Chili

Interesting solo but that is what gave us dominion over the species. It is not a defect because the commumication still exist between the two (we call this the HS) until a rewiring is done with the onset of menopause where the Beatific Vision is complimentary and from there the 'older brain' (TOK we call it) is the mother that once was taken from us to remain aloof and send the HS our way whenever she is a in a good mood (enmity between between these two brains = Mary and Magdalene and higher up between Herod and Pilate).

aa5874

An explanation of an historical Jesus based solely on the Bible is completely and fatally flawed. The Jesus of the Bible is a God that was born of the Holy Ghost was resurrected and went through the clouds on his way to heaven.

Mark 16.6: The historical Jesus is not in the Bible, He is NOT there, He has Risen.

badger3k

Sorry to disagree, but the mythical Jesus position goes back to German and Dutch scholars from 100+ years ago. It is only "new" in the sense that a historical Jesus concept it older than it.

Re Dawkins, I suspect (but have no evidence) that he really doesn't care. The idea of whether or not a human Jesus existed is irrelevant - if there is no god, then who cares whether a human named Yeshua existed in the past (other than scholars, and those interested in the history of the region or religion, anthropologists, etc).

Clivedurdle

Solo, you have resurrected some stuff from the distant past - I read Ghost in the Machine in 1971 and have been puzzled that its insights are not more widely discussed.

It is around here somewhere, thanks

Clive

Chili

. . . only because the Reformation introduced him as a real person in a concrete way. The myth was written by the mythmakers and was defended by the mythmakers at all cost until the civilization had reached its high point and was bound to decline after that.

jules?

Hmmmm hasn't the concept of a mythical Jesus been around since christians started to worship as gnostics?

Toto

Mythicism may be traced back to second century gnostics or 19th century Dutch and German scholars, but the modern formulations are relatively new.

spamandham

What I'm interested in, is someone who doesn't start with that assumption.

jules?

The 'was Jesus historical' arguement rages on several fronts but from the perspective of what should the default position be I would go with the myth first and go on from there. [i did toe the collective line a few years ago and I am still open to the idea].

If we were to deal with a similar hero such as King Arthur or Merlin then 'scholars' tend towards the mythical with the element of a real person lurking somewhere. Jesus is different and it is telling that from the very creation of Christianity writers were at great pains to point out that their hero really did exist. It is telling because if it was widely accepted they need not have wasted their breath. All the early writers were of the Greco-Roman world and wrote in Greek or Latin [is this correct?] indicating they were never directly connected to the events described.

I agree in some respects with the OP in that if Darkins had said Merlin was probably a great historical man but just a man and not born of an angel/woman then we would probably be quite critical.

Howay the Toon

Its probably because he would rather not derail whatever discussion he's having at the time into a rather pointless, boring and irrelevant discussion on the evidence for the historicity of Jesus.