Clivedurdle

More urban myth! Actually British WW2 soldiers!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illegitimi_non_carborundum

EarlDoherty

You need better nuance and clarification here. First of all, Plutarch himself was proposing that the "traditional tales" are best seen as allegorical, but in the course of his discussion he reveals that others took them literally, and he speaks at one point [373A, see JNGNM, p.147 / TJP, p.313] of "a legend" about Osiris and Isis which talks of 'repeated' events in the heavens. (Don, of course, denies this, or disputes the implication of the words). And the very fact that he is admonishing Clea not to take the myth literally obviously shows that others did.

Now, it is actually ambiguous in the above quote in Plutarch as to where this "taking of the myths literally" located them: was it on earth, or was it in the heavens in Platonic fashion? Plutarch spends some time in examining the original myths of Osiris in the context of an earthly location, but this is because he is covering all the ground in which the Osiris myth expressed itself throughout history, and the original stories were about a perceived ancient king in Egypt. Later he goes on to deal with settings in the heavens, and it may be that "Clea" and other literalists (whether in the mysteries or otherwise) also placed them in the heavens--just understanding them literally as taking place there (just as my Chapter 12 in JNGNM shows that similar activities by gods and other divine entities could also be envisioned within the heavenly spheres).

Now, he is not speaking specifically that those "others" include officiants and devotees within the Osiris mystery cult itself, but I think it is quite unlikely that the cults shared in the outlook of a philosopher like Plutarch and rendered all the events of their myths merely allegorically. Don, if I recall him correctly, used to set up a limited dichotomy for an understanding of the myths: either they were regarded as allegories or they didn't happen at all. But then I would ask him (to which he never responded) if he thought the Galli, the eunuch priests of Attis, would have castrated themselves quite graphically and violently for the sake of emulating an allegory. Do Christians, especially those who self-induce stigmata, believe in the crucifixion of Christ as an allegory only?

So no, I have never suggested, and do not believe, that the cults in interpreting their rites, did so as allegories like Plutarch or other philosophers did.

Second, you ask did the cults believe that their myths "took place in a world of myth"? You need to define and locate that "world of myth," since the traditional stories of the gods set originally in a primordial time on earth also took place in a "world of myth," one on earth in a distant or undefined (sacred) past. When I use the term in connection with the mysteries or other Platonic expression I am defining it as a "world" located in a non-material dimension, whether in an upper realm or some perceived supernatural location. So the answer to your question is, yes of course they placed the savior god myths in a "world of myth." The debate is over where and when that world was located.

Earl Doherty

andrewcriddle

This may be of interest. numeniusofapamea

Andrew Criddle

Horatio Parker

Indeed:

62a. SOUL-STRUGGLE BEFORE INCARNATION.

Thank you, Andrew.

I'm going to look at the rest later...

Jayrok

That's mighty presumptuous of you. Because Pliny doesn't specifically mention the crucifixion of Christ it doesn't automatically mean that the Pauline letters are late. That's silly.

Are you saying that because two "deaconesses" didn't directly instruct Pliny about the letters of Paul or Paul's ministry perhaps 70+ years earlier, it means that no such letters were in circulation? Who says they didn't and Pliny dismissed it all as superstition? Perhaps the two women hadn't actually seen any of the letters and were simply followers of the faith.

So what? Pliny/Tragan correspondence also does not corroborate the book of Ezekiel. Does that also mean it couldn't have been written before the second century CE?

Your line of reasoning doesn't make sense.

EarlDoherty

I would like to call everyone's attention to the exchange of comments attached to Roo Bookaroo's review on Amazon of the e-book publication of my Vridar series on Bart Ehrman's book. Not only is Roo's incredible rambling diatribe against me quite entertaining, it's very illuminating of a certain mentality of anti-mythicism, although he does have a style which is rather unique, and the psychology lying behind it also strikes me as intriguing. Something very personal is going on there, which may not be surprising in one who advocates belief in the goddess Athena.

