mountainman

Do you believe that Gandalf the Grey escaped from the pit after battling the Balrog and returned to Middlearth as Gandalf the White?

mountainman

Eusebius was the first apologetic historian. He had many continuators but no rivals.

Well this is of course standard practice and one which should not be dispensed with, however in this instance we have reasonable evidence to suspect that Eusebius was a dishonest historian. The relevant citations would include:

a) the Testimonium Flavianum forgery
b) the Agbar-Jesus letters forgery
c) the Paul and Senecca correspondence forgeries

Independent objective scholars since the Age of Enlightenment have targetted Eusebius with various charges of "forgery". As a matter of general principle, I do not ignore the suspicions and assessments of forgery from objective scholars and academics over the last 350 years levelled against this "Early Christian Church Historian".

Eusebius was the "packager" and editor of the earliest large publication of the new testament. Constantine instructed Eusebius and Eusebius ordered his people in the scriptoria to make the necessary copies. IMO we cannot just turn a blind eye to the possibility that Eusebius cannot be trusted.

mountainman

Why do so many people assume that the gospels have been authored and published in good faith?

Is this just a case of social brainwashing, rinse and spindry?

mountainman

Would any of those few people who have voted for option (1)
please also state the evidence which supports their position.

Citations to evidence which supports the contrary option (3) include:

a) the Testimonium Flavianum forgery
b) the Agbar-Jesus letters forgery
c) the Paul and Senecca correspondence forgeries
d) the fraudulent misrepresentation of the publisher (Constantine) at the Council of Antioch.
e) a general assessment of the integrity of Eusebius as an historian.

Chili

It is fiction if you allow me to say that whatever exists in the imagination must exist in reality as well . . . but not as phantasm (fantasy) but in reality this time.

mountainman

This cannot be the case Chili since the subject matter of ancient history might be categorised into the following sub-fields:

"Literature Tradition"
(1) authors
(2) ancient texts - philology, and its translations

The "Field Traditions"

(3) the ancient documents (the physical written sources, original texts, codices, papyri, papyri fragments);
(4) architecture, buildings, monuments;
(5) inscriptions in stone and metal and mosaic - the epigraphic habit;
(6) sarcophagi, burial relics, funerary ornaments;
(7) coins (gold, silver, bronze, other);
(8) art, paintings and graffiti;
(9) sculpture, relief’s, frescoes, ornamental works;
(10) archaeological relics and other citations.

Supporting Other fields:

(11) palaeographic assessment of original texts, papyri and papyri fragments;
(12) radio carbon dating citations;
(13) Collective and collaborative databases (e.g.: epigraphic, numismatic, papyri, etc.).

Aside from the data presented by Eusebius, Jesus and the Gospels do not make an appearance in these fields of ancient historical reality until the fourth century.

Gandalf the Grey makes an appearance in the 20th century, along with Superman, Harry Potter and other fictional characters.

The suggestion therefore is that it is not unreasonable to argue the case that the gospels were not authored in good faith in the 1st century but were in fact authored for the purpose of a religious (and historical) fabrication at some later date. The later date has upper bounds according to the evidence that the gospels were published to the Greek civilisation c.325 CE -- the major greek codices still extant date to this century. Thus the fabrication it is argued must have been authored between the 2nd and the 4th centuries.

Chili

Yes but so what? It is no secret that they were back-dated and whether that be 100 or 300 years is not important. That there was no historical Jesus is not imprtant either because he is still alive today in being the mythical character who plays that certain role . . . and that role is real and exist in the imagination or it would not be real.

My argument is very simple in that the role Jesus presents is our cocoon stage during metamorphosis and that does not make it fiction. It also makes it significantent, relevant, timeless and it can be tied down in our soul where it finds some recognition.

spamandham

'Fiction' implies a story written for entertainment purposes. I don't see a good reason to draw that conclusion.


The 'early period audience' is who I'm referring to, and even then, really just the earliest of the early period. These are the intended audience of the author. Later audiences clearly believe the stories to have been real, even into the modern era.

I didn't say they were idiots, but ok, we disagree in regard to the penchant of ancients to discern myth from reality. This seems an odd disagreement to me, since even in the modern world, the average person lacks such ability.

Chili

Be careful because to them myth is real as it is or is about eternal things and that makes them real . . . even today and the arts cannot get away from them or they lose the art of artworks with then philosophy being the finest of fine arts.

mountainman

Have the gospels not entertained humanity for long enough? And besides, fiction does not necessarily imply "entertainment". How was Scientology invented? A political manifesto for example may have fictitious components.


The sounds like the first few microseconds of the Big Bang theory. I thought your opinion was that Matt, Mark, Cool Hand Luke and John did not author their respective books.


The ancients who preserved the literature preserved the knowledge of the Greek civilisation (Euclid et al) were not your average infidel in the street.

The technology of writing and reading was not available to the average person in the ancient world. My point is that some of the educated Greek ancients were very intelligent and to say that they could not discern myth from reality is IMO not giving them the credit they deserve.