Jeffrey Gibson

You've never actually read Schweitzer, have you.

Jeffrey

spin

Certainly not meaningless. Perhaps undemonstrated or unsupported by any data that could establish historicity. It's eminently meaningful, as three "quests" to find the data suggests.

I think you are using the terms "historical", "historiographical" and "history" in a coherent manner in this sentence, though basically nowhere else in this post. There is a notion that stimulates the "third quest". You find the workings underpinning the effort problematic, as to their efficacy in achieving their ends. And what should be the study of what happened in the past is instead religion in practice. Then you go on to use a different meaning of history:

Admittedly these uses of "history" you are using to present the views of Kähler, but they don't reflect the previous use I considered above. They seem to indicate some god's eye-view of all events of the past. And I'm at a loss to glean your meaning of "historiography" in the following:

And don't you think "real historical Jesus" is overkill?

Robert Tulip

Yes I have. This interpretation that Schweitzer thought the quest was futile is sourced by the link I gave to The Jesus Quest: The Third Search for the Jew of Nazareth by Ben Witherington (1997) pages 9-13

Chili

And a red flag should go up when we read in Matthew that he was "called out of Egypt" and only made a pitstop in Nazareth so "it could be said that he was from Nazareth," while he was not.

So do you not think the the above title already slaps the author in the face before even one page is read?

That is even worse than calling a Christian Boookstore, "Manna," is it not?

Jeffrey Gibson

Then you ignored or overlooked the section in his The Quest (pp. 315-354 in the 2001 [first complete] English edition of The Quest or on pp. 330-397 of the 1968 English edition) --not to mention his Das Messianitats- und Leidensgeheimnis. Eine Skizze des Lebens Jesu (Tubingen and Leipzig, 1901) -- where Schweitzer goes on without compunction or self-contradiction to do what you say he judged to be futile -- namely, to give a full scale reconstruction of the ministry and teaching of the historical Jesus.

And, FWIW, it appears that you haven't read Witherington either (who BTW doesn't think the quest is futile since he engages in it). Nowhere in pp. 9-13 of his book does he present Schweitzer as saying in his Quest that efforts of those whose work he describes was futile. What he notes is what Schweitzer said about the first quest -- i.e. that it failed, and this in Schwietzer's view was not because the task was a fool's errand, but, as Witherington notes, because the first questors "had one and all neglected or wrongly minimized the eschatological and apocalyptic dimensions of Jesus' life, teachings and actions. Because these were not marginal or minor aspects of Jesus or his teachings, the result had been a significant distortion rather than a clarification of what the historical Jesus was like." (p. 10)

That Schweitzer himself abandoned biblical studies was because he felt that Jesus teachings, which he always believed he had firmly established, were not relevant.

I suppose the lesson to be learned here is "Don't trust WIKI", and with respect to what Schweitzer said and believed, not to mention what Witherington said Schweitzer said and believed, don't trust RT.

Jeffrey

Robert Tulip

Jeffrey, your comments read like a Christian apologist. Accordingly, I expect you to cherry pick and distort anything I say in the effort to discredit my views regardless of actual merit. That is par for the course in discussions with dogmatists.

Wikipedia cites Witherington as using "futile". You are welcome to edit it if it is wrong. The points you have made are minor matters of nuance. It is unscrupulous of you to elevate such a semantic detail to a question of trustworthiness.

The Wikipedia entry states "Schweitzer himself also argued that all the 19th century presentations of Jesus had either minimized or neglected the apocalyptic message of Jesus, and he developed his own version of the profile of Jesus in the Jewish apocalyptic context. Schweitzer then became convinced that the search for a historical Jesus was futile, abandoned biblical scholarship and went to Africa as a medical missionary." This means that his view on the futility of the quest was developed after his book. This is a question of detail which can be discussed politely rather than drawing malevolent inferences about trust. You are just making mischief.

Jeffrey Gibson

Leaving aside the ad hominems here, I thought I quoted you in full.

Yes, but does he? That's the question I'm raising. If you had actually read Witherington, you'd know. QED.

Can you be trusted to state what Witherington says if you haven't actually read him and if it's shown that you have misrepresented what he says?

OK. Your source adduces Witherington as saying or supporting the idea on pp. 9-13 of his Jesus Quest that Schwietzer became convinced (why, BTW?) that the quest was "futile". But I ask again, is this what Witherington actually says? More importantly, is this what Schweitzer said? Can you cite me any passages from his works written after his The Quest where he explicitly says this?

But back to Witherington: if he did not say what the Wiki article repors him as saying, but you keep insisting that that he did, especially when it's clear that you haven't read Witherington, then we have good reason to believe that you are not a trustworthy reporter of what you claim people say. Is it really "malevolent" ("wishing or appearing to wish evil to others" "Having an evil or harmful influence") to point this out? You have pointed out what you had reason to believe are misrepresentations of what AS has said. Are you being malevolent when you do so. If you say no, then you are giving yourself breaks that you will not allow others to have.

And that, too, makes you untrustworthy.

Jeffrey

Sheshbazzar

Farrell Till would roll over in his grave, confronted by the conformity to 'convention' and to the promotion of maintaining the 'status quo', among those 'scholars' here that now pretend to skepticism and atheism.
From the tenor of many of these posts one would think that JPH is hard at work among us under several aliases.

Iskander

Reconsidering Albert Schweitzer


http://www.religion-online.org/showa...asp?title=1864

Robert Tulip

It is legitimate in discussion on a forum such as this to cite Wikipedia as a source. Of course people should exercise caution in use of Wikipedia, as is well known. I simply said that the Wikipedia article provides an overview of the topic and referenced some of its key content. It is useful then to examine the accuracy of this article against the primary sources, as you have helpfully done.

I was perfectly trustworthy in my citation of Wikipedia, and made no pretense to anything more, recognising that as a publicly editable source it is not always reliable. I provided a reliable citation of Wikipedia's comment about Schweitzer, but you elide from this into an assertion that I am vouching for its accuracy, and further that I asserted Schweitzer's "futility" view was expressed in his Quest book. I did not say that. As well you suggest regarding Witherington that I "keep insisting that that he did" say what he is cited as saying, when I have made no such assertion, and then you use this false "keep insisting" allegation as grounds to malign my trustworthiness. Witherington may or may not say what he is cited as saying, but pardon me if I don't trust you as a guide to that. Unpacking summary comments on such topics is not helped by leaping to partisan accusations about trustworthiness.