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The "Son of man"

   The Gospels  say, at times, that Jesus speaks of himself same as of another person, in the sense that doesn't say "Me", but "the Son of man".  It's an usual use of the language and the Semitic culture.  This title "Son of man", is brought thirteen times in the Gospel of John, that, as we know, it has been written at the end of the first century, while in the synoptic Gospel, more ancient than John, this  this sentence is written 69 times.  This shows, together to other factors, that the title  "the Son of man" has a lot of guarantees of antichity and the same researchers recognize it as belonging to Jesus's preaching in the years of his public life, therefore before the Easter.  

   Well, we set there three questions related to our search of the historical Jesus: 

   1) what meant Jesus wants to tell the title of "the Son of man"?

   2) What does he want to say, speaking, about this sentence, to his listeners?

   3) What it tells us the title "the Son of man" about the identity of Jesus? That is, what can we know about Jesus "Son of the man" overcoming the editorial filter of the Gospels? 

   To understand the evangelical meaning of this sentence  it needs to compare it with the apocalyptic literature of the Bible. We read in the book of the prophet Daniel: 

   "In my vision at night I looked, and there before me was one like a son of man, coming with the clouds of heaven. He approached the Ancient of Days and was led into his presence. He was given authority, glory and sovereign power; all peoples, nations and men of every language worshiped him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion that will not pass away, and his kingdom is one that will never be destroyed"(Dan 7,13-14). 

   In the apocalyptic tradition, Daniel assists to a vision to the center of which The Son of man  appears on the clouds of the sky. He receives the universal empire. The scenery seems to teach that "the conclusion and the passing from the four human kingdoms to the Kingdom of God, it would not have happened without the collaboration of a particular envoy of God". 

   The problem that many are set, it concerns the identification of this figure of the "Son of man" with a collectivity or with a single person, that could be the Messiah of Israel. 

   Kept account that according to Feuillet, this appellative of "Ben adam", "Son of man" has been inspired to Daniel by the prophet Ezechiel that uses it  93 times, it means that "The mysterious character of the Son  of man of Daniel is a kind of visible demonstration of the invisible God...; it belongs to the sphere of the divine one and it is as an incarnation of the divine glory, as the human image contemplated by Ezechiel" (A. Feuillet, Her Fils de the homme de Daniel et the tradition biblique in RB 60 [1953] 189, in M. Cimosa, Messianismo, in New Dictionary of Biblical Theology, And. Paoline, p.949). 

   But Ezechiel, to which Daniel refers, show another aspect of the Son of man: Since the moment of his election to prophet, from when he receives the Spirit of God, he is called "Son of man" "Or rather: small fragile thing, one of the so many, that nevertheless God has chosen and lifted, transfusing him his spirit". 

   To this point a third very important datum that the researchers unite must be noticed. In the whole Biblical literature a continuous passage is noticed by a collective conception to an idea of the Son of man as single person.   This idea  spreads in the biblical literature, also  inspiring the theme of the Messiah,  thin to identify the idea of the "Son of man",  contained in Daniel's book in that of the "Servant of Jahvé", so dramatically described by the according to Isaiah, a character whose mission of salvation doesn't regard only Israel, but all the people and whose life is predestinate to  tragically end himself. But he will be glorious after the death and so it will save the men pouring hisr blood for them. 

   To testify the agreement of these two characters is really the use of the term "the Son of man" on the lips of Jesus, as he is brought in the Gospel. 

   The a lot of evangelical texsts that contain this title "Son of man", they have been listed in three groups: 

   First group: it picks up all those testimonies in which the "the man's Child" "humble condition lives, low, but, together, important and decisive.  In this group are all the texts in which it is deduced that "Jesus inaugurate the escatologic epoch and the "Son of man" starts to take his  full power". 

   Second group: the mission of the Son of man. He will have to suffer shines through, to die and to rise, completing the mission of the "Servant of Jahvé". "In these texts the title "Son of man" seems to melt himself, in the person of Jesus, with the characters of the Servant of God. 

