J-D

The way I heard it was:

How do we know Jesus was Jewish?

Because he went into his father's business, he didn't leave home till he was thirty, his mother thought he was God, and he thought his mother was a virgin.

Interesting variation.

J-D

Why? Apparently you've read it, and it doesn't seem to have made it possible for you to come up with an answer to my question. But perhaps you just don't like answering questions.

J-D

I know that. You were the one who brought Zeus and Achilles into this thread, not me. And apparently you had no good reason for doing so.

J-D

No, what you have to do is tell us what's mythical about the gathering of disciples. From a historical point of view, that seems to me to be the crucial event, and I don't see why it has to be mythical.

mountainman

Interesting. Do you recall which writings of Tertullian are asserted to be
independent of their quotation by Eusebius, and which independent
author provides us with these glimpses of a non-Eusebian Tertullian?

J-D

We know that you have rejected all other possibilities. You don't need to belabour that point. What you have been asked to do, repeatedly, and have failed to do, repeatedly, is state your grounds for rejecting those possibilities.

mountainman

You'll note Toto that under these two different chronologies\
the net result of the appearance on the planet of "christianity"
(consistent of a number of practicing "christians") is the same.
The methods of the appearance differ, but in both cases we
should expect to find archeological evidence of "christians"
with effect from the first century. This does not vary from
the mainstream expectation, although, the methods of the
appearance differs in both cases from mainstream.


But are they outside the first century with respect to the
effective "appearance of historical christians"? By all counts
here and elsewhere, most commentators, although they all
have disparate ideas as to the method of their appearance,
and the appearance of the "christian literature", all agree
that the "appearance of historical christians" is to be expected
in the first century. (Even Joe's Caesar's Messiah)


Yet the evidence for this expectation is not forthcoming.
That is why I have suggested taking a look in the fourth century.

J-D

What makes you think there should be a BC&H consensus? Why shouldn't different posters have different views?

I, for example, am not asserting the truth of any particular chronology. You, on the other hand, sometimes appear to be, although at other times you appear to be asserting only its possibility, not its truth.

If somebody (and this would include you) does assert the truth of a particular chronology, it seems reasonable and fair to ask their grounds for doing so. On the other hand, insisting that somebody assert the truth of a particular chronology does not seem reasonable and fair to me. People should be allowed to say 'I don't know'.

J-D

Why are you asking me? You cited the thread. Can't you read it yourself?

mountainman

I have ever always asserted that I am willing to be disproved
either in full or in part by the provision of appropriate archeological
and/or scientific evidence. I do not pretend to be infallible or to
offer anything other than a best-guess scenario for a sketch of
an alternative history of antuqity in which both the appearance
and the rise of christianity coincided with the appearance and rise
of the emperor Constantine.

I the end, all we have here in 2007 with respect to the period 000-325
are theories of history, which by all objective and scientifically minded
logic need to have the utmost and maximal integrity with respect to
all archeological and/or scientific citations. We are all dealing with
theories of history.

Specifically, we are still dealing with a theory of history written and
assembled from scanty records of the past for this period 000-325.
This theory of history was published under Constantine, and was
written by Eusebius Pamphilus of Cesarea, c.312-324 CE.

The entire foundation of BC&H Studies rests upon the backbone of
Eusebian history, but it is distinctly historically possible that this very
Eusebian history is a pseudo-history, a fiction of men composed by
wickedness.

The fact that evidence exists by which it is possible to perceive
Constantine in the role of a malevolent despot and dictator, edicting
for the destruction of the literature and writings of the most learned
academics of the (then) empire (Porphyry), and for the death penalty
for NOT BURNING the books of the learned. The Constantine Bibles,
the first time the NEW and OLD testaments were physically bound
togeher into one book were done c.330 CE, by orders of bullneck
to Eusebius.

The first bible was published while the
neopythagorean literature burnt.

It was a DELETE and an ADD at
the imperial level with effect 325 CE.