Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Johann_Kaspar · 03-19-2007, 06:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aa5874

Your statement is extremely strange. You not making sense.

Do you lack understanding skills? You are claiming that an HJ did not exist. Prove it! One thing is sure, you can not prove while disarding evidence. Too bad.

Quote:

Originally Posted by aa5874

I can be sure you have read every book in the world.

Stupid reply. What is sure is that I read one more book than you. Precisely the one with the most information about a possible HJ. Too bad. Now it would be possible to discuss the pertinence of what Josephus wrote or did not write because of later interpolation/edition/deletion... but it looks like your prejudice could not accept that. As if you want to ignore what could contradict your prejudice.

Quote:

Originally Posted by aa5874

I don't know how the historicity of Jesus the Christ could be valid. I don't know of any information from any extra-biblical source of Jesus the Christ, his thousands of followers or his teachings, in the first century. I don't know the date of birth of Jesus the Christ, his place of residence as a child, his genealogy or how his body could have disappeared from a sealed tomb while under guard. I don't know that the so-called Paul knew whether Jesus the Christ was a phantom or real.

I don't know anything about this character, Jesus the Christ. I don't know how he could be considered to have been a real person.

Do you know?

Bullshit. You claim with all your "I don't know" that an HJ did not exist. Because you ignore the main evidence. Ignorance as an argument. Too bad.

I don't know if an HJ existed or not. Maybe Elysée Reclus is right. Maybe a Messiah was crucified by Pontius Pilatus. No definitive conclusion is possible with the available evidence. Except that what Josephus wrote makes an HJ not impossible.

Johann_Kaspar · 03-19-2007, 06:26 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aa5874

However, in order to establish historicity of Jesus the Christ, one must be able to confirm some level of credibilty in the written stories about him. It is my observation that the stories presented are not credible, ...

Your observation is not complete. Too bad.

Johann_Kaspar · 03-19-2007, 06:29 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aa5874

The silence of the first century with respect to any concepts of 'Christ' gives me the impression that 'Christ' was fabricated in the 2nd century, and this 'Christ' may have been an 'unbegotten phantom'.

The 1st century is far from silent unless you are viewing it with an xian mentality. Too bad. You should start to study Hebrew. And read Josephus. All of it.

Johann_Kaspar · 03-19-2007, 06:56 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aa5874

Now, without the TF, who or what does Christ refer to, since there are no other references to 'Christ'?

There could have been one deleted by the xians and replaced by the TF. There is a lot of evidence that the works of Josephus were edited to fit the xian myth.

aa5874 · 03-19-2007, 07:43 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by J-D

Your position would be clear to me if you made it clear to me when I asked you to. Why won't you do that? If you say that 'an HJer may or may not accept the book called Acts', why do you purport to argue against 'the HJ position' as if it necessrily includes acceptance of the truth of the book called Acts?Again, your position is not clear.

I made a simple assertion, the historicity of Jesus the Christ has no basis. That is clear. You can disagree or agree without or without reason. I have already given reasons in my OP. I cannot continue to repeat myself.

Quote:

Do you hold that none of the written stories about Jesus the Christ are credible? Or do you hold that some of the written stories about Jesus the Christ are not credible? These are two different positions. In my view, some of the written stories are things that could not possibly have happened, but others are things that could possibly have happened.

All the stories about Jesus the Christ, in the NT, appear not to be credible.

Quote:

Again, what do you mean when you say that your view 'does not inhibit' that of an HJer? What do you think 'inhibit' means? Do you mean that your view is not logically incompatible with an HJ view? If so, why did you begin this thread by saying that an HJ view cannot be maintained?

All I am trying to convey is that you can believe whatever you want to believe, or hold any view without or with taking into consideration any input from me.

J-D · 03-19-2007, 09:10 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aa5874

I made a simple assertion, the historicity of Jesus the Christ has no basis. That is clear. You can disagree or agree without or without reason. I have already given reasons in my OP. I cannot continue to repeat myself.

