stephan huller

A little over a year ago to this date the otherwise unknown figure of 'spin' got into a nasty fight with Earl Doherty about his claim that Jesus was a heavenly rather than a physical man. http://www.freeratio.org/showthread....thicism&page=5 Since this debate of course - and in the lead up to the publication of Ehrman's book - 'spin' has disavowed himself of any hostility to mythicism and more recently the fact that the brothers of Jesus were physical kinsmen of Jesus. Yet since so many people are unhappy with Bart Ehrman's critique of Doherty's work, I wondered where I might find a critique that might be thought 'serious enough' by Doherty's supporters. I would imagine that since Ehrman's book came out in March of this year that the professor would have started to work on the manuscript a little under a year ago. As such we can imagine that spin and Ehrman were developing arguments against mythicism and Doherty in particular in the same language and in the same country. I wonder given Ehrman's limited exposure we might use this thread as a substitute for a debate between Ehrman and Doherty. Some highlights from the thread:

The debate goes on and on. Hours of entertainment at your fingertips. Spin, at one point hints that peter and cephas are two different people which makes him similar enough to Ehrman that we can imagine - at least for a moment - that we actually have someone like Ehrman confronting Doherty face to face.

In any event thought I would bring it up. Got to go.

stephan huller

Another interesting side note. When I was doing research about Ehrman's attitude about Morton Smith in the lead up to Lost Christianities I found someone printed an email from the professor within a year of publishing the book where Ehrman said that he wasn't sure whether Smith was really the forger. He says he changes his mind day to day. Then with the publication of the book he ended up presenting the most misleading arguments in favor of forgery (Smith's alleged 'homosexual' interpretation of the letter). In a similar way you can see spin often frets over acknowledged difficulties in the gospel/letters of Paul even if Ehrman does decisively come down on side of the issue:

thief of fire

Did you mean "brothers of the Lord" :devil1:, and did you mean "fact" or "idea"?

EarlDoherty

Well, Stephan, if you read through the entire debate between spin and myself, you would recognize that every time I backed him into a corner over his contention, central to which was his interpretation of 15:45b--by pointing out that "Christ became a life-giving spirit" is a misleading translation (supposedly implying that he went from human to heavenly after his resurrection) because it does not parallel 45a, that Adam "became" a living soul, and since Adam did not 'become' anything in the sense of passing from one state to another but was simply "created as", so Christ in 45b also did not pass from one state to another but simply "came into being" as a life-giving spirit (no implication of any passage from human to heavenly)--well, he simply changed course and argued some other insupportable interpretation.

He finally in desperation had recourse to Pinocchio, who was created as a lifeless puppet and then had a consciousness implanted in him, and thus he changed from one state to another and thus this is what is implied in 45b. When Christ has to be argued as coming into being in some lifeless state and then "changed" into a spirit, we know that the argument has become bankrupt and ridiculous.

I have no intention of ever getting into another 'debate' with spin.

Earl Doherty

maryhelena

Do you really what to go through all that again??

My pick of the most relevant point made in that discussion:

There we go Stephan - history is where it's at...Any updates re your theory about Agrippa (II)? since you ditched the historical gospel JC assumption?

Sheshbazzar

Yeah, the story makes it really obvious Jezuz really became a living-dead, come back from the grave, poked-full-of-holes, bloodless "stuff you hand into my side and see that I'm not a spirit" zombie corpse, before he flew off into the clouds.

stephan huller

The question is whether history was made here at the forum. As I always believe that there is magic going on all around us without many of us being aware of it, I am very open to the possibility.

maryhelena

:banghead:

outhouse

History here?? I wouldnt think so.



proving oneis the other is one thing

proving a scholar not logged in reading anonymous, is another.




having heard the same old typical excuses and poor or weak or completely lacking scholarships regarding mythical jesus, has a higher probability as a source.


would be interesting, if you found something a little more convincing.

stephan huller

If it were true it would help explain how Ehrman made the jump in Lost Christianities to claim that Morton Smith claimed that the Letter to Theodore was describing a homosexual rite (something which simply isn't an itnerest in any of Smith's books on his discovery). If this is a similar situation you could see that the author really doesn't believe that the case is a slam dunk against mythicism. As in the case with Lost Christianities the certainty is necessary to make a good read. You have to metaphorically iron out the wrinkles to get the clarity which is present on each page - the certainty. If it were true it would help explain why Ehrman is such a good writer - everything is artificially present as black and white. That makes the reading so much easier.