Ben C Smith

Thank you, David. I am not familiar with that work, though I have heard or read many of the sentiments quoted.

What I have to ask is this: Apart from the indubitable value of performing a thought experiment now and again (but one always pulls out of a thought experiment at some point), why would an historian intentionally ignore something that he knows (or can know) about the author when trying to interpret the text in an historical context?

Ben.

DCHindley

Ask Barthes or Foucault.

I don't go that way myself, well, at least not the way they go that way. That is taking post structuralism to its extremes.

Most post-structurally inclined sorts actually LIKE to know a lot about the author or historian. After all, if all historical interpretations are influenced by the POV of the author, you can mine more meaning from the historian's work by knowing more about the author's POV or historical situation. I suppose, though, that doing so puts one in danger of a bit of circularity.

DCH

spamandham

Fraud no earlier than the 2nd century is undeniable really. The questions as I see them are whether or not that fraud was later than the 2nd century, and whether or not there is a historical basis for any of the characters. I've convinced myself that Jesus and the 12 are better explained through a complete fabrication. I remain unconvinced thus far in regards to Paul, though I'm certainly willing to consider the evidence of it.

...I'm still pondering your response in the Galations/Acts polemic thread I started.

aa5874

All the primary information about Jesus, the disciples and Paul are internal or apologetic. Now if you consider Jesus and the disciples as fiction using these internal sources, then by deduction it can be reasonably deduced that Paul is also fictitious or the name was fabricated.

The name Paul is found in the NT primarily in Acts, then the Pauline Epistles and one single verse in the epistle from Peter, however Acts is regarded as unreliable. So, we are left with the Epistles to make an assessment of Paul's historicity.

Now, an epistle is a really a leter, and in general, only the author of a letter can verify authorship, that is only Paul can authenticate his own letters, there need not be any witnesses to Paul actual physical writing of these epistles, just for the name Paul to be attached to them.

In effect, Paul is a witness to himself.

We have no sermons from Paul to the Churches, outside of Acts and the Epistles, there is no mention of Paul in the NT. Even the apostle John, who according to Irenaeus lived until the time of Trajan or the end of the 1st century, did not mention Paul in gJohn, the epistles of John or Revelation, all claimed to be written by the apostle John.

Now, if Paul did make sermons or actually taught the teachings of Jesus as revealed to him to the Churches, then I would expect these sermons and teachings to far surpass the depth of a mere letter. Letters are not normally documents that expound on doctrine in detail, letters are in general sketches or make references to some other major work, but the letters appear to be Paul's only major work, and there is no evidence that Paul had a live audience,that is, no Church members or converts ever saw Paul teach or make a sermon.


Again, Paul is mentioned only one single time outside of Acts and the Pauline Epistles and this only verse is an indication to me that Paul was fabricated and that he had no live audience.

2Peter 3.15-17 It would appear to me that Paul was just an unknown letter writer, that was his major work, and this is augmented by the discovery that there were more than one letter writers using the name Paul.

This mix-up, this mistaken identification of Paul's writings can be easily accomplished when Paul is unknown and had no live audience.

Paul was just an unknown letter writer, and was fabricated to do so.

spamandham

Maybe, but a better explanation is that the 'letters' were originally a collection of sermons and teachings, and that the name Paul was assigned to them later on. But that then begs the question of why Paul? If Paul is a character invented from whole cloth in the mid 2nd century, then his name would carry no authority. This would be an anachronistic argument.

If the letters are pseudographia, this still doesn't explain why the name 'Paul' is attached to them. Whether real, legendary, or symbolic, we need a reason for the name "Paul" being attached to these letters.

aa5874

Jesus was fabricated out of whole cloth and it woud appear his name was the fundamental core and authority of Christianity. The authors of the NT and Church fathers did exercise their propensity to fabricate figures from whole cloth and invent their authority.

Why Jesus? If Jesus was invented from whole cloth then his name would carry no authority.

The answer is simple. The main characters of a fiction novel always have names.

And you must never forget that Jesus, his disciples and Paul got their REAL AUTHORITY from CONSTANTINE. Before Constantine they were nothing.

spamandham

I agree, which is one of the reasons I don't think that's how it happened! In the case of Jesus, his name is symbolic of what he represents. I don't see a similar connection in regards to the name 'Paul'.

This idea fails to explain the strata we see in the documents, unless you propose that the authors of the fraud were so good, that they even introduced various layers to simulate a changing theology over time, to fool those who would not have the analytical tools to detect such a thing for another ~1600 years.

A theory that is inconsistent with some of the evidence, is discredited.

mountainman

POL is an abbreviated form of Apollonius. It is a play on words so that those who knew and understood that that there once was a real live philosopher and sage, journeyer, author, and a known writer of letters (and the subject of collections of letters) called Apollonius, would have a peg to hang their hat upon. Paul is a literary fabrication of the historical Apollonius, the neopythagorean healer and holy man, and follower of the (pagan) Logos.

NOTE to aa5874: Make sure you read Arthur Drews (1912).



We have evidence of forgery by the papacy and their subservient mafia (or vice verse) continuously from the fourth century to the twentieth. See the Tacitus forgery artilce of the 15th century.

The strata that we now see in the 21st century for the centuries 1,2,3 and 4 are not the same as the strata was in those centuries. There have been far more than a thousand years worth of minor adjustments to the common theme of covering up Constantine's forgery.

Start with the pagans called the Docetists, those who believed your man Jesus H only appeared to exist, that he left no physical footprint, etc. A simple euphemism for fiction by any other name. The christian historians did not like to leave a record that anyone called christianity a fiction, so that they invented (over time) a huge set of herecies againt the majesty of christendom. The words of Arius for example, were anathema. Why?

Eusebius need not have interpolated Tacitus Annals in the 4th century, since certain scholars have demonstrated this "evidence" was forged in the 15th. Do you understand this?



Best wishes,


Pete Brown

mountainman

Fraudulent misrepresentation enters the arena once we understand that the narrative has an intent to deceive. Suspicions as to fraud are generally raised when authors of literature knowingly insert false documents and present them as being true, such as is the case with Eusebius, and the handwritten letter of your man Jesus H, and in the fourth century literature known as the Historia Augusta.


Best wishes



Pete Brown

aa5874

Well, in which century was the name of Jesus symbolic and what did a crucified blasphemer represent?

Suetonius, Tacitus and Josephus appear not to be aware that Jesus represented anything or was symbolic of anything up to or around the 2nd century.

And I see similarities between Jesus and Paul, both had no live audience and were unrecognisable by their authors.

You keep forgetting that the strata you see in the document is fiction, just like the strata you see in the Gospels.

Were there any analytical tools to detect the veracity of the religion started by Joseph Smith in the 19th century or the religion started by Muhammad around the 7th century? Or did they expect these tools to cause them to end up like David Koresh or Jim Jones?

Religions depend on believers and believers do not believe that they have been fooled as long as they live until they become non-believers.

Your theory is better explained through your imagination.