Leolaia and/or Narkissos, "pseudochristos" = "false anointed"?

by AuldSoul 9 Replies latest watchtower bible

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  AuldSoul

  I want to make sure I am understanding this correctly. In the places where Jesus is recorded as saying "false Christs" would come in his name, is it correct to state that pseudochristos/pseudochristoi literally means "false anointed ones"?

  It didn't make any sense for them to (1) claim to be Christ and also (2) claim to know where Christ is.

  My studies led me to believe that there is no reason (besides tradition) for capitalizing the "c" in translating "christos" in these instances, particularly since the plural form is used. The lower case "c" would mean we were being warned away from those who claim to be anointed and who also claimed to know where Christ is.

  Please help me out on this one. (e.g. Matthew 24:24 gr. pseudochristoi)

  Respectfully,
  AuldSoul
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  Leolaia

  Sorry to give a quickie answer. The term pseudokhristos is clearly related to other compounds like pseudoprophétas "false prophet" (cf. Matthew 7:15, 24:11, 24; Mark 13:22; Luke 6:26; Acts 13:6, 2 Peter 2:1, 1 John 4:1, Revelation 16:13, 19:20, Didache 11:5, 8), pseudapostolos "false apostle" (2 Corinthians 11:13), pseudadelphos "false brother" (2 Corinthians 11:26, Galatians 2:4), and pseudodidaskalos "false teacher" (2 Peter 2:1). With the exception of "brother", all of these involve some implied authority... authority as teacher, authority as prophet, authority as apostle. This would suggest that the synoptic neologism pseudokhristos also has connotations of authority, especially since it is only used in conjunction with pseudoprophétas. The term khristos in LXX and NT Greek could refer to priests of the Temple (as it is used in Daniel and 2 Maccabees), or anointed kings. In messianic movements within militant Judaism, such khristoi would refer to claimants to the Davidic throne, or priestly khristoi of the line of Levi. The likelihood that the term has a messianic sense (i.e. claiming identity with Christ) is ensured by the parallel of Mark 13:22 in v. 5-6: "Take care that no one deceives you. Many will come using my name and saying, 'I am he' and they will deceive many". This explains the term pseudokhristoi in v. 22; these are individuals who falsely claim to be Christ and use his name. This interpretation of the name is made explicit by Justin Martyr (c. AD 155), who states that the pseudokhristoi "come forward in the name of Jesus" (Dialogue, 35). The term pseudokhristoi also has an obscure relationship with the antikhristoi "antichrists" of 1 John. While the term clearly does not refer to messianic claimants in 1 John (the sense is rather closer to Christians who deny Jesus as the Christ-come-in-the-flesh), there is an attested usage of the term to refer to the expected Jewish Messiah, e.g. "I anathematize and curse the Messiah (Messian) awaited by the Jews, who will come as Christ (Khriston), rather the Antichrist (Antikhriston)," (cf. Griffith, p. 178), and I recall that Marcion similarly characterized the Christ anticipated by the Jews as a false demiurgical Christ.
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  Leolaia

  BTW, forget completely about the use of the term "anointed" to refer to certain Christians. This has no parallel in NT usage and instead is a vestige of an old Watchtower teaching that claimed that "the Christ" (with the definite article) in the NT refers to Jesus Christ + the elect, while "Christ" without an article refers to Jesus Christ alone (this is the old "mystery" teaching). This claim was abandoned in the 1950s or 1960s, but the name "the anointed" stuck as a replacement of the older "the Christ" term, and of course the Society still teaches that the anointed class plays a role in the salvation of the "other sheep".
  

  About Matthew 24:24//Mark 13:22, the reference to pseudokhristoi is clearly intended to explain the declarations "Look, here is the Christ" and "Look, he is here" in the previous verse (hence the gar "for, because"). That is to say, the indivudals who have these declarations said about them are the pseudokhristoi.

  It didn't make any sense for them to (1) claim to be Christ and also (2) claim to know where Christ is.

