mountainman

Young Alexander,

You do understand that my quote above refers
to the search for the AHISTORICAL Jesus,
and not to the search for the HJ which has been
in full swing over the last few hundred years.

Noone appears to be me at the moment.
Please see my response to Hex below.
Hopefully that will clarify my position in
regard to the search for the AHISTORICAL Jesus.

Best wishes,


Pete Brown

PS: Thanks for the extract re: Prosenes

mountainman

Hey Hex,

Thanks for this question. The answer is essentially yes.

We have the problem of the author, sage and
philospher Apollonius of Tyana who appears
with a substantial measure of historicity in
antiquity. Constantine calumnifies Apollonius,
destroys temples of his patronage, and has
the resident priests executed as a prelude to
his imperial summons to Nicaea.

You can rest assured that Constantine had
control of the empire and the new church
structure between the years 324 and 337.

We have no "non-christian" historians speaking
from the time of Constantine; Ammianus' account
begins with the rule of his son Constantius, his
earlier books "unpreserved". Ammianus informs
us, essentially, of torture of the upper classes.

Where before there were two arms of imperial
power (the civilian administration and the military)
there was now a third arm - that of the new
structure set in place by Constantine - the church.

The highways were covered with galloping bishops.

Constantine may be blamed for starting it.
But not for its perpetuation, since it was
a tax-exempt power structure.

It is my opinion that it was "common knowledge"
of the Eastern empire academics in the fourth
century that the NT was a base fiction, thrown
together by Constantine.

The Emperor Julian championed this reaction
to Constantine, in writing c.363 CE, but the
preservation of literature was in the hands
after he died, of the Christian emperors and
their minions of christian Bishops, such as Cyril.

Cyril, in the early fifth century admits that the
church was having problems of credibility, and
that Julian's treatise was "turning many away",
and that "Julian wrote LIES AGAINST THE CHURCH.

We have lost Julian's 3 books. Only Cyril's writings
remain. My opinion is that Cyril of Alexandria, in
his treatise AGAINST JULIAN, censored this "common
knowledge" that the eastern (Greek speaking) academics
considered the NT a fiction of Constantine's, such that
apart from Julian's opening statement (which Cyril dared
not censor at the time) we have no other evidence
of the implementation of this NT fiction -- yet.

The only notion of "conspiracy theory" entertained by
my thesis, is that the christian regime had the power
and the resources to cover-up after Constantine, as
the Nicene Oath was still much prosperous for many
of the families and descendants of the original
Nicene Fathers, whom Constantine coerced to sign
the Nicene Oath, in allegience to himself.

See the statements and the cunning evident in the
response of Cyril AGAINST JULIAN here.



Systematically on a number of fronts:


1) C14 dating citations with respect to "NT literature"
will start to form a bell curve as more "arrive" (we only
have 2 at present). Any pre-Constantinian C14 citation
will refute my thesis. However the distribution of future
C14 citations -- the more citations there are -- the more
the bell curve sits over the fourth century.

2) Archaeological finds from 000-300 such as the papyri
at Pompei just now being examined. The more of these
which come to light, which dont mention "christian" the
more likely we have a sudden appearance in the 4th CE.

3) Archaeological finds relating to Apollonius of Tyana.
We have recently found an inscription epitaph to him.
He was an author and a sage of high repute enough
to have the wife of the Roman Emperor Severus,
Julia Domna, commission a biography to be written
of this author --- by Philostratus. The writings of
Apollonius are lost. Eusebius quotes him as an
authority on the abstinence of sacrifice. Were his
writings to be found, would they be similar to any
of the "NT" texts? This includes Arabic texts
where Apollonius is referred to as Balinus.

4) Discovery of texts by Ammianus Marcellinus -
his Books 1 to 13 -- what would they say about
the history of the empire (and christians) from
92 CE throug to 351 CE, and C's obit.

5) There is a huge amount of scholarship on the
archaeology, papyri, and literature remains from
the fourth century. To date, all such evidence
has been interpretted based upon the traditional
postulate that Christianity existed before Constantine.
However, if in fact Constantine implemented this
new religion by means of his military supremacy,
fraudulently and with the invention of fictions,
by re-examining the old evidence with a new
postulate (or perspective), such a search may
turn up unexpected confirmation of 4th CE
invention.

6) We could ask to have a look around the
Vatican's archives, or perhaps sponsor a spy
on the inside.

7) The 4th century is the key IMO.

Best wishes,


Pete Brown

mountainman

I understand that I am radically demarcating and separating
the "early christian sources" from all other sources and
approach this task with a critical skepticism --- which
itself of course is open to critical skepticism.

There is nothing personal in any of this.
I enjoy catching waves just as much as
the next surfer. We share a common history,
but what is that history?


We should be interested in the evidence
and we should have an open mind, that
is where I am coming from. I appreciate
your scholarship and research, as I have
appreciated that in many contributors here.

I hope everyone understands this basis.
as a student of ancient history.



Best wishes,



Pete Brown

mountainman

Further, it will become evident that there was an
"Hellenic" tolerance of many religious traditions
during this period, with more inscriptions turning
up to "Hermes" and to "the Pythagoraean tradition".

We will slowly perceive a great unity in the prenicene
epoch under an ancient umbrella of tolerance,
very rich in its literature (Second Sophistic) and
inscriptions, art, etc. The Judaic "Hebrew Texts"
are part of this phenomenom, and part of this
mixing pot of ancestry in the Roman Empire,
coordinated for 1000 years by the "Pontifex Maximus"
at least in Rome.

The cohesiveness of the Second Sophistic and
all its underlying archaeological parallels will
become apparent, as will - perhaps - the
absence of "anything christian".

Constantine hit the eastern empire hard.
Alot harder than Mao hit Tibet.
Or Pol Pot, or Hitler, or anyone since.

Records of a boundary event centered on the
"Council of Nicaea" will become apparent perhaps
to future researchers in the field of ancient
history.


Just an after-thought.

Best wishes,


Pete Brown