In John 21, Peter asks Jesus if “the Beloved Disciple” would live to see His return. Jesus doesn’t answer & TBD/the author himself does not affirm it, but the idea of SOMONE in Jesus’s day living until the Second Coming has excited Christian AND non-C’tian imagination. It has been suggested btw that TBD was not really John, BUT Lazarus. Of course, Mary Magdalene & quite a few others have also been suggested. I have no problem believing many of them helped contribute but that John of Zebedee had the main task of compiling their contributions into one Gospel (in the same way Luke notes that his Gospel came from interviews with others who did encounter Jesus).
Back to the OP, I also have heard that the story of the centurion and the story of the Wandering Jew have been mixed up.
Read “The Death of Ahashuerus” by Lagerkvist for an an interesting tale of how the Wandering Jew manages to break his mortal coil.
Lazarus Long is the nickname of the main character in Heinlen’s “Time Enough for Love” which I happen to have sitting on my desk, among other things. Good book, crappy ending.
Tim
For northern piper I must say that I intermixed the concept of a “ceturion” with the word “soldier” all I was trying to get across was that it was one in the Roman legion that did this to Christ’s body. … ok, that was your point one…your second point states that he was not named in the Bible, this is true and I said just that in the paragraph you were responding to, in fact you quoted it again when you wrote your response. Point 3 I also agree with although, by asking if Nicodemus was the “end of it”. I was provided wandering Jew information, so it served my means to keep digging until I hit something hard. … I"m not quite sure how to address your fourth point piper, talk about not having a basis on my information. Immortality is quite a prevalent topic in the bible itself as well as the Christian faith, however usually when one is blessed with it in the bible they are allowed into the kingdom of heaven, whereas being cursed has somehow been construed as staying “here” or worse.
Why would I choose to believe the stories? Well, I’ll stay with the Humble servant’s response… but add a bit. Why do any of us know who Zeus or Apollo or Hercules are? Well, true many of us were taught such things in school, but many of us studied the Greek gods even more afterwards… why? Curiousity, intrique, excitement at the possibilities of what could have been. I’m certain many have come before me with the same questions, not that I need a parade to hold my hand. I had questions and I asked them. I"m going to get it for this next part, but hell why not.
You say that the Christian church rejected this doctrine and by “Christian church” you mean “Catholic church”, because that’s how all of our faith started out before breaking away from Roman Catholicism those who consider themselves THE church; the very institution of Christianity.
My beliefs in Christianity are centered around the good that has come out of what used to be considered Christianity. There are too many dislikes/disagreements of mine to go into for me to ever consider the Catholic church so much a part of what the “Christian Church” has become. To avoid some flaming I am not saying Catholics aren’t Christians… but I am saying that the workings of the Catholic church conflict with many of messages in the bible. I am also not saying I believe in the Gospel of Nicodemus, but I would not go so far to dismiss things I don’t have all the facts on.
**If you’re going with my response, you’re going with exactly what Northern Piper was saying–these stories are not Christian doctrine–I just added that I think they’re interesting anyway. I don’t “believe” in them. Maybe you are not using the word “believe” in the same way I do.
Stories about saints such as the Centurion’s, popular with the poor, credulous laity, and the miraculous spear shards kept as relics, are examples of exactly those sorts of extra-biblical Catholic traditions that many of the anti-Catholics of the Reformation reacted against. I’m pleased to see that your desire for story and fable may trump your adherence to whatever you mean by “biblical self-evidence.”
BTW, John Wayne played the Centurion (non-elaborated version) in The Greatest Story Ever Told.
I do not believe in the stories in the way I believe in God, servant. The idea was to research the centurion story and somehow I have become a hypocrite. My desire for story does not reflect my belief in the very words of the bible (my biblical self-evidence usage). I only seek to find the truth in something that has has been quite a intriguing story to me for a long time. I apologize if it was implied that I was riding on your coattails for safety servant, I stand behind my beliefs and yet am still forming my opinions and how better to have “real” opinions than to test them ion the eyes and minds of the world. I do not claim to be wise, maybe just enough to be dangerous haha… until next time parry-up :7
quote: “To be a Christian, it’s mandatory that you believe the Bible is the very word of God”
Mandatory huh, You think so?
