PhilosopherJay

Hi Ben,

Thanks for this answer. I am assuming you mean ancient Greek, Latin, Hebrew and Aramaic. This would certainly eliminate all but a few thousand or maybe even a few hundred people.

Can you explain why this is a requirement? Is there a case where somewhere has been mislead into a false conclusion on this issue because of a bad translation?

I think you would agree that someone does not have to study Greek to understand that Hercules was a mythological person, nor learn Latin to understand that Julius Caesar was an historical person. Why is this different in the case of Jesus?

Warmly,

Philosopher Jay

Magdlyn

So, he decided he didnt like feeling so far to the right anymore?

Perhaps because no one has presented convincing evidence for this in professional journals where peer-review is the norm — as has been mentioned earlier in this thread, mentioned two or three times in fact.[/QUOTE]

That's too easy. The evidence is there. Why won't anyone write it up?

My theory:

aa5874

Absolute nonsense. The search for the historical Jesus is directly linked and is entirely about the Jesus of the NT. One cannot discarded the Jesus of the NT altogether and still maintain that he is a figure of history.

A person who lived at any period of history does not have to accomplish or is expected to have said all that is written about him or her, all that is necessary is that this person can be reasonable verified or established to have lived at some time in history.

The Jesus of the NT has no known history, no known historian, contemporary or not, has within reason and credibilty, placed this Jesus of the NT at anyplace or in anytime.

And furthermore, if anyone claims that Jesus was a person of history, they are obviously refering to the Jesus of the NT, even if it is a Jesus of faith, or it is just a Jesus whose body was never found.

Ben C Smith

More or less, depending on the exact nature of the inquiry.

Yes, it probably would.

First, let me be as clear as I can regarding what exactly I am saying it is a requirement for; it is a requirement for being considered a qualified scholar on the life and times (or nonlife and nontimes) of Jesus. Just as one cannot call oneself a qualified scholar on Chaucer without being able to read (Middle) English, one cannot call oneself a scholar on Jesus without being able to read the relevant ancient languages.

If you are thinking of requirements for a different status altogether (that is, a status different than qualified scholar on Jesus), then this is fair notice that I am talking about actual scholarship on a topic, which is something different than, though hopefully overlapping, intelligent discourse on a topic.

Yes. On this board, aa____ once thought that Irenaeus dated the death of Jesus to the reign of Trajan. This conclusion, which aa____ used to bolster his or her notion that ancient Christians could not even agree on the most basic facts of the life of Jesus, and therefore that Jesus was purely mythical, was based on a misunderstanding which knowledge of the original language could have at least greatly helped to clear up.

One can understand virtually anything without learning a foreign or ancient language. In all such cases, this understanding is based almost exclusively (so far as the evidence is linguistic in any way) upon what scholars have done, either in their arguments or in their translations.

Can one come to the correct conclusion without being a scholar? Of course. Does coming to the correct conclusion make one a scholar? Of course not.

(Please note in all of this that I am not disparaging the contributions of nonscholars; I do not regard myself as a Jesus scholar; I am strictly an amateur and enthusiast, and happy with that status. I would hope that my name would never appear on a list of qualified academics, or scholars, or anythings, who hold an HJ position of some kind. Such a list would be meaningless.)

Ben.

Antipope Innocent II

This "institutional bias" excuse doesn't hold water. Are you really telling me that the churches still have such a stranglehold on Biblical scholarship that they manage to stifle anyone holding any form of the Jesus Myth/ahistorical Jesus theses? How do they manage to do this while totally failing to stifle the plethora of Jesus as an apocalyptic loon/Jesus as a cynic sage/Jesus as a husband of Mary Magdalene/Jesus as a magician/Jesus as the gay lover of Mark and/or John theories? It's kind of weird how they manage to stifle one type of theory that contradicts church teaching yet utterly fail to stifle all those others.

I can't see any "misunderstandings or misreadings". I made it quite clear that I was talking about professional academics. You then made it quite clear that you understood that as well. But in your post above you pretend that I was only talking about "mythicists" generally and then moved the goalposts later. Which is utter crap. Sorry - "misunderstandings or misreadings" doesn't cover it. The word you're looking for is "misrepresentation". But do feel free to apologise for deliberately misrepresenting what I said.

That particular type of question of existence or otherwise tends to fall within the purvey of historians rather than philosophers, but anyway ...

You seriously have a "problem" seeing if that's relevant?

It can have some relevance. I doubt any archaeologist will ever produce something that settles the question one way or another (unless its a text, but that would be something to be analysed by others), but things like whether Nazareth existed, for example, can be relevant. An archaeologist declaring that they were a Jesus Myther purely on the basis of archaeology, however, wouldn't carry much weight.

Eh?

Gee, you think?

Which differs from ancient history, how?

See archaeology, above.

?? How about Interior Design. Or perhaps Kitemaking?

And we've already established what a "professional academic scholar" looks like (not that there was any real doubt) Clearer now? These parameters certainly rule almost all of the entrants on your list well and truly out of scope. Except Price and Thompson.

Speaking of which - why on earth is William Wrede on your list?

Magdlyn

You've set the bar quite high. Hebrew (how many dialects?), Aramaic, Greek, a bit of Latin, some Syriac, a smattering of Coptic, and one or two modern languages to be able to call yourself a Biblical scholar. How will we ever find the HJ? The Jesus Seminar didn't set the bar that high. They've got Karen Armstrong!

Now are you talking about peer reviewed properly published books? Or fun books for the lay public? The church has not stifled the fun kind. Well, not in recent years... I come across Jesus as a mythological pagan godman and Jesus as the consort of Mary about in equal measure. Often in the same book.

But I thought we were talking now about actual scholarly tomes by people who can read in about 7 dead languages. I suggest that Biblical scholars suppress their doubts themselves, or risk losing their way of making a living, ie: selling the traditional Christ of faith.

mens_sana

Burton Mack is retired, but Bart Ehrman seems to be making a pretty good living. Can you cite some work of theirs where they sold us a "traditional Christ of faith?

Magdlyn

Ehrman and Price. That's all we've got. Not very many, out of how many qualified Biblical scholars in the world (even if we don't go by the 7 dead languages requirement)? It seems a bit odd, to me.

Antipope Innocent II

That's all we've got? Really? I'm just looking at the books on my "Origins of Christianity" shelf. Let's see. Apart from Ehrman and Mack I can see books by Geza Vermes, Paula Fredriksen, Dale Allison, John Dominic Crossan, Harvey Falk, Hyam Maccoby and Elaine Paigels.

The "traditional Christ of faith"? Not in those books. I'm sure others can give you plenty more such authors. Can you explain why the Churches are managing to keep a lid on the whole "Jesus Myth" thing while letting these agnostics, atheists, Jews and post-Christians run rampant with their newfangled, untraditional Christs of theory?

Ben C Smith

You are setting it even higher than I did.

The Syriac and Coptic are useful mainly for textual criticism of the NT. They would not be absolute requirements for historical Jesus studies.

As for the four other ancient languages, such things can be somewhat flexible. Some scholars are experts in one or two of them but just get by in (at least some of) the others. But are you seriously suggesting that people should call themselves scholars on Jesus without any ancient languages? Not even Greek?? Come, now. Surely the suggestion does not even flutter, let alone fly.

Ben.