Luke, Chapter 5 - Fishing Men

Chapter 5 is a fairly dull list of the sort of miracles which are run-of-the-mill for any Greek or Egyptian deity or even hero, none of them reported anywhere at the time, despite their world-changing implications and the usual "multitudes" who supposedly saw them. The main developments are political as C gets a few anti-Jew bits in and even starts to portray the Romans in a good light.

Chapter 5

And it came to pass, that, as the people pressed upon him to hear the word of God, he stood by the lake of Gennesaret, 

I can't find any really firm definition of "Gennesaret" (lots of possibilities but nothing really convincing).

And saw two ships standing by the lake: but the fishermen were gone out of them, and were washing their nets. 

And he entered into one of the ships, which was Simon's, and prayed him that he would thrust out a little from the land. And he sat down, and taught the people out of the ship. 

Now when he had left speaking, he said unto Simon, Launch out into the deep, and let down your nets for a draught. 

And Simon answering said unto him, Master, we have toiled all the night, and have taken nothing: nevertheless at thy word I will let down the net. 

And when they had this done, they inclosed a great multitude of fishes: and their net brake.
And they beckoned unto their partners, which were in the other ship, that they should come and help them. And they came, and filled both the ships, so that they began to sink.

So, a standard "Hero tells normal people to do something, they say there's no point but humour him anyway and are astounded" cut and paste job, albeit nicely written. Attempts have been made to connect this story with another story about Pythagoras but they're totally unconvincing beyond both involving fish.

When Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus' knees, saying, Depart from me; for I am a sinful man, O Lord.

For he was astonished, and all that were with him, at the draught of the fishes which they had taken:

And so was also James, and John, the sons of Zebedee, which were partners with Simon.

Okay, I said that I didn't want to compare Luke to Mark, as that was not C's intent, but James and John are named in Mark as "The Sons of Thunder" which suggests that they may actually have been Bill and Ted. No real explanation for this nickname has been forthcoming but it has been suggested that this detail was evidence that the story is based on real people as no one would make up such a trivial thing. Of course, someone did.

I once watched a film of a man walking around Fermanagh telling the stories of how the hills, streams, roads, and even some of the trees and rocks got their names. The vast majority of it was both trivial and nonsense, but he knew hundreds of these stories, and someone made up every one of them for no better reason than to pass the long winter evenings by the fireside, as far as I could see. Similarly, the apostles and disciples attracted literally hundreds of stories about their lives and actions. It was this specific characteristic of the NT stories that motivated Constantine to demand that a canonical Bible be constructed in the first place - the existing traditions were contradictory and many were clearly too fantastical even for the majority of 4th century believers to swallow. "Sons of Thunder" may well be a trace of some deleted hero-story from this wealth of material. Whatever way one looks at it, it's not external evidence of anything.

Additionally, whatever the reason B had for calling them The Sons of Thunder, C clearly either did not know the story or found it unworthy of his "perfect" account, even though he presents many events which B also puts in his (their) Gospel. 

And Jesus said unto Simon, Fear not; from henceforth thou shalt catch men. 

And when they had brought their ships to land, they forsook all, and followed him. 

And it came to pass, when he was in a certain city, behold a man full of leprosy: who seeing Jesus fell on his face, and besought him, saying, Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean. 

And he put forth his hand, and touched him, saying, I will: be thou clean. And immediately the leprosy departed from him.

This is a classic example of the luck involved in being healed by Jesus - JC doesn't seek out the sick very much; he expects them to find him. Yet he could simply appear to every sick person in the world in a dream and heal them all instantly.

This is the traditional monotheistic paradox - God can do anything, but doesn't. It is perhaps the reason that C so often resorts to grandiose claims of huge multitudes or simply words like "all" and "everyone" - he's trying to suggest that it wasn't just dumb luck that got people healed, it was unavoidable even though Jesus doesn't really travel about all that much - mostly an area the size of modern London, with a few excursions to Kent.

And he charged him to tell no man: but go, and shew thyself to the priest, and offer for thy cleansing, according as Moses commanded, for a testimony unto them. 

But so much the more went there a fame abroad of him: and great multitudes came together to hear, and to be healed by him of their infirmities. 

And he withdrew himself into the wilderness, and prayed.

Bi-polar Jesus - keep a healing secret, then heal a great multitude (or perhaps ignore them, it doesn't actually say he healed them!) and then run away and hide in the wilderness. What's going on?

Well, B had introduced the idea that Jesus's mission was a big secret (which explained why no one had ever heard of Jesus) but C isn't so sure that's a good idea. This sequence seems to be a confusion about what the "party line" actually us. There's a few other bits later.

 And it came to pass on a certain day, as he was teaching, that there were Pharisees and doctors of the law sitting by, which were come out of every town of Galilee, and Judaea, and Jerusalem: and the power of the Lord was present to heal them.

And, behold, men brought in a bed a man which was taken with a palsy: and they sought means to bring him in, and to lay him before him. 

