Review article
"Son of Man" in the Debate of M. Casey with P. Owen and D. Shepherd
Mario Cifrak
; Catholic faculty of theology University of Zagreb, Zagreb, Croatia
Darija s. Pia Herman
; St. Francis Catholic School Center, Tuzla, Bosnia and Herzegovina
Abstract
The paper deals with a polemic that is part of a very lively contemporary debate about the title ‘Son of Man’, namely the one between Maurice Casey on one side and Paul Owen and David Shepherd on the other.
The expression ‘Son of Man’ stands in the Gospels always in the definite form (o` ui`o.j tou/ avnqrw,pou). M. Casey sees the origins of this Greek expression in two Aramaic expressions: in the definite, emphatic form of bar enasha (the son of man), and in the absolute, indefinite and general form of bar enash (a son of man). He undertakes a very comprehensive and complex process of proving that in the Jesus’ Galilean Aramaic language both of these expressions, definite and indefinite, could have indefinite and general meaning, and that they both signify simply a man. According to this, when Jesus spoke of the Son of Man, he never had himself in mind, and the Son of Man would not be a messianic title. The expression would simply be a synonym for the more general term a man.
P. Owen and D. Shepherd challenge Casey’s claims by interpreting differently those places from Aramaic sources on which Casey bases his arguments. Over the past ten years, the three of them developed a debate, and the aim of this paper is to briefly present their arguments and counter arguments, and to evaluate them in the end.
Keywords
Son of Man; bar enash; bar enasha; Galilean Aramaic; Maurice Casey; Paul Owen; David Shepherd
Hrčak ID:
93674
URI
Publication date:
31.12.2012.
Visits: 1.339 *