Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Kapyong · 01-21-2010, 01:12 AM

Gday,

Quote:

Originally Posted by ApostateAbe

Yes, the Marcionites were docetists, and they believed that Jesus seemed completely human, as did other docetists (presumably) so it seems irrelevant to the theory that early Christians believed Jesus was merely spiritual. Docetism was meant to solve what seemed to be a big problem: that Jesus was both God and human. Docetists solved the problem by saying that Jesus was God and nothing else. The modern doctrine that Jesus was 100% human and 100% God is accepted today but it seemed like nonsense to many people of the ancient time. The gods and men were traditionally thought to exist in mutually exclusive realms.

I showed two examples of groups who did NOT believe Jesus existed as human being.

Which shows that your claim :

"There is no evidence that there was any question or dispute in early Christianity that Jesus existed as a human being"

is wrong, because those groups DID dispute Jesus existed as a human being.

K.

gurugeorge · 01-21-2010, 01:16 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chaucer

Quote:

Originally Posted by spin

Here we have discussed the Josephus passage numerous times and you don't seem to have contributed to the discussion. Given the tainted nature of the TF, the fact that the James passage has clearly been interfered with, and that the only two places that AJ has "christos" is regarding Jesus, it is difficult to believe that an infidel would argue for the veracity of the Jesus stuff in Josephus. But time and again, we get people who will try to use one dubious passage to support a dubious interpretation.

You are still trying to use a text that was written some time after Paul to reflect what Paul meant. It is a crass error to read a later text into an earlier one. It's of the blunder level of reading Prince of Egypt into the Moses story. You persist in repeating such rubbish without any solid argumentation to justify the time wasted reading your repetition.

The brother(s) of the lord is a reference that is made obscure by the term "lord" being used. How many times in Paul's works is the non-titular κυριος used for Jesus? How many times for god? How many times is the name Jesus used? If you do the math you'll see that there is no reason from Paul to assume you understand the term "brother(s) of the lord".

When someone has the name Ahijah, would you assume that the name refers somehow to Jesus? It would seem that the lord can have a brother according to the Hebrew name. Paul frequently refers to believers as "brothers", so why should you expect that "the brother(s) of the lord" doesn't refer to the subject's (s') belief?

You won't answer these issues because you have an a priori view.

Not two different phrasings at all. I keep telling you to stop manipulating the text. One talks of "the brother of the lord" and the other, a marginal comment taken into the text, says "the brother of Jesus called christ".

You will persist in thinking that anchronisms and dubious parallels help you make some point, but the only point I see is how willing you are to abuse the evidence to reach your a priori view.

spin

But here we see Spin ignoring the chief aspect in 1 Corinthians 9:5 that most directly affects any understanding of the phrase "the Lord's brother", or variants of same, at all. In 1 Corinthians, verse 9:5 reads

"Don't we have the right to take a believing wife along with us, as do the other apostles and the Lord's brothers and Cephas?"

This being so, Paul here is plainly resisting using the term "Lord's brothers" for the apostles. Apostles are separate from "brothers" here. Therefore, the most pertinent question is --

If "Lord's brother" here is plainly not being applied to the apostles at all, then what IS "Lord's brother" being applied to? Please d-e-f-i-n-e what "Lord's brother" here could possibly reference if it's neither siblings nor apostles.

Thank you,

Chaucer

The word translated as "believing" is actually SISTER, the same word as used with "the Lord's", only with different gender. So what's being said is:

"Don't we have the right to take a SISTER wife along with us, as do the other apostles and the Lord's BROTHERS and Cephas?"

What does it mean? Well, the simple fact of the matter is we can't be sure, but it certainly can't be recommending incest!

So all we can say is that it's some kind of "term of art".

show_no_mercy · 01-21-2010, 07:12 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Toto

Someone - I think it was Robert Price - has speculated that there was a separate group known as "The Brothers of thr Lord" - a brotherhood of believers, not siblings.

There is not enough there for the weight you want to give it.

Weren't the Desposyni considered family members of Jesus, but not by blood?

storytime · 01-21-2010, 07:33 AM

Doesn't the story answer the question of "who is my brother, sister and mother"?

The mother and brothers of Jesus were waiting outside to speak with him and one of Jesus disciples told him, "you're mother and brothers wish to speak with you". Jesus then pointed out to his audience who his mother, sisters and brothers were. Jesus waved his hand across the room and declared, "Those who do the will of my father are those whom are my mother, sisters, and brothers."

Also, John the Baptist's sect of disciples, although not all were followers of Jesus, were not considered as enemies of Jesus. Another separated one, an individual, who the disciples thought should not be preaching as he wasn't a follower of Jesus, Jesus told his disciples to leave him alone, for those who were not against him[Jesus], was for him.

Another group of men were preaching for Jesus and not only the 12 that Jesus had recruited to remain at Jerusalem. How many preachers for Jesus were there throughout the region that taught about the arrival of Jesus before his birth and then afterwards? Seems these all would have been collectively a large number and and called "brothers" of the Lord.

