Freethought & Rationalism Archive

GakuseiDon · 02-16-2010, 01:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jayrok

For the record, I think Jesus may have existed but the stories written about him were mostly made up for effect and theological purposes. That said, I find Earl's case for mysticism strong and would like to read scholarly opposition to it.

Jay, I'm no scholar, but what did you think of my analysis of Earl's comment of "sky caverns", on the last page? Did my analysis make sense? I've provided the cites so you can check this for yourself, which I urge people to do.

Kapyong · 02-16-2010, 01:18 PM

Gday,

Quote:

Originally Posted by ApostateAbe

Why do I pontificate...? you ask. I do that largely because the case for the historical Jesus is well-established,

There is no need to LOOK thru that telescope,
as the Pope has already determined that Jupiter cannot have moons.

K.

maryhelena · 02-16-2010, 01:24 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by GakuseiDon

Quote:

Originally Posted by maryhelena

All GDon is doing is attempting to knock down specific details of a particular theory that revolves around the non-historicity of Jesus.

Correct. Though I would say I've already knocked it down, at least to my satisfaction. The "caverns in the sky" piece earlier is just another example. What I've been attempting to do is to get people to look into these things for themselves. That's the really hard bit! I've provided the analysis and the cites used. Not much more than I can do than that.

I'm not out to debunk mythicism generally, though. There are plenty of mythicist theories that I haven't looked at and will never look at.

I can't prove it, no. But I think it is the best available explanation of the evidence that we do have (as I laid out in the RDN thread a few weeks back).

Quote:

Originally Posted by maryhelena

So, however many more mythicists produce various theories - all that does is give GDon some more work.

No it doesn't, unless the theory falls into my area of interest.

OK - sorry about putting the whole mythicist burden on your shoulders - much better idea to have something left over for Tim to pour his scorn over...

GakuseiDon · 02-16-2010, 01:31 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by maryhelena

OK - sorry about putting the whole mythicist burden on your shoulders - much better idea to have something left over for Tim to pour his scorn over...

BTW, what did you think of my analysis of Earl's "sky cavern" claim? Did what I write seem fair and correct?

maryhelena · 02-16-2010, 01:35 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by GakuseiDon

Quote:

Originally Posted by maryhelena

OK - sorry about putting the whole mythicist burden on your shoulders - much better idea to have something left over for Tim to pour his scorn over...

BTW, what did you think of my analysis of Earl's "sky cavern" claim? Did what I write seem fair and correct?

Seems OK to me......

GakuseiDon · 02-16-2010, 01:41 PM

Thanks!

Toto · 02-16-2010, 02:52 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by GakuseiDon

...

A certain Arideus [in Plutarch's "On the Delay of Divine Justice"] is carried in a vision to a higher realm among vast stars. Within that realm are caverns and trees and flowers.

I thought, "Really? Caverns and trees and flowers in the Sublunar Realm? Doesn't sound right. Anything containing earth or water has a natural inclination towards the ground, according to the ancients. What on earth is Plutarch saying?"

So I looked up Plutarch's work, which is fortunately on-line. Here is what he says:
http://www.archive.org/stream/plutar...0plut_djvu.txt

When the friend of Thespesius had thus spoken, he led him rapidly to a certain place that appeared immense, toward which he moved directly and easily, transported on light-beams as on wings, — until, coming to a large and deep cavern, he was deserted by the force that had borne him, and he saw other souls there in a like condition. Clustering together like birds, they flew round the chasm in a circle, but did not dare to cross it. Within, it resembled the caves of Bacchus, like them diversified with boughs of trees, and living green, and flowers of every hue; and it exhaled a soft and mild breeze, wafting up odors of wonderful sweetness, and producing an effect similar to that which wine has on those who drink it freely.

That's the cave reference. The spirits are obviously above it, "clustering together like birds" and being affected by odors "wafting up". But is the cave itself up in the air?

