Freethought & Rationalism Archive

judge · 06-02-2010, 10:21 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by spin

What is the relationship between the material in Mark and the information found in Paul?

You dont know. I dont know. We can speculate and make guesses.

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We know that Paul wrote well before the time of the Marcan material.

No we dont. We can make guesses. You problem is, as usual, you want to turn guesses into solid foundations. But the nature of these documents dont allow the certainty you wish for.

Stop being such a fundamentalist and be more sceptical about you own nonsense.

aa5874 · 06-02-2010, 10:25 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by judge

Mark, our earliest account of the life of Jesus tells us Jesus had a brother called james.

Mark 6:3

Quote:

Isn't this the carpenter? Isn't this Mary's son and the brother of James, Joseph, Judas and Simon? Aren't his sisters here with us?" And they took offense at him.

Mark did NOT say that Jesus had a brother called James.

The author ASKED THREE questions.

1. Isn't this the carpenter?

2. Isn't this Mary's son and the brother of James, Joseph, Judas and Simon?

3. Aren't his sisters here with us?

The author of gMark did not answer any of the questions.

Quote:

Originally Posted by judge

Paul in Galatians appears to say the very same thing.

The Pauline writer did NOT say the very same thing. He said he met an apostle James the Lord's brother.

Quote:

Originally Posted by judge

The most parsimonious explanation is that the earliest gospel tradtion tells us Jesus had a sibling called James, and that Paul also thought this to be so.

Of course we can come up with all manner of complicated excuses to think this isnt so, but the simplest explnation is the the earliest tradition about Jesus was that he had a brother called james and that Paul agreed with this tradition.

You first task is to IDENTIFY who were the LORD and the apostle James.

Secondly you must show when Galatians 1.19 was written.

Now, you must agree that if the LORD was actually an animal, or was believed to an angel, a demon or a SPIRIT then the term "Lord's brother" did not refer to a actual human brother.

And you must also agree that if no apologetic source corroborated that an apostle James had a brother called Jesus then the "Lord's brother" did not refer to an actual sibling.

1. Jesus the LORD was considered the offspring of a Ghost of God, the Creator of heaven and earth, equal to God, who walked on water, transfigured, was raised from the dead and ascended to heaven.

Clearly the Lord was not considered human. The term "Lord's brother" in Galatians 1.19 did not refer to an actual human brother.

2. Apologetic sources did NOT corrobate Galatians 1.19. No apostle called James in the Gospels was called the the brother of the Lord and Papias also claimed the apostle James was NOT the son of Mary supposed mother of Jesus.

Again, the "Lord's brother" in GALATIANS 1.19 did not refer to a human brother or was a mistake based on the ABUNDANCE of EVIDENCE supplied by APOLOGETIC sources.

But, there was a another serious problem for the passage in Galatians 1.19, you see, once Jesus was NON-historical, he had NO apostles.

GALATIANS 1.19 is fiction even if the Pauline writer did go to Jerusalem since he could not have met apostles called Peter or James.

ApostateAbe · 06-02-2010, 10:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by yalla

Apostate Abe

Hmm.
Not an apologist eh?
OK.

Are you a believing christian?
A man of faith?

I ask because I have just finished glancing at and taking some notes from Galatians.
I reckon you need to look at Galatians.

Try these:

1. Galatians 3.7
"..it is men of faith who are the sons of Abraham."
Now, according to Paul if you Abe are a man of faith, if anyone is a man of faith, then they are sons of Abraham.
And if they are 'sons of Abraham' then what are they to each other? Brethren?
Really truly in a blood kin sense? Of course not.

The kin term used here does not indicate a kin relationship.

2. Gal. 3.26
"For in Christ Jesus you are all sons of god through faith".
And if you are all sons of god then you would therefore be brothers to each wouldn't you?
Come to think of it Jesus Christ/Christ Jesus allegedly was/is a son of god therefore all mentioned here would be brothers to each other and all belong to a brotherhood of people who are sons of god...brotherhood of the lord [aka 'god'].
In the 21st century thats a billion or more persons who, through faith in CJ/JC, belong to the brotherhood of the lord [even the women].

