Transient

You sound almost identical to the sort of people who used to try to put me off investigating the foundations of Christianity - they were quite like that - "who are you to question the best theology scholars in the world - what would you know - can you read greek or hebrew?" they would say to me.
Luckily I saw past their garbage bluffs and bravado and kept investigating.
I now see them for what they are - small narrow minded people.
I never trust anybody's judgement or ability to analyze data when they behave like that.

avi

Thank you Transient, good point.

This is a thread which attempts to clarify the extent to which our "primary" (CMC) and "secondary" (Ephraem) sources about Mani's own writings, have been, or could have been, or, most probably have been, changed, (forged, altered, redacted, etc.) consequent to Nicea.

The notion of arguing, from an ostensible vantage point of expertise, on a subject in which this supposed expertise is based upon fraudulent documentary evidence, is improbably persuasive.

avi

stephan huller

Really? So your position is that the right answer about the historical Mani and what his beliefs were and whether or not he believed in Jesus is MORE LIKELY to come to the people who have no fucking clue who the Manichaeans were, what literature they produced, what kind of a world they lived in? Really? You really believe that? Really?
That's your position?

stephan huller

And I should add - that the same people who after three days of patting each other on the back for how well spoken each one has been HAVEN'T SO MUCH as formulated a coherent model for when Manichaeanism allegedly transformed from a non-Christian religion to one which embraced Jesus, HOW this was accomplished, WHY the Romans wanted to establish a heretical Church completely opposed to the principles of Nicaea, why all the Manichaeans living outside the Roman Empire suddenly abandoned the original non-Christian beliefs of Mani for this compromised religion and why writers like Ephrem, living as this alleged transformation of Manichaeanism was going on don't report that Manichaeans only recently adopted Christianity after their master Mani was an utter heathen.

Indeed strange is it too that the Marcionite author of the Acts of Archelaus only knows about the Christianized Mani when reporting Mani was a heathen would strengthen his case against the heretic

The whole world - even the earliest witnesses - all get it wrong about who Mani REALLY was except Pete who found out about Manichaeanism just yesterday and the day before.

Isn't it more likely that his radical opinions have everything to do with his complete lack of knowledge about the subject matter?

Sheshbazzar

:strawman:

maryhelena

Methinks we could just as easily turn this around:

Isn't it because of Stephan Huller's radical opinions re only one King Agrippa that makes his arguments re anything else not worth listening to....

Stephan, this continual bringing up of Pete's theory re christianity and the Roman empire is an attempt to circumvent the argument that Pete is presenting in this thread. His argument re Mani should be addressed on it's own terms not burdened with his other arguments. Someone may as well reject everything else Stephan Huller has to say just because his theory re only one King Agrippa has no backing from either the Herodian coins or ancient historians. Nonsense - deal with what is on the table.

Toto

This thread will not be helped by dragging Agrippa into things.

I think that Pete's arguments have been addressed on their own terms.

The problem is that the claim that Mani was turned into a Christian heretic has no supporting evidence and appears to be part of Pete's attempt to show that Constantine invented Christianity.

Sheshbazaar states that he will present the case. I will wait for that.

stephan huller

Why does it always go back to my Agrippa argument with you? Do you see this as a competition as to who developed the stupidest Herodian theory? As I said before, any time you start up a thread where you challenge me on any aspect of thesis I will respond AS I HAVE TO OTHER THREADS STARTED UP BY OTHER PEOPLE. I will say that I actually DEVELOPED ARGUMENTS to support my claims (I would say 'rational' arguments but that is a subjective opinion I guess). I didn't just point to a single book and declare the equivalent of - 'look, the dating for Mani is wrong in the Acts of Archelaus THEREFORE Mani didn't believe in Jesus.'

stephan huller

The question comes down to - would you get open heart surgery from someone who had never studied medicine? Indeed to carry the analogy one step further, accepting the proposition of these guys regarding Mani would be like allowing a guy who never studied medicine AND CAN'T EVEN TELL YOU HOW HE IS GOING TO PERFORM SURGERY, WHERE THE HEART IS LOCATED, WHAT IT'S FUNCTION IN THE HUMAN BODY IS. Somehow he is going to fix your problem but he won't tell you how he's going to do it.

This is so absurd the only thing more bizarre is how seriously everyone is taking Pete's position.

The only compelling reason that everyone seems to point to as to why we should all think that Mani wasn't who all the ancient sources say he was is because Pete is a nice guy and we like the way he digs around and finds evidence to challenge the status quo THEREFORE we support his claims about Mani which everyone knows has developed from complete ignorance about the subject matter.

That's utterly embarassing. If someone doesn't know what they are talking about they should be challenged and called out.

In America they tend to vote for the President who most people would like to have over for a BBQ. Is this how we want things settled at this forum? Is this how history should be decided? ...

maryhelena

Sure, I agree with you re bringing Stephan Huller's theory re one Agrippa into this thread is of no substantial value. However, this cuts both ways - and surely then, Stephan Huller should be requested to refrain from bringing the ''radical opinions' of Pete into this current thread and stick to the OP. Fair play and all that....