wrote this description of a typical day in Jerusalem. It makes me wonder why so many people think that only a few mentions of Jesus (Yeshua) in an ancient history do not prove that he existed. Instead, I find it amazing that the likes of Josephus mentioned him at all.

If you had been there in the Land of Israel (Matthew 2:20-21), in the unromantic streets of Jerusalem on another hot and sticky day in the First Century AD, in the tense streets lined with bored Roman occupation forces ready and willing to arrest and brutally crucify any they felt might raise a finger against Roman authority, in the bustling streets moving with common daily activities of merchants and bargaining vendors, of women with their children shopping in the outdoor markets, of poor beggars and groups of conflicting religious sects and revolutionary groups whispering politics, streets fragrant with the burning animal sacrifices rising on curling plumes of smoke in the temple courts, filled with the sounds of Jewish pilgrims from many tongues making their way through the winding streets to the temple to hear the teachings of many local and itinerant teachers and rabbis... (to be continued)

... if you had been there and seen amongst the crowds a poor and common looking young Jewish rabbi and stone mason with his disciples as other rabbis and their disciples, his tunic damp with sweat as all others in that humid climate, if you were there with no Christian religious or messianic teaching and doctrine of seminaries and denominations, with no Christian religious history or holidays or customs or churches, with no book called the New Testament to study, with no clear and published doctrine of how a messiah was to appear, would you have dismissed him as just another interesting part of the rich fabric of Middle Eastern Jewry of the time, or believed that the young teacher was the fulfillment of ancient messianic prophecies that you may have never heard or read, would you have indeed believed him the Messiah son of David, the son of God, or God Himself?

Suzanne, I think you've got the wrong end of the stick. The quote is by a Jew who believes that Yeshua is the Messiah. He has lived in Jerusalem for 28 years, served in the IDF and works with Netivyah, a messianic group in Jerusalem.

smkeller: You seem unaware that the papyrus fragments called the "Gosepl of Thomas" dated to between 130 and 350 AD. No one dates it earlier. It is a random collection of sayings that it attributes to a number of people, including Jesus.

I'm a little uncertain why you follow me around, attempting to throw cold water on my faith. You cannot succeed, but you could do your homework first. My only previous connection to you was to try to help you out with a favor. No good deed goes unpunished, I guess.

Answer 1

If you were not Jewish and had never heard anything about the prophecies of the Messiah. Then you probably would not have paid much attention to him.

Now if you heard about what he was preaching and the miracles he had performed then you may have been curious to learn more about this man.

If your curiosity lead you to actually listen to what Jesus said, you may have been moved to learn more and research the prophecies to see if he could infact be the promised Messiah.

But as history showed, most, even the Jews did not pay attention to what he preached. That does not change the fact that he did exist, that there are other recorded accounts other than the bible of his existance. I guess it comes down to whether or not you believe the bible is inspired by God.

Answer 2

We truthfully have no idea what Jesus's title used to be (besides that it wasn't Jesus); This isn't the identical because the challenge with The Tetragramatton, that's delineated a couple of instances within the Hebrew Scriptures in such varieties as crostics (the primary sound of the primary phrase of every succeding line of a poem being the sound of every succeeding letter within the Name). imho, it used to be most likely some thing in the direction of "Iesuas" as that's closest to the Greek transliterations in manuscripts. But, a few cultish Christian corporations have taken to the usage of different quasi-believable guesses corresponding to "Yeshua" and "Yehoshua" as a style of Masonic handshake.

Answer 3

What you're saying is that we should ignore the Bible accounts of Jesus drawing crowds of thousands, whom he miraculously fed before talking to them. We should ignore his publicly walking on water and publicly raising people from the dead. We should ignore the crowds appearing before Pilate to demand Jesus death and Barabas' release. You are saying that those highly conspicuous events from the Bible record would have drawn no note.

You are saying that the things you can explain away are the things barely mentioned in the Bible. The "carpenter's son," (or brick mason's son, if you prefer) gets a passing reference.

You are trying to make your analogy from highly different circumstances. The things written in the Bible about Jesus are not about "typical" days. They are about ATYPICAL days. They are about things that had to have drawn mass attention if they happened.

As for the mention in Josephus' writings, some simple web searches will tell you that that is widely considered to be interpolation.

Answer 4

I would like to think that there would have been "something about him" that I would have noticed; something in His eyes, perhaps. But Isaiah says that there was nothing about Him to attract folks, so unless I had a personal encounter with Him, I don't suppose I would have...

I'm just glad I have had a personal encounter with the Risen Lord Jesus; there certainly is "something about Him"! Something that changes lives and hearts.

Answer 5

We might have recognized him as a mean and arrogant boy who caused people to go blind and fall down dead when they bothered him.

This is the from the Gospel of Thomas, one of the Nag Hammadi documents, written by the Gnostics and discovered in the Egyptian desert in 1945.

This Gospel never made it into the Bible for obvious reasons.

Answer 6

We are mere mortals who can be fooled. Pray that the Anti-christ will not con you into mis information! Study God's Word, and no other ...so you will know the truth.

Answer 7

I believe that I would have believed it was him. If I believe him now...and I never saw him. It's highly probable I would have believed who he was then. I would have had no reason to not believe he was who people said he was. Plus he was performing miracles like crazy....For an unbeliever back then...they believed after that.

Answer 8

I'd hope so, depending on when in he's ministry, if it was toward the end, the crowd and the healing's would have given him away to me :)

Answer 9

If you did not know him,you would not know him.

Answer 10

he's nothing but a dirty Hippie