Roman Imperial Theology and Christian Theology | Dr. John Dominic Crossan

Suetonius reports that when the Roman Emperor Vespasian was dying he said, "Vae, puto deus fio" which can be translated "Woe is me. I think I'm turning into a god."

Caesar and Jesus | John Dominic Crossan and Jesus | The Empire of Rome and The Empire of God - The hybrid mix from the ancient clash of civilizations of Rome and Jerusalem. Hellenism and Judaisam.
John Dominic Crossan :"Why did we call Jesus 'lord'? In the Roman world, Caesar was lord, so if you call Jesus lord, Caesar ain't, and it becomes high treason. What was the alternative vision for the world that Jesus and Paul had, and why did it get them killed?"

John Dominic Crossan was originally drawn to the priesthood because "God had the most interesting game in town".

Augustus deposited his will at the House of the Vestals in Rome. He died on August 19, and on September 17 the Senate enrolled him among the gods of the Roman state.
Roman religion had many gods and spirits and Augustus was keen to join their number as a god himself. This was not unusual: turning political leaders into gods was an old tradition around the Mediterranean. There was also precedent in Roman history – Aeneas and Romulus, who had helped found Rome, were already worshipped as gods.
Having fought his way into power, Augustus used religion as a tool to protect his position and promote his political agenda.

A piece of heaven
An important part of this strategy involved religion. The Emperor of Rome was already the most powerful man on earth, but this wasn’t enough. Augustus wanted a piece of heaven too: he was determined that his people would see him as their supreme spiritual leader.
At his death, Augustus, the ‘son of a god’, was himself declared a god. His strategy had worked. Early in his reign, Halley’s Comet passed over Rome. Augustus claimed it was the spirit of Julius Caesar entering heaven. If Caesar was a god then, as his heir, Augustus was the son of a god and he made sure that everybody knew it.

Controversial scholar and former priest John Dominic Crossan has never shied away from uncomfortable questions of faith.

JOHN Dominic Crossan may be one of the world's leading New Testament scholars but he doesn't hide behind academic language.

Think, for a moment, about the first-century world of Jesus...
Religion scholar John Dominic Crossan, in GOD AND EMPIRE, a study of the early Christian movement as well as empire, posits a broader understanding of empire than most and contrasts it with his understanding of the kingdom of God as championed by Jesus and Paul.
For Crossan, empire and civilization are essentially equivalent. Civilization itself, he writes, "has always been imperial -- that is, empire is the normalcy of civilization's violence."
I have always thought of the historical Jesus as a homeland Jew within Judaism within the Roman Empire. I have always thought of the historical Paul as a diaspora Jew within Judaism within the Roman Empire. For me, then, within Judaism within the Roman Empire has always been the absolutely necessary matrix rather than the annoyingly unnecessary background for any discussion of earliest Christianity. You can see that three-layer matrix, for example, in the sub-titles to the first and last books above. For the historical Jesus, The Life of a Mediterranean Peasant, emphasizes Rome, Judaism, and Jew.
The Apostle Paul Opposed Rome's Empire with God's Kingdom, emphasizes Jew, Rome, and Judaism. Whether you start or end with the Roman Empire, the Roman Empire is always there."

John Dominic Crossan
https://faithandreason.org/

Incarnation was not invented by Christianity. Caesar and Alexander before him were Sons of God. The Jesus as God theology was a revolution not by a man as a Son of God but what TYPE of man could be a son of God. It was also a counter narrative to what type of man could be a Messiah for the Jews.

Alexander and Jesus both had later claims that their Fathers were God. Alexander and Jesus also died around the same age, one as an Imperial King in Babylon and the other as a usurper against the Roman empire in Jerusalem.

A son of God who was not a conquering King. A messiah who was not a man of power but a man of suffering and tragedy. This was the counter narrative of Christianity to the incarnation theology in the ancient world.

Suetonius on the Roman Emperor Vespasian:
Not even when he was under the immediate apprehension and peril of death, could he forbear jesting. For when, among other prodigies, the mausoleum of the Caesars suddenly flew open, and a blazing star appeared in the heavens; one of the prodigies, he said, concerned Julia Calvina, who was of the family of Augustus; and the other, the king of the Parthians, who wore his hair long. And when his distemper first seized him, "I suppose," said he, "I shall soon be a god."

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