I enjoyed your comments. I understand your point that it is “absolutely impossible” to establish “exactly” what the historical Jesus said as it would certainly be very difficult to determine “word for word” the historical sayings of Jesus after they have been handed down orally for years until finally being written down. Jesus, although very little is said about him in non-Christian sources of antiquity (e.g. Josephus, Tacitus, Pliny) no doubt existed on this earth based upon numerous writings, both canonical and non-canonical alike. A scholar, therefore, could certainly summarize the authentic sayings of the historical Jesus through an extensive examination of the New Testament, apocryphal gospels, the writings of the Apostolic Fathers, and the Koran. The process of eliminating agrapha from the mix is often plagued with “biases,” yet this should not deter one from continuing the search for the true sayings of Jesus. The dedicated scholar should not simply give up the search simply because he or she perceives the task to be too daunting.

I do agree that scholars should not be too quick to eliminate agrapha simply because they do not agree with the Jesus in the canon of New Testament. I suggest that some of the early “heretical sayings” may have in fact been simply fabricated by those early Christians who were in direct opposition with the proto-orthodox sect. One could argue, however, that it was the proto-orthodox that altered the sayings of Jesus to fit their own theology. Certainly there are many interesting possibilities.

Can you please elaborate what you mean when you say the Muslim agrapha is “more in tune” with the “canonical” Jesus than many of the “legitimate” ones? What do you mean by the “legitimate ones”? Do you mean the New Testament (Acts and Paul)? If so, these agrapha would be considered reflecting the “canonical” Jesus since they make up part of canon of the New Testament. Do you mean the agrapha found in the writings of the Apostolic Fathers? If you mean the agrapha found in Christian apocrypha, this should not be considered “legitimate” in comparison to the Muslim agrapha since they are both non-canonical.

I personally found the agrapha in a Muslim mosque (“the world is a bridge – do not settle upon it”) to be more in tune with the canonical Jesus than many of the ‘legitimate’ ones.

Cheers,
Joshua

1)find some unessential point to quibble with, then
2)summarily dismiss the rest of the 47 pages, then
3) hope that nobody actually reads Brown’s piece.

Yes I saw that. His point is well-taken (and check out the responses he got too). I’m going to put in a correction asap.