Didn't we go through this the last time you tried to criticise Doherty's line of thought? Doherty has never claimed that Plutarch is a perfect example of the sort of thinking he posits. And he cites this section of Plutarch as an example of divine punishment in a spiritual realm - punishment which depends on a fleshy component of the body. To continue quoting from Doherty at p. 151:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jesus Neither God nor Man p. 151

From the earth below "the souls of the dying rose like fiery bubbles through the parted air," emerging as diminutive human forms. These are judged and subjected to punishments according to their guilt. . .

And these souls are transported "on light-beams as on wings," or rise like fiery bubbles through the parted air. Where does this happen, if you think that the location of these "events" can be described?

Quote:

The writer continues:

The spirit said that by this opening Dionysus went up to the gods, and afterward led Semele up by the same way, and that the place is called Letlie [should be "Lethe"].

Lethe is the Place of Oblivion, which is in the Underworld. Semele of course was Dionysus' mortal mother, whom he rescued from Hades. So the cavern can hardly be detached from the ground. In fact, it extends upwards from the Underworld!

Now, what happens when these souls start to breath the moistured air?:

He did not suffer Thespesius to remain there, though he wanted to stay, but took him away by force, teaching him at the same time, and telling him how the mind is melted and soaked by sensual pleasure, while the unreasoning and body-like part of the soul, being thus nourished and made fleshly, calls up the remembrance of the body, and from that remembrance wakes a desire and longing that draw it toward another birth, or genesis, which is so called as being an inclination toward the earth in the soul that is thus weighed down and water-logged.

So: the "water-logged" soul has an "inclination towards the earth". What would have happened had the soul remained above the cavern? He would have dropped back down to earth, to be reborn. (He certainly wouldn't have dropped into a sky cave to be reborn!)

So what do you make of the fleshy part of the soul? What does that tell you about the possible meanings of the phrase kata sarka?

Quote:

And this helps illustrate the issue I have with Doherty's Sublunar Incarnation Theory. Anything taking on flesh -- which is earth and water, according to the ancients -- has a natural inclination towards the ground. See also Clement of Alexandria:
http://www.earlychristianwritings.co...hortation.html

How, then, can shades and demons be still reckoned gods, being in reality unclean and impure spirits, acknowledged by all to be of an earthly and watery nature, sinking downwards by their own weight, and flitting about graves and tombs, about which they appear dimly, being but shadowy phantasms?

Is this support for the idea that the Docetic Jesus must have suffered on earth? That as a spirit taking on flesh he was here on earth and not in a spiritual realm? Interesting. But what happens when you stop believing in spirits? Was the Docetic Jesus a real person perceived as a spirit or a spirit interpreted as being on earth? It sounds like a strange question, but if it is the latter, then there were in fact mythicists in early Christianity.

Quote:

Now, those who are convinced by Doherty can just ignore what I wrote above. It is, after all, the same point as I've been making all along. So if I've been wrong all those other times, I must be wrong here.

Or if you missed the point before, as you clearly did, you probably are still missing the point.

I don't claim to be fully convinced by the idea of a sub-lunar incarnation (I think that outright interpolation is an easier explanation of some of the passages), but I do not think you have fully grasped his theory and I do not think that you are making a fair critique.

I notice that you have skipped over the other examples that Doherty gives on page 50, before the section you quoted.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jesus Neither God nor Man, p. 150

The Enochian pre-Christian writings envision all sorts of activities in the various layers of heaven. There one can see fire and ice, armies and chariots . . . in the second heaven there are prioners, hanging and awaiting judgment. . . There are mountains and rivers in these heavens, and trees. . . the variety and inventiveness of thought gives us a window onto the conception of a multifarious universe in which just about anything could be envisionsed as happening in the spirit world -- including the crucifixion or hanging on a tree of a descending Son at the hands of demon spirits.

This is actually closer to the crux of Doherty's argument, not Plutarch.

Notice that Doherty never claims to have direct proof that this is the thinking behind the NT stories, just that it is provides the best explanation of the evidence taken in its entirely.

mountainman · 02-16-2010, 03:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by maryhelena

As I have repeatedly said - the basic mythicist position is that the Jesus spoken about in the NT is not a historical Jesus. That's it, that's all there is to the basic position. All a mythicist position rules out is that Jesus is not historical.

OK

Quote:

That there were people involved in early christianity is obvious.

