spin

I am talking about methodology not your attempts to avoid it by attacking the context we are in. If you are not interested in using scholarly methodology, then you should realize that what you say won't have much weight.


spin

Elijah

Evidence of witnesses? I thought it was fiction??? Who are these witnesses of what?

I’m not asking the same questions over and over, I’m asking you to explain the words coming out of your mouth when talking about Jesus.
You completely ignore the evidence of ancient man taking these concepts figuratively. I don’t know because I can’t know. The beliefs are too varied and your Christmas tree ornament understanding isn’t going to work for me.
No not really. There is “historical core exaggerated” and there is the “undetermined myth theory” out there. Since everyone has difficulty putting together a myth theory that explains the phenomenon I don’t really count it as plausible so there is really only one plausible theory.

The only relevance here is pursuit of the truth. And in order for that pursuit you have to move on with what you got. If you can move forward going from a mythical base then go for it but it doesn’t make any sense for me and a historical core is something I can get my head around.
To think that ancient man were super gullible and would believe anything because they had a flat earth and poor science is from the TV. Taking the understanding of the dumbest believers of today and projecting it over all of ancient man is strawmanish.
These words don’t have meanings to you, they have visual/artistic representations with no real world counterparts.
“When Homer wrote that Achilles” who wrote the Jesus story? If it’s fiction shouldn’t the writer have been remembered like Homer was?

You are taking one concept, reducing it to its most simple and then comparing to another story with a similar aspect and calling them the same. It doesn’t work that way. You need to understand the Jesus phenomenon under a more informed light then someone who’s taken an intro to myth class at their community college and think they know it all.

aa5874

So, if the wtitten statements from the authors of the NT and the church writers were fiction, from what credible source did you derive your "historical core" of Jesus of the NT?

You are using the same fictitious data of the authors to erroneously claim that there was an "historical core" to Jesus. You are just guessing that whatever you think is plausible is true which is exactly like the believers of 2000 years ago.

You are just like Marcion, Justin Martyr, Eusebius, Origen, Tertullian, Irenaeus, and other church writers whatever they believed was plausible was true.

Your position is so absurd, using known fiction, or figurative non-literal statements as the basis for the historical core of Jesus.

2-J

But most Christian believers today believe in miracles. Even educated, intelligent Christians - even those who have a grasp of the law-like regularities in nature that modern science gives.

No Robots

And what is the methodology that you anonymously proffer, and how do you relate it to other scholarly methods, other than by churlish dismissal of the latter?

I have been clear and consistent about my methodology. From what I've seen of yours, it resolves itself into insistence on epigraphic corroboration for Christ's existence.

Elijah

Is it fiction? I thought you were talking about evidence from witnesses? Which is it AA? Fiction or is this an account that we should take as literally happening?
Yep I’m using the data that’s available.
Thank you?
No it’s absurd to take figurative non-literal statements literally as the basis for your dismissal of a story.

Elijah

It’s an assumption on what most believers actually believe. Within single churches the beliefs vary. You don’t understand Christ/bible the same way at 14 years old as you do when you’re 40 or 84… shouldn’t at least.

When people do believe it’s not because of the plausibility of the story but because of the belief of those around them and those who have come before them that believed. The story itself is not very convincing on its own. I think most are agnostic but just playing it safe in regards to the more magical claims.

Again just taking those who are irrational today towards religion and the world and making them the standard by which everyone else is modeled after in the ancient world doesn’t seem the correct way to do things.

The self sacrifice of the early followers is what convinced early believers not the plausibility of the story.

Some of the Jews did seem to have faith power in their belief system where mind over matter was possible, but in a more new age way then praying for a miracle way.

JES

Elijah,
I am curious as to your beliefs, if you don't mind sharing. You seem to think that the irrational Christians, those who believe in a cartoonish version of God, are but a small minority. This has not been my experience at all. The vast majority of Christians I know (and I know a lot, my Father has been a Lutheran pastor for over 30 years) believe in a literal Heaven and Hell, Jesus as Lord and Savior and a God who answers prayer. Most also believe in a literal interpretation of the Bible and a young-earth.

Do you believe there is a Heaven and Hell? A God who answers prayer? Which parts of the Bible can I discard as myth? How does one discern that?

I honestly am curious as to what you believe because I would certainly consider a number of your comments outside the mainstream of Christianity.

spin

You have me wrong. I don't dismiss any scholarly methods. I would appreciate that they were used rigorously in the field of religious studies.

All scholarly methodology deals with use of evidence as a basis of rational argument, rather than use of presuppositions to select evidence.

Straining of the past through the shaping lenses of the authors you appreciate.

As you seem not to notice things written to you, here is what I said:

Methodology requires you to leave as many of your presuppositions out of your analysis as you can. It requires you to learn as much contextualization of the material to be analyzed as you can. It requires you to work from what is known and substantiate new evidence from beyond what is known. It's like building a path from where you can safely stand, placing the roadwork before you so you can step forward.

The only sources we have are the written traditions of the early religion. How do you extract historical evidence from those traditions? And to put that question into perspective, how do you extract historical evidence from the Augustan Histories or the Travels of Sir John Manderville? You need to demonstrate some basis of historical fact contained in the core material found in them to expand on. How do you do that?

Epigraphy is a fine source of evidence, but there are others. However, due to the nature of the material we are trying to evaluate -- which claims to deal with events of people who were not in a position to leave very much, if anything, physical that would last --, we may be looking at a case of not being able to do historical research to bring the figures of the core material into historical relief. If someone doesn't leave historical evidence behind then they cannot be dealt with as though they did. Traditions that don't provide any way to get past the tradition to the history remain only traditions.


spin

Elijah

This is going to be completely off topic but OK. 32 posts but been on here since 2003?

Not a small minority. It’s an interpretation of youth and there are lots of kids in the church and adults who stick with the understanding they had as children. Also there are preachers who preach to family oriented churches that keep it simple for the people that gives validity to the concept. It may have been your experience to have known a lot of literalist Christians in your lifetime; but I don’t know how much you really dug into the questions or are just making assumptions on their beliefs.

The number of Christians who believe in young earth though are very few and far between. When you meet one you’re like “Wow! Really?”
A heaven and hell like the myth plane stuff they were talking about where it’s some magical realm going on someplace? No, that’s a pagan concept. I believe in the New Day and a day of resurrection where some things will be settled that we will call God’s Judgment.

Heaven for me in a spiritual context is more understood as the constant side to the universe. Like 2 Corinthians 4:18. But it can also be used synonymous with the life after the resurrection where things are better, but never a magical dimension you go when you die.

I don’t believe in a genie who answers wishes, if that is what you mean by a god who answers prayer. I have “faith” in my worldview that god answers your will if you believe he will, but this isn’t about a anthropomorphic entity in some other realm granting wishes this is a mind over matter type of deal.

You don’t discard anything you try to understand correctly why it is there.
I don’t know if there is a mainstream to Christianity.