And when they could not find by what way they might bring him in because of the multitude, they went upon the housetop, and let him down through the tiling with his couch into the midst before Jesus. 

And when he saw their faith, he said unto him, Man, thy sins are forgiven thee. 

And the scribes and the Pharisees began to reason, saying, Who is this which speaketh blasphemies? Who can forgive sins, but God alone?

They're not worried about the healing, apparently. There's almost a conveyor belt of sick people going in one end and healthy people coming out the other but they're not impressed at all by that? C is so keen to make the Pharisees the baddies that he forgets to write them as sane people. In fact, of course, the Pharisees are representing the nasty Jews (whom they were leading in the time of C, anachronistically for the story of Jesus) who deny the evidence of their own eyes and only worry about the pedantic old-fashioned Law. Boo! Hiss! They're behind you, Jesus! But, I guess you already knew that.

This episode is probably actually from the story of John the Baptist who B shows as forgiving sin but whom A, C, and especially D relegated to a much more minor role, in the process taking some of the stories attached to him over to their own cult figure. The "Lord's Prayer" is another example.

But when Jesus perceived their thoughts, he answering said unto them, What reason ye in your hearts? 

Whether is easier, to say, Thy sins be forgiven thee; or to say, Rise up and walk? 

But that ye may know that the Son of man hath power upon earth to forgive sins, (he said unto the sick of the palsy,) I say unto thee, Arise, and take up thy couch, and go into thine house. 

And immediately he rose up before them, and took up that whereon he lay, and departed to his own house, glorifying God. 

And they were all amazed, and they glorified God, and were filled with fear, saying, We have seen strange things today. 

And after these things he went forth, and saw a publican, named Levi, sitting at the receipt of custom: and he said unto him, Follow me. 

And he left all, rose up, and followed him. 

And Levi made him a great feast in his own house: and there was a great company of publicans and of others that sat down with them. 

But their scribes and Pharisees murmured against his disciples, saying, Why do ye eat and drink with publicans and sinners? 

And Jesus answering said unto them, They that are whole need not a physician; but they that are sick. 

I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.

This sequence is one of my favourite Jesus stories and illustrates the difference in importance between the reality of Jesus-the-god and, say, Socrates. If all the Jesus story dealt with was stuff like this, the question of his existence or not would be a minor side argument. Whether Socrates really existed or not, the philosophy would still matter. But Jesus-the-god is supposed to make a real difference because of the fact of his sacrifice, not simply his wisdom. If he didn't exist, or wasn't really a god (or sent by one), then there is a material difference. It's a basic fact of life that gods don't exist, so this isn't (for me) in dispute and it's not what I'm really looking at here, which is the structure of the myth and how that structure reveals itself to be a myth. But some people claim that the details of the story are unimportant so long as Jesus existed and died as stated. But if the story's details are all false or unreliable, what reason is there to believe that he died either? 

And they said unto him, Why do the disciples of John fast often, and make prayers, and likewise the disciples of the Pharisees; but thine eat and drink? 

And he said unto them, Can ye make the children of the bridechamber fast, while the bridegroom is with them? 

But the days will come, when the bridegroom shall be taken away from them, and then shall they fast in those days.

Jesus doesn't say "John's rules are those of a man" (and so can be ignored) nor does he say "John's rules are from God" (in which case they can't). Jesus simply makes another reference to John being a minor figure. This will get the story into a bit of a knot later when Jesus uses the importance of John as a method for attacking the Temple priesthood.

And he spake also a parable unto them; No man putteth a piece of a new garment upon an old; if otherwise, then both the new maketh a rent, and the piece that was taken out of the new agreeth not with the old. 

And no man putteth new wine into old bottles; else the new wine will burst the bottles, and be spilled, and the bottles shall perish. 

This seems unlikely. however, the original doesn't speak of bottles, of course. It speaks of skins, and an old skin will be closer to wearing out so there is some logic here.

But new wine must be put into new bottles; and both are preserved. 

No man also having drunk old wine straightway desireth new: for he saith, The old is better.

So, Jesus is saying that John's ideas are old and he's too stuck in the mud to accept the new ideas (the new wine) and that John is not worth correcting (patching) as he can't move on. This section is usually taken as a more general comment on the "new" in "New Testament", but it seems to me to be much more specific to the task of denigrating the rival teaching of John who was selling salvation via baptism in the name of Jehovah, rather than Jesus's human sacrifice. It's possible that one of the members of the "C" writers' group wanted to take a harder line than another, or perhaps that the one that wrote the first chapter was trying to water down the anti-John feeling of this passage. In any case, the tone of the text dealing with John seems uneven.

Over and over, the story shows signs of being stitched together, as indeed the introduction says it was, from differing accounts with different points of view. The question is whether these are different accounts of events or different interpretations of stories, different attempts to fit the same Old Testament predictions into the context of explaining the origins of Christianity, or even attempts to fit together different Christianities into one synthetic whole.