GakuseiDon

:rolling: It reminds me of an episode of "Yes, Prime Minister", where the tobacco lobby said that they were happy to donate money anonymously, as long as all the politicians and the public knew that the tobacco lobby were donating money anonymously.

judge

Since you exaplined it you must understand it.
Can you explain the difference then?

mountainman

Cyril wanted the heresies buried. Not to be written about. The heresy of Nestorius was reporting the existence of heresies ...

archibald

No, George, it isn't just that it isn't there. It is there., It just isn't contemporary (the 'independent' stuff) though it's not late by the standards of ancient history, objectively applied. As for non-independent stuff, there is no good reason to expect outside contemporary sources for such a local, minor character (minor at the time, I mean).

But local, recent figures held to be fictional who soon after turned historical are not ten a penny. I have lost track of how many times I have pointed this out.

What, precisely, makes me think he may have been a real human being are the numerous descriptions which describe him as such, for starters (no time here to restate my overall case for the umpteenth time). Then I compare this to your hypothesis, that he was dreamt up initially, only decades later to be construed as historical and I find no good reason to switch to that less parsimonius alternative.

The evidence for Jesus is better than we should expect. It is irrelevant that there is not more, since if we applied that standard objectively, we would have to also cross hundreds if not thousands of figures from ancient history off the list. If you are willing to do that, fine, then you aren't contradicting yourself. In the meantime, you are.

YOU are not being objective, or consistent. Run me through the contemporary, independent, triangulated, causal chain evidence for Buddha again.

dog-on

What do you mean by "local, recent figures"?

You are simply tripping over your assumptions, as usual, archibald.

archibald

Dog-on, I think you and I may have run our course. I'm not assuming anything. I'm taking a view of the timing of events which is non-controversial, widely held and supported, the personal reasons for which I have gone into previously, and which I readily accept can't be treated as certain.

The often aired response that someone else is 'assuming' their position, when really it's just a different position to the person objecting to it, which the first someone can and has explained their reasoning for, is one of the lamest trends doing the rounds.

In fact, its only competition in the irrelevant and inaccurate stakes, is the accusation of 'using an argument from authority' which, to be fair, I don't think I've heard from anyone, on either side of the debates, at any point.

No, I tell a lie, 'your mind is closed' is another.

dog-on

That you continue to fail to understand the issue at hand continues to speak volumes.

You said the following:

This assumes that the subject was, in fact, a local and recent figure, which is what has been called into question in the first place. You have no real reason to hold such an assumption as self evident, as you lack the evidence required to do so.

:wave:

archibald

No. It doesn't assume it, or take it as self-evident, in the slightest. Nor does it assume it because it is first assumed he did exist. I already said why that was not accurate, and that I had given my reasoning for taking the position on timing elsewhere (yes, it's a 'position', Dog-on, no need to wet your pants), but apparently you don't actually read others replies to you. You do grasp the difference between 'assumed as self evident' and 'view held, for reasons given', don't you? No. Apparently you don't.

Oh, and thanks for reminding me of another popular and irrational canard. The 'you don't have evidence' canard. Yes, the people saying this do have evidence. We are not all in the same boat. Lol.

mountainman

Objectively there is very little historical evidence for Buddha. Three hundred years after the supposed birth of Buddha the warlord Ashoka erected stupas and inscribed columns in his memory, and converted most of India to Buddhism. But Ashoka did not establish a canonized version of the Buddhist writings to serve as a "Holy Writ" at the basis of a centralised monotheistic state Buddhist religion.

The earliest Buddhist manuscripts have been C14 dated to the 1st century CE. Buddhism is not necessarily perceived as a religion, and is openly acknowledged to also represent a philosophy and a metaphysics. The same cannot be said about Christianity. The Buddhist texts do not mention the existence of Anti-Buddhas, who refused to confess that Buddha appeared in the flesh. The same cannot be said about Christianity.

So the evidence for the historical Buddha is late a sparse. When you are ready we can move on to the evidence for the historical Jesus, which is also very late and very sparse, but which is inextricably interwoven with pious forgery, interpolation, masses of heretics (who were disposed of) and monumental controversies (e.g. The Arian controversy, the Origenist controversy, the Nestorian controversy, etc).

We do not find on the Buddhist side of the ledger a treatise written by an extremely well educated Indian King entitled "Against the Buddhists", and commencing with the statement ....

"It is, I think, expedient to set forth to all mankind
the reasons by which I was convinced that
the fabrication of the Buddhists
is a fiction of men composed by wickedness.

Though it has in it nothing divine,
by making full use of that part of the soul
which loves fable and is childish and foolish,
it has induced men to believe
that the monstrous tale is truth.

We do not find a very centralised holy Buddhist Creed saying effectively ....

"We the undersigned Buddhists do really and truly hereby believe in Buddha and Nirvana and etc etc etc ...

But the holy Buddhist church anathematizes those who say: "There was a time when he was not," and "He was not before he was begotten" and "He was made from that which did not exist," and those who assert that he is of other substance or essence than the Father, or that he was created, or he is susceptible of change.'

There is no doubting that the Buddhists had competing schools of thought, but they did not revert to persecution and intolerance and the use of the Indian army to seek out and destroy anti-Buddhist texts, or to apply the death penalty to those who preserved other books which were not considered to be canonical Buddhist books.

This OP is about heresies. Do you happen to have any historical evidence for Buddhist heresies or heretics? There is plenty of historical evidence for Christian heretics. What might this imply? The Buddhists obviously could not care two figs about so-called apperceived "heretics", but the Christians always had before them, from the canonical letters of John, those vile blasphemous anti-christian people who for some obscure reason refused to confess that Jesus appeared in the flesh - i.e. in history. I wonder why?

archibald

MM,

Thankyou, but I really wasn't intending to compare and contrast, at this point (interesting though it might be). I was really just pointing out what looked like an inconsistency on George's part, since I believe he cited the evidence for Buddha as being better and more detailed. I think...he might even have said it was from a contemporary source. A disciple, I think. :]