avi

OK, let's not ignore the evidence. Where is it?

Evidence:
1. Christian polemical work;
2. Epiphanius;

There's a couple of sterling references.

3. Eusebius;

4. the Mani cologne codex, the infamous CMC, supposed autobiography of Mani, written in ???. Oh, was it transcribed from Greek??? Hmm.

5. Hippolytus;
6. Origen;

Is Eusebius' hand not prominent in every one of those references?

7. Fihirist, of al-Nadim, tenth century Muslim encyclopedia.

That even the most fundamental aspects of our understanding of Mani and his life, are uncertain, is attested to by this text:

avi

Transient

Again a lot of twaddle about nothing

Transient

Actually what you have said here is abusive and disgusting.
I am sick and tired of your abuse of people - you are disgusting.
The sooner you leave this board the better - you are very divisive.

stephan huller

Transi

I'm divisive am I? Do you really think that you can accomodate the idea that were an endless number of conspiracies in the fourth century with anything resembling historical reality?

It is impossible.

These people have no interest in anything other than establishing complete historical anarchy. This in order to muddy the waters and make it impossible to differentiate their fantasies from historical facts.

If you have no ill feelings toward such people maybe you don't know any better.

Transient

Why don't you shift your hatred towards those that believe that "Jesus" was a complete myth? That is just as fanciful as Pete's theories.
I dare you! You will take on more than you bargained for if you do and you won't find your insults taken as well as the gentleman Pete has done so.
Or do you think it was all myth?

stephan huller

Pete is the obvious target because his methodology is so shoddy and his zeal for proselytizing so strong. I have nothing against stupid beliefs. We all have stupid beliefs. But once you take those stupid private beliefs and start promoting those beliefs like your a Mormon missionary with only the most superficial understanding of any given topic - it is too much to take.

Just for the record I do believe that the ultimate context of the gospel is in a mystery religion which determined the ultimate shape of the historical narrative (ie rather than the other way around). I think the same things is true with regards to the relationship between the Torah and the Jewish liturgy.

In short I do not see the gospel's real purpose in terms of passing on historical details.

Stop feeling sorry for losers. Often the surgeon has to cut in order to heal. Life is too short to judge truth by which spokesmen is the most pitiful.

Pity is often a vice.

Transient

What undisputable evidence is there that the gospels were not written in the first century by the close associates of a chap called "Jesus"?
Mostly I just see accusations of the sort that they couldn't have known the temple would soon fall so therefore they must have been written post-70AD. that is a very weak argument because it fails to allow for the possibility that "Jesus" was indeed God and not only could predict the future but also controlled it.

stephan huller

The term gospel has everything to do with the Jubilee cycle which comes every 49 plus one years. Origen confirms the connection between gospel and Jubilee as does Clement.

I would argue that Jesus came to announce one seven times seven year period and the gospel as we know it is about another seven times seventy year period - ie the prophesied destruction of the Jewish temple in Daniel.

The transference accounts for how Jesus could have appeared almost forty years befor the event at the heart of the gospel as we now have it.

In case you aren't familiar with the understanding - the Jews always believed (still do) that the universe is governed by numbers. The cycle of sevens was everything. After a certain number of sevens the messiah would appear. It would be the end of the old, the beginning of something new. The year one plus seven x seven is the Jubilee. The year one plus the right number of sevens is the beginning of the messianic age.

One could imagine, according to some Platonic-Jewish conceptions that the order of numbers and letters even controlled the Creator i.e. that he didn't create the fabric of the universe but just imitated one that we pre-existent in a more perfect realm. Hence the secret at the heart of gnosticism which seemed to depreciate the Demiurge.

Transient

But then you would have to dismiss most of what "Jesus" said as made up and then you might as well dismiss the entire thing.
It is clear from the gospels that that is not why "Jesus" said he came.

mountainman

The reason that I (and others in other cases) have been the target is because my methodology is to closely follow only those issues concerning a thing called "evidence". Evidence and not rhetoric or tradition or "belief" should mitigate our dialogue.


Dominated by "False Beliefs" for over 15 centuries?

The field relating to the history of Mani has been dominated since the 4th century by the writings of authors like Hegemonius, Ephrem and Augustine all of whom are today eminently classifiable as "heresiologists". Blindly for over 15 centuries we have spent entertaining an orthodox heretical non historical and fictitious account of this Persian Buddhist-like sage and author and founder of a once widespread, but now extinct religion.

New Evidence has been arriving - do we examine it? Yes

The more Manichaean literature that turns up, the more the researchers appear to be realising that the Manichaean accounts should be followed as the preferred "historical sources" and that the fabricated accounts of the orthodox heresiologists should be rejected as "historical sources".

In short, there is a movement taking place.
A tide is turning here.
Do you not see it?