Well, if we’re going to reference Barry Saddler and John Wayne, might as well go for comic books as well. Supposedly, the spear of Longinus was a major magical artifact (presumedly of lawful evil alignment). In comic book folklore, it was owned by Hitler and prevented any superhero from using his or her power in any land controlled by the Nazis or their allies. This was the reason given why Superman didn’t just fly to Berlin or Tokyo and end WWII in a couple of days.
Finally, back to a friendly learning atmosphere =) thanks Nemo, it’s all interesting.
Thinktank, I’m having trouble following what you’re saying. If you’re just interested in these sorts of myths and legends that have grown up around Christianity, I understand.
However, you’re also mixing the legend in with references to the inerrancy/inspired nature of the Bible - that’s what I don’t understand, as I don’t see how you can take that position if you believe that “the Bible is the very word of God.”
Yes, it’s a prevalent topic, but always in the context of the immortality of the soul, coupled with resurrection after death.
As Friar Ted notes, the only reference in the New Testament which even vaguely hints at the possibility of immortality without death is in the last chapter of John, and the author of John is at pains to deny that Jesus promised that he would not die. In context, that passage looks more like Jesus giving a mild rebuke to S. Peter, who may have resented the relationship the author of John had with Jesus.
To the best of my knowledge, no Christian denomination recognizes the possibility of physical immortality without death - even Jesus died, so why would human beings have a superior position than him? That’s why I said that the stories of an immortal Roman are contrary to Christian theology - and I was not restricting myself to Roman Catholic theology. If you can provide any example of a Christian denomination (Catholic, Orthodox, Protestant, etc.) that does believe in the immortality of the body without death, I’d be most interested and surprised.
Two points in reply.
First, as Motog notes, the Gospel of Nicodemus, which appears to be the original source for the legend of Cassius, has never been accepted as part of the Bible, not by the primitive church, not by the Roman Catholic or Orthodox churches, nor by the Protestant churches. That’s not got anything to do with particular Roman Catholic views.
Second, I’m simply not following this comment. As Humble Servant notes, one of the points that was hotly debated in the Reformation was the releavnce of just this sort of Christian legend that had grown up in Christendom. The Protestant reformers took the view that these legends were of no significance at all and should be swept out of the Church, along with any reverence for relics and so on. Only what was found in the Bible was necessary for salvation. (For a typical example, see Article VI of the Church of England’s Thirty-Nine Articles of Faith. If you’re saying that this type of myth or legend is part of the Christian tradition, it seems to me to be inconsistant with the Protestant tradition, so I’m not sure where you’re coming from on this.
In addition, an episode of Witchblade had the bad guy obtain the spear because it was the only weapon that could counter the power of the Witchblade. It was said that if the owner dropped it, he would be defeated.
just interested in these sorts of myths and legends that have grown up around Christianity 
Thinktank:
Cite?
Getting back to the original question, it does appear that the two comments in the New Testament sited above are the source for the myth. However, the myth itself was grafted onto various other immortality myths (including one from the Koran sometime during Medieval times. The story of the Wandering Jew probably reached its “modern” form sometime in the 13th Century. There are many variations, of course, which is why you’ve heard of WJ having either different names or differnt professions, or both. The story is still popular in the last 200 years, and has popped up in literature (Nathanial Hawthorne used the WJ in “Mosses from an Old Manse”), comic books (it’s been alluded that DC’s Phantom Stranger may be the WJ) and TV (remember the classic Star Trek story “Requiem for Methusaleh”?).
For a really good summary of info on the WJ, check out:
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Oracle/1720/wjfaq.htm
Various ambiguous statements made by Jesus in the Gospels appear to say that he will come in glory before everyone alive in his time has died. The early Christians are generally figured to have thought the end of the world was coming very soon, and so these statements were likely taken literally.
