Zeichman

Then you're left in the position of having to explain why Q, Thomas and the Didache overlook such a soteriology. They show no awareness of such a tradition (either polemic against or support of it) as one would expect. Is there evidence for such a tradition-history? Otherwise you're just conjecturing.

Ted Hoffman

Doherty Gibson Barrett
On the Thread about Plutarch and Doherty
Dancing with Katie Sarka under the Moon
If this is not an attempt to extract an accurate interpretation from muddled thoughts of the ancients, I dont know what is.

GakuseiDon

Thanks, TedH! I think that an accurate interpretation of what people thought then is probably more useful than an inaccurate one, but that's just me. As Vork says, we should use Paul to interpret Paul. If Paul says something that goes against the beliefs of the day, then that's what he believed. But if Paul says something ambiguous, then the more parsimonious explanation is the one that matches the beliefs of the day. To that end, an accurate view of what people believed back then is useful.

By the way, you've described ancient thought as well. So let's talk about it! Starting from here:
http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?t=148821&page=3
That sounds like what I am saying. (I've cut the bit about Carrier's comments regarding "in the flesh", but we can cover that if you like). Does that represent the thoughts of the people of Paul's time? Are there any more that we should add to the list? And do you agree that this is a worthwhile activity?

Also, from the same page, we had this encounter:
So, you are saying that the sublunar realm is one contiguous physical space astronomically from earth to moon, but not theosophically nor ontologically, at least according (presumably) to the people of Paul's time. It still sounds like double-talk to me, I'm afraid. Can you expand on that, please? References would be good, too. Is this something that Doherty believes as well, or do you differ from Doherty here?

Ted Hoffman

Why? To satisfy your thirst for a literal meaning? At any rate, the point has been made. You want exact locations. You want accuracy. And you want specifics from ambiguius thoughts and ideas. You are imposing your own demands and expectations on the texts.

GakuseiDon

youngalexander

According to Paul Veyne Did the Greeks Believe in Their Myths? (or via: amazon.co.uk), ch2 'The Plurality and Analogy of True Worlds', pg17

Greek mythology, whose connections with religion were very loose, was basically nothing but a very popular literary genre, ...

These legendery worlds were accepted as true in the sense that they were not doubted, but they were not accepted the way that everyday reality is.

They were seen as belonging to "an ageless past, defined only in that it was earlier, outside of, and different from the present".

Mythological space and time were secretly different from our own. A Greek put the gods "in heaven," but he would have been astounded to see them in the sky.

In other words they were not 'literal' in the sense that you keep on insisting must be the case. What you fail to appreciate is the plurality of perceived reality in the ancient mindset.

Veyne then goes on to discuss that ancient (Greek) mindset.

The analogy between these temporal worlds disguises their hidden plurality. It is not self-evident that humanity has a past, known or unknown. One does not perceive the limit of the centuries, held in memory, any more than one perceives the line bounding the visual field. One does not see the obscure centuries stretching beyond this horizon. One simply stops seeing, and that is all.

Pause for reflection - we are trying to think like ancients here! So what do we ancients see?

The heroic generations are found on the other side of this temporal horizon in another world. This is the mythical world in whose existence thinkers from Thucydides or Hecataeus to Pausanias or Saint Augustine will continue to believe - except that they will stop seeing it as another world and will want to reduce it to the mode of the present. They will act as if myth pertained to the same realm of belief as history.

Might this not account for the conundrum of Paul? What I mean is, if we rewrite the above

Christ Jesus is found on the other side of this temporal horizon in another world. This is the mythical world in whose existence Paul will continue to believe - except that he has stopped seeing it as another world and has reduced it to the mode of the present. He acts as if myth pertained to the same realm of belief as history.

I rather think that this is what happened.

GakuseiDon

I'm NOT insisting that the myths must have been 'literal'. It depends on the myth, and the person themselves. Plutarch clearly sees the story of Osiris as non-literal metaphor for order vs chaos, for example. However, he also has Romulus founding Rome at a particular point in time. (To me, a good analogy would be how liberal Christians today view stories in the OT -- on earth, though literally not true. Maybe even some speculation about real events that inspired the stories. But a Doherty who wanted to assert that therefore some Christians thought that the story of Noah took place in a "mythical realm" and not on earth would be far from the mark). I wish that people would read what I write, rather than just what others are claiming I write. I've clearly and consistently differed with regards to myths that were apparently set on earth and those in the heavens, and stated that some were regarded as metaphors (and not to be taken literally), others weren't really believed but people thought that there was a historical core (like Plutarch with Romulus). Can you quote me where I keep insisting that myths must have been 'literal'?

It's possible I suppose. So let's look into it further. I'd love to know what primary sources the author is using. That book has been on my reading list for ages! I'd love to get it. Did you purchase it through Amazon, or got it here in Vic?

youngalexander

pg42 Paradox 1:

there were people who did not believe in the existence of the gods ...

... from the fifth century B.C. to the fourth century A.D., absolutely no one, Christians included, ever expressed the slightest doubt concerning the historicity of Aeneas, Romulus, Theseus, Heracles, Archlles, or even Dionysus: rather, everyone asserted this historicity.

Hmm, remind you of anyone?

pg95 II. Noah in the Ark, Ante-Pacem

... consists normally of an Orante standing in a boxlike ark. Nearly always a dove with an olive branch flies toward Noah or has alighted on his outstretched hand.

The Noah story offered the early Christian artisan an opportunity to express piety and peace in a vessel that withstood the threatening environment.

That is a pictorial scene (& narrative) pertaining to a 'conflict' situation.

Apart from sorting MM's particular problem out, the book has some very interesting Christological & other conclusions concerning early Christian practice. A way of understanding your "average Xian" in the late 2nd (180 CE) to early 4th C. As opposed to the sometimes 'tendentious' literature everyone keeps quoting.

129 pages and 216 notes, sources too numerous to mention. I'm about half way thru at moment. Gotit at Amazon.

GakuseiDon

Yes, and I submit that this forms the background to Paul. The MJ Paul would have been the odd one out, just as mythicists are the odd ones out today on this subject. My guess is that pagans were arguing over how much myth was in the story of Romulus, Hercules, etc. They didn't necesarily believe that the myths were literally true, but didn't doubt that some myths had a historical person at the core. They may have even believed that the person had become a protective hero/daemon, and so worth cultivating their good will through being worshipped. There were probably even debates about the "historical Romulus" vs the "mythical Romulus". But they would have said to the MJ Paul, "What! Your saviour god died WHERE? In the air? What was he, a daemon or something?" But there doesn't appear to be anything like that.

I've got to get that book!

spamandham

The straightforward answer to this contention, is that these documents are later in the game - the result of groups that rejected the salvation theology, and so they stripped it off, but who viewed Jesus as a wise holy man nonetheless.

There is precedent for this, as Origen records the Ebionites as having done this exact thing .

The coarse outline might be something like;

1) Isaiah's suffering servant + pagan influence -> proto-christianity

(John's cult, books of Enoch, Essene TOR...)

2) baptizing cults + Jewish wars -> mystical "YHWH's salvation"

("authentic" Paul falls here)

3) mystical "YHWH's salvation" + pagan influence + dawn of age of Pisces -> mythical Jesus

(Marcion's Jesus?)

4) mythical Jesus + fictional biographical harmonization -> proto-catholicism

5) proto-catholocism + legends, sayings -> various gospels

6) At this point, some groups stripped off the mythical aspects of what was now considered to have been a historical holy man -> Ebionites+