Toto

I beg to differ - I traced all of the Biblical quotes that you listed, and found that they did not support your point. Perhaps we have a difference of opinion, but anyone can check that out.

I said that textual criticism was not a hard science, and you agreed. I said "I find little evidence of 'science' in your textual criticism, and a lot of politics." I stand by that.

And on the Carrier review in the other thread, I challenged your clearly erroneous assertion that Carrier had not dealt with two issues that he had spent several paragraphs discussing, and your assertion that Dever had been mischaracterized in the book.

If you can't even get these little details right, why should I trust anything you assert?

Kinda like Paul, Joseph Smith claimed to be divinely inspired. If we are to believe the writers of the New Testament, we must give Joseph Smith the same leeway, shouldn't we?

Mormons believe his translations of the bible not because he was an expert in the field, but because they believe God spoke through him. How in the world do credentials even come into the debate, then?

Of course, Earl Doherty doesn't claim to be divinely inspired, but your use of Joseph Smith certainly can't apply to Earl Doherty in this instance.

When we are studying the Bible as an historical document, no one gets to claim the privalege of "inspiration" or inerrancy. So the answer here is no, we do not give Joseph Smith, or the Pope, or Earl Doherty or Brian Trafford any privaleged and special right to translate the Bible as he sees fit.

Because unless anyone here is prepared to place blind faith in Doherty's skills and objectivity as a translator of Koine Greek, his readers have a right to demand and expect him to demonstrate that he has the qualifications to do the translations.

Given the fact that his translations are so radically different from that of every other expert in the field, and much of his own argument hangs on these idiosyncratic translations, then I think his next best option is to prove that everyone else has gotten it wrong, and he has gotten it right.

Of course it applies sentinel. No one here would let Joseph Smith get away with his own amateur translations, so why do that for Earl Doherty. As I have said before, I am willing to consider any independent source he wishes to use, but I do not think that it is reasonable to allow him to simply rely on his own unknown authority.

Of course, if he persists, and refuses to offer anything beyond his own readings, then I will demonstrate how unique his translation truly is, and leave it to the readers to decide if his translation is credible.

Out of curiousity, how would you personally evaluate a translation of a language you neither read nor write?

Brian (Nomad)

Brian,

I am giving you the last word on the issue of bias in the debate on the historicity of Jesus, since I think we are going round i circles. Anyway, because we are already some way into the debate there is not much point further discussing if it is worth it or not.

The other issue, about references and experts, is still open. Right now there is a point of contention in the form of the correct translation of a particular expression. Let me confess up front that I have at the moment no idea why this particular point matters - I hope you or ED can clarify this. However, I would like to throw in my 2 cents on how to establish what is reasonable.

Both yourself and Ish seem to concentrate on showing how many Bible translators/translations go for one particular meaning. This comes close to the appeal to authority, because from such an argument we still don't understand why this meaning is to be preferred over another one.

To shed light on that question, we may want to use analogs - investigate how the particular expression was used in other, roughly contemporaneous non-biblical documents. This would provide the necessary degree of independent control.

If Earl could demonstrate that this Greek phrase is often translated in accordance to his view, he would have a case. If he cannot show this, or if you can show that a translation as you propose makes more sense in those other documents, his case would be weaker.

The use of non-biblical documents removes the question from the thorny issue of (non)existing religious bias and dependance between different Bible readings/translations. Application of independent control would certainly carry a lot of weight in my book.

fG

I wouldn't evaluate it.

FG, check my post again. The last part of my post explains why Earl should translate his phrase the way it is in all the other translations that I listed. It is definitely not an appeal to authority when I demonstrate how the phrase should be translated.

Ish


[This message has been edited by Ish (edited May 12, 2001).]

Well, Brian, you certainly are a prolific writer. I would be worn down if I produced so much material so quickly.

But I think you would do well to slow the pace. I'll offer just a few examples.

There is no double standard. My words "and wonder about them as well" indicate that Earl's translations could, like bible translations, be biased and inaccurate.

Well, one of us doesn't know what an appeal to authority is. Earl cited the authority opinion, and also provided an argument to support it, comparing the language in Colossians, which you included in your quote! Furthermore, this is one small part of a much larger article appearing as an educational piece on a Web page, which is a far cry from a debate, such as this. Now, if you challenge Earl on how to interpret this passage and he has nothing to say other than rattling off the 37 scholars who agree with him, THEN you will have a legitimate complaint.