When the world didn’t end shortly after Christ’s time, believers were left with the problem of reinterpreting his statements.
One approach was to assume that the remarks had not referred to the Second Coming at all. For instance, Mrs. White, the founder of the Seventh Day Adventists, took his statements to refer to the Transfiguration. Other theologians have taken the remarks to refer to the Ressurection, or to the founding of the Church and the establishment of the Kingdom of God as an abstraction existing among people of good will.
Then there were the people who argued that maybe somebody who lived contemporaneously with Jesus hadn’t died.
Most of these suggestions can be gathered under the heading of “The Wandering Jew”.
As noted above, a common version of the legend is that a Jew mocked Jesus or was otherwise abusive to him as he was walking to Calvary. A common version says that he pulled a stool away when Jesus tried to rest for a moment. Jesus then said something like: “wait here till I come back”. In some versions of the story the man never ages. In others he becomes incredibly old yet cannot die. In yet others he grows old, then becomes young again, then grows old…ad infinitum. In some stories he is a wretched, homeless downtrodden figure. In yet others he is a figure of immense wealth and power. Sometimes he is a horrible villain, and sometimes he is quite saintly.
There are even versions where he is a woman. In parts of Italy children anticipate the coming of the Wandering Jewess on Christmas Eve rather than Santa Claus. This woman is said to have met the Magi when they were on their way to see the Christ child, but declined to go with them. It is said that after leaving presents for the children in a house she goes and looks in on them as they sleep, ever hopeful that one day she will see the Christ child.
When Jesus called St. Peter and St. Andrew to go be “fishers of men”, St. John came following after them. When they questioned Christ about this, he said something cryptic such as “what is it to you if I bid this man to tarry till I come?” (I’m sorry; I didn’t think to take time to look up the passage before I started this). Because of this, it is sometimes said that St. John is the Wandering Jew. In one legend from the Middle Ages he is said to be lying asleep in his coffin, his heartbeat incredibly slow.
Finally, there are those stories which say that the person remaining on earth from Christ’s time was never a Jew at all. In such case he is sometimes said to be the Centurion who stabbed Jesus with his spear.
There exists an old gilded spear variously called “The Spear of Destiny” and “The Spear of Longinus” which is said by some to be the spear the Centurion used. Long in a museum in Germany, Hitler is said to have ordered that it be preserved in a vault during Allied bombing. Using this isolated fact a number of writers have written extensive and imaginative accounts of how Hitler believed he could overcome the world so long as he was in possession of the spear. The movie The Raiders of the Lost Ark made speculations about Hitler’s occult beliefs popular, and brought the spear to public attention. It is likely this which led to renewed interest in the Centurion legend.
As a postscript, I should mention that Martin Gardner has done a good review of the Wandering Jew legends and related beliefs. It can be found in several of his books of essays. The motif has been very, very popular in literature well before the current era of science fiction, and was dealt with by Hans Christian Andersen as well as any number of opera librettists.
FWIW, C. Cassius Longinus was a historical personage – an assassin of Caesar, who committed suicide at Philippi.
Whether there is a conflation of the Roman who stabbed Caesar with the Roman who (allegedly) stabbed Jesus, I don’t know.
Just a note that Heinlein’s Lazarus Long, AKA Woodrow Wilson Smith, made his first appearance in “Methuselah’s Children”, published in 1941, very early in RAH’s career. I don’t doubt that he intended the name to be evocative of one form of the Lazarus legend - Long isn’t IMMORTAL, exactly, just very long-lived, initially as a result of being a particularly successful result of the Howard families breeding program, later as a result of life-extension technology. Or maybe he realized that he intended to keep resurrecting the character on a regular basis.
I want my spear back.
That’s all I’m gonna say.
http://www.askwhy.co.uk/christianity/0720WanderingJew.html
Cartaphilus/Kartaphilos, is this the guy y’all are talking about?