Gamera

If Paul's writings are authentic and accurately dated, this claim is false. What we have is a contemporary of Jesus adumbrating a religion based on the above teachings. And this is evidence.

But it seems to me Occam's razor applies. To claim that Christianity arose a hundred years after Jesus and then constructed a Jesus to suit its teachings is much more ornate that claiming that Jesus taught certain things and Christianity arose out of those teachings.

More to the point, I was responding to your cliam the that existence of the Alexandrine empire years after his purported death is evidence of Alexander's historicity. Fine. No difference. The same applies to Jesus.




Point is, it happened. The existence of Christianity is evidence that Christianity began somewhere, and its current teachings are some evidence of what the first teachings were. This is no different than your claim that the establishment of the Alexandrine empire is evidence of Alexander.

spin

You seem to have missed out on the fact that you can't date Paul's letters. You also seem to be working on the notion that one can guarantee the integrity of the Pauline letters, when the same cannot be guaranteed for any other of the christian documents.

So in short the application of Occam's razor is you cutting yourself up.

Did Jesus exist?? You won't deal with that one at all.

If you can't date the texts then you can't use them for a specific era. Yet you seem intent on doing so. You claim to know when Jesus lived, yet there is a ten year difference between the time of his reputed birth in Matt and Luke. Josephus has John the baptist dying after Pomtius Pilate had been dismissed. The small indications about time regarding your undated documents and what we know from the era is that they are not trustworthy.

You cannot proffer anonymous undated unprovenanced texts as evidence for anything much at all.

Your honor, I'd like to submit these documents as evidence. I don't know who wrote them. I don't know when they were written and I don't know where they were written. But I guarantee you, your honor, they are relevant.

Why reduce things to such oversimplified comments? The Alexandrian empire brought down Darius III. It placed new cities in Egypt, Mesopotamia, and various other centers, nice termini a quo. The coins reflect the sudden expansion of the empire and they nominate Alexander as the king. Stop playing the ostrich with your head in the sand.

This is as meaningful as the existence of Judaism is existence that Judaism began somewhere. No joke.

No. Its current teachings are evidence of what people now believe.

Why do you pretend that the physical evidence is not there? Your analogy is hopelessly inadequate.


spin

ynquirer

That’s correct.

Lack of contemporary evidence for Alexander the Great is striking. The first extant book of history to mention him, Polybius’ Histories, was written almost two hundred years after the hero’s death. There are, of course, thousands of coins bearing either Heracles’ head in the obverse, the name Alexandrou (=Alexander’s) with or without the word Basileôs (=the King’s) in the reverse, or whatever combination of them. And some participants in this thread take for granted that any of these inscriptions, or all together, are sufficient evidence that the coin was minted by Alexander himself.

Dating Alexander’s coins is a whole branch of numismatics, and a very difficult one. There are several theories, the most serious ones based on detailed studies of the micro-marks in every coin that denote - we assume - the minting place. One of the most recent such theories is H.A. Troxell’s Studies in the Macedonian Coinage of Alexander the Great (or via: amazon.co.uk) (1997), that the word Basileôs was not struck for the first time until Alexander IV (Roxana’s son).

Another recent contribution is P. Marchetti’s "Autour de la frappe du nouvel Amphictionique," Revue Belge de Numismatique (1999), that interpreting the head of Heracles as Alexander’s portrait is anachronism: that type of representation is typical of later Hellenistic and Roman coinage. In the late-fourth and early third-century BC Heracles’ head simply was a continuation of the classical Greek tradition to represent deities and/or mythical symbols in both obverse and reverse - much like I have affirmed in a previous comment here. At most, Heracles might represent the pretension of the Macedonian kings to descend from the mythical hero; actually, Philip II was the first to mint coins with Heracles in the obverse - G. Le Rider, Le monnayage d'argent et d'or de Philippe II frappe en Macédoine de 359 a 294 (1977). In reference to this, the minting of such coins by Ptolemy I Soter of Egypt is evidence of his pretension to be an illegitimate son of Philip II rather than of anything else - again, as I have contended for in here.

Names by no means guarantee a safe dating. This coin here, with Alexander’s name in the reverse, was minted in Thrace ca. 250-225 BC, that is, after a century Alexander was dead. All the coins in here bear portraits of Alexander that are dated to the early third century BC or later. There are, of course, some coins that are supposed to have been minted during Alexander’s life - the so-called lifetime Alexanders. Yet, the coins bear no dates nor make clear-cut connections to any historical fact. (Coins minted in Amphipolis, Macedonia, for example, are supposed to be lifetime Alexanders.) Therefore, the presumption that they were minted by Alexander is as tenuous as, for instance, the presumption that Paul wrote in the forties and fifties of the first century CE.

