Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Clivedurdle · 10-09-2012, 05:48 AM

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When Socrates was executed in 399 B.C. he was about seventy years of age. Plato, the friend and pupil to whose genius and devotion we owe so much of our knowledge of Socrates, was then about thirty. The history of Greece in their lifetimes had been both brilliant and disastrous.

At about the time when Socrates was born the enormous threat to Greece of the vast Persian empire had passed away. At the beginning of the century the Ionian cities of Asia Minor, Thales' birthplace among them, had been ruthlessly punished for revolt against the satraps of Darius. The assistance given to the rebels by Athens and Eretria, while powerless to save them, was enough to expose Greece itself to the Persian vengeance. But at Marathon in 490, at Salamis ten years later, and again at Plataea in 479, the Greeks had triumphed against the huge armies and navies of Darius and his successor Xerxes, and in doing so had established, not only their own independence, but a heroic legend that worked as an inspiration to the magnificent achievements of the following years. Athens in particular, on which had fallen the major burden of the Persian Wars, rose not only to the height of her political power, but to the height of that achievement in literature and the arts by which she has earned "the undying gratitude of mankind". Throughout the early years of Socrates, Athens, at the head of the Confederacy of Delos, was an imperial power; and by the initiative of her great democratic statesman Pericles, the city itself was so adorned as to be a worthy visible symbol of its own pre-eminence, and indeed of the ascendancy of all Greeks over "the barbarians." Work on the Parthenon began in 447...

http://www.ourcivilisation.com/smart.../platoback.htm

Tom Holland Persian Fire argues cogently that Darius also introduced a major innovation - the One True God and the concept of religious war.

Robin Lane Fox is also fascinating. I think the reality is huge influences of Persia and Greece on each other, Greece as actually self sustaining because of its very long tradition of discussion and arguing about practical matters, and Judaism as actually a minor influence because its discussion was theological. Building, supplying and fighting with triremes were far more important...

Which is more beautiful, a golden shield or a wicker rubbish bin?

proudfootz · 10-09-2012, 06:40 AM

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Originally Posted by aa5874

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Originally Posted by proudfootz

Are you dating this evidence?

What about you?? Where do you get your dates for early Paul?? In Acts of the Apostles there is NO claim that Saul/Paul wrote any letters to Churches.

Who invented the dates and order of authorship for the Pauline letters??

Other people date them, and I do the best I can to evaluate their arguments - just like you do.

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What about you?? Did you carbon date the Pauline letters to the 1st century in your kitchen?? Have you seen or heard that Pauline letters were carbon dated to the 1st century in or out a kitchen??

I'm not in a position to date any materials - and neither are you. It's a fair bet you've never handled any of these documents yourself. Just like me, you are dependent on others to date the materials.

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P 46, the Pauline letters have been dated by Paleography to the mid 2nd-3rd century so why are you giving the impression that they were early??

Who has dated them? You're probably taking somebody's word on this claim - aren't you?

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What about you?? Are you an expert on paleography?? Is Ehrman or Doherty experts on paleography??

No I am not - and neither are you. Both of us are dependent on others for this sort of information, aren't we?

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Tell me why do scholars who are not experts in Paleography claim the Pauline writings are early WITHOUT a shred of evidence??

It may be merely tradition. Perhaps it has something to do with the contents. Maybe different scholars use different justifications. I don't know, and neither do you. I can't read minds - and neither can you.

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The Pauline writings are dated by Paleography with an error of 50 or more years from mid 2nd-3rd century

This may be true. But just like you I am dependent on the expertise of others to come up with that date.

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So-called Scholars date the Pauline writings to c 50-60 CE without a shred of evidence.

There may be persuasive arguments that this dating is wrong. The best we can do is evaluate these arguments to best of our abilities.

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Who taught you?? Who teaches people to examine Written Statements??? Who needs a Ph.D to state that the NT Jesus was described as the Son of a Ghost, that was God the Creator, who was on the pinnacle of the Temple with Satan, Walked on the sea, transfigured, resurrected, Ate Food after wards and then ascended in a cloud??

I don't need a Ph.D to say that Adam and Eve in Genesis were Myths. Jesus was the product of a Ghost and a woman. I was TAUGHT to identify Myth Fables by writings attributed Justin Martyr.

Some scholar attributes some document to Justin Martyr, and some scholars provide the translation. Like me you are dependent on scholars for your information.

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What have you seen?? You have NOT seen any manuscripts of the Pauline writings dated to the 1st century.

Never claimed I did, and never made the DEMAND that anyone need do so.