This is one heck of a mouthful. Silly me. All this time I thought it was the other way around, that Earl had formed his views AFTER studying the evidence and noticing how so many Christian writers wrote so much material over so many decades while never citing a miracle, an earthly teaching, a trial or detail of the passion story, etc. But I guess this is what we're all here to hash out.

Brian, I could go on for buffers with examples which make me feel you should slow
your pace and think through things more carefully before posting. You've written thousands of words expressing your concerns over what might happen in this discussion. Now, maybe we can get going and address matters as they arise! I'll help out by submitting no further posts this weekend!

Bill

No Bill. Earl cited unnamed "scholars" telling us that "most" of them believe something. The truth is that "most" of them know no such thing, and in not giving us either names or references, he is expecting us to take his word for it. Earl, has, however, admitted that he may need to beef up his site and fix the articles. He also admitted that he will have to change his broad based assertions, and remove references to "most" scholars.

This is an appeal to authority, the error is compounded by the fact that the scholars do not say what he claims, and further compounded by his assertion that a majority of them say it. These are serious problems, and give the appearance of much broader support for his ideas than actually exist.

Even if he did have 37 scholars (which he does not), this would be a fractional minority, and not a majority as he has claimed. What you see here is Earl giving us a very skewed and ill informed (very nearly disingenous) view of scholarly opinion. Since many of his readers will not know about this skewing, it is easy for them to accept his claims at face value.

Stopping you here because this is one of the very common fallacies readers of Earl's website tend to make Bill.

Go back to Earl's preamble and you will see that he first learned of the Jesus as myth theory from reading G.A. Wells. Since then, he has been very busy investigating the historical record, and the Bible, and has found that he has had to create his own special translations of the Greek, make very big arguments from silence, claim that huge conspiracies exist to silence potential free thinking scholars, and that the truth is out there.

Of course, what he has missed in all of this is that the truth really is out there, there is no scholarly conspiracy to conceal it, and Jesus did actually exist. Even Wells admits this now. So I do not blame you for thinking that Earl did the research, then drew his conclusions, but I assure you, it is definitely the other way around. From the beginning Earl's theories have had to drive his research, or he would never have persisted in his claims that Jesus is a complete mythological construct.

We will get into this in more detail as the debate progresses, of course, but watch for the number of times that Earl will have to resort to evidence that he alone has been able to uncover, and how often he will dismiss counter opinions with the wave of his hand (a good example was his treatment of Michael Grant, imagine if I had begun the debate with the same statement about Doherty's work as Earl does about Grants. the cries of protest would be quite deafening, no? ).

Yeah, we'll get through this too, since Earl has to offer the most contorted readings you can imagine to "prove" his point. Stay tuned.

Yes it is.

Thanks for your thoughts Bill.

Brian (Nomad)

[This message has been edited by Brian Trafford (edited May 12, 2001).]

I don't see why he should use a model from natural sciences. I know that's your field and it's what you feel more comfortable in. But it is not the only approach to knowledge.This debate is in the realm of history. There is no reason to use a natural sscience model, since historical methods are sscholarly and well developed. It is, therefore, more to the point to use an historical model for research and documentation.

It could be that the important point is lost in a hail to scholarly quotation, but that is easily avoided. The proof is in the pudding. Just look to if he's really doing it. I don't think he is.

I happen to think that in any field of serious investigation, be it science, history, or what have you, it is essential to separate data, arguments, opinions and speculation. I am not at all convinced that, unlike natural scientists, historians have the freedom to fall back on the opinions of others, expressed in non-peer reviewed publications, and still be entitled to the label 'scientific'.

You rightly say that it is knowledge we are interested in. The way this is going, there seems far too much risk of subjectivity, politics and 'Stimmungmacherei' determining the direction of the debate, rather than level-headed presentation and discussion of the data.

I am not really interested in who thinks what, and where they are coming from. I would like to go through the available data on the historicity of Jesus, and form an opinion by myself on how convincing it is, helped by those who have studied this more extensively. So far, I have seen very litte data but lots of side issues.

fG

[This message has been edited by faded_Glory (edited May 12, 2001).]