Some at this forum label such details as “pedantic lack of perception of the significance of coins.” I wish to be shown just a coin of which one could be convinced, beyond a doubt, that it was minted by Alexander himself. Otherwise, those coins are witnesses to Alexander’s historicity, of course, but not of a better quality than the gospels to Jesus’: a tribute paid by unconditional followers.

Gamera

[QUOTE=spin;4094129]Didn't miss out on the fact at all. That's why I prefaced the comment with "If". Which by the way, should also preface any comment about the putative highly suspect Alexander.

Wow, enough with the witty repartee!

Sure I have. I conclude he existed based on the same standard whereby I conclude Alexander existed.

So it follows Alexander didn't exist, is that what you're saying?

Again, are you talking about Alexander, Socrates, Pericles. This applies to them all!

Retrojection at work. Something brought down Darius. Later (much later) mss tell us it was this guy, Alexander, who sounds alot like a mythic figure. No contemporary documents support his existence. Could it be that the mythic Alexander and the mythic Jesus knew each other?

Well, it is funny, since the existence of Judaism in the 2nd century tells us something about the existence of Judaism in the 1st century, and so on. Same is true about Alexander's political system. And the same is true about Christianity.

Radical historical discontinuity, eh? You're starting to sound like postmodern me. Sure you want to go there?

No pretense. You just haven't cited any that wasn't deconstructed and rebutted. See ynquirer's post on numismatics below. He has taken your premises apart. You appear to be an apologist for Alexander.

No Robots

The Christian empire brought down paganism. It placed new religious structures in Egypt, Mesopotamia, and various other centers, nice termini a quo. The spread of the Gospels reflects the sudden expansion of the Church and they nominate Christ as the King of kings. Stop..., etc.

Gamera

The parallel is exact. But spin is just to invested with the idea that historical figures must be historical and Jesus must not be, to admit this.

spin

Don't try to ham your way out of your own rhetorical devices.

No, you don't avoid the problem by comment on the style while ignoring the comment. You can't wield the razor when you are carrying the more baggage.

Ignorance is no recourse to the law. I haven't started to move all the evidence with regard to Alexander. You just want to be force-fed.



Umm, Xenophon? Thuciydides? Known mints from known locations?

Demonstrate this claim!

Something nominated by the coins as king Alexander. Try to deal with evidence and not your own desires.

You're right, but I haven't said differently and it doesn't help your cause.

Discontinuity is your problem. You are not connecting. The current beliefs in christianity came from somewhere, but you cannot assume from where: you need to demonstrate from where.

You haven't even dealt with the coins yet.

ynquirer showed he couldn't deal with the coins a while back. He just bumbled on about the iconography and had no means of placing the coins in their context.

While the coin evidence is problematical, if you want to present evidence from them I'll deal it, but as it stands the inception of the coins in their context must be dealt with. One cannot do that without attempting to repudiate the whole body numismatic evidence, rejecting on the way the coins of Philip II, Philip III and all the diadochi and their dependents, because they are all part of a system and those coins in themselves support the Alexander coins and the authority behind them.

But then, there is other tangible evidence for Alexander, isn't there Gamera?

You appear to have nothing up your sleaves. In fact, you appear not to have any sleaves or anything else to cover that body apologetic. Tu quoque is not an answer to evidence.


spin

spin

Doh! Where's a terminus a quo in this???


spin

spin

I really appreciate your hope eternal. When you've got nothing else...


spin

Gamera

[QUOTE=spin;4096588]Saying "if" is hamming? Hokay.

The problem applies to Alexander as much as Jesus. That's not my problem it's yours since you grant historicity to one but not the other. It's clear to me the evidence supports the historicity of both, so no problem for me. Quit projecting.

I guess I'll have to wait for all this evidence because so far all you've provided is mss written centuries after the fact and undated coins with somebody or other on them.

Give us the mss dates please. I want you to hang yourself.

Already have.

This has been utterly debunked in this thread, but I guess you can pretend and maybe I won't notice.

Sure does. No radical discontinuity, then we have some sense of what Christianity was in the 1st century, and it seems to have something to do with this guy named Jesus.

It's no problem. I think discontinuity is just a fact. But you seem to invoke it when you need to and ignore when you want to.

I don't need to. Others have utterly and completely rebutted your claim. You need to deal with them, not me.

He utterly rebutted you. Stop whining to me about it and respond to him.

I refer to ynqirer's post which rebut you and which link to appropriate evidence. Deal with his posts, not me.

That's the thing, there isn't any evidence that is substantially more relevant than the evidence supported Jesus.

Wow, rhetoric.