Was Boy Jesus Really That Smart?
The Rabyd Atheist | 5 March 2025
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7g3lPQOq5CU
0:37 For St. Luke's Gospel, the witness on some things is the Blessed Virgin Mary.
I'd say that's as credible as you get.
On the same occasion, St. Luke made an icon of the Blessed Virgin. A copy of a copy of it is called, variously, Our Lady of Perpetual Help or, by the Greeks, Hodegetria. As he was Greek, he did not relate to the ban on images, and Our Lady knew Our Lord had miraculously put images on cloth, so She was OK with it too.
Given St. Joseph was also present at the occasion, his children from a previous marriage could also witness to St. Luke. Like St. James, Brother-of-God, the first single monarchic bishop of Jerusalem.
2:07 Two witnesses is a criterium for judges.
St. Luke wasn't a witness, he was judging witness accounts.
2:32 "the author of Luke is anonymous"
That's not modern scholarship. That's modernist scholarship, i e part of what Pope St. Pius X called a synthesis of all heresies.
It began with Markan priority, the traditional account of the Gospels (both Augustine and Clement of Alexandria, though differring on the relation between Mark and Luke) places Matthew as first Gospeller. In Bismarck's Germany, among Liberal Protestants, Markan priority was convenient, because it allowed Liberals to stamp Matthean prooftexts for the papacy as "later accretions" ...
The theory pre-existed the Kulturkampf, but gained vastly in traction by the Kulturkampf.
The criteria that modernist Bible scholars use to determine or dis-determine authorships are such that, if consistently applied in other fields of Ancient scholarship, for instance Latin or Greek literature, would cripple knowledge. They are for instance such that on their criterium, you couldn't know that Caesar (the one who was killed on the Ides of March) wrote Bellum Gallicum. I've been confronted by those types of criteria, and I've taken a look at what they would mean for Bellum Gallicum. And mind you, all scholars accept Bellum Gallicum and Bellum Civile as authored by Caesar, except BG book VIII which specifically tells us that Caesar confided authorship to someone else for that. The idea "if Moses wrote the Exodus, why no first person" would also doom Bellum Gallicum, if accepted as a good argument against a witness.
2:51 No, it is not "conjecture and speculation" it is straight off the tradition of the Church.
2:53 "No historical attestation elsewhere."
You are here applying the criterium of the so called Weibull school about historic research and presentation.
It works fine for early modern times to the present, because we have so much printed documentation. We have records of debates, and so, that Laurentius Magni was named archbishop of Uppsala in 1527, when it was too late, when Gustav Wasa had given up on being in temporary schism, hoping the Pope would change his mind, and got fullblown Lutheran, this is a fact that can be verified from:
- Laurentius Magni or his brother Olaus Magni
- Vatican archives
- Gustav Wasa's men, probably Laurentius Petri (the Nerician), a disciple of Luther himself, or his brother Olaus Petri.
So, you probably can get at least 3 independent sources for the fact.
We are close to 500 years after the fact. However, multiply that by 4. 2000 years ago is a very different story. As well as anything further back. We have one source for the Finding in the Temple, unless it's also mentioned in Proto-Gospel of St. James, in that case 2. We also have exactly one ancient source for Caesar building a bridge over Lake Geneva. Caesar in Bellum Gallicum (it's the campaign against Orgetorix or its aftermath, I forget which). Go far enough back, probably to before the 11th C. revolution in reading and writing, perhaps earlier than that in Byzantium, and the criterium completely breaks down.
2:59 "to tell what characters are feeling"
I don't think St. Luke or anyone else is indulging in many speculations about someone's inner feelings. Those of Mary, he had Her as the source. As to the teachers in the Temple, well, "they were astonished" must be read as "they expressed astonishment" ... a modern novelist might have allowed them to make up to 5 utterances, in order that each could be shown in some shade of astonishment, but papyrus was not as cheap, and scrolls tended to be short even for reasons of maintaining the scroll.
I think you haven't mastered the 1st C. context of the culture of writing in general, back then.
3:30 Before a judge, hearsay is inacceptable.
In history, authors are to be presumed as being judges. I e, Luke is to be presumed to have better sources than just hearsay, unless you can show he usually bungles things, which you can't, and Luke himself is not hearsay, but a judge about the evidence available to him.
4:20 "anyone could write anything about Jesus' boyhood, and believers were going to believe it"
That's a pretty wild reconstruction.
First, I'm not sure the account of Infancy Gospel of St. Thomas are false. But second, that text gained only local traction and was never accepted as a canonical Gospel. Perhaps "partial" is better than "local" but anyway. If there had been no scepticism from believers about it, it would have made it into the canon. It's not just absent from the canon decided in 380's and 90's, but the Muratorian fragment doesn't seem to have it, and it was generous enough to include Apocalypse of St. Peter. As far as I could make out in wikipedia (which could be vandalised), but also a google search, Melito of Sardis is only giving an OT canon.
