Monday, October 26, 2009

Larry Hurtado on How Did Jesus Become a God

Larry Hurtado is Professor of New Testament Language, Literature and Theology at Edinburgh University, Scotland and author of Lord Jesus Christ: Devotion to Jesus in Earliest Christianity and How on Earth Did Jesus Become a God?: Historical Questions about Earliest Devotion to Jesus. His research has significantly advanced the discussion on what the earliest Christians thought about Jesus. Hurtado provides solid evidence that Jesus was thought of as divine within just a few short years after Jesus death and resurrection. Indeed, in this video Hurtado says if you want to be a bit more daring you could say it perhaps happened within the earliest weeks or months after Jesus death but we don't have any evidence from that period. At the end of the video he contrasts his view with that of Maurice Casey and James (Jimmy) D. G. Dunn who hold to a more "evolutionary" view which sees the divinity of Jesus as developing over several decades after Jesus death (that discussion starts at 6:41 if you want to skip ahead). Enjoy!

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