Freethought & Rationalism Archive

rlogan · 03-18-2004, 03:29 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Doctor X
Uh . . . Fred, I think . . . you know the one who ran the projector after the Last Supper. . . .

--J.D.

Cheered me up there, J.D.

And right, Steven. We just have a few too many miracles.

The embarrassment criteria. The trojan pony of the HJ myth. Don't be wheeling that thing in here again.

Theorem: If it is embarrassing it is true.

Vinnie, are you prepared to accept the

Corollary: If it is not embarrassing it is false.

Boy, can we storm through the NT with that Corollary.

For sake of argument, say you are making up a myth. He has to die somehow.

Old age? Dies in sleep? Pretty lame.
Messiah conquers the world? Nope.
Drowns on a three day drunk? (Second choice)
Dies in apocalyptic battle? Too big to fake.

Explain what ending would suit the purpose better than the Martyrdome and all of the Hebrew Bible trappings of being rejected by his own people and so forth.

Asha'man · 03-18-2004, 04:35 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by JTurtle

Quote:

3. The Jewish transmission of sacred traditions was highly developed and reliable.

If this was true, then other Jewish writings about Jesus should not be ignored. There is evidence that Jesus was born during the reign of Alexander Jannaeus and stoned to death around 78BCE under the rule of Jannaeus' wife, Salome. (G.R.S.Mead)

If the Jewish accounts are really all that reliable, this also provides an extra 100 years for the myth to have developed.

capnkirk · 03-18-2004, 05:47 AM

Vinnie,

If the following quote is from a historian, I sure wouldn't trust any history based on his arguments. My critique is interlaced in red.

Quote:

Ted Weeden:

quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Richard, when I say that as a historian I am convinced that the crucifixion of Jesus is a historical fact, I am making a judgment based upon the best available evidence, weighing that evidence against various probabilities, and then deciding which of the various probabilities is most cogent and persuasive. (claim to credential = objectivity) Notice that the "existence" of a historical JC is not subjected to this standard. In the case of the crucifixion it is, as has been pointed out by others on this list, multiply attested by both Christian sources (Paul, the Gospels) and non-Christian sources (the Jewish historian Josephus [unless Josephus' reference to Jesus' crucifixion is a total Christian corruption of the Josephus text] and the Roman historian Tacitus) of the first century. Is he claiming that each of these attestations is independent of the others? There is no evidence that any source of the first century states or infers that Jesus died a natural death or by some other tragedy, or that Jesus was mythologically viewed as having been apotheosized or translated to heaven, as some traditions hold to be the case for Elijah, Moses, etc. Again, the existence of a HJC is presumptive. Using the criterion of embarrassment, employed by some Jesus scholars, such as Meyer, would suggest that Jesus' death by crucifixion could only have been an embarrassing, even scandalous, fact about him (see Paul) in the view of non-Jewish or Gentile persons, since his crucifixion would have been recognized as a clear indication that Jesus was guilty of some capital crime against the Roman Empire. Introduces the "embarrassment factor" inviting us to speculate on how it would have affected Paul's (and the apostles') proselyting work. If it was embarrassing, one would have expected the event to be "minimized" or completely excised. If Jesus did not die from crucifixion, it is difficult to explain why Christians, interested in winning converts among Gentiles of the time, would have invented such a tradition, since such a tradition would in effect serve to undermine their evangelistic cause rather than support it. Now in a complete diversion, he uses these grounds to explain why Paul made the Crucifixion/Resurrection the central tenet of his salvation plan for the world. Without "Christ's sacrifice", there would be no ministry of Paul. This would argue that Paul would have been tempted to invent such an event rather than hide it. Besides, if you actually "read" Paul's letters, there is much more evidence that he understood this crucifixion/resurrection to have happened in the lower levels of the heavens rather than on earth anyway.

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/crosstalk2/message/15249
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Joe Weaks' quote which immediately follows Weeden's DOES support a crucifixion event, but not of a Jesus "Christ". Here he strongly hints that the divinity of Jesus was added after the fact to make Jesus into a religious martyr rather than a political one.

spin · 03-18-2004, 05:48 AM

What makes anyone think any of the gospels were written in Palestine? By tradition Luke wrote his out of Palestine. Matthew according to some scholars was written in Egypt. John, some relate to the person who according to tradition lived on Patmos. And Mark, the one given the good Roman name and featuring enough Latin to suggest that it was written in a Roman context, say umm, Rome.

So of these gospels which were written in Palestine and how does anyone know?

spin

graymouser · 03-18-2004, 06:35 AM

One point I raised in my long critique of the original (terribly long) OP that I haven't seen addressed much at all is:

The scriptures found at Nag Hammadi give a number of competing interpretations of Jesus Christ. Just like the four Gospels that we have, the Nag Hammadi text is quite sectarian. Is there any strong non-sectarian argument as to why the NH finds are not of any value in trying to find the historical truths behind Christianity, while the canonized New Testament is?

-Wayne

MortalWombat · 03-18-2004, 06:41 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by spin
And Mark, the one given the good Roman name and featuring enough Latin to suggest that it was written in a Roman context, say umm, Rome.

And not to mention Mark's ignorance of Palestinian geography and customs.