Third. You are not just ignoring Church Tradition, you are presuming the contrary is true about the Church's back then due diligence about the Gospels.
5:10 No, the Bible actually doesn't indicate that Mary had more children.
St. Joseph had children from a wife who had died before the Gospel account starts.
6:04 The closest we get to such a testimony from rabbis is:
- Gamaliel
- Joseph of Arimathaea
- Nicodemus
all converted to Christianity, sooner with the latter two, later with the former (arguably after both his disciples Paul and Barnabas were already doing ministry).
As to getting such a testimony from Rabbinic Judaism, the expectation would be very naive. All over the four Gospels, we see a later generation of Pharisees trying to test Jesus. One motive would be, He gathered disciples. But given the acrimony of the over the top testing, asking for a miracle just after He had performed one, a probably motive would be sons feeling slighted that their dads had admired Jesus more than them. The Mishna was assembled by committees of a fairly anti-Christian bias. Any testimony of the kind you say would be welcome would have been weeded out well before the Mishna was finally assembled.
6:19 Do we even know there was any Rabbinic teaching in Nazareth at this point?
Because, I haven't even seen evidence Nazareth at this point has a Beth Sepher.
By the way, I don't see any early Church Father making the boy's wisdom a direct argument for divinity.
Bede does, but his view on the passage is too late to be a motive for it. In Catena Aurea*, I'll cite Bede and a Greek expositor:
Origen makes it a consequence of his divinity. I'll cite him too:
ORIGEN. Because moreover He was the Son of God, He is found in the midst of the doctors, enlightening and instructing them. But because He was a little child, He is found among them not teaching but asking questions, as it is said, Sitting in the midst of the doctors, hearing them, and asking them questions. And this He did as a duty of reverence, that He might set us an example of the proper behaviour of children, though they be wise and learned, rather to hear their masters than teach them, and not to vaunt themselves with empty boasting. But He asked not that He might learn, but that asking He might instruct. For from the same source of learning is derived both the power of asking and answering wisely, as it follows, All who heard him were astonished at his wisdom.
BEDE. To shew that He was a man, He humbly listened to the masters; but to prove that He was God, He divinely answered those who spake.
GREEK EXPOSITOR. (Metaphrastes vel Geometer.) He asks questions with reason, He listens with wisdom, and answers with more wisdom, so as to cause astonishment. As it follows, And they who saw it were astonished.
If you'd say "there was a Beth Sepher everywhere" ... no, attendance at such only became mandatory with the High Priest Joshua ben Gamla, who died early in the Jewish war.
7:40 "Matthew seems to indicate that the family was always residents in Bethlehem"
But he actually doesn't.
8:03 Romans were pretty fond of tax collecting from provincials.
I think you presume from the fact that a tax in Judaea after Archelaos was removed was the first and sparked a revolt.
This doesn't mean there was no much more humdrum taxing in Galilee, and St. Joseph would have stated the intention of going to Bethlehem in order to avoid those tax collectors, and either he was pleasantly astonished to find no census official in Bethlehem "what? the Centurion said all the world is being taxed!" ... or his intention to get taxed was straight face, and he enrolled to pay tax to the Temple instead.
He probably changed his mind about Roman tax collectors when hearing about the child killing in Bethlehem.
8:13 "once the tax is over"
There is no explicit mention that St. Joseph actually did enroll.
"there is no flight to Egypt in Luke"
Could Our Lady have found that memory a bit traumatising? Even if Jesus was saved, She would have known that lots of the children killed were children She had seen or that St. Joseph knew (not sure if the account is compatible with his having property there, but one could imagine he had leased out his house and had to seek accomodation elsewhere for that reason, or he could have visited Bethlehem with relatives there).
8:53 "running from the law"
More like, from a crime by the state. Note, by the vassal Kingdom of Judaea, at this point still semi-independent.
9:08 St. Matthew certainly didn't use Mark. Neither did St. Luke.
The most credible option for the Synoptic problem as to often identical wordings is that given by St. Clement of Alexandria. When St. Luke came to the first Pope, Peter, to get a stamp of approval, this Chief Apostle was enthusiastic, read alternatingly from Matthew and Luke, adding own comments, and St. Mark (at least at the beginning of the process, one may imagine) sthenographed the Gospel that St. Peter was finally dictating, but as this wasn't the intention, just a verification, the human initiative to the second Gospel comes down to St. Mark.
As he himself founded the Church of Alexandria, I think St. Clement was in a very good position to know.
9:33 St. Matthew couldn't know about St. Luke, since he was first.
St. Luke didn't learn about St. Matthew's Gospel until he came to see St. Peter.
Probably, if Theophilus is Theophilus Ben Hanan, the people he interviewed in Jerusalem deliberately hid the Gospel of Matthew from him. But their wording as oral witnesses to St. Luke may have been influenced by it.
9:48 St. Matthew, as one of the twelve, didn't have to depend on oral tradition, except from the Holy Family (probably St. James Brother-of-God) for the childhood narrative.
