FRDB Archives

Freethought & Rationalism Archive

The archives are read only.


Go Back   FRDB Archives > Archives > Religion (Closed) > Biblical Criticism & History
Welcome, Peter Kirby.
You last visited: Today at 03:12 PM

 
 
Thread Tools Search this Thread
Old 03-15-2012, 01:14 AM   #121
Veteran Member
 
Join Date: Oct 2004
Location: Bordeaux France
Posts: 2,796
Default

Quote:
Originally Posted by Adam View Post
By the way, as a person who has never excavated Troy, it's quite legitimate for me to wonder whether the structures Schliemann discovered might have been of some city other than the Troy of the Iliad.
The answer to this question is well known. But iti is not the problem of this thread.
Huon is offline  
Old 03-15-2012, 01:50 AM   #122
Veteran Member
 
Join Date: Feb 2012
Location: Auburn ca
Posts: 4,269
Default

Quote:
'Paul' as often as not turns out to not have been 'Paul' at all.
false

we know who wrote what, and what epistles were not attributed to paul. And can see the redactions.

Some of the epistles are not up for dispute by anyone.


Quote:
Josephus has been 'doctored' by the Christians,
True

but not the parts being used to build historicity.


Quote:
the Gospels are simply religious mythology.
False


like all writings of this time, historicity can and is pulled from this much early material

the hellenized early writers often wrote mythically of mortal men not in question by anyone. mortal men were deified all the time that we know existed.
outhouse is offline  
Old 03-15-2012, 07:09 AM   #123
Contributor
 
Join Date: Feb 2006
Location: the fringe of the caribbean
Posts: 18,988
Default

Quote:
Originally Posted by aa5874 View Post
Jesus was a Myth in Matthew 1.18-20, Luke 1.26-35, John 1, Mark 6.48-49, Mark 9.2, Acts 1.9, Galatians 1 and 1 Cor.15.

Can you see this??

Matthew 14:25 KJV
Quote:
And in the fourth watch of the night Jesus went unto them, walking on the sea.
Quote:
Originally Posted by LegionOnomaMoi View Post
[Yes, I can see you've created a false dichotomy between the genres of ancient historiography and myth, not to mention your view that, contrary to virtually every theory/philosophy of historiography, we cannot infer, deduce, or otherwise apply logic and reasoning when it comes to history. We are only allowed to make blanket statements concerning the entirety of some piece of evidence such as a text, rather than follow any historiographical method...
Your statement is UTTERLY erroneous. You very well know that there is an ON-GOING QUEST for the Historical Jesus for the last 250 years because the NT is about Myth Jesus [the Jesus of Faith] and want to give people the absurd and mis-leading impression that all Scholars have agreed about the existence.

Please, I will NOT allow you to make blanket statements that are unsound and completely unsubstantiated.

There is ZERO credible sources for an historical Jesus so the SEARCH for HJ is still on going.

You very well know that historians/Scholars consider Jesus to be MYTH or are unable to re-construct the history of Jesus if he did live based on the very fact that the NT is historically unreliable and there are ZERO credible non-apologetic sources.

May I remind you that we are NOW on the THIRD QUEST, the THIRD SEARCH for an historical Jesus and so far we have come up EMPTY-HANDED.

By the way, you do not even understand what is meant by "false dichotomy".

There is a VAST difference between EVIDENCE for Myth Jesus and "false dichotomy".

You should have known, but it appears you don't, that in order to argue that Jesus was a MYTH character that I MUST produce written statements from antiquity which describe Jesus as a MYTH.

1. Matthew 1.18-20 is EVIDENCE of Mythological Jesus--not a false dichotomy.

2. Luke 1.26-35 is EVIDENCE of Mythological Jesus--not a false dichotomy.

3. John 1 is EVIDENCE of Mythological Jesus--not a false dichotomy.

4. Mark 6.48 and 9.2 are EVIDENCE of Mythological Jesus--not a false dichotomy.

5. Acts 1.9 is EVIDENCE of Mythgological Jesus--not a false dichotomy.

5. Galatians 1.1 and 1 Cor.15 are EVIDENCE of Mythological Jesus--not a false dichotomy.


In fact, people who call themselves HJers have presented NO evidence but LOGICAL fallacies to support their Jesus.

Please PRESENT some actual evidence for HJ instead of Rhetoric and logical fallacies and bring the SEARCH for HJ to an end.

Quote:
Originally Posted by LegionOnomaMoi View Post
[Unfortunately for you, your artificial dichotomy falls apart approached from either end. If we state that the NT is all myth, and therefore cannot contain historical information, then the same is true for other myths like the Iliad. Of course, these myths are the only evidence we had for Troy (as later historians relied on these myths when discussing troy). However, while we stilll don't have any more reliable historical accounts than the Iliad, we found Troy. So either even myth can contain history, or our archaeological excavations of Troy never happened.
Well, you found Troy, congratulations.

NOW find your Jesus!!!

You will NOT ever find your Jesus!!!

You know the evidence for TROY is NOT evidence for YOUR Jesus.

