thedistillers

A debate is going on @ the "Debunking Christianity" blog about how historians treat textual evidence. The blog's owner, John W. Loftus, claims:

You simply cannot be serious. Be consistent then with all textual evidence and see where that gets you. Become a historian and then you'll know why they treat textual evidence as prima facie true unless discomfirmed. THEY MUST DO THIS! THERE IS NO OTHER ALTERNATIVE!

I'm not a historian, but common sense dictates it is a naive and simplistic approach. Even today, unless the information is neutral or mundane, we do not accept everything we hear or read as true until discomfirmed. (Or else I should start reply to emails telling me I have won the lottery ) So why should it be different with old texts?

Toto

You are quoting from here.

Loftus is just wrong here. Modern historians do not treat the content of ancient documents as prima facie true. There are some historians and others who think that an ancient document might be sufficient indication of something, but generally only after it has been analysed and evaluated.

aa5874

But, if historians did adopt the principle that textual evidence as prima facie true, then Jesus was indeed the offspring of the Holy Ghost, was transfigured, resurrected and ascended through the clouds as witnessed.

andrewcriddle

Tentatively I think we should distinguish between honesty and accuracy.

It is probably right that we should regard the author of an ancient text (or any text) as believing what he is saying unless there is some reason to suspect otherwise.

However the author may be honest but mistaken. It is probably necessary, before accepting an ancient text as apparently reliable, to provide evidence that the author had the opportunity to know the facts of the matter.

Andrew Criddle

Ben C Smith

Loftus may be confusing (A) an acceptance of the accuracy of the contents of a text (an historical-critical issue) with (B) the acceptance of that portion of text as original to that text unless otherwise demonstrated (a textual-critical issue). Even the most gullible historian will not consistently follow A, and even the most skeptical will tend to follow B.

Ben.

badger3k

I have to admit that I have been following the "debate" (if you can call it that), and I honestly don't understand Loftus' position. At best, I can see that many things we find in historical documents are tentative, and unless confirmed or supported by other sources remain tentative. We can't say with certainty many things that are commonly considered historical, but as with everything they are subject to revision.

In regards to the historical Yeshua argument, I can't see much evidence for one, even if the mythicist position still has a lot to prove as well. I am skeptical that a man is at the root of the myth, but it is possible. It is also possible that Asclepius was once a man, but, like HJ, we have no evidence for that, except to say that a man could have been at the heart of the myths. Do we accept the idea of Loftus that these documents constitute evidence for a human Asclepius (an HA maybe?)?

I do have to admit that when people use the absurd "as much evidence for Caesar (the other JC) as there is for Jesus" argument, I tend to be a bit more critical of both them and their argument, so I do have some bias.

I just don't see the rather absurd "but then we don't know anything" argument, or else maybe I don't see it as a problem as he does. I have no problem with the fact that for much of history, we really know very little, and everything we know could in fact be wrong. I see nothing wrong with that.

The argument just saddens me, to be honest. I expected better.

thedistillers

I don't as well; just because we don't treat old texts as prima facie true doesn't mean we trash them. :huh:

John W. Loftus

This is Jeffrey Jay Lowder's view as well:

http://www.infidels.org/library/mode...r/indconf.html

I think others should try to understand it before criticizing it.

Have you seen this debate?:

http://www.opposingviews.com/questio...torical-figure

John W. Loftus

Lowder states:

"...independent confirmation is not necessary to establish the mere existence of the Jesus of the New Testament. There simply is nothing epistemically improbable about the mere existence of a man named Jesus. (Just because Jesus existed does not mean that he was born of a virgin, that he rose from the dead, etc.) Although a discussion of the New Testament evidence is beyond the scope of this paper, I think that the New Testament does provide prima facie evidence for the historicity of Jesus. It is clear, then, that if we are going to apply to the New Testament "the same sort of criteria as we should apply to other ancient writings containing historical material,"[19] we should not require independent confirmation of the New Testament's claim that Jesus existed."

dog-on

If NT scholarship is to be believed, the first mention of Jesus is from a letter writer named Paul. Paul claims to have met Jesus through a revelation and that this Jesus was some sort of divine entity.

How are divine entities, met through revelation, in any way historical?

Does the fact that later writers wrote, using a significant amount of midrashic materials, about this divine entity's "early years" constitute prima facie evidence for historicity?

Are you kidding?