St. Luke explicitly does receive a tradition, but is careful to receive it first hand.
Event > X > Luke = yes.
Event > X > Y > Luke = no.
10:37 Not sure how much information Jesus showed above the expected (except it wouldn't have been expected from a home-schooler), more like He received the fullness of judgement about the information He had.
While Jesus was arguably a home-schooler, His Mother had been raised in the Temple. That's why She knew exactly She was being compared to Jael and Judith, wondered why, and when St. Elisabeth adds a bit, recognises Genesis 3:15. Which, given Satan's victory is sin, must have meant She was sinless.
So, right before the Magnificat, She got confirmed She was Mother of God, which She already knew, but explained (in terms She, as raised in the Temple, would immediately understand, quicker than Robert Langdon, comparing only qualifications in "symbolology") She was sinless. And She was as happy as a bright midsummer's day.
This background was not common knowledge to the simple teachers of the law in the Temple, only the priests knew it. And this mind raised Jesus, who had come from Her flesh. The mind that was happier to obey God than to be His close and privileged relative. Just as Jesus forwarded to someone in the sense of "give my ma the compliment she likes best, she deserves that too" (Luke 11).
Is there never anyone who ever struck you as admirable because of surprising takes in his or her judgement?
11:40 Look. In the early Mishnaic period, which begins before the NT, there were these two very well known rabbis, Hillel I and Shammai.**
Since then, there is some kind of understanding among Jews, you must either be "house of Hillel" or "house of Shammai" ... my likeliest candidate for what astonished the teachers is, He showed them how to be both.
As He was homeschooled, He didn't start out in one of the schools. As He was devout, to a Torah which He shared with both, it's probable He was giving a third angle. And as the two angles were right then a problem (which humanly He might not have known, and actually didn't show Himself as knowing, providing only the solutions), this astonished. You may know the clip from Young Messiah, where, a few years earlier, in Alexandria, Our Lord is asked "when was God ever a Carpenter?" and is met with answers from what was common knowledge and would have been like First Grade Sunday School knowledge, or comparable, since back then it was obviously not "Sunday" school, but with a judgement the man hadn't expected. (I'm less fond of the answer about earthly paradise).
11:49 Yes, the Samaritan woman was certainly divine prophecy.
But back to Luke 2, St. John Chrysostom comments:
CHRYSOSTOM. (sup. Joh. Hom. 20.) The Lord truly did no miracle in His childhood, yet this one fact St. Luke mentions, which made men look with wonder upon Him.
In other words, what astonished the teachers was not miraculous knowledge, just maturity not expected in those years. The reaction would have been similar to how the Yanuka is seen these days.
12:27 Given Our Lady was raised in the Temple and first cousin to Elisabeth Cohen, given St. Joseph was of the house of David, it's impossible that they would not have possessed the Torah.
On a very, very, very mush lesser note, I was once teased for being the smartass of the class, and in 6th grade someone gave me an equation for 7th grade maths, and I did it. That day, I was not teased any more.
But obviously, my mum was an ace in mathematics, had "capital A" up to an ablation of the appendix, and from then on "lower case a" in the Swedish grading system. (Yes, she made a point of this). Mathematics were part of her and my own hobbies, and I'm basically ashamed of now forgetting how to do magic squares of six sides or more. Back then I knew. Solving a first degree equation was not super hard. Even if it was my first time around doing it on my own, I think I had seen one done in one of the math books I loved.
Mozart was more precocious about music. Neither of these examples and probably not the teaching of the teachers either, was strictly speaking miraculous.
12:47 If He was both, we would expect different contexts to provide different occasions for either.
Catholic theology doesn't by that Jesus, even as man, didn't have prophetic knowledge of the day and hour, some explain it "doesn't know" = "doesn't make known" ("I don't know" = "I won't tell you" ... in Catholic moral theology this doesn't count as a lie). Some say His physical body, His own person, knew, but His mystical body, the Church, doesn't.
* Catena Aurea by St. Thomas Aquinas, Luke, Chapter 2
https://www.ecatholic2000.com/catena/untitled-63.shtml
** One can consider the contributions of Hillel I and Shammai as being in legalities of the Old Law the equivalent of my doing the upper and lower boundaries for the sum sqrt(5) + ... + sqrt(13) as it has to be lower than 27 but bigger than 23. I got bigger than 23 from sqrt(5) to sqrt(8) being four sqrts bigger than 2, and the remaining sqrts being five sqrts, equal to or bigger than 3. 4*2 + 5*3 = 8 + 15 = 23. Then I get back to the video, where Prime Newtons explains how the lower limit must be 26:
Romanian Mathematics Olympiad
Prime Newtons | 1 March 2025
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cqlpr0W0-34
Ah yes, each of the paired sqrts is bigger than 34, and each should contribute 23/4 if the lower limit is 26 and we leave out 3 as unpaired sqrt(9). Obvilously. Well, the teachers of the law must have felt something similar when hearing Jesus after knowing Hillel I and Shammai.
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