Quote:
Originally Posted by LegionOnomaMoi View Post
And as long as we are on Troy, approaching your genre dichotomy from the other side, we find myth all over the place in the writings of ancient historians. Once again, we can either disregard them all, and say we know virtually nothing about the past, or we can apply reasoning, logic, probability, and other methods employed by historians.
Again, your statement is NOT really credible. You very well know that there is an ON GOING QUEST for the historical Jesus for over 250 years which has been abandoned more than once due to a lack of credible evidence.

The present support for the Historical Jesus comprises of LOGICAL fallacies and forgeries.
aa5874 is offline  
Old 03-15-2012, 08:40 AM   #124
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Feb 2012
Location: Massachusetts
Posts: 692
Default

Quote:
Originally Posted by aa5874 View Post
Please, I will NOT allow you to make blanket statements that are unsound and completely unsubstantiated.
Wouldn't dream of it. It seems you're going for a monopoly on such statements, and far be it from me to stop you.




Quote:
In fact, people who call themselves HJers have presented NO evidence but LOGICAL fallacies to support their Jesus.
I tried to give a simple example (the coin toss problem) of a logical/reasoning problem people often get wrong, and then had to spend many posts trying to explain why your fallacious reasoning prevented you from seeing the correct answer. If the logic behind probability is so difficult for you (and history is about what most likely happened), why on earth would I accept your claims of what is or isn't a logical fallacy?


Quote:
Well, you found Troy, congratulations.

NOW find your Jesus!!!
I did. He's a regular on family guy and lives in South Park.

Quote:
You know the evidence for TROY is NOT evidence for YOUR Jesus.

Let me give a brief and what I've no doubt will be a futile example of logical reasoning to illustrate one of the many problems behind your claims. I'm going to assume you don't have a background in mathematical or symbolic logic, so rather than formally representing your argument I'll use English, but I'll set it up in the same way.

Premise: The NT texts are mythical

Premise: If a text is mythical, such as the NT or the Iliad, then it is wholly mythical and cannot contain any historical information

Premise: If all our texts about an event, person, place, etc., are either mythical or based on myths, then anything they say about this event, person, place, etc., must also be discounted as ahistorical.

Conclusion: As the NT and the Iliad are mythical, and no author we know of ever wrote anything about Troy or Jesus which wasn't based on such myths, neither Troy nor Jesus existed.

This is, in essence, a major part of your argument. The problem is it leads to a contradiction. Using the same argument I can conclude Troy didn't exist, but it did. Even if one were to accept that the NT, like the Iliad, is completely mythical, it is clear that myth can contain history. If it this were not true, then Troy wouldn't exist.
LegionOnomaMoi is offline  
Old 03-15-2012, 12:00 PM   #125
Veteran Member
 
Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: On the path of knowledge
Posts: 8,889
Default

Quote:
Originally Posted by Adam View Post
Quote:
Originally Posted by Sheshbazzar View Post
Troy is a bit more tangible than one invisible man.
A city if it ever was real, has some prospect of its remains being located.

There is no J-C whose remains can ever be produced. If such remains were produced, then they absolutely could not be those of that J-C that is described in the NT texts.
You've moved the goal posts. You're talking about Biblical Jesus.
I don't have any goal posts to move.
Of course I'm talking about Biblical Jeebus, because that is the only Jeebus (the deity) that exists, or to the best of human knowledge, ever has existed.

There are no existing contemporary descriptions of any other Jeebus of Nazareth other than those found within the Gospels.
The only texts or records you have of this Jeebus are these highly fictional Gospels. There is nothing within these writings that present the fictional character portrayed therein as being any normal human being.

All existing early Christian writings are unanimous in their reporting that their Jeebus was either the Jewish God himself, or an utterly unique manifestation of the Jewish-Christian God, with supernatural abilities and superior in all respects to any human, and was NOT any normal human being.

There is no other 'Historical' Jeebus described anywhere in any of these early writings or reports.

The ONLY Historical Jeebus is the God of the Christians, and the God of the Christians is the ONLY Historical Jeebus.

Now if you are attempting to reach some imaginary set 'goal posts' it is only because you are trying to carry the ball of your vivid imaginations towards a non-existent goal line.

Quote:
Outhouse and I (and almost everyone) say Historical Jesus existed. We deny MJ.
You deny MJ? What do you mean by that?

Do you mean that your imagined non-MJ Jeebus was not conceived by the 'overshadowing of the Holy Ghost'?

How then was your imagined non-MJ Jeebus conceived? How do you know this?

Who was your imagined non-MJ Jeebus's mother? How do you know this?

Who was your imagined non-MJ Jeebus's father? How do you know this?

Where was your imagined non-MJ Jeebus born? How do you know this?

Where is your imagined non-MJ Jeebus buried? How do you know this?

How do you know that these are the remains of that one and only Jeebus of Bible fame?

Quote:
You can't deny HJ by claiming that "historical" remains of BJ by definition cannot exist.
I don't deny the ONLY historical J-C that has ever existed.
The ONLY J-C that IS accounted for, anywhere, by history, is that fictional character employed within old religious propaganda writings.

No material evidence for the existence of any flesh and blood figure behind these myths has ever been produced.