The kin term used here does not indicate a kin relationship

Presuming you, Apostate Abe, have faith in JC, then you Apostate Abe belong to "the brotherhood of the lord".

3. Gal. 4.5
In fact, through faith even those " who were under the law" [presumably Jews] could "receive adoption as sons ...and heirs".

The kin term used here does not indicate a kin relationship

4. Gal. 4.19
"My little children..."
I don't think the persons Paul is addressing here are actually 'little children' or 'his'.
I reckon its an affectionate term for people who share his faith.
To repeat:
"The kin term used here does not indicate a kin relationship".

5.A quick count found more than a dozen other examples in Galatians alone [ignoring all his other epistles], in addition to the above, where Paul uses the kin term "brethren or brother'.
Its ubiquitous.

Abe its bleeding obvious from a reading of Paul that he does not use kin terms as kin terms but in a collegiate communal sense of a 'brotherhood' who through faith in JC have commonality.

As such you cannot point to one single example out of the dozens that fit into the common context and, just because it suits the apologist [whether you are one such or not] purpose of trying to get it to mean an historical JC who had kin, ignore completely the Pauline context that trtansparently contradicts that interpretation.
cheers
yalla

Thanks, Yalla. Like I said in my second bullet point,

1 Corinthians 9:5 is the passage that would imply that such a group of men have a high status in the church. They are placed alongside the apostles and Cephas as having certain privileges unfairly granted to them that are not granted to other Christians. That is the basis of mythicists such as Doherty and Price speculating that they are a high-status group of Christians (but not the brothers of Jesus). That is the competing theory I used in my analysis. If you have a different proposition, then lay it out and stand behind it. Tell me what seems to be the most probable estimate for who the "brothers of the Lord" may be.

If you care to switch the alternative explanation to: "brothers of the Lord" means just your normal everyday Christians, the same way Paul normally uses the word "brother" in isolation, then you solve the problems I described for items #3, #4 and #5 of ABE. However, you would be introducing a new and big problem applicable to item #6: "It must be disconfirmed by fewer accepted beliefs than any other incompatible hypothesis about the same subject; that is, when conjoined with accepted truths it must imply fewer observation statements and other statements which are believed to be false." The hypothesis would be very much inconsistent with Paul's use of the phrase in 1 Corinthians 9:5.

Do we not have a right to take along a believing wife, even as the rest of the apostles and the brothers of the Lord and Cephas?

Clearly, in this passage, Paul is not talking about normal "brothers" or "brethren." They are people who are allowed to take wives, the same as the apostles and Cephas (Peter). The normal Christians, on the other hand, are either prohibited or discouraged from taking wives, and Paul is defending their rights. That is why I assumed that the predominant mythicist explanation would be that the "brothers of the Lord" are high-status Christians who are not literal brothers. That is the position that is most typically argued.

If your main point is that Paul uses kin terms plenty of times to denote people who are not literal kin, then I see the point, but it does not strongly indicate what Paul means when he says, "brothers of the Lord." If he meant a literal brother, then he would have no choice but to use the same word.

You don't have to trust me on that, but you can trust me on the point that I am not an apologist.

A few years ago I went to go to churches on Sunday morning with a "GOD IS FAKE" sign, and I am thinking about doing it again when I move to Mississippi.

Toto · 06-02-2010, 10:40 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ApostateAbe

.... Do you think "high-status" is a good way to express this group of brothers? That is the assumption I made about Proposition #2. Maybe it is an unwarranted assumption. If you like, I can choose an alternative explanation, such as maybe "brothers of the Lord" were just normal Christians, and I can go through ABE again using that.

What's the point? You don't seem to have much of a feel for what this is about.

Quote:

... Do we really expect that the almost-contemporary readers of Paul would misread the phrase, as if they had no idea who the "brothers of the Lord" actually were?

Perhaps they were not contemporary at all. Perhaps they were from different traditions. Perhaps Mark deliberately translated metaphors into concrete figures for his own literary purposes.

Quote:

What sort of deference would you expect? I take the title, "brother of the Lord," as deference enough. If this is a problem, then I don't think Proposition #2 is any better at solving it, because a high-status Christian also deserves deference.

Deference in terms of respect for his interpretation of Jesus' words.

Quote:

There were two men named James. It was a common name
Jesus was also a common name.

