Jesus

"Moreover, the factor of antagonism is lacking, as we have already emphasized in the discussion of the one-sided, expansive evolution of the mental disease assumed by the three authors. Jesus had, indeed, enemies and opponents because he spoke out against the narrow-minded and external piety of the Pharisees. In relation to these opponents, not imaginary but genuine, Jesus conducts himself in a fashion diametrically opposite to the conduct of a sick man with a persecutory trend. He does not remain inactive and does not limit himself to a defensive attitude like so many of the sick who believe themselves persecuted, but rather seeks by actions which have a provocative character-the driving from the forecourt of the temple of the traders and moneychangers, the discourses against the Pharisees (Matt. 23) — to bring on a conflict with the authorities and to force them to take steps against him, until in the end he brings the high council to the decision to get rid of him even before the festival."

"The expectation of the end of the world and the coming of the Messianic Kingdom has nothing in it of a nature of a delusion, for it belongs to a world-view which was widely accepted by the Jews of that time, and was contained in their religious literature. Even the idea held by Jesus, that He was the One Who on the appearance of the Messianic Kingdom would be manifested as the Messiah, contains nothing of a morbid delusion of greatness. If on the ground of family tradition He is convinced that He is of the House of David, He may well think Himself justified in claiming for Himself one day the Messianic dignity promised to a descendant of David in the writings of the prophets. If He chooses to keep to Himself as a secret His certainty of being the coming Messiah, and nevertheless lets a glimmer of the truth break through in His discourses. His action, looked at solely from the outside, is not unlike that; of persons with a morbid delusion of greatness. But it is, in reality, something quite different. The concealment Of His claim has with Him a natural and logical foundation. According to Jewish doctrine the Messiah will not step out of His concealment until the revelation of the Messianic Kingdom. Jesus, therefore, cannot make Himself known to men as the coming Messiah. And if, on the other hand, in a number of His sayings there breaks through an announcement of the coming of the Kingdom of God made with all the authority of Him who is to be its King, that, too, is from the logical point of view thoroughly intelligible. Altogether, Jesus never behaves like a man wandering in a system of delusions. He reacts in absolutely normal fashion to what is said to Him, and to the events that concern Him. He is never out of touch with reality."

"Faryzeusze mają odpowiadać za wszystkie zabójstwa, popełnione przez kogokolwiek, na osobach niewinnych od początku świata. (...) Zaczęło się od docinków raczej – o rozsiadaniu się na kazalnicy, o modach, obyczajach, o próżności, a kończy się na przekleństwach i zapowiedziach ogólnych, ociekających krwią na czas najbliższy."

"Jesus takes a hostile attitude towards his family because his relatives wish to take him home and to obstruct his public ministry (Mark 3:21). When, moreover, he declares that the bonds knit between men by the common faith in the nearness of the Kingdom of God are holier than the ties of blood (Mark 3:31-35) and desires that men in the days of the coming persecution should not be led astray by looking back toward their relations, this is not a lack of family loyalty to be accounted for psychopathologically, but a special point of view to be explained by peculiar preconceptions contemporarily conditioned, as indeed everything is to be explained by those premises which the psychopathologists consider moral defects in the ethical conduct and teaching of Jesus."

"Overdo it, and our schizotypalism in the Western religious setting is what we call a "cult," and there you are in the realm of a Charles Manson or a David Koresh or a Jim Jones. You can only do post-hoc forensic psychiatry on Koresh and Jones, but Charles Manson is a diagnosed paranoid schizophrenic. But get it just right, and people are gonna get the day off from work on your birthday for millennia to come. [laughter] This is great! I think this is the first time I've ever said that line without somebody getting up and leaving in a huff from the audience. It's very nice being here."

"Did Jesus hear voices because he was schizophrenic? Was this a messiah complex before we had a name for it? Lord knows there is enough arguing in the church already. Rather, such investigations into the mental health of Jesus remind us that although our investigations are often aimed at finding the answers to the identity of Jesus, we can easily forget how strange, how countercultural, evenhow threatening was the behavior of Jesus."

"There is a 5%–10% lifetime risk of suicide in persons with schizophrenia. Suicide is defined as a self-inflicted death with evidence of an intention to end one’s life. The NT recounts Jesus’ awareness that people intended to kill him and his taking steps to avoid peril until the time at which he permitted his apprehension. In advance, he explained to his followers the necessity of his death as prelude for his return."

"Thus psychologists have found that the megalomania of John's Jesus mounts ceaselessly, for he is con­tinually occupied with his ego, openly proclaiming his messianic dignity."

