Jesus at the Festival of Sukkot, Part 1: John 7:1-24

April 28, 2011 by William Hamblin

Continued from Page 2

When Jesus claimed to teach on the authority of God, he thus circumvented centuries of rabbinic tradition. Of course the rabbis, firm believers in the authenticity of their traditions, rejected these claims, especially when Jesus' teachings contradicted theirs.

Jesus challenged his critics by claiming that if they truly wanted to do the will of God, they would know that his teachings were from God (7:17). He also accused them of not keeping the Law of Moses because they sought to kill him for breaking the Sabbath by healing a man (7:19-23), an allusion to the earlier healing at Bethesda (Jn. 5:1-16). This agitated the crowd against the Jewish leaders, leading to the next confrontation (Jn. 7:25-52), which I will discuss next week.

Another accusation arose during this discussion. The critics claimed that Jesus was possessed by, or in league with demons, a common claim in the Gospels (Jn. 7:20, 8:48, 52, 10:20; Mt. 9:34, 12:24; Mk. 3:22; Lk. 11:15). There are two aspects to this accusation. The first is that Jesus performed his signs and miracles through demonic rather than divine agency. Second, possession by a demon was believed to cause madness and irrational behavior. The accusation of demon possession was thus a means by which his critics could account for both Jesus' seemingly eccentric behavior and teachings, and his miracles. These types of explanations, coupled with accusations of performing miracles by magic, formed a staple of both Jewish and Pagan anti-Christian responses both during the lifetime of Jesus and in subsequent centuries.

A full version of this column, with extensive references and notes, can be found at DropBox:

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/15865520/Enigmatic%20Mirror/EM-John%207a.pdf

And Academia.edu:

http://byu.academia.edu/WilliamHamblin/Papers/551727/John_7_1-24

Updates and discussion can be followed on Facebook at:

http://www.facebook.com/pages/An-Enigmatic-Mirror/180889785272535

Page: 3 of 3

4/28/2011 4:00:00 AM

Mormon

An Enigmatic Mirror

Sacred Texts

Mormonism

more at patheos

An Odyssey without the Good Parts

Gene Veith

Newton: "I am a riddle to myself, a heap of contradictions"

Adrian Warnock

Everybody’s an Expert Today and So Are You

Frank Viola

Meet Catholic Hugo Nominated Writer John C Wright

Mark Wilson

About William Hamblin

William James Hamblin is professor of Near Eastern History at Brigham Young University. You can follow and discuss "An Enigmatic Mirror" on Facebook.

Patheos Logo Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Subscription Support Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In

Follow Patheos