Chris Weimer

Where do the gospels depict him trying to reform Judaism? As for the founder of Christianity, he doesn't have to be actively involved to be considered the founder. Confucius "founded" Confucianism, but I doubt he knew he was starting his own religion.

I don't see the logical sequence here. How does any of this pertain to HJ? So you're arguing that Paul actually started the Gentile inclusion in Christianity - how is this relevant?

Marcion is too late to have been the founder, even if he wrote Paul. Mark was out before Marcion was. Furthermore, even if Paul did write the letters, how does that make him the founder? He talks about James and Simon and others preceeding him, thus making him not the original Christian.

Read on to find out I'm not directly implicating you, Amaleq.

However, I don't see any of your views further relevant to this discussion. This thread was founded on defending mythicism, why are we talking about the defending historicity again?

jakejonesiv

See here for a start.

Also see 2 Corinthians 3:17-18.

17 Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.
18 But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the Spirit.

Historists like to pretend that the Pauline material merely has "silences" about a historic Jesus. But that is not the whole case. The silences are combined with positive statements that Jesus was a spirit.

Jake Jones IV

Ben C Smith

Agreed. We should make it a tad more specific.

I did not bring Alexander and Augustus into it in order to compare degrees of evidence. If somebody omniscient presented me with a list consisting of Alexander, Augustus, and Jesus, and then told me that one of those individuals was entirely legendary, the other two historical, I would pick Jesus as the myth. I think Alexander and Augustus have more historical support than Jesus.

However, the standard for historicity is not Alexander or Augustus! If the only people we accepted as historical had to meet that threshold of evidence the halls of antiquity would be practically vacant.

Rather, I invited Alexander and Augustus to the proceedings in order to demonstrate a point of methodology. There were people on this thread claiming that, for example, the virgin birth was evidence against an historical Jesus. If that is the case, then the serpentine birth is evidence against an historical Augustus. In other words, the amply attested historical Augustus proves that legendary biographical details are not evidence against the historicity of the person himself. This helps us with our methodology for finding an historical Jesus.

Nor was my purpose in bringing in Arthur of Britain to compare sheer volumes of evidence. It was, again, a point of method, showing that even at its extreme legendary accumulation does not count against historicity; it merely takes more and more material off the table for consideration.

That I doubt.

I think we can get that specific. But that would belong on a positive evidence for historicity thread.

Not at all. But perhaps it requires living in Alaska to understand that the purpose of this thread was to sort positive evidence against an historical Jesus from false positives.

Ben.

jjramsey

And positive statements that Jesus was of the flesh, such as Jesus being "born of a woman," being of the seed of David, and being born in human likeness. It is hardly unlikely that Paul thought that Jesus was flesh while on earth but became able to be a spirit after his resurrection and exaltation. That would not be entirely out of line with his line of thinking in 1 Corinthians 15:42ff.

Ben C Smith

Let me run this idea through a few filters....

Belief that Augustus was Zeus is positive evidence against a human Augustus, and it takes a human Augustus to be historical. :banghead:

Belief that Cortés was a god is positive evidence against a human Cortés, and it takes a human Cortés to be historical. :banghead:

Belief that the Phoenix nightlights were alien spacecraft is positive evidence against a natural phenomenon, and it takes a natural phenomenon to be historical. :banghead:

Well, the idea does not seem to pass muster, but the headbanging is almost cathartic.

I cheerfully add Ephesians 4.9-10 to the list, as per your suggestion. Galatians 4.6 is another story. I do not immediately understand how it points to a mythical Jesus.

Ben.

Ben C Smith

In order to use 2 Corinthians 3.17-18 (or anything from 2 Corinthians 3, for that matter) as evidence for a mythical Jesus, one has to be up on the debates over that chapter.

These two verses, as I understand them at present, have little to do per se with Jesus. The passage is an analogy based on Exodus 34.33-35, in which Paul is saying that the role that the Lord (Yahweh in verse 34, not exactly Jesus himself) played with Moses is the role that the spirit now plays in the new covenant.

Ben.

Ben C Smith

This is what makes Paul so important. Since most agree that he is extremely early, if not the earliest, it becomes vital to understand him. If it can be shown that Paul the apostle thought of Jesus solely in terms of a savior myth or some such, then we would have a potentially solid layer of myth undergirding an historicized structure.

The mythicists would still have to fend off challenges from other sources that some claim to be earlier than or contemporaneous with Paul (a passion narrative, Thomas, the Didache, Q), but those challenges would be easier to dismiss than an historicist Paul.

The problem with using Paul for strict mythicism is that he says that Jesus came from a woman, was a descendent of David, had a brother (prima facie!), and died on a cross after God delivered him up (we even get a passion narrative detail here, at night). The name Paul gives him almost as a title, the messiah, also implies that Jesus was a messianic claimant.

When I was attracted to mythicism all the parallels with dying and rising gods and divine savior cults and such fell pretty hard on these Pauline rocks. That is why Wells held appeal for me: He admitted that Paul thought of Jesus as human (and divine), but thrust the origins of the cult back into the shadowy past.

What I find interesting about the Pauline epistles is that what I regard as the pseudonymous ones are both more compatible with mythicism (Ephesians and Colossians) and clearer on historicism (1 and 2 Timothy and Titus).

Ben.

Ben C Smith

Okay.

Would a lengthy attack on the Alexander romances be apposite in a discussion against the historicity of Alexander?

(Note to Michael Turton: This is an even if comparison, not a signed confession on my part that the gospels are comparable to the Alexander romances. )

Does it look to you like Tatian is claiming that his own stories are only legend? Or does it look to you like Tatian is asking for leniency from his Greek audience even if they were to do so on the basis of similar legends?

Ben.

jakejonesiv

That misses the point so completely that it is A TWO BANGER. :banghead: :banghead: Now, if you could produce some evidence that Augustus and Cortes were believed to be disincarnate spirits, you might have something.

Jake Jones IV

Chris Weimer

But Paul didn't think that Jesus was a disincarnate spirit, so I don't see how it's relevant.