dog-on

Nope, I want the earliest actual reference to each of the works, you cited above.

renassault

You do know the earliest reference only establishes the latest date they could have been written. In any case, I think 1 Clement (c.95) refers to all of them, including Hebrews.

spin

Gosh that's a serious argument style.

There may be some approximate correctness in these dates, but none of them deal with the Jesus who you want to be a historical figure. Paul claimed no personal knowledge of this Jesus. He merely had a mystic revelation (Gal 1:12). We want historical sources, man.

Trotting out Josephus when people like various members of the Jesus Seminar accept that the Testimonium Flavium is tainted. In so doing they are left to decide what they accept as tainted and what not, making the process arbitrary. This is the famous flyspecks on the buttered bread problem: how do you know what you eat is not contaminated?

This such a vacuous argument it's hard to imagine that you would have seriously tried it. I can't help coming back to your need for History 101.

I didn't use the phrase: 'evidence that contradicts this'. Perhaps you could be clearer in your effort at stating your problem.


spin

renassault

Galatians 3:13 and 4:4 don't seem like a mystic revelation to me. Also, it's highly unlikely he'd report a mystic revelation about Christ being hung on a tree.

The minor passage which talks about James, brother of Christ, is obviously not tainted for the simple reason that it refers to Christ in a non-reverential way. I doubt you would question Josephus' accuracy about Herod, so why do it there? He isn't a Christian, and it's highly unlikely he'd be relying entirely on "Christian hearsay."

It's pretty much true. The Talmud was the oral law written in 200. Has nothing to do with Josephus, who gives a history of the Jews, who has nothing to do with Paul.

spin

"11 For I would have you know, brethren, that the gospel which was preached by me is not according to man. 12 For I neither received it from man, nor was I taught it, but I received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ. "

You are perverting the text. Gal 1:19 says "the lord's brother", a term equivalent in meaning to the Hebrew name Ahijah.

Do check up on the problems regarding the Testamonium Flavium (see for example Josephus_on_Jesus). Josephus was preserved through christian scribes.

But that is not your argument per se. You are trying to use those texts in some sort of artificial unison. You need to validate each text. Quantity is not a sign of history. Just look at all the rubbish written about William Tell or Robin Hood.


spin

dog-on

Clement is a forgery, no earlier than 125, (likely closer to mid second century), written in an attempt to secure the position of the fledgling Roman orthodoxy through the concept of apostolic succession, contra Marcion.

renassault

I meant Galatians 3:13 for that. Sorry, I fixed it before you posted but I guess you had quoted me by then.

I wasn't referring to Galatians 1:19, but 1 Corinthians 9:5 (why would Cephas be separated in that verse if the term doesn't refer to physical relatives?).

That's not part of the Testimonium Flavium, which is the larger passage if I'm not mistaken. This passage too is not considered entirely a forgery due to the Arabic 10th century copy which has clearly Christian changes (I think 3) missing.

I don't think the Talmud or Josephus had any reason to invent Christ, and to claim they were basing it entirely on hearsay is untenable in the case of the Talmud because it would bring up a pointless debate; if they were just answering Christians from their time (viz. 200-600 AD) then they would have just claimed they were liars.

super-renassault

Toto

Ren - no one is claiming that Josephus invented Jesus. Everyone agrees that Josephus was interpolated at least in part, and if it was interpolated, we can't rely on it for saying anything in particular. The Arabic version could well be late, with the more overtly Christian parts stripped out (much as Christian scholars have tried to create an original.)

The Talmud is quite late, even if some parts may go back to an earlier tradition. But again, it appears to react to Christian arguments, rather than be an independent source.

These are all issues that have been run into the ground.

spin

Same problem. You're trying to get the text to say what it doesn't.

You need to get the evidence out. Third hand recollections aren't very useful.

And nobody would even think of such a thing. Do you think Tertullian invented Ebion?

(The Talmuds are later than this.)

Why didn't Tertullian just claim that the Greeks who believed in their ancient gods were liars? Instead he argued against their beliefs and values. You are not dealing with history, but conflicts of beliefs and values. Can you get back to history?

The Talmuds were written very much later and are in no sense primary historical sources on the issue. They did deal with aberrant Jewish beliefs.

Josephus may not have known anything at all about Jesus. The texts that to me are interpolations have been oft debated here and no-one seems to be able to get past the flyspecks on the bread and butter problem. Think about it: a piece of bread and butter dropped on the floor. Can you pick it up and pick out the flyspecks and then be content enough to eat it?? That's equivalent to what some people try to do with Josephus and the Testimonium Flavium.



Now can you get back to Paul as a non-witness to a historical Jesus? Remember Gal 1:

"11 For I would have you know, brethren, that the gospel which was preached by me is not according to man. 12 For I neither received it from man, nor was I taught it, but I received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ. "

spin

Apostate1970

Exactly. Plenty of them. Thats' why it's preposterous to say that there wasn't one.

Someone who said most of the sayings in the synoptics and elsewhere probably did exist.

No, obviously he does not. Obviously the real historical Jesus had no superpowers. Obiously he was much like any of the other screaming fishermen that you mention above.

This is because the early Christians wanted to make it sound as if their leader was a prophecy fulfiller. They reviewed the OT and tried to find actions that fit verses therein, such as Psalm 22:16-18. Obviously in doing this they would have had to take things out of context since the Jewish idea of a messiah in no way fits the gospel account, hence the sloppiness.

What are you takling about here?

Yes, we can. He was an iconoclastic Jew who taught an initially small but devoted group of followers which later reinvented him as a spiritual messiah figure in fulfillment of Jewish prophecy. How he would have felt about such a reinvention is an interesting question. I lean towards the notion that it is something which he tried to do in his own life but became disillusioned about and gave up, only to have his followers succeed where he failed.

There are clearly preposterous claims ... bread = wine, ectoplasm flitting around, 3 = 1, human parthenogenesis, water >> wine, dead >> living, loaves + fish = cornucopia. All of these are ridiculous. But saying "There was a person who went up to the temple and overturned tables and shouted at moneychangers." is not preposterous. Saying "There was a person who said very specific things about lost sheep and water and so forth." is not preposterous. And on like this. There are claims in the NT which clearly purport to be bona fide historical claims. Among these are claims that are nonmiraculous and don't involve mysterious metaphysics. Let's call these three conditions "The 3 M's" ... metaphor, miracle, mysterious metaphysics. Among the claims in the NT that are not 3M, at least some of them are true. In fact, probably quite a lot of them are. Moreover, the same can be said of pretty much ANY sacred religious text.

Yes, it does. And history is a science but many of the ahistoricists seem to want to turn it into an ideology instead. Shame on them.

Yes, so?