It is not obvious to history. Were indeed these "early christians" like Papias and other Eusebian introduced "authors" historical? Their pedigree for their historical existence is derived from the maxim "IN EUSEBIUS WE TRUST". Eusebius' task was to write a history for the epoch leading up to the Council of Nicaea, and by all accounts he was well renumerated for this task. This makes him a "mercenary". To underline the critical nature of the Eusebian history ---- it is the ONE AND ONLY account in the possession of mankind. It is alone and insular. In the paraphrased words of Arnaldo Momigliano Eusebius had more continuators than you can poke a stick at in the 4th and 5th centuries, but he had no rivals for the early epoch. Nobody but nobody (still extant) went back over his researched material. It has NEVER, I repeat NEVER, been critically questioned.

This of course sits well with the church.

How can we trust a "mercenary historian"? Why should we trust a "mercenary historian"? And if we objectively, skeptically and critically doubt the integrity of this "mercenary historian" is it indeed obvious that there were people involved with christianity earlier than the epoch of the authorship of this "mercenary history"?

The independent corroborative archaeological and literary evidence suggests very strongly that there is a reasonable case to simply doubt Eusebius, and thus reasonably doubt this "obviousness" there were any people involved in "early christianity".

GakuseiDon · 02-16-2010, 04:50 PM

Toto, Doherty said he had added "added a lot of that new material partly as a result of [my] demands to back up parts of [his] earlier case". So I pulled out a sample of his new material, as an example of (IMHO) how it fails like the old material.

Now, whether you agree or disagree with any or all of Doherty is irrelevant. Doherty has made a specific claim. I have responded to that claim.

This is Doherty's specific claim:

A certain Arideus [in Plutarch's "On the Delay of Divine Justice"] is carried in a vision to a higher realm among vast stars. Within that realm are caverns and trees and flowers.

You can see my response on the last page. Does Plutarch place the "caverns and trees and flowers" in "a higher realm among vast stars"? It's quite clear that Doherty is incorrect there.

I'll go through the rest of your points if you like, but let's get this one out of the way. The link to Plutarch is in that post; you can read it for yourself. Others can check as well, so are able to keep you, me and Doherty honest. Does "the higher realm among the stars" contain caverns and trees and flowers? Or is it something that stretches from the Underworld, that spirits see when looking down, and that draws them back to rebirth on earth?

ApostateAbe · 02-16-2010, 05:41 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kapyong

Gday,

Quote:

Originally Posted by ApostateAbe

Why do I pontificate...? you ask. I do that largely because the case for the historical Jesus is well-established,

There is no need to LOOK thru that telescope,
as the Pope has already determined that Jupiter cannot have moons.

K.

Well, in this case, Galileo is charging $49.95 for each look through that telescope, so I think it is best to let someone else do it.

02-16-2010, 04:50 PM	#99
GakuseiDon Veteran Member Join Date: Apr 2003 Location: Australia Posts: 5,714	Toto, Doherty said he had added "added a lot of that new material partly as a result of [my] demands to back up parts of [his] earlier case". So I pulled out a sample of his new material, as an example of (IMHO) how it fails like the old material. Now, whether you agree or disagree with any or all of Doherty is irrelevant. Doherty has made a specific claim. I have responded to that claim. This is Doherty's specific claim: A certain Arideus [in Plutarch's "On the Delay of Divine Justice"] is carried in a vision to a higher realm among vast stars. Within that realm are caverns and trees and flowers. You can see my response on the last page. Does Plutarch place the "caverns and trees and flowers" in "a higher realm among vast stars"? It's quite clear that Doherty is incorrect there. I'll go through the rest of your points if you like, but let's get this one out of the way. The link to Plutarch is in that post; you can read it for yourself. Others can check as well, so are able to keep you, me and Doherty honest. Does "the higher realm among the stars" contain caverns and trees and flowers? Or is it something that stretches from the Underworld, that spirits see when looking down, and that draws them back to rebirth on earth?

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02-16-2010, 01:41 PM	#96
GakuseiDon Veteran Member Join Date: Apr 2003 Location: Australia Posts: 5,714	Thanks!

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