Is this question passable?

Question

I initially intended to make this a footnote to my question on main, but I would like some feedback from the community so I figured this is a better place to do that. I'm trying to figure out what rules of pseudo-neutrality in questions may or may not be operative around here. (Moderator or not, I'm relatively new to BH.SE, so I appreciate you bearing with me.)

The (potential) trouble with this question is that my own bias has framed the question with the assumption that John's gospel records (albeit in translation) words actually spoken by Jesus.* The "easiest" answer may be that this passage instead reflects the christology of the author of John's gospel projected back onto the lips of Jesus, without the need for a Semitic correlate.

In reflecting on how to structure the question to deal with this, I considered adding to my list of options, "Jesus didn't say this at all..." However, this seems to open a totally different line of argumentation — one that would require analysis far beyond this passage, and probably one that isn't scoped appropriately for a BH.SE question.

Is the question acceptable, or is there a way to change it so that it is?

_{*While we have many questions that assume the historicity of various aspects of the biblical text, it seems like the words of Jesus as recorded in John's gospel may be a special case, as there is a substantial contingent who takes the text seriously yet understands these words as something other than direct quotations....a view I won't attempt to characterize further as I'd probably do it incorrectly.}

Answer 1

Pseudo-neutrality never completely took off as official site guidelines (and despite being the primary proponent of them, I'm actually kind of glad about that after many discussions with folks like Jack Douglas, Jon Ericson, etc.). While elements of it are in effect to some extent, they are often clarified under other ideas (e.g. questions must start from and arise naturally/obviously from the text).

Assuming Jesus was a real person and that John's gospel records his words (most likely translated into Greek) is not problematic—it is clear to me how that arises naturally from the text. So long as you are open to an answer that contends otherwise (which it appears you are), that's fine.¹

What Jack Douglas and others helped me realize is that all questions have assumptions, and they are unavoidable. The goal is to minimize those as much as possible to encourage a diversity of answers, but we'll never make everyone happy. If we push pseudo-neutrality to its extremes, no one could ask anything.

If you can't tell, I'm no longer a huge proponent of strict pseudo-neutrality. I've shifted my focus to other, more specific things. The key thing is that the question arises naturally/obviously from the text. In this case I think it's clear that it does. +1 from me.

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_{¹ The only contention I would have is that it is technically unanswerable to tell you what someone actually said (certainty) unless we have an eyewitness/recording. What answers can do is tell you what he most likely said (probability), but that is a pedantic distinction. I wouldn't bother editing it—it's a good question as is.}

Answer 2

I have already added an answer on "main", and UV'ed here. The question is a (better than) good one. Perhaps there was a slightly better way of framing the question, although OP's tweak from "actually" to "likely" headed in a good direction. ;)

The main points I want to make on Meta are:

1. This question is no more "opinion based" that 84.7% of the questions asked on BH.SE that involve interpretation arising out of historical context. Responses to such questions necessarily require eliciting evidence, weighing it, and providing argumentation for its shaping a response in one way or another. This question does precisely that.

2. I'm afraid that claims that there is "no evidence" for this question were simply made in ignorance. There is a large body of scholarly discussion of this issue, and it hasn't all simply been snatched out of the air. One needn't even be familiar with the specialist literature: a simple survey of standard commentaries would make this clear.

3. Initial assumptions about where any evidence might, in fact, come from also turned out to be misplaced. Answering questions on BH.SE often necessitates doing research -- or a least a minimal bit of homework. This might sometimes be the case even for offering comments on questions. Difficulties arise when we don't know what we don't know ;) -- but I get the sense that most participants on BH.SE have a bit of humility and are here in order to learn.

So my take on this -- and generalizing from this particular case -- arrives at the same position that a previous response offered. Thoughtfully framed, well-researched questions that arise out of the text are very likely to be "on topic", even if they might need some help in formulating the question most effectively.