Flaming Moe

Thanks, Doug and Mountainman, for those comments.

Forgive my ignorance, but if it even MIGHT be true for the 2nd and 3rd century as well, how is that reconciled with Paul?

spamandham

mountainman proposes that all of the records implying a first century origin of Christianity were forged under direction of the emperor Constantine - that includes "Paul".

The only evidence that refutes his position, is textual evidence - the same evidence he says is forged. So his position is consistent unless/until archaeology proves otherwise.

However, his solution is not the simplest solution for the evidence we have, and is not accepted by any scholars I'm aware of, nor even very many laymen.

But his position adds value to the discussion, IMHO, because it forces us to consider the roles propoganda and fraud actually did play in early Christianity.

Flaming Moe

I appreciate that explanation, Spamandham, thanks.

mountainman

And at the moment, by my count, no matter whether or not others support the position, I am ahead by the score of two points to nill on the count of the carbon dating citations in their own right.

On the contrary C14 analysis while being new has a greater degree of reliability in an independent sense of dating things in time. I do not need to hypothesise from the carbon dating evidence alone, which is significantly grouped with a formative Bell curve nicely domed over the fourth century. What has mainstream got besides conjecture? Over.

Be that as it may, the thesis has not yet been refuted either in whole or in part. And at the beginning of this road I stated quite clearly that I am quite prepared to be refuted by the evidence alone. I am still here.

Thank you spamandham and others who have not rejected either the messenger or the message in its entirety at this moment in time.

Best wishes,


Pete

spamandham

...glad to have helped in some small way.

spamandham

I don't dispute the c14, but neither do I see your position as the simplest. There are