You have produced no evidence at all supporting the existence of any other Jeebus than the historical fictional one, as the founder for your favorite cult.
If you have the real Jeebus, bring out his bones, and irrefutable evidence that they are indeed the bones of the one and only J-C of NT fame.
Put up or shut up.
Sheshbazzar is offline  
Old 03-15-2012, 05:45 PM   #126
Veteran Member
 
Join Date: Oct 2004
Location: Ottawa, Canada
Posts: 2,579
Default

Quote:
Originally Posted by Vorkosigan View Post
Quote:
No it isn't, as Ehrman makes clear. "Separationism" is the belief that Jesus and Christ were separate beings, with Christ separating from Jesus at the crucifixion. "Adoptionism" is the belief that Jesus the man was adopted as Son of God (and so became the Christ) at some point.
But, DG, didn't the Adoptionists believe the Spirit left Jesus at his death??

Way cool. This is what happens when you read Wiki:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adoptionism
  • Spanish Adoptionism was a theological position which was articulated in Umayyad and Christian-held regions of the Iberian peninsula in the 8th and 9th centuries. The issue seems to have begun with the claim of archbishop Elipandus of Toledo that – in respect to his human nature – Christ was adoptive Son of God. Another leading advocate of this Christology was Felix of Urgel. In Spain, Adoptionism was opposed by Beatus of Liebana, and in the Carolingian territories, the Adoptionist position was condemned by Pope Hadrian I, Alcuin of York, Agobard, and officially in Carolingian territory by the Council of Frankfurt (794).

Someday I will proudly be able to answer that question in the bar trivia contest....
It appears that Ehrman himself coined the term "separationist". See The Orthodox Corruption of Scripture, Oxford 1993, p 14.

Best,
Jiri
Solo is offline  
Old 03-15-2012, 07:23 PM   #127
Veteran Member
 
Join Date: Jan 2002
Location: In the NC trailer park
Posts: 6,631
Default

Just saw Bart's Facebook message about the new book, and here is a link to some of the content http://www.harpercollins.com/browsei...=9780062204608
Zenaphobe is offline  
Old 03-15-2012, 08:49 PM   #128
Veteran Member
 
Join Date: Sep 2011
Location: Dixon CA
Posts: 1,150
Default

You state questions. So what?
Nor is there is evidence for anything affirmative you do state. It's all your opinion.
Adam is offline  
Old 03-15-2012, 10:34 PM   #129
Veteran Member
 
Join Date: Mar 2009
Location: England
Posts: 2,527
Default

Quote:
Originally Posted by Zenaphobe View Post
Just saw Bart's Facebook message about the new book, and here is a link to some of the content http://www.harpercollins.com/browsei...=9780062204608
Thanks for the link. I had a quick look at the introduction - and found this end sentence rather disturbing:

Quote:
Jesus existed, and those vocal persons who deny it do so not because they have considered the evidence with the dispassionate eye of the historian, but because they have some other agenda that this denial serves. From a dispassionate point of view, there was a Jesus of Nazareth.
It's sad to read such words from a respected scholar.

Agenda? Yes, we all have agendas - we all do what we do for a reason. But, seemingly, Ehrman would like to credit the mythicists with something of the order of a negative agenda. And that, to my mind, is not a way forward in this HJ verse MJ debate. Good faith needs to be credited to the mythicists before any meaningful dialogue with the historical JC camp can open up a road forward. Ehrman is not being scholarly here.

I would suggest to Ehrman that he reconsider this approach if he wants his contribution to the HJ/MJ debate to be taken seriously.

Quote:
Page 248

Why do people become heretics - what answer would heretics themselves give? We must here address ourselves not to self-centred sect-builders or pathological malcontents, who have always been plentiful in this area, but to the genuine great heretics. Leaving aside all detailed and technical points and any psychological motivation, they would surely reply that they wanted the best for the Church, that they acted in good faith. ..................Surely he must presuppose such a good faith - interpretation benigna must apply to heretics as well - particularly knowing that he himself cannot prove his own good faith to anyone at any time?........It is striking that the great heretics rarely took an easy road, they committed themselves totally to their ideas, without counting the cost; they subordinated everything to their faith and sacrificed everything to it: this was how they were able to make their tremendous impact. In this the great heretics were very like the great saints. Neither group has ever been understood by lukewarm believers, by shrewd ecclesiastical tacticians and by the diplomats of the Church, great and small, who are not born for martyrdom.

The Church (or via: amazon.co.uk) Hans Kung

my bolding for 'good faith'
maryhelena is offline  
Old 03-16-2012, 12:36 AM   #130
Veteran Member
 
Join Date: Jul 2001
Location: England
Posts: 5,629
Default

Bart's introduction explains that a lot of Biblical scholars are expert and can read Greek and Hebrew and other languages.

So they must be right.
Steven Carr is offline  
 

Thread Tools Search this Thread
Search this Thread:

Advanced Search

Forum Jump


All times are GMT -8. The time now is 11:28 PM.

Top

This custom BB emulates vBulletin® Version 3.8.2
Copyright ©2000 - 2015, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.