Just like me, you rely on the scholarship of others to determine who wrote what, when they might have written it, and the contents of these documents.

You are in the same position as I am - relying on scholars and their scholarship for your 'evidence'.

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Originally Posted by proudfootz

Can you read the texts in the original languages?
Or is it POSSIBLE that JUST LIKE EVERYONE ELSE you are RELYING on DATES and INTERPRETATIONS made by others?

What about you??? Even if you can read all the languages of the ancient world you will not read in any extant Codices that Paul wrote letters to Churches in Acts of the Apostles.

As I have said - just like me you are relying on the expertise of others for your information.

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The Pauline writings are unattested, and without corroboration in the very NT.

I RELY on the dates provided by Paleography and C14.

1. No author of the NT claimed Paul wrote any letters up to c 59-62 CE.

2. No Pauline letters have been found and dated to the 1st century.

The claim that the Pauline writings were early is a product of "Chinese Whispers" or propaganda.

As I have said - I am dependent on others for discovering these documents, translating them, and dating them.

Just like you are.

You may be correct that the 'Pauline' epistles are much later than traditionally dated. The scholars you don't cite may be quite right about these claims about C14 and Paleography.

But neither of us would know the first thing about Paul and Justin Martyr and the Acts of the Apostles unless we read the work of scholars.

Horatio Parker · 10-09-2012, 08:06 AM

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Originally Posted by tanya

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Originally Posted by Horatio Parker

Or - syncretism occurred because Greek became the intellectual lingua franca of the Jews.

Thanks, Horatio. Your post got me thinking, always dangerous.

Umm, I do not claim to grasp sotto voce's argument here, vis a vis Plato's having encountered the written Hebrew Torah in Athens, in the fourth century BCE. I seem to recall, from Wikipedia, that the Persians invaded Greece in the fifth century BCE, so, if anything, would there not have been an influence, in Athens, rather, from Zoroastrianism, (Zarathustra), instead of from Moses? When did the Babylonians destroy the temple, and expel the Jews, about a century earlier, right?

And, wasn't a significant component of the Hebrew bible composed during the Jewish forced residence in Baghdad? And, does this ancient religion not demonstrate at least a modest influence from Zoroastrianism, as a consequence of Jewish residence in Baghdad? And then, when King Cyrus released the Jews, so that they could return to Jerusalem, why would not some of them travel instead from Baghdad to Athens, to set up shop in that growing metropolis, just as some traveled East, to Persepolis?

I assume that the significant influence of Greek on the Jewish people originated with the invasion by Alexander, about a century later.

I read somewhere that the demise of the temple state and subsequent rise of collegia post-Alexander laid the groundwork for Christianity.

Thomas Thompson says the idea of one God or rather the equivalence of religions was learned by the administrators of the Mesopotamian empires. Can't recall if it was Assyrians, Babylonians or Persians or maybe all of them.

Sotto Voce's argument AFAICT is a rehash of Philo, who speculated that Plato & co must've somehow learned the Hebrew scriptures. Or, both were guided by the same divine inspiration. Either way, it was an attempt to incorporate Plato into Judaism, and later, Christianity.

sotto voce · 10-09-2012, 11:45 AM

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Originally Posted by Horatio Parker

Sotto Voce's argument AFAICT is a rehash of Philo

So the unique events and lore of Genesis could not possibly have reached Plato, even by non-specific 'osmosis' of concepts.

:huh:

Clivedurdle · 10-09-2012, 11:56 AM

Genesis

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On the third day, about noon, it was found that a fly and been left behind. The return voyage turned out to be long and difficult, on account of the lack of chart and compass, and because of the changed aspects of all coasts, the steadily rising water having submerged some of the lower landmarks and given to higher ones an unfamiliar look; but after sixteen days of earnest and faithful seeking, the fly was found at last, and received on board with hymns of praise and gratitude, the Family standing meanwhile uncovered, our of reverence for its divine origin. It was weary and worn, and had suffered somewhat from the weather, but was otherwise in good estate. Men and their families had died of hunger on barren mountain tops, but it had not lacked for food, the multitudinous corpses furnishing it in rank and rotten richness. Thus was the sacred bird providentially preserved.

