Subject: Re: Was Jesus afraid?
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 1999 13:53:04 -0500
From: "Scott" <>
Organization: CENTURYinter.net
Newsgroups: alt.christnet.theology

Simon Woo <> wrote in message
news:37ef2603.18338210...
> Perhaps somebody can try to answer this question? Before Jesus was
> crucified, he sounded afraid as he asked his God why He has forsaken
> him. But Jesus knows that he is the son of God, he knew that he would
> be resurrected, and he knew that he had powers beyond any human being,
> like healing the blind and curing the sick, etc. Why would he still be
> afraid?

I following text may be helpful. The bottom line for McBrien is that if you
argue that Jesus was all knowing you undermine his humanity. He had to live
as one of us in order to have the same shared experiences with the rest of
humanity. How could Jesus have found  humar in a joke if he could already
have known the punchline?

from Catholicism by Richard McBrien:

Chapter XV Special Question In Chirsology

The knowledge, Or Consciousness, Of Jesus
The question of the knowledge, or consciousness, of Jesus is important for
two reasons: (1) Many problems of New Testament interpretation cannnot be
solved if there is no possibility of development, even error, in the
knowledge of Jesus and (2) Hebrews 4:15 and the Concel of Chalcedon assert
that Jesus is like us in all things "yet without sin." How much like us is
Jesus if he knew exactly what the future held for him, down to the finest
detail? We face the future with wonder and hope, and sometimes with fear and
dread. Jesus would have experienced none of these human emotions if he knew,
with factual certitude, precisely what the Father had in store for him, and
especially that the Father would raise him from the dead "on the third
day.".... Is he really one with us --in all things except sin?

There are three subquestion to be considered: (1) does the New Testament
attribute ignorance and even error to Jesus? (2) Does the official Church
admit of ignorance and error in the mind of Jesus? (3) Can the New Testament
record be reconciled with the official teaching of the Church?

Does the New Textament Attribute Ignorance and Even Error to Jesus? Although
there are indications in the New Testament that the early Church thought
Jesus to be in possession of unlimited and infallible knowledge, the weight
of the evidence seems to be on the other side.

Given the development from a low (Jesus-as-human) to a high
(Jesus-as-divine) Christology within the New Testament and within the
Gospels themselves (eg., from Mark to John), it is not surprising that the
later New Testament material shuld have suppressed any suggestion of Jesus'
ignorance. For example, Matthew 9:20-22 reports the same incident found in
Mark 5:25-33, where a woman "afflicted with a hemorrahage for a dozen years"
touched Jesus' garment and "healing power had gone out from him." In the
earlier Marcan account, however, Jesus does not know who touched him. In
Matthew's account, Jesus turns and immediately identifies the woman.

In John's report of the miracle of the loaves, Jesus asks Philip where they
could find enough bread to feed such a "large crowd" (John 6:5). But John
quickly adds that Jesus "said this to test him, for he himself knew what he
was going to do" (v. 6)....

All of the Gospels attribute to Jesus the ability to know what others are
thinking (Mark 2:6-8; Mark 9:33-34; Luke 9:46-47; John 2:24-25; 16:19,30).
But it is not always clear whether this reflects Jesus' own keen perception
of human nature or whether it is really a form of superhuman knowledge.... 

Indications Against Unlimited Knowledge
In Mark 5:30-33 ( = Luke 8:45-47), to which we referred above, Jesus does
not know who in the crowd touched his garment. In Luke 2:46 he asks 
questions of the teachers of the Law in the Temple. In Luke 2:52 he is
described as having "increased in wisdom." both these texts are significant 
because they are part of the Lucan Infancy Narrative, where Jesus is
presented unequivocally as God's Son from the moment of his conception.

