aa5874

MJers have the most economical explanation and it answers almost any and every conceivable question about Jesus and it is only takes five words:

JESUS WAS FICTION BELIEVED TRUE.

ChuckE99

I love it. You've hit the nail on the head.

gstafleu

The reason Jesus turned human was a matter of being at the right place at the right time. Over time, the god of the Jews (Yahweh) had become increasingly distant from life, the universe and everything. It had gotten so bad that you couldn't even say his name--he had become "wholly other", "qaddosh." (This was part of a development many thousands of years long, but I don't have enough space in this posting to illuminate that). Such a god is pretty useless, so what was needed was a reunification of god and man. This is what Jesus accomplished, hence he had to be both god and man. You can therefore see a development where first (Paul e.g.) Jesus is pretty much "up there" (mostly a divine being) and not much "down here." This then changes in the gospels, and that version became canonized.

Of course this ploy of making god useful again was bound to fail, and did fail rather spectacularly, but that is another of these stories for which I don't have the space.

Gerard Stafleu

mens_sana

I hadn't noticed. Sometimes I compose in WORD, then C&P. I've lost several long posts because the system doesn't think I'm still online if I take too long answering. And I keep forgetting to copy the message first. Eventually, I'll get this down — I hope.

mens_sana

Yes, a hypothesis that fits the evidence is valid until shown to be wrong. However, you have to look at the evidence, which is how Lowder can say that the Gospels provide prima facie evidence of Jesus' existence. You formed a hypothesis about my o.j. without looking at my evidence. In this situation, I am the only accredited authority on that o.j.

You are completely correct. The MJ hypothesis has not been shown to be incorrect. However, if it is to be a viable hypothesis, it must explain the situation in a more comprehensive manner than the HJ approach. I don't think it does, because, at minimum, it has no scenario for the years between ca. 4 BCE and 70 CE. The HJ, James, Peter, the "twelve," and Paul do a better job.

I understand your characterization of Occam's "economics." Yet, I think it needs a little nuance. The "razor" is not a strait jacket. Neither is it a Procrustean bed. "It was all a myth" is the simplest answer, but it is not a comprehensive answer. History, human psychology, 1st century Hellenistic culture, and power politics don't make for simple answers.

mens_sana

I agree.

Your analogy here depends upon the St Nick story and the Gospels as both being complete fiction. I don't think the Gospels are complete fiction. I think they are a mix, just as the Deuteronomist has left us a mix.

Toto

aa5874's questions have been split off here.

jjramsey

More to the point, the same logic that says that "JESUS WAS FICTION BELIEVED TRUE" is the most economical explanation because it is only five words also would lead to the conclusion that "GOD DID IT" is an even more economical explanation because it is shorter still. Similarly, "It was all a myth" is only simple until viewed closely. MJers have had to come up with speculation as to why "brother of the Lord" doesn't mean what it appears to mean, for example.

karlmarx

Except that explanation is not economical, because it simply wraps in the term "God" the unexplained assumptions of an anthropocentric God, that he happened to choose Israel as his chosen people, that he chose to give us a poor carpenter as his mouthpiece, etc, etc. Sweeping unexplained assumptions under the carpet and calling them "God" doesn't help.

This isn't what MJers are doing, however - the MJ hypothesis does not call for supernatural explanations, nor otherworldly assumptions. It is, in fact, fairly mundane.

Occam's Razor calls for the most economical explanation - not for the explanation expressed in fewest words.

Conversely, HJers have to to explain why "brother of the lord" MUST mean what they think it does, when the mention of 500 "brothers" in 1 Cor 15:6 obviously refers to something else.

patcleaver

Your completely wrong. There are lots of factual things in A Visit from St. Nicholas. People really do use reindeer to pull slays. Houses have fireplaces connected to chimneys. There really is snow on rooftops. Children really get presents around Christmass time. There are lots for true facts in A Visit from St. Nicholas. The Jesus story is the same way - some things are true and some things are false - like almost any fictional story.

There is no way to separate the truth from the fiction in a fictional story solely by access to the fictional story and its derivatives. We know there was nobody fitting the description of St. Nick in 1860 because we have no independent evidence of anyone fitting that description. We know there was nobody fitting the description of the historical Jesus because we have no independent evidence of someone fitting the description.

I could be wrong about both Jesus and St. Nick. Dr. Moore could have built his fictional story around a real person nammed St. Nick that he witnessed or heard about. Mark could have built his fictional story around a real person named Jesus that he witnessed or heard about. However, its highly unlikely because only a tiny percentage of fictional characters in fictional stories describe and name otherwise unknown people like St. Nick or Jesus.

I think its far less likely that Mark was based on an historical Jesus of the 1st century then that Dr. Moore was based on an historical St. Nick of the 1860's.