Photon

I have been debating with a troll-like person on another board, and he claims that he has evidence of the historicity of Jesus from a Roman document, and when I asked him to provide a reference he wouldn't give one (saying that I had to do the research). He seems to enjoy the arrogant withholding of support for his claims. He did mention a writer named "Marcius" though.

Throughout our discussions (he is a Bible literalist) I haven't been particularly impressed with his research skills on other matters (like radiometric dating, geology, astrophysics, etc.), or even on matters in regard to biblical interpretation or simple reading comprehension. Anyway, I digress.

I've looked for quite awhile, and I can find numerous obscure references to various people named Marcius throughout Roman history, but does anyone know specifically which one he might be talking about in relation to a historical Jesus?

spin

Sorry, if, upon your request, the guy can't supply you with a specific book (title, author, publisher, year) as a source for his knowledge of this reference, forget it. The guy isn't serious.


spin

Photon

Now he's come out and said that the name was really "Marcion", but still won't give a specific reference. Marcion at least makes mroe sense, but I fail to see how a guy who claimed that Jesus was another divine entity entirely from the OT god, and who lived a century after Jesus' alleged death would have any evidence of a historical Jesus beyond personal revelation.

His collection of the Christian canon and his subsequent edits got him excommunicated, I think. Certainly Marcion is an example of how far some early Christian writers would distort the documents to be reconciled with their own beliefs.

spin

Marcion was a rich man who came from Sinope in Asia Minor on the Black Sea coast to Rome, where he was received with no great problem and stayed there for a long time before any friction broke out between the Roman proto-Orthodoxy and his followers, for he had gathered numerous followers. He finally got kicked out after many years in the Roman xian community.

He is the first person on record to have collected Pauline works and combined them with a gospel, which Irenaeus thought was a bowdlerized version of Luke -- but then Luke could have been an augmented version of Marcion.

You should find a bit about him on the web, if you acn bother sifting through the baloney.


spin

rlogan

Are you debating him on TWEB?

Photon

No the forum at www.atheists.com. We've had quite a night. Though he began refusing to respond when his references were challenged and rebutted, not that that is surprising.

Demosthenes

sounds like that guy have no clue what he's talking about. You're probably better off showing him the way to the nearest trash can.