Providentially. That is the word. For the fly had not been left behind by accident. No, the hand of Providence was in it. There are no accidents. All things that happen, happen for a purpose. They are foreseen from the beginning of time, they are ordained from the beginning of time. From the dawn of Creation the Lord had foreseen that Noah, being alarmed and confused by the invasion of the prodigious brevet fossils, would prematurely fly to sea unprovided with a certain invaluable disease. He would have all the other diseases, and could distribute them among the new races of men as they appeared in the world, but he would lack one of the very best -- typhoid fever; a malady which, when the circumstances are especially favorable, is able to utterly wreck a patient without killing him; for it can restore him to his feet with a long life in him, and yet deaf, dumb, blind, crippled, and idiotic. The housefly is its main disseminator, and is more competent and more calamitously effective than all the other distributors of the dreaded scourge put together. And so, by foreordination from the beginning of time, this fly was left behind to seek out a typhoid corpse and feed upon its corruptions and gaum its legs with germs and transmit them to the re-peopled world for permanent business. From that one housefly, in the ages that have since elapsed, billions of sickbeds have been stocked, billions of wrecked bodies sent tottering about the earth, and billions of cemeteries recruited with the dead.

http://www.sacred-texts.com/aor/twain/letearth.htm

Sheshbazzar · 10-09-2012, 04:30 PM

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Originally Posted by Clivedurdle

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Cyrus King of Persia is referred to in Isaiah 45:1 as a Christ: "Thus sayeth the LORD to his anointed, to Cyrus".

<http://www.theologyweb.com/campus/showt...rus-Christ>

I understand the experience by the Rivers of Babylon to have been a major system upgrade for Judaism, when the Most High got revised, angels and demons introduced, and many other Zarathustran habits.

The publication of the Septuagint is a further system upgrade, when Greek apps get added.

The destruction of the Temple led to a major splitting of the system, one following the original OS, the other going to the equivalent of Microsoft!

Here is Isaiah 45:1 in the Hebrew with 'messiah' (me'shee'kah) highlighted.
In this verse it is actually a 'construct' with an initial ל 'lamed' and a terminal ו 'waw', in this instance pronounced as 'leh'me'shee'ko' > 'to anointed (of) Him'
כה־אמר יהוה למשיחו לכורש אשר־החזקתי בימינו לרד־לפניו גוים ומתני מלכים אפתח לפתח לפניו דלתים ושערים לא יסגרו׃

And here is Isaiah 45:1 of The Septuagint 'translation' with that 'christ' highlighted;

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45:1 οὕτως λέγει κύριος ὁ θεὸς τῷ χριστῷ μου Κύρῳ οὗ ἐκράτησα τῆς δεξιᾶς ἐπακοῦσαι ἔμπροσθεν αὐτοῦ ἔθνη καὶ ἰσχὺν βασιλέων διαρρήξω ἀνοίξω ἔμπροσθεν αὐτοῦ θύρας καὶ πόλεις οὐ συγκλεισθήσονται

Two things of note here. The specific Divine Name of the HEBREW's deity יהוה 'Yahweh' has been rendered with the generic Greek term ὁ θεὸς 'THE GOD' which Greeks used indiscrimanately for all 'gods'.
Report has it, and it is very likely, that the original Septuagint texts contained the actual Name in Hebrew letters, latter transliterated with equivlent Greek letters, and then finally entirely replaced with the generic Greek ὁ θεὸς 'ho theos' > 'THE GOD', or by English custom, 'The LORD'.

The second is that the term 'christ' used here is the variant form χριστῷ 'christo' rather than χριστοῦ 'christos'.
No difference in meaning and both get rendered into English as 'anointed' or 'christ'.

Personally in English, I prefer and exclusively use 'messiah' or 'anointed' in my speech for two reasons.
First, the former represents an actual, if somewhat crude, transliteration of the actual Scriptural term and title. yet familiar enough for English ears. While the latter accurately conveys into the English language the meaning of that term.

Secondly, I do not employ the term 'christ' in my speech, as I regard the term because of how it has been employed, and by whom, to have became a vile identifying word, a thing, a concept, a symbol of identity with an idoltorous and evil concept, and a religion that is accursed and 'devoted' ('cherem') to destruction.
Nothing can 'fix' it. The only course is for men of integrity to flee from it, and have no association with it.
The word is 'Come OUT of her!' Not attempt to fix what is wrong with that degenerate Χριστιανὸν religion described as 'The MOTHER of WHORES and abominations of the earth'.
Men of honor need to get OUT and AWAY from her city Babylon the Great, spit Her words out of their mouths and use them no more.
In the wilderness is freedom, and the promise of abundant life in a revived name. In the city of Babylon with the Great Whore and her whoring daughters, there is nothing but that death and destruction soon to come.