  I think you are confusing the pseudokhristoi with the people who talk about them. Note that Matthew 24:23 is not just about people who falsely claim things; these people are presenting someone else as the Christ. The wording of the passage is not "I am the Christ" but "Look, here is the Christ"; compare 16:20, in which Jesus gave his disciples an order so that they would not say that "he is the Christ (autos estin ho Khristos)". Rather, the pseudokhristoi are the ones in 24:5 who say, "I am the Christ" (egó eimi ho Khristos).
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  rootofallevil

  As far as the greek translation of the word "pseudochristos" is concerned it is a compound word, made of "pseudo" = false and "christos"= annointed.

  When the "c" in christos is capitalized it refers to the annointed Jesus.
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  peacefulpete

  Just as Leolaia said "annointed" as an identifier occurs only with Jesus in the NT. I believe the only occassion where annoint/annointing in used in reference to Christians is in 1 John 2 where it describes the mystical blending of minds believed in the Johannine community, not an identifying lable. This is not to say that some camps of Christians did not see themselves as inheritors of promises to become kings over others, just that the word in discussion was not a designation in comon usage.
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  OHappyDay

  Christians as "anointed":

  2 Corinthians 1:21 O de bebaiwn hmav sun umin eiv Criston kai crisav hmav qeov "It is God who establishes us with you in Christ, and has anointed us." (English Standard Version)
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  peacefulpete

  Good catch Happy Day, however it should read: "But He confirming us (or making us steadfast) and annointing us with you in Christ is God." It seems to me that here again the word is used in a mystical way, not as a designation/title but as an experience of blessing the writer felt all his audience shared in as membership of Christ. They were Christed as it were. Alternatively some feel that the "annointing" here refers to the literal annointing with oil that was done at baptism in some quarters and is attested in the 2nd century.
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  Narkissos

  Sorry I'm catching this thread just now.

  I guess AuldSoul's idea is etymologically correct but semantically wrong for the reasons Leolaia pointed out. Logically the Christians as "anointed" might be called christoi, "Christs" -- but it is all the more noteworthy that in the NT they are not. Christos in the NT is limited to Jesus, and whereas the Johannine use of chrisma, "anointing," (1 John 2:20,27) comes close to identifying believers as christoi it actually refrains from doing so.

  While the Jewish sense of Messiah is hardly dominant in the NT as a whole it is important in the Gospels. As has been pointed out Mark 13:22 directly echoes v. 21, "Look! Here is the Christ/Messiah," and it echoes other passages where the Jewish notion of Messiah is at stake, such as 12:35 (the Son of David?); 14:61 (the Son of the Blessed One); 15:32 (the king of Israel).
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  AuldSoul

  Thank you all for your answers (((Leolaia))), (((rootofallevil))), (((peacefulpete))), (((OHappyDay))), and (((Narkissos))). I have been fevered for the last few days, so I may not have communicated my question very well. I think Narkissos hit on what I was asking about, since the self-identified "Faithful and Discreet Slave" also self-identify as "anointed ones" or "the anointed" it seems to me they are calling themselves christoi.

  Even if they aren't professing to be the returned Jesus they are proving to be false christs (pseudochristoi) in that they are not anointed and false prophets in that their prophecies don't come true. But I may be proving the point that a little knowledge of another language can be a dangerous thing.

  Respectfully,
  AuldSoul
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  Narkissos

  Hi AuldSoul, hope you are better now.

  Even if they aren't professing to be the returned Jesus they are proving to be false christs (pseudochristoi) in that they are not anointed.

  To be fair, not really. Or, only etymologically. The "anointed" status which they claim is NOT that of "THE Anointed One" (= the Christ/Messiah in Mark 13:21f//), but the secondary status which Pauline and Johannine Christians did claim: "anointed in the Anointed" as it were. In this sense I think they don't qualify as pseudochristoi in the sense of Mark 13:21f//, which targets individuals (in the late 1st and early 2nd century AD, btw, such as Bar Kochba) which claimed (or were ascribed by their followers) a religious/political messianic role in the Jewish sense. Pseudoprophètai, otoh, is another matter.

  But I may be proving the point that a little knowledge of another language can be a dangerous thing.

  LOL. No problem, one has to live dangerously anyway...