The enemies of Jesus, those who spoke against him, were the Pharisees, as stage front in the story. These Jesus called "children of the devil" and not considered as brothers, disciples or apostles.

Also, Jesus in one part of the story says, "have I not chose 12 and one of you is a devil"? This one disciple would not have been considered a brother.

show_no_mercy · 01-21-2010, 07:56 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by gurugeorge

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chaucer

But here we see Spin ignoring the chief aspect in 1 Corinthians 9:5 that most directly affects any understanding of the phrase "the Lord's brother", or variants of same, at all. In 1 Corinthians, verse 9:5 reads

"Don't we have the right to take a believing wife along with us, as do the other apostles and the Lord's brothers and Cephas?"

This being so, Paul here is plainly resisting using the term "Lord's brothers" for the apostles. Apostles are separate from "brothers" here. Therefore, the most pertinent question is --

If "Lord's brother" here is plainly not being applied to the apostles at all, then what IS "Lord's brother" being applied to? Please d-e-f-i-n-e what "Lord's brother" here could possibly reference if it's neither siblings nor apostles.

Thank you,

Chaucer

The word translated as "believing" is actually SISTER, the same word as used with "the Lord's", only with different gender. So what's being said is:

"Don't we have the right to take a SISTER wife along with us, as do the other apostles and the Lord's BROTHERS and Cephas?"

What does it mean? Well, the simple fact of the matter is we can't be sure, but it certainly can't be recommending incest!

So all we can say is that it's some kind of "term of art".

Yes... to be consistent, the translators who translated αδελφη before "wife" or "woman" as "believing" instead of "sister" should also have translated αδελφοι as "believing". Paul seems to reserve the word "apostle" for those who have seen the resurrected Jesus (9:1), and "brother" for those who are in the church but haven't seen the resurrected Jesus.

ApostateAbe · 01-21-2010, 08:43 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by spamandham

Quote:

Originally Posted by ApostateAbe

But, the way I see it, there should be no default position. It is most reasonable to simply choose the theory that best explains the available evidence.

I agree with this. But reasonable people who are reasonably well informed can nonetheless come to different conclusions as to what hypothesis best fits the evidence, because there is *no theory* that explains all of it without imposing assumptions and speculation.

As a trivial example, the Gospels record Jesus as healing a blind man with spit and mud. This is an impossibility. We *must* propose a reality that differs from the direct reading.

1. The gospel authors made it up for dramatic effect because they were trying to paint Jesus as magical/godly (HJ or MJ)

2. Jesus actually did rub spit/mud in someone's eyes and in an unrelated medical coincidence, the person's eyes were healed (HJ only)

3. It was a common myhtheme of the time and the authors just figured Jesus must have done it (HJ or MJ)

4. It's symbolic of something else altogether, and both the authors and original audience knew this (HJ or MJ)

5. It's a fictional story meant to entertain (MJ)

6.-1001. ?

Quote:

There is strong evidence that Jesus existed.

No. Evidence is neither strong nor weak, it simply is.

It's the conclusions that we draw from evidence that are relatively stronger or weaker.

I once read a book by Robert T. Pennock titled Tower of Babel: The Evidence Against the New Creationism (or via: amazon.co.uk). His main point was that, though intelligent design advocates often reprimand the philosophy of postmodernism, the main advocates borrow the arguments from the philosophy very greedily. My main debating experience has been defending evolution against creationists (see here for example). The creationists really do make such postmodernist points in their own literature, and I have seen it on the website of Answers in Genesis and the newsletters of Institute for Creation Research--they say that both evolutionists and creationists have the same evidence, but each group interprets the evidence differently. And I see it underlying their arguments when cornered. For example, the archeopteryx contains features common to both birds and theropod dinosaurs, but there is no reason that the archeopteryx can't be just another animal that God specially created. Though creationists are also very well-informed of the facts, they say they only interpret the facts differently and their explanations are equal to evolutionary explanations--even when the evidence smacks very plainly of common descent.

Creationists, I think, are much more extreme in their intellectual gymnastics than MJ advocates, and they have much less of an excuse to dress up in postmodernist outfits. But I keep getting flashbacks to their arguments when arguing with MJ advocates, and it worries me. You say, "But reasonable people who are reasonably well informed can nonetheless come to different conclusions as to what hypothesis best fits the evidence, because there is *no theory* that explains all of it without imposing assumptions and speculation." But, some explanations really are better than others. Yes, no theory explains all of the evidence without speculation, but what should be the important thing is that some theories explain much more of the evidence much better than all of the other theories.

aa5874 · 01-21-2010, 09:18 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ApostateAbe

.... But, some explanations really are better than others. Yes, no theory explains all of the evidence without speculation, but what should be the important thing is that some theories explain much more of the evidence much better than all of the other theories.

But, the HJ is one theory that must discard virtually all the data in the NT and Church writings about Jesus, except perhaps his name.