"Brother of the Lord" was apparently his title, which would be more respectful than, "Brother of Jesus," and it would be more clear to the readers. It may also be shorter than "Brother of Jesus Christ." Paul almost always uses the name "Jesus" as part of the phrase "Jesus Christ.".

That's what we call ad hoc.

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... Paul does seem to make a passing allusion to Mary in Galatians 4:4, "...God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the Law,"

This is scraping the bottom of the barrel.

Quote:

..
Since, the items in ABE are about relative evaluations, then we most certainly can make such evaluations. If they are both plausible, then we can still make a judgment about which is more plausible than the other. If they are both implausible, then we can still make a judgment about which is more plausible than the other. Or else maybe this method is not for you. Are you telling me that Proposition #1 is practically just as ad hoc as Proposition #2? The ad hoc item of ABE is a big one to me.

What exactly are you trying to do here? You have decided what you believe, and you don't seem to want to explore it in any depth. But you want to defend your beliefs against everyone else.

When I read your writing, I keep hearing echos of bad arguments that Christian apologists have made. Christians know what they believe because the Holy Spirit visited them in their hearts, but they feel they have to go through some arguments to support Jesus on the internet. What's your motive? Why are you so sure of your beliefs? Why are you set on defending your understanding of the Bible, which is so close to what some Christians have argued here?

yalla · 06-02-2010, 10:57 PM

Abe.
There is no kin term used as such in Galatians.
Brother does not mean brother = kin it means comrade/colleague/fellow believer.
Always.

Can someone link to a You tube or transcript to scene[s] in Monty Python's "Life of Brian" for me pretty please.
The scene where Reg [John Cleese] is referring to his fellow comrades of the Peoples' Liberation Front of Judea [is that what their name was, or was that the name of the 'spitter' group?] as "brothers".
But then whatshisname [Eric Idle] wants to be called 'sister' cos he wants to be a woman.
So later on in the film Reg modifies the term that he uses to address his colleagues to 'siblings' to include the newly renamed Loretta [Eric Idle].
Yet none are blood related to each other.

Abe, how Reg adresses his fellow members of the PLFJ [whatever] is the same sense that Paul uses when he addresses fellow believers in his epistles.

ApostateAbe · 06-02-2010, 11:00 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Toto

Quote:

Originally Posted by ApostateAbe

.... Do you think "high-status" is a good way to express this group of brothers? That is the assumption I made about Proposition #2. Maybe it is an unwarranted assumption. If you like, I can choose an alternative explanation, such as maybe "brothers of the Lord" were just normal Christians, and I can go through ABE again using that.

What's the point? You don't seem to have much of a feel for what this is about.

Perhaps they were not contemporary at all. Perhaps they were from different traditions. Perhaps Mark deliberately translated metaphors into concrete figures for his own literary purposes.

Deference in terms of respect for his interpretation of Jesus' words.

That's what we call ad hoc.

This is scraping the bottom of the barrel.

Quote:

..
Since, the items in ABE are about relative evaluations, then we most certainly can make such evaluations. If they are both plausible, then we can still make a judgment about which is more plausible than the other. If they are both implausible, then we can still make a judgment about which is more plausible than the other. Or else maybe this method is not for you. Are you telling me that Proposition #1 is practically just as ad hoc as Proposition #2? The ad hoc item of ABE is a big one to me.

What exactly are you trying to do here? You have decided what you believe, and you don't seem to want to explore it in any depth. But you want to defend your beliefs against everyone else.

When I read your writing, I keep hearing echos of bad arguments that Christian apologists have made. Christians know what they believe because the Holy Spirit visited them in their hearts, but they feel they have to go through some arguments to support Jesus on the internet. What's your motive? Why are you so sure of your beliefs? Why are you set on defending your understanding of the Bible, which is so close to what some Christians have argued here?

There are two reasons. The lesser reason is that I want to encourage reason in other people. I see reasonable arguments and conclusions being pushed aside in favor of the wishful thinking that accompanies anti-religious ideology, and I would like to fight that. I don't want religion to successfully discouraged among the younger generations in our society only to be replaced by ideologies that include bad history. If you take that as insulting, then I am sorry. I don't mean to be insulting, but I would like to answer your questions honestly. That is only the lesser reason, though. The greater reason is that it is fun and interesting to me.