Vorkosigan · 03-18-2004, 06:48 AM

Hot damn, cap'n! Wonderful! Well, I'll provide a critique as well tomorrow morning. It's 11:00 pm and I had night classes. Exhaustion has fogged my brain.

Seems like JT has vanished from the earth.

Amaleq13 · 03-18-2004, 06:56 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Vinnie
The cross was initially embarrassing ... <snip> ...The "skandalon" of a crucified Jesus is history remembered. "Skandalon", as you should know, is from the Pauline corpus.

Nonsense. Paul is so clearly and explicitly proud that his Christ was crucified that he makes this central to his theology. The concept was abhorent and a "skandalon" to others outside Paul's fellow believers (ie Jews). It was certainly not an embarrassment to those who shared Paul's beliefs but a foundational tenet for their faith.

capnkirk · 03-18-2004, 07:14 AM

My apologies, Vinnie, for splitting my response into two parts. I got interrupted, but now I can finish: Again, interleaved critique in red.

Quote:

Jeffrey Gibson

quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Funny how Suetonius and Celsus and Porphyry and Lucian and Minucius Felix and Fronto, among others, who were targets -- or at least aware --of this alleged marketing plan, didn't pick up on that, but instead see Jesus' crucifixion as a sign that Jesus was a failure and Christianity superstitious and pernicious nonsense. And funny that Jeffrey Gibson would fail to realize that it was the claim of resurrection that was incredulous to these men, and that they probably viewed these claims as attempts to "resurrect" a failed mission.

Funny how apologists like Justin Martyr and Origen and Octavius found themselves having to devote more attention to defending the claim that Jesus' crucifixion did not prove Jesus a charlatan and Christianity utter foolishness than with anything else they had to struggle with in their defense of Christianity. Again, it was the apologists' claim of a resurrection that most found incredulous. Besides, these authors wrote in the 2nd cent. CE, AFTER the gospels were written. How can their arguments imply any "remembrance" of Jesus' crucifixion?

In any case, you have a hidden supposition here that what the cross and Jesus' crucifixion has **come** to symbolize is what it **would** have symbolized to those who were the first recipients of the message of "Christ crucified". The first recipients of the "Christ crucified/resurrected" message were ostensibly those in Arabia where he spent his first three years after "his" conversion. Chronologically, Paul's letters were the first to claim "christology" in Jesus. The gospels were written much later, in fact, Xtians point to Luke's association with Paul as an attestation of the veracity of GLuke! For the gospel attestation to have primacy, one must ignore the influence of Paul's "christ" on the gospel writers when the evidence points solidly in the opposite direction. There is much more evidence that the "christ" concept was edited back into the proto-gospel sources by Pauline Xtian interpolators in the construction of all the gospels.

In the light what of what Jews had been schooled by Deut. 21:22-23 to believe regarding those hung on a tree, let alone what Circero and Plautus and Varo and other Greco-Roman authors say regarding the horror and the impropriety of even the mentioning of crucifixion, and what Zeno tells about the absolute irrationality of dying as Jesus was known to have died, this hardly seems likely -- and I really have to wonder where your claim is coming from. It certain is not well grounded in primary evidence. Interesting here that Jeffrey is trying to use the "shame" of the crucified that would attend the crucifixion of a non-divine person to justify the extension of same to what Xtians claim was not just martyrdom, but "an intentional personal sacrifice and the prequel to his miraculous resurrection". Again, the shame of crucifixion only comes into play for those who had already rejected the resurrection claim.

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/crosstalk2/message/15263

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All these quotes serve only to demonstrate how the presumption of an HJC causes people to misapply the evidence in order to maintain their faith. Mongo NOT impressed!

capnkirk · 03-18-2004, 07:25 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Vorkosigan

Seems like JT has vanished from the earth.

Maybe the sharks ate him.

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03-18-2004, 05:48 AM	#44
spin Contributor Join Date: Mar 2002 Location: nowhere Posts: 15,747	What makes anyone think any of the gospels were written in Palestine? By tradition Luke wrote his out of Palestine. Matthew according to some scholars was written in Egypt. John, some relate to the person who according to tradition lived on Patmos. And Mark, the one given the good Roman name and featuring enough Latin to suggest that it was written in a Roman context, say umm, Rome. So of these gospels which were written in Palestine and how does anyone know? spin

03-18-2004, 06:35 AM	#45
graymouser Veteran Member Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: Collingswood, NJ Posts: 1,259	One point I raised in my long critique of the original (terribly long) OP that I haven't seen addressed much at all is: The scriptures found at Nag Hammadi give a number of competing interpretations of Jesus Christ. Just like the four Gospels that we have, the Nag Hammadi text is quite sectarian. Is there any strong non-sectarian argument as to why the NH finds are not of any value in trying to find the historical truths behind Christianity, while the canonized New Testament is? -Wayne

03-18-2004, 06:48 AM	#47
Vorkosigan Contributor Join Date: Jan 2001 Location: Barrayar Posts: 11,866	Hot damn, cap'n! Wonderful! Well, I'll provide a critique as well tomorrow morning. It's 11:00 pm and I had night classes. Exhaustion has fogged my brain. Seems like JT has vanished from the earth.

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