"Christ never lost the balance of mind under excitement, nor the clearness of vision under embarrassment; he never violated the most perfect good taste in any of his sayings. Is such an intellect — clear as the sky, bracing as the mountain air, sharp and penetrating as a sword, thoroughly healthy and vigorous, always ready and always self-possessed — liable to a radical and most serious delusion concerning his own character and mission? Preposterous imagination!"

"Jesus hates the "wise and prudent" for not believing in him. And because he hates them, he "praises" the Father for "having hidden these things" from them. What a nonsensical chain of thoughts, which could have originated only in a paranoical brain."

"House: This is awesome. 33-year-old carpenter presenting with narcissism, delusions of grandeur, hallucinations. Taub: [about the patient] He hasn't had hallucinations. House: I'm not talking about him. I'm talking about "him" with a capital "o-m-g." Chase: You want us to do a differential diagnosis on Jesus? Masters: Hears voices, thinks he's the son of God. Probably Schizophrenic."

"In view of such utterances, the diagnosis of a mental disease is charitable. For it would be degrading to mankind to think that a mentally normal human being could give expression to such vileness. And this is the God of mankind!"

"It is to be noticed that de Loosten and Binet-Sangle lay great stress upon the statements concerning the mental condition of Jesus which have been handed down to us from contemporaries. They appeal to the fact that his opponents among the Pharisees maintain that he is "possessed", and that his family wish to bring him home from Capernaum to Nazareth because he is "beside himself". From this, however, one may only infer that the former wish to discredit him with the people at any cost, and that the relations perceive a change in him and are not able to explain to their satisfaction how it comes about that he sets himself up as a teacher and a prophet. Besides, it should be laid down as certain that the Pharisees and the followers of Jesus do not declare that he is beside himself because he considers himself to be the Messiah, for they know nothing whatever about this claim."

"Niepohamowany bezsilny gniew dyktuje tu obelgi, za które w Kazaniu na Górze groziło piekło każdemu. Wyrok potępienia wydany w formie ogólnej i skrajnej bez przesłuchania i obrony i bez litości i bez miłosierdzia. Wzmożone poczucie mocy i godności boskiej, która zamiast uznania i poddania się, napotkała na opór i krytykę."

"And what had these people done to him, to make him treat them with such "Christian love"? Nothing."

"Any one, having only the least experience in mental diseases, must recognize paranoia in utterances such as these. Even the educated layman must see that such effusions can be the product only of a diseased brain."

"Surely, if anyone were to come forth today claiming to be a messiah and preaching the message of Jesus, he would be considered crazy. There are thou- sands of similar bedraggled souls who have ended up in mental asylums. Jesus was so exasperating to the established authorities that they crucified him, a much worse fate. But was one of the reasons that he was psychotic? I do not mean to be unfair to Jesus, and no doubt devout Christians will be offended at the suggestion."

"All those cities in which he was not acclaimed and honored as "king" and "Messiah" he curses, neck and crop. In vain do we seek here for the "Christian love" which strives only for the good and happiness of the enemy. Or, are his doctrines applicable to all others and not to him?"

"[Pontius Pilate speaks to Yeshua] 'Oh, no, you don't look like a halfwit,' the procurator replied quietly and smiled some strange smile."

"For the serious student of the New Testament the problem of the psychic health of Jesus is not to be solved by religious recoil at the thought of such a suggestion, nor by an appeal to history, but it is to be faced and met on the basis of an historical and critical study of the sources of our knowledge concerning Jesus' words and deeds as found in the Gospel literature. The battle is to be fought out on the field of the New Testament, and any shift of the scene of action from this field renders the issue unscientific and indecisive."

"Ce qui signifie: "Laisse ceux-là enterrer leurs morts qui, ayant refusé de me suivre, ne posséderont point la vie éternelle.""

"Les propos tenus par les hystériques ou les fous délirants sont tenus par les démons, avec lesquels Ieschou entre eu convcrsation."

"Pour être sûr qu'on n'aime que lui, il exige qu'on haïsse les siens et qu'on se haïsse soi-mèmc, ordre monstrueux qui est encore suivi à la lettre par les demi-fous de nos monastères."

"It is the high duty, and should be the pleasure, of every follower of Jesus to greet and welcome any study that will throw new light upon the person of Jesus and help to a renewed, perhaps new, appreciation and understanding of him. The raising of the problem of Jesus' psychic health, we repeat, is to be welcomed as all new problems should be, sorry to say not always have been and are, welcomed because it brings us to read our New Testament again from a different point of view and with new thoughts in mind."