Horatio Parker · 10-09-2012, 06:14 PM

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Originally Posted by sotto voce

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Originally Posted by Horatio Parker

Sotto Voce's argument AFAICT is a rehash of Philo

So the unique events and lore of Genesis could not possibly have reached Plato, even by non-specific 'osmosis' of concepts.

:huh:

Possible, but improbable.

What is "non-specific osmosis of events"?

aa5874 · 10-09-2012, 06:30 PM

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Originally Posted by aa5874

Tell me why do scholars who are not experts in Paleography claim the Pauline writings are early WITHOUT a shred of evidence??

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Originally Posted by Proudfootz

It may be merely tradition. Perhaps it has something to do with the contents. Maybe different scholars use different justifications. I don't know, and neither do you. I can't read minds - and neither can you.

This response has Exposed that you have NOT really done any evaluation or incapable of doing any because you can't read minds. You have confirmed that you are merely repeating what others write.

Quote:

Originally Posted by aa5874

The Pauline writings are dated by Paleography with an error of 50 or more years from mid 2nd-3rd century

Quote:

Originally Posted by Proudfootz

This may be true. But just like you I am dependent on the expertise of others to come up with that date.

Well, why are you arguing with me if you accept that the Pauline writings were dated by Paleography within 100 years from c 150-250 CE by various experts on paleography??

Acts of the Apostles does NOT claim Paul wrote letters to Churches so how in the world can Ehrman and Doherty claim the Pauline writings were early??

Quote:

Originally Posted by aa5874

So-called Scholars date the Pauline writings to c 50-60 CE without a shred of evidence.

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Originally Posted by Proudfootz

There may be persuasive arguments that this dating is wrong. The best we can do is evaluate these arguments to best of our abilities.

You have already admitted that you CAN'T READ MINDS and that YOU DON'T KNOW how these dates were derived.. You are in no position to evaluate the dating of the Pauline writings as claimed by Doherty and Ehrman.

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Originally Posted by Proudfootz

You may be correct that the 'Pauline' epistles are much later than traditionally dated. The scholars you don't cite may be quite right about these claims about C14 and Paleography.

Again, you must first find out what actual evidence supports the so-called traditional dating. If you fail to show the evidence then you appear to be engaged in Chinese Whispers.

Any claim made WITHOUT evidence can be instantly REJECTED.

I reject the so-called traditional dating of the Pauline writings because it is NOT even corroborated in the very Bible.

No author in the Canon claimed Saul/Paul wrote letters to Churches between c 50-60 CE.

proudfootz · 10-09-2012, 08:52 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aa5874

Quote:

Originally Posted by aa5874

Tell me why do scholars who are not experts in Paleography claim the Pauline writings are early WITHOUT a shred of evidence??

This response has Exposed that you have NOT really done any evaluation or incapable of doing any because you can't read minds. You have confirmed that you are merely repeating what others write.

Well, why are you arguing with me if you accept that the Pauline writings were dated by Paleography within 100 years from c 150-250 CE by various experts on paleography??

Acts of the Apostles does NOT claim Paul wrote letters to Churches so how in the world can Ehrman and Doherty claim the Pauline writings were early??

You have already admitted that you CAN'T READ MINDS and that YOU DON'T KNOW how these dates were derived.. You are in no position to evaluate the dating of the Pauline writings as claimed by Doherty and Ehrman.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Proudfootz

You may be correct that the 'Pauline' epistles are much later than traditionally dated. The scholars you don't cite may be quite right about these claims about C14 and Paleography.

Again, you must first find out what actual evidence supports the so-called traditional dating. If you fail to show the evidence then you appear to be engaged in Chinese Whispers.

Any claim made WITHOUT evidence can be instantly REJECTED.

I reject the so-called traditional dating of the Pauline writings because it is NOT even corroborated in the very Bible.

No author in the Canon claimed Saul/Paul wrote letters to Churches between c 50-60 CE.

I'm not arguing with you.

You are arguing with me.

Whether or not the writings attributed to 'Paul' reflect a Greek influence doesn't matter whether 'Paul' is early or late.

AFAICT it looks like whoever penned these 'epistles' was familiar with Platonic concepts.

If you could confine yourself to the actual arguments it would save you a lot of attacks on people who may in fact be in agreement with you.

Just like you I am dependent on the arguments of 'scholars' for matters of dating these texts.

But nobody dates 'Paul' to be before Plato.

Sheshbazzar · 10-09-2012, 08:56 PM

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But nobody dates 'Paul' to be before Plato.

Well, except maybe sotto.

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