Of course, there is the usual rant against those who are "amateurs" who self-publish, together with a lot of psychoanalysis of us charlatans, and he even throws out some barbed analysis of our late lamented GakuseiDon (late, because he seems to have bowed out here, though i don't know how lamented that is). There's more rabid condemnation of my "bloated redundancy" in the title of The Jesus Puzzle: Did Christianity begin with a Mythical Christ? Challenging the Existence of an Historical Jesus. Of course, Roo had no way of knowing that the addition of the last element was recommended by Amazon itself (it was originally something separate), in order to get the term "historical Jesus" into the cross-hairs of the search engines. But this kind of cardinal sin of prolixity seems to strike Roo as tantamount to rape of the poor reader's mind. Perhaps he had a grammar school teacher take a switch to him (or something worse?) for sentences longer than three words and he has never recovered!

Of course, an 800 page book (JNGNM) which tries to cover everything for the sake of completeness becomes nothing less than a Nazi atrocity, which, however, gets dismissed as simply throwing in every kitchen-sink argument ever put forward in the long history of mythicist writing. This stands in sharp contrast to those who have accused me of filling it with all my own inventions and speculations, unsupported by anyone else, things "not on the radar of established academic study" as GDon puts it, or not even subscribed to by fellow mythicists, as Carrier implies. But I will certainly stand by any observation that much of my books tills new ground and offers different analyses than any mythicist writer before me. (R. Joseph Hoffmann made the same erroneous accusation against me for TJP, which ended up on Wiki, indicating that he, too, did not actually read my books.)

The review:

http://www.amazon.com/End-Illusion-E...2345009&sr=1-6

and the comments:

http://www.amazon.com/review/R2U67XP...wasThisHelpful

Earl Doherty

aa5874

Who says it does authomatically mean that the letters are late?? That's silly!!! I did not write such a thing.

Who says what?? Perhaps, maybe, why not, suppose, what if?? Are you arguing that you don't know what you are talking??

I am not arguing that Pliny/Trajan correspondence does not corroborate the book of Ezekiel.

Your strawman argument makes ZERO sense and is irrelevant.

It is a fact that the Pliny/Trajan correspondence does NOT corroborate that the Pauline letters represent an early Jesus cult of Christians of the 1st century.

EarlDoherty

These are the best examples Roo could find of my astonishing "overblown verbosity"? (They are all taken from the Jesus Puzzle novel on my website, none from my 1980 science-fiction novel The Gamemaster, also on my website.) And to think that he actually waded through both works just in order to 'get the goods' on me!

In a six-paragraph review of my e-book on Amazon, Neil devoted only four lines to Roo's review, using rather mild language. That made it, for Roo, a review "written for the explicit purpose to counteract my own review." And, of course, he launched into a counter to it which was his lengthiest eruption yet, with all sorts of nasty innuendo directed at both myself and Neil.

And despite all the discussion on this thread, Roo still refers to my "world of myth" as something of my own invention. He also accuses me of slavishly copying past mythicists, especially G. A. Wells, which shows that he knows nothing about either writer, let alone the significant difference between us relating to the very core of my thesis. An ignorance R. Joseph Hoffmann also demonstrated.

This guy is disturbed, and about as nutty as the coming season's most famous confectionery.

Earl Doherty

Steven Carr

Abe points out that there were 'worlds of myth' , not a 'world of myth'.

I quote his very words 'Doherty makes his point using the singular "world of myth," not "worlds," as though there was only one significant "world of myth."

Which means that Jesus must have existed :-.

You have to admire the sheer chutzpah of somebody like Abe who can whine on at such length about a writer who uses the phrase 'world of myth' instead of 'worlds of myth'.

He can get 3 years of postings about the failings of any writer who uses a singular word when perhaps a plural word would have been better.

Most of the rest of us are then convinced that if critics can scour an 800-page book for errors and come up with 'Doherty used world of myth while Ehrman says there were worlds of myth', then that 800-page book is ram-packed full of stuff that can't be faulted.

MrMacSon

It is especially ironic that essentially they both mean the same thing.