It is how I get my high when my neighbors don't share their pot. I used to argue against Biblicist Christians for about the same two reasons, but they were no challenge at all. It was shooting fish in a barrel. The mythicists and super-skeptics are a tougher and more intelligent crowd, they are better reasoned, and sometimes I even change my mind in their favor. That is why I am a little worried that you have been left with the impression that I "don't seem to want to explore it in any depth." Really?

EDIT: I think it was yesterday when I asked you if you had any recommendations on books about historiography. That request still stands.

ApostateAbe · 06-02-2010, 11:08 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by yalla

Abe.
There is no kin term used as such in Galatians.
Brother does not mean brother = kin it means comrade/colleague/fellow believer.
Always.

Can someone link to a You tube or transcript to scene[s] in Monty Python's "Life of Brian" for me pretty please.
The scene where Reg [John Cleese] is referring to his fellow comrades of the Peoples' Liberation Front of Judea [is that what their name was, or was that the name of the 'spitter' group?] as "brothers".
But then whatshisname [Eric Idle] wants to be called 'sister' cos he wants to be a woman.
So later on in the film Reg modifies the term that he uses to address his colleagues to 'siblings' to include the newly renamed Loretta [Eric Idle].
Yet none are blood related to each other.

Abe, how Reg adresses his fellow members of the PLFJ [whatever] is the same sense that Paul uses when he addresses fellow believers in his epistles.

OK, I am going to have to ask my housemate to order Life of Brian on Netflix.

mountainman · 06-02-2010, 11:11 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by yalla

Can someone link to a You tube or transcript to scene[s] in Monty Python's "Life of Brian" for me pretty please.
The scene where Reg [John Cleese] is referring to his fellow comrades of the Peoples' Liberation Front of Judea [is that what their name was, or was that the name of the 'spitter' group?] as "brothers".

I think this scene is in Segment 4 and about one and a half minutes into it.

Doug Shaver · 06-02-2010, 11:17 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by judge

Stop being such a fundamentalist and be more sceptical about you own nonsense.

I was a Christian fundamentalist before I was an atheist. For some 30 years after becoming an atheist, I was highly skeptical toward theories that Jesus never existed. Most of them, I thought, were nothing but crackpot conspiracy theories. Then I found one that seemed well argued.

yalla · 06-02-2010, 11:50 PM

Ta Pete, but I found it in part 3 of your link.

2min 40sec roughly

Michael Palin ".....thank you brother"
Stan interjecting: " or sister"

4min 30 sec roughly

Mike Palin " We support your right to have babies brother...er sister".

And then later in their hideway Reg addresses the group as "Siblings".

Funniest film ever.
And relevant to this discussion.

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06-02-2010, 10:57 PM	#95
yalla Veteran Member Join Date: May 2002 Location: oz Posts: 1,848	Abe. There is no kin term used as such in Galatians. Brother does not mean brother = kin it means comrade/colleague/fellow believer. Always. Can someone link to a You tube or transcript to scene[s] in Monty Python's "Life of Brian" for me pretty please. The scene where Reg [John Cleese] is referring to his fellow comrades of the Peoples' Liberation Front of Judea [is that what their name was, or was that the name of the 'spitter' group?] as "brothers". But then whatshisname [Eric Idle] wants to be called 'sister' cos he wants to be a woman. So later on in the film Reg modifies the term that he uses to address his colleagues to 'siblings' to include the newly renamed Loretta [Eric Idle]. Yet none are blood related to each other. Abe, how Reg adresses his fellow members of the PLFJ [whatever] is the same sense that Paul uses when he addresses fellow believers in his epistles.

06-02-2010, 11:50 PM	#100
yalla Veteran Member Join Date: May 2002 Location: oz Posts: 1,848	Ta Pete, but I found it in part 3 of your link. 2min 40sec roughly Michael Palin ".....thank you brother" Stan interjecting: " or sister" 4min 30 sec roughly Mike Palin " We support your right to have babies brother...er sister". And then later in their hideway Reg addresses the group as "Siblings". Funniest film ever. And relevant to this discussion.

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