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Christian right calls James Talarico "demonic" — for quoting Jesus (www.salon.com)

submitted 1 day ago by resipsaloquitur@lemmy.cafe to c/nottheonion@lemmy.world

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cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/48166923

James Talarico has been found guilty of quoting Jesus. The sentence he uttered, according to right-wing media, was “demonic” and “blasphemous,” exposing him as a “fake Christian.” Talarico is running for the U.S. Senate in Texas on a platform The New Yorker recently described as basically the New Testament. One Newsmax host accused him of using fake Bible passages.

The passages in question are familiar ones, found in Matthew 22 and Matthew 25. Love God and love your neighbor. Feed the hungry, heal the sick, welcome the stranger. They are, in fact, in the Bible.

The right’s attacks on Talarico aren’t about him, or at least not entirely. They’re about a much older argument — one progressive Christianity has been losing in public for 50 years — about whose version of the faith gets to count as real. The answer to that question has consequences far beyond any Senate race. When Christianity becomes a tool of power rather than a challenge to it, it doesn’t just damage the church. It destabilizes democracy. We are watching that happen in real time.

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[–] phutatorius@lemmy.zip 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

In the Old Testament, only the books of Daniel and Ezra were written in Aramaic; the rest is Hebrew. All of the New Testament was written in koine Greek, though the Gospels quote short phrases of Jesus's speech that are in Aramaic, which was his primary language (there's some evidence that people in Galilee knew Greek, and he might have also known Hebrew, which was still spoken by the Samaritans as well as being the liturgical language of the Jewish religion).

[–] Asidonhopo@lemmy.world 1 points 16 hours ago

The original languages of both testaments is disputed by scholars, there's evidence both were written originally in Greek (the OT no earlier than 200BC) and translated later into Hebrew, Aramaic, etc. Hebrew was basically a dead language at the time the Old Testament was written, having around 8000 words, and the OT seems to draw heavily from Greek mythological texts available at the time through the Library of Alexandria.

Greek was the lingua franca of the time and Judea, Galilee and Bethlehem were thoroughly conquered at this time and Jesus and the disciples were native Greek speakers. The ruins of synagogues unearthed from the centuries near the crucifixion had Greek text on the walls.

In my opinion, anyone who tries to talk about the Bible but has a lack of understanding of the Grecoroman world is missing 90% of the picture. The most authentic texts are the Greek ones, the Seputagints for the Old Testament and the Greek versions for the New Testament.

Anyone interested in learning ancient Greek is fortunate right now as Dr. Ammon Hillman has a free 2 week intensive course up on his non monetized youtube channel along with a vast amount of supplementary material.