The HJ theory cannot use the data collected from sources of antiquity. The HJ theory must assume there is other data somewhere out there and that the unknown data supports the HJ. The HJ theory best explains uncollected unknown imagined data.

The MJ theory is directly dependent of the data collected from antiquity. Just like the conclusions that Achilles or Romulus and Remus are MYTHS are directly dependent on the extant data recovered from antiquity.

The following are some of the data of antiquity readily available about Jesus that are used directly by MJ.

The data recovered from antiquity about Jesus appears to be completely of a mythological nature from conception to ascension.

The HJ theory really explains virtually none of the recovered data from antiquity about Jesus.

ApostateAbe · 01-21-2010, 09:20 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kapyong

Gday,

Quote:

Originally Posted by ApostateAbe

Yes, the Marcionites were docetists, and they believed that Jesus seemed completely human, as did other docetists (presumably) so it seems irrelevant to the theory that early Christians believed Jesus was merely spiritual. Docetism was meant to solve what seemed to be a big problem: that Jesus was both God and human. Docetists solved the problem by saying that Jesus was God and nothing else. The modern doctrine that Jesus was 100% human and 100% God is accepted today but it seemed like nonsense to many people of the ancient time. The gods and men were traditionally thought to exist in mutually exclusive realms.

I showed two examples of groups who did NOT believe Jesus existed as human being.

Which shows that your claim :

"There is no evidence that there was any question or dispute in early Christianity that Jesus existed as a human being"

is wrong, because those groups DID dispute Jesus existed as a human being.

K.

OK, I'll give you that. I was aware of the Marcionites, but I was not aware of the other docetists when I made that erroneous statement.

ApostateAbe · 01-21-2010, 09:32 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by spamandham

Quote:

Originally Posted by ApostateAbe

"The Lord's brother" is an example. If the phrase wasn't written by Paul, then the evidence would be considerably weaker. But, there seems to be no reason to believe it is a redaction except to make a particular theory seem plausible.

6 of the traditional 13 Pauline epistles have been identified as pseudepigrapha by well qualified scholars. It is reasonable to conclude from this that *all* the epistles are likely pseudepigrapha, particularly when you consider that they are all letters to other churches somehow consolidated together - they all knew Paul's letters would be incorporated into the canon because Paul was all-that?

So there is no default position of authenticity. We *know* the authors had agendas and used the authority of Paul (we don't know why Paul was considered authoritative) to promote their ideas. Galatians could have been written well into the 2nd century by anyone for any reason.

I agree that to argue that Galatians is genuine except for that one phrase is whack, but to argue that all of Galatians was written long after Christian mythology was well developed is not.

There is evidence that leads the scholars to believe that some particular "Pauline" epistles are forgeries and other evidence that leads the scholars to believe that the other epistles are authentically Pauline. You should not project that all the epistles are forgeries based on the apparent fact that some of them are, because it does not follow. Is it equally reasonable to believe that all Australopithecus and transitional Homo fossils are fraudulent based on the fact that some of them really were? No. You should make your decision based on the evidence that directly relates to each specimen.

Quote:

Originally Posted by spamandham

Quote:

Same for the passage that identifies Cephas as Peter.

Which passage is that?

Galatians 2:8, mainly, but also Galatians 2:12 ("party of the circumcision") and John 1:42. The link is a little tenuous, but it seems to have the best probability.

ApostateAbe · 01-21-2010, 09:35 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Toto

Someone - I think it was Robert Price - has speculated that there was a separate group known as "The Brothers of thr Lord" - a brotherhood of believers, not siblings.

There is not enough there for the weight you want to give it.

Yes, and I think the argument is an example of how possibilities can trivially solve any problem. It is the sort of argumentation that I keep trying to discourage.

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01-21-2010, 07:33 AM	#64
storytime Veteran Member Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: USA Posts: 2,608	Doesn't the story answer the question of "who is my brother, sister and mother"? The mother and brothers of Jesus were waiting outside to speak with him and one of Jesus disciples told him, "you're mother and brothers wish to speak with you". Jesus then pointed out to his audience who his mother, sisters and brothers were. Jesus waved his hand across the room and declared, "Those who do the will of my father are those whom are my mother, sisters, and brothers." Also, John the Baptist's sect of disciples, although not all were followers of Jesus, were not considered as enemies of Jesus. Another separated one, an individual, who the disciples thought should not be preaching as he wasn't a follower of Jesus, Jesus told his disciples to leave him alone, for those who were not against him[Jesus], was for him. Another group of men were preaching for Jesus and not only the 12 that Jesus had recruited to remain at Jerusalem. How many preachers for Jesus were there throughout the region that taught about the arrival of Jesus before his birth and then afterwards? Seems these all would have been collectively a large number and and called "brothers" of the Lord. The enemies of Jesus, those who spoke against him, were the Pharisees, as stage front in the story. These Jesus called "children of the devil" and not considered as brothers, disciples or apostles. Also, Jesus in one part of the story says, "have I not chose 12 and one of you is a devil"? This one disciple would not have been considered a brother.

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