"Le juif Joshua, que les chrétiens appellent Jésus-Christ, était un dégénéré vésanique, et, selon toute appatence, un mélancolique à délire systématisé. Vous savez, Messieurs, qu’en Orient les fous ont eu de tout temps un caractère sacré, et qu’on rencontre encore dans l’Inde et en Égypte des saints très analogues aux saints catholiques de la décadence latine et du moyen âge, les uns et les autres n’étant que psychopathes. Si les saints sont devenus si rares dans le monde civilisé, c’est qu’on les enferme. J’ai eu l’occasion d’entendre récemment dans un asile un délirant mystique d’une éloquence rare, et qui eût eu, à n’en pas douter, un succès considérable au temps des apôtres. Qu’on ait fait un Dieu de Joshua, comme on fit un prophète de Mohammed, lequel était un épileptique et un halluciné, rien là qui soit étonnant pour qui est au courant des mœurs orientales."

"La foi en leschou est si bien la condition essentielle pour entrer dans le royaume, que bons et mauvais y seront admis indscintement, puurvu qu'ils l'aient cru et suivi, ou qu'ils aient cru Iohanan le Baptiseur affirmant la mission du Nazaréen."

"Il se livrait constamment au prosélytisme et avait des explosions de fanatisme contre les profanes, les sceptiques et les incrédules."

"Last of all, the pathographers of Jesus have toyed wantonly and wilfully with the one figure in history to which are attached the sincerest sentiments and the dearest affections of the occidental religious world; and without sufficient reason or justification."

"Son temperament anarchiste sa haine des riches les lui fait écarter du divin séjour. L'un d'eux s'en étant allé tout triste parce qu'il lui avait ordonné de vendre ses biens et d'en donner le produit aux pauvres, il s'écrie."

"That the baptism of Jesus should figure prominently in the pathographic position is only natural because the incident is inaugural in the place it occupies in the evangelical life of Jesus and because it, not only historically, but psychologically marks a high point in the life of Jesus. The rupture of the heavens, the descent of the dove, and the assuring voice are psychic phenomena uncommon and unusual to the average run of healthy-minded persons and are quite common and usual in the experience of psychopathic subjects."

"There is no need or purpose in trying to explain Mc 3,21 22 away. Both constituted a problem for Mt and Lc as they do for us. They solved the difficulty by omission or modification ; this we cannot do. We may urge critical considerations concerning Mc's theology of Jesus' person as incomprehensible and his method of presenting his theology. Historical reconstruction may find reasons for an estrangement between Jesus and his family. We know further that a man's enemies are seldom, if ever, reliable and impartial judges of his mental soundness. But we must admit that some of Jesus' contemporaries, some of his family and friends as well as his foes, regarded him as an alien. But that these contemporary judgments passed upon Jesus are correct is quite a different question which can be answered only by our study as a whole."

"And we sent Moses, with Our Clear (Signs) and an authority manifest,Unto Pharaoh and his chiefs: but they followed the command of Pharaoh and the command of Pharaoh was no right (guide)."

"Is it ...possible that beneath and behind the stained-glass curtain of Christian legend stands the dim figure of a historical founder of Christianity? Yes, it is possible, perhaps just a tad more likely than that there was a historical Moses, about as likely as there having been a historical Apollonius of Tyana. But it becomes almost arbitrary to think so."

"My point here is simply that, even if there was a historical Jesus lying back of the gospel Christ, he can never be recovered. If there ever was a historical Jesus, there isn't one any more. (Opening Statement by Robert Price)"

"Generations of Rationalists and freethinkers have held that Jesus Christ corresponds to no historical character: There never was a Jesus of Nazareth. We might call this categorical denial “Jesus atheism.” What I am describing is something different, a “Jesus agnosticism.” There may have been a Jesus on earth in the past, but the state of the evidence is so ambiguous that we can never be sure what this figure was like or, indeed, whether there was such a person."

"This dogma had first to be shattered before men could once more go out in quest of the historical Jesus, before they could even grasp the thought of His existence. That the historic Jesus is something different from the Jesus Christ of the doctrine of the Two Natures seems to us now self-evident. We can, at the present day, scarcely imagine the long agony in which the historical view of the life of Jesus came to birth. And even when He was once more recalled to life. He was still, like Lazarus of old, bound hand and foot with grave-clothes — the grave-clothes of the dogma of the Dual Nature."

"Thus each successive epoch of theology found its own thoughts in Jesus; that was, indeed, the only way in which it could make Him live. But it was not only each epoch that found its reflection in Jesus; each individual created Him in accordance with his own character. There is no historical task which so reveals a man's true self as the writing of a Life of Jesus."

"The myth theory as stated by J. M. Robertson does not exclude the possibility of an historical Jesus. “A teacher or teachers named Jesus” may have uttered some of the Gospel sayings “at various periods.” The Jesus ben-Pandera of the Talmud may have led a movement round which the survivals of an ancient solar or other cult gradually clustered. It is even “not very unlikely that there were several Jesuses who claimed to be Messiahs.” The founder of the movement may have met his death by preaching a subversive political doctrine, and the facts may have been suppressed by later writers. A Galilean faith-healer named Jesus may have been offered as a human sacrifice by fanatical peasants at some time of social tumult."

"[Per] The Jesus Myth (1999), [G. A.] Wells ...now accepts that there is some historical basis for the existence of Jesus, derived from the lost early “gospel” “Q” (the hypothetical source used by Matthew and Luke). Wells believes that it is early and reliable enough to show that Jesus probably did exist, although this Jesus was not the Christ that the later canonical Gospels portray."

"[J. M.] Robertson is prepared to concede the possibility of an historical Jesus perhaps more than one having contributed something to the Gospel story. "A teacher or teachers named Jesus, or several differently named teachers called Messiahs" (of whom many are on record) may have uttered some of the sayings in the Gospels. (J. M. Robertson, Christianity and Mythology, revised edition, p. 125) [...] What the myth theory denies is that Christianity can be traced to a personal founder who taught as reported in the Gospels and was put to death in the circumstances there recorded."

"The ideal "Life of Jesus" [biography] at the close of the nineteenth century is the "Life" which Heinrich Julius Holtzmann did not write — but which can be pieced together from his commentary on the synoptic gospels and his new testament theology. It is ideal because, for one thing, it is unwritten, and arises only in the idea of the reader by the aid of his own imagination, and, for another, because it is traced only in the most general outline."

"Other writers who are often placed in the mythicist camp present a slightly different view, namely, that there was indeed a historical Jesus but that he was not the founder of Christianity, a religion rooted in the mythical Christ-figure invented by its original adherents. This view was represented in midcentury by Archibald Robinson, who thought that even though there was a Jesus, “we know next to nothing about this Jesus.” (A. Robertson, Jesus: Myth or History?, 107.) [Robertson, Archibald. Jesus: Myth or History? London: Watts & Co., 1946.]"

"The historical Jesus will be to our time a stranger and an enigma. The study of the Life of Jesus has had a curious history. It set out in quest of the historical Jesus, believing that when it had found Him it could bring Him straight into our time as a Teacher and Savior. It loosed the bands by which He had been riveted for centuries to the stony rocks of ecclesiastical doctrine, and rejoiced to see life and movement coming into the figure once more, and the historical Jesus advancing, as it seemed, to meet it. But He does not stay; He passes by our time and returns to His own. What surprised and dismayed the theology of the last forty years was that, despite all forced and arbitrary interpretations, it could not keep Him in our time, but had to let Him go. He returned to his own time, not owing to the application of any historical ingenuity, but by the same inevitable necessity by which the liberated pendulum returns to its original position."

"[The Mythical Jesus viewpoint holds that a historical Jesus—if he did exist—] had virtually nothing to do with the founding of Christianity."

"Some rabbis take the point of view—listen carefully—that yes, the true story of Jesus is in our Talmud, not in the Christian Bible. Meaning that when you have a problem of reconciling the Christian version of who Jesus was with the Jewish versions, some rabbis take the point of view: "Yeah, the Talmud gets it right. And the Christian scriptures? It's not accurate.""

"At the conclusion of a class at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in 2000, during which I quoted passages from the New Testament, a student approached me and asked whether I would be citing more quotes in future classes. I told her that I would give her two answers. The first: yes. The second: In all the 2,700 pages of the Babylonian Talmud, there is only one quotation from a non-Jewish book, namely from the New Testament (Babylonian Talmud Tractate Shabbat 116a-b). What is allowed to the Talmud is allowed also to a talmid (pupil). She never showed up in my classes again."

"It is now more than half a century since Renan put the question, "Has Jewish tradition anything to teach us concerning Jesus?" This question must be answered in the negative. ... The Jewish legend—a growth of those later centuries—gave him an aspect of its own, purely apocryphal in its character, neither meant nor ever taken by the Jews as real history."

"These Talmud stories seem as though they are deliberately intended to contradict events recorded in the Gospels: the selfsame facts are perverted into bad and blameable acts."

"The Jesus or Jehoshua ben-Pandira (or ben-Stada) of the Gemara is a shady character who in the reign of Alexander Jannaeus (103–78 )—different versions give different dates—learns magic in Egypt, leads the people astray, and is stoned to death and hanged at Lydda. ... The character of Jesus is blackened, his miracles are explained by magic, his trial is made out to have been regular and fair, and so forth."

"That the Talmud and other Jewish sources say nothing about Jesus which is not the distortion of Christian tradition is sufficiently explained by the date of these documents and the fact that those who compiled them were governed by entirely polemical considerations."