   Third group: the figure of the "Son of man" appears as  "an escatologic Messiah", in line with the prophetic spirit of Daniel (Mr 8,38; Mt 16, 27; Lc 9,26).  

   Defining himself  as "the Son of man",  Jesus updates the vision of the prophet Daniel and, if on one side he is conscious to have the authority, "exousía" solemnly recognized to the "Son of man" of the vision of Daniel, from the other he knows to make actual what is written in the book of the prophet Isaiah, about image of the "suffering Servant of Jahvé".  In fact, keeping in mind the progressive human conscience of Jesus, when he clearly realizes to go toward to a tragic destiny, thinking about the Writings, to the Bible, he discovers in two books that it knows well, Isaiah  and Daniel, two mysterious characters seem to anticipate him: The first person is the suffering Servant of Isaiah 52,13-53,12, that allows him to understand the mystery of his sacrificial death and to measure his course, already opening the perspective to a future glorification. The second person is  the Son of man of Daniel 7,13-14. He make him glimpse in certain way an anticipation and a prophetic announcement of his exaltation..... 

   And' psychologically explainable that Jesus identifies in these two mysterious people. 

   In conclusion, we can say that, saying to be the "Son of man", Jesus points out his mysterious origin and, at the same time, his extraordinary importance in the project of God finalized  to the salvation of the man, as it appears in the references of Ezechiel and Daniel. On the other side, calling himself "the Son of man", Jesus intends to live the condition of brittleness, of weakness, characteristic of this title in the prophet Ezechiele. He is the historical Jesus, the Jesus that clearly shows to have chosen the street of the weakness and the brittleness before the experience of the Easter; His choice passes for his cross and for his death. 

   There is a clear reference to this voluntary choice served as the Rabbi of Nazareth, and we immediately find it in the hours precedents to his arrest. After the last supper, aware of the betrayal of Giuda, Jesus goes into the Getsemani with his disciples. The place is known from Jiudah  the traitor. He knows that Jesus approaches there. He is sure to find there, after all other times they had been together  there. 

   Also knowing that Judah knows the place, Jesus goes there the same. Yet he could avoid the risk to be "captured". it would Be enough to go himself to Betania, in the house of the friend Lazzaro, not too far the Getsemani. Or he doesn't perhaps want to put in difficulty his friends of Betania. But he could shelter him in the desert of Giuda that immediately starts after Betania. its ravines, the deep throats could offer a comfort shelter to its friends and him. And with calm it would have, then, the possibility to return him of it in his/her Galilea or elsewhere. 

   Nothing of all. Jesus chooses the Getsemani. First of all because in the night of Easter he needs to be in Jerusalem to fully live the Easter, and gives the thick presence of pilgrims, it is not alone among the boundaries of the holy City that he is able to sleep; but in a perimeter vast than, to east he also embraces the city of Betfage on the mountain of the Ulivis (Betania is excluded). Therefore also the Getsemani and the mountain of the Ulivis belong to this perimeter. This is the first motive that pushes Jesus to live the the solemnity of Easter in the perimeter in Jerusalem, also knowing that there the traitor will find him; there he will be arrested; there his "small flock" it will know the scandal of the dismemberment. 

   Already now, before being arrested, Jesus is aware of his victory on the death. And he is for this that already in the north Galilee he had preannounced his death, reproaching even Piter for his attempt of to dissuade him from the way of the cross. 

    In short,  Jesus is aware of to face the scandal of the cross. The title "the Son of Man" introduces him in his authentic humanity, but also in his Divinity, in his love to the man that suffers. 

   In conclusion this title makes him near to every man, rather it does him feel deeply everything one with the man that is in the pain. Above all he confers a sense full to the suffering that accompanies the man since the dawns of his history.

   "Then the high priest stood up before them and asked Jesus, "Are you not going to answer? What is this testimony that these men are bringing against you?" But Jesus remained silent and gave no answer. Again the high priest asked him, "Are you the Christ,[f] the Son of the Blessed One?" "I am," said Jesus. "And you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of the Mighty One and coming on the clouds of heaven"(Mark 14,60-62).

TO THE DISCOVERY OF JESUS OF NAZARETH