Even in the specifically religious realm Jesus is shown to have been
ignorant about certain matters. He reflects the inadequate and sometime
erroneous biblical views of this contemporaries. He cites an Old Testament
text which apparently does not exist (John 7:38). He is wrong about the
identity of the high priest at the time David entered the house of God and
ate the holy bread which only priest were permitted to eat (Mark 2:26); it
was Ahimelech (1 Samuel 21:1-6) and not Abiathar, as Jesus thought. He was
in error, too, about the fact that Zechariah, son of Jehoiada, was killed in
the Temple (2 Chronicles 24:20-22); it was not Zechariah, son of Barachiah,
as Jesus said (Matthew 23:35).  And Jesus mistakenly attributed Psalm 110 to
David, making it a messianic psalm besides (Mark 12:36), even though there
was no expectation of a Messiah at the time it was composed. Jesus also
shared the primitive ideas of the contemporaries about demons, confusing
demon possesssion with epileply and insanity (Mark 5:4, 9:17-18; Matthew
12:43-45; Luke 11:24-26). He drew upon the same limited religious concepts
of his day to describe the afterlife and the end of the world (Mark 9:43-49;
13). There is nothing new, superhuman, or unique about such declarations.
Jesus simply employed iedas and imager that were already current.

We cannot even take at face value his foreknowledge and predictions of this
passion, death, and resurrection (Mark 8:31; 9:31; 10:33-34; and parallels).
Among other exegetical problems, one has to account for the exceedingly
curious attitude of the desciples who, if they had really heard Jesus make
such predictions, should not have been taken by such complete surprise by
the crucifixion even when it was imminent; nor, of course, should they have
been so totally unprepared for the resurrection (Luke 24:19-26)....

....The biblical and theological discussions about Jesus' knowledge of the
date of the Second Coming (parousia) cannot usefully be summarized here. But
all those who favor a so-called maximalist position (namely, that Jesus knew
everything, and everything about everything) have to contend with the stark
assertion: "But about that day or hour no one knows, neither the angels in
heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father" (Mark 13:32)....

Does the Official Church Admit of Ignorance and error in Jesus? The gap
betweenthe New Testament and the official teaching of the Church is greater
here than on the first two special questions, the virginal conception and
the sinlessness of Jesus. On the other hand, the magisterial sources are
less authoritative (nothing approaching an ecumenical concil, for example),
and their dependence upon the medieval synthesis is even more pronounced.

Medieval Christology had argued , on the basis of the hypostatic union, that
no perfection is to be denied Jesus if it was as all possible for him to
have had it. Therefore, he not only klnow everything, but he knew everything
about everything. He ad *beatific* knowledge, i.e., God's knowledge of all
things; *infused* knowledge, i.e., angelic knowledge requiring no learning
effort; and experimental knowledge, i.e., what he inescapalbly encountered
within the particularitites of his earthly life. An extreme from of the
medieval position was expressed by certain seventeenth-century commentators
of Thomas Aquinas, known as the *Salmanticenses*. In their view , Jesus'
knowledge was so unlimited that he could accurately be described as the
greatest mathematician, the greatest doctor, the greatest painter, the
greatest farmer, the greatest sailor, the greatest philosopher, and so
forth....

In 1907 the Holy Office, under the direction of Pope Pius X, issued its
anti-Modernist decree *Lamentabili*, in which it rejected certain
contemporary assumptions about the knowledge and consciouness of Jesus,
namely, that he was in error about "the proximity of the Messianic
advent" and that his human knowledge was limited.

In 1918 the same Holy Office, this time under the direction of Pope Benedict
XV, categorized certain propositions as being "unsafe" for teaching in
Catholic seminaries and universities, namely, the opinion that Christ may
not have had the beatific vision during his lifetime, that he would not have
known "from the beginning... everything, past, present, and future, that is
to say everthing which God knows with the 'knowledge of vision.' "

Finally, in 1943 Pope Pius XII declared in an encyclical letter on the
Church as the Mystical Body of Christ (Mystici Corporis) that Jesus enjoyed
the beatific vision "from the time He was received into the womb of the
Mother of God." consequently, "the loving knowledge with which the divine
Redeemer has pursued us from the first moment of His incarnation is such
as completely to surpass all the searching of the human mind."....

Can We Reconcile the New Testament Record and the Teaching of the Church? 
No; at least not *these* teaching. But then, what precisely are these
teachings excluding, and what authority do they have?

The difficulty with answering the first of these two questions is compounded
by the variety of theological universes that are operative in the New
Testament, the medieval period, and in contemporary thought. On closer
examination, the three universes are not mutually opposed. The medieval
position is the "odd one out." The New Testament and present-dayt
theology are in closer harmony, one with another.