It is not possible for me either to disagree or to agree with you unless I know what you mean. And the fact that you assert that your meaning is clear does not make your meaning clear. It was not clear to me. I needed you to give clarification. And despite your tone, you have in this post given me the clarification I asked for (and it was something you hadn't made clear before, not merely a repetition of something you had already said).

Quote:

Originally Posted by aa5874

All the stories about Jesus the Christ, in the NT, appear not to be credible.

Now that's clear.

But it's not clearly true.

To begin with, why is it not credible that he was baptised? Why is it not credible that he preached? Why is it not credible that he gathered disciples? Why is it not credible that he was crucified?

aa5874 · 03-19-2007, 10:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Johann_Kaspar

Bullshit. You claim with all your "I don't know" that an HJ did not exist. Because you ignore the main evidence. Ignorance as an argument. Too bad.

Ok, I ignore the main evidence. Let's see what you conclude with the main evidence.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Johann_Kaspar

I don't know if an HJ existed or not. Maybe Elysée Reclus is right. Maybe a Messiah was crucified by Pontius Pilatus. No definitive conclusion is possible with the available evidence. Except that what Josephus wrote makes an HJ not impossible.

You don't know! Too bad!

aa5874 · 03-20-2007, 12:01 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mountainman

Firstly, what makes Irenaeus an historical author with vibrant things
to write that may be considered factual? Not only just that,
but according to your assertion the very first to legitimately
write historical data on "the tribe of christians" in antiquity?

It is not that I consider Irenaeus to be a factual historical author with respect to the historicity of Jesus of Nazareth, all I am asserting is that Irenaeus wrote about the many versions of Jesus the Christ.

Once it is understood that 'Jesus the Christ' was believed to be 'unbegotten', not a real person or a 'phantom', the non-historicity of Jesus the Christ becomes even more apparent.

Irenaeus himself cast doubt about the historical version, when he claimed the one he believes in died of old age.

Quote:

Secondly, your assertion that the first century appears to be quite
literally devoid of "legitimate historical references" to the tribe of
christians" logically implies that some of the evidence which we have
before us must have been fabricated. Yet you do not follow through
this logic to explicate how, and who, and specifically when the
fraudulent misrepresentations were enacted.

I cannot determine how, who and when the faudulent mis-representations were enacted, however I am not prepared to claim it was done by a single person, although the pattern of questionable passages and interpolations, that I have read, appear to have the same objective, to place a non-mythical Jesus and his followers in the 1st century.

Quote:

What makes you draw a line in the sands of the history of antiquity
with the Eusebian derived author, and "christian saint", and "bishop"
being the first author whom, it appears to me anyway, that you
are saying ... "I am not going to start to believe some history
commenced with this LITERARY TRADITION PROFILE".

The fundamental issue for me, with regards to Eusebius, is that his version of 'Christ' as evidenced with the canonisation of the NT, is patently fictitious.

And with respect to Irenaeus in Against Heresies, it is my opinion that all versions of 'Christ' are fictitious, however, fictitious as they may be, those versions were actually believed to be true by the followers of Valentinus, Basilides, Simon Magus, Marcion and others in the 2nd century, and the non-historical version may have been the original.

J-D · 03-20-2007, 03:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aa5874

Once it is understood that 'Jesus the Christ' was believed to be 'unbegotten', not a real person or a 'phantom', the non-historicity of Jesus the Christ becomes even more apparent.

The story that Jesus was 'unbegotten' is not historically credible.

But that doesn't mean that none of the stories about Jesus are historically credible. Some of them are things that could easily have been historically true. Consider verses 6 and 7 of Chapter 23 of Luke, for example. I don't see anything incredible there.

spamandham · 03-20-2007, 03:53 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by J-D

The story that Jesus was 'unbegotten' is not historically credible.

Is it less credible than any of the other Jesus stories, and if so, why?

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