teamonger

I don't venerate E. P. Sanders either, I merely said I found his position persuasive. I would not suggest that you venerate your favorite scholars.

To my knowledge, the TF has not been thrown into the "trashcan" except by mythicists. Most scholars still think it was an adulterated text, which has more instrinsic probability. I find it much easier to imagine a scribe being offended by a negative text, than to imagine a scribe coming up with a complete fabrication.

You did not request new information, you simply said I probably would have nothing new you haven't heard before. Concerning the "brother of Jesus" reference in Josephus, you're probably right. I'm persuaded by the evidence that Origen probably read that reference, but you aren't... I'm willing to leave it at that.

What gets me weary is the veiled ad hominem in your style of discussion (not to mention your metaphors).
t

bacht

I believe that background details in the NT can be true. Secondary narrative points could have come from real history, including 2nd C factional conflicts.

The only thing original about Jesus is his person, the Son of God. The kingdom teachings are variations on existent apocalyptic and philosophical themes. The parables are contiguous with the wisdom tradition.

There is no institutional support for the mythicist position, unless you lump it into 20th C Communist atheism. The historicist view has enjoyed centuries of support both inside and outside the churches.

spin

No, you don't. It is sufficient for Paul to believe through his revelation that Jesus died and was resurrected. He is combining the notion of the dying savior with the Jewish tradition and calling the result a misnomer, the "christ" or "messiah" (though Jesus doesn't qualify as the messiah).

What you refer to was written long after Paul.


spin

spin

spin is an agnostic on the issue, but in order to maintain his agnosticism he has argued 1) that there is no historical evidence for a Jesus and 2) that Paul didn't need one to start proselytizing. There may have been one, but I don't like being browbeaten by people who think they have more than they have and there are a lot of people who try to use "common sense" to show that there "must have been" a Jesus, when all they usually do is show that they aren't aware of what is necessary to arrive at "must have been".

I have mentioned one Ebion a non-existent eponymous founder of the Ebionite movement, brought into existence by erroneous assumptions of early church fathers such as Tertullian, Hippolytus and Epiphanius. Non-entities can be reified for a tradition and once in the tradition the figure can gain more detail. Ebion is a small example of what Jesus could be: once this Jesus entered tradition through Paul's revelation, the tradition is developed (partly via the same process as chinese whispers).

It doesn't affect me one way or another in the end. It's just that my knowledge of the evidence says you are all full of it, when you show no knowledge of historical methodology.


spin

Merlin27

It stated 5 writers and books that validated Jesus exsistance by non christian writers who were just historians.

aa5874

There are no mention of the word Jesus anywhere except for forgeries in Josephus. And, no real HUMAN ever ROSE from the dead after three days.

It is just not true.

The word "Jesus" is not in Suetonius, Tacitus, or the Pliny letters. It is false and mis-leading to claim the word "Jesus" can be found in those writings when they are absolutely not.


There is no evidence for Jesus.

It is true, Jesus is a myth, only evidence can contradict me.

spin

How can people writing so far after the reputed time of Jesus be used as primary sources for the life? They can't. You don't trust hearsay in a court of law. There's no way to connect the hearsay to anything real.


spin

Kapyong

Gday,

So what?

Merlin, like many apologists, has confused two fundamentally different issues - he is arguing that because we have so many copies this proves the contents true. Well, this is obviously not true - the number of copies has nothing to do with the truth of the contents. Consider -

* the Iliad - over 600 manuscripts, more than the NT until after 1000AD - does this mean that the Iliad was more true than the NT until about 1000AD, but from the middle ages on, the NT became MORE TRUE than the Iliad?

* the works of 10thC. Yen-Shou of Hangchow - about 400,000 copies exist, about 4000 times as many copies as NT copies at that time - does this make the work over 4000 times MORE TRUE than the NT?

* the Book of Mormon - there are millions of copies of this work, many dating maybe a FEW YEARS after the original - would this make the Book of Mormon much MORE TRUE than the NT?

* the Lord of the Rings - there are many millions of copies of this work, (including the original manuscript AFAIK), dating from very soon after its writing - does this makes the Lord of the Rings of vastly more true than the NT?

No.

It should be obvious that the NUMBER of copies attesting to a work gives no support to the truth of the contents.

Accurate?
Compared to what?
We DON"T have any originals.

All we have is later copies of copies - all different.
That's right - all MSS of the NT are different from all others (not counting tiny scraps.)

Where is the "accuracy" ?


Kapyong

spamandham

I could easily list another 1000 writers who mention Jesus and who assume he was historical - from various secularists, to Muslims, to Buddhists.

...but they are practically useless toward establishing the historicity of Jesus, if they are simply recording 3rd hand information, as is the case for your 5 references.

What is needed to establish the historicity of Jesus, is contemporary evidence. Without that, he could be anyone in history - or no-one at all.

Kapyong

Gday,

Please use common sense.
They BELIEVED it was true.
People BELIEVE false things are true now.
People die for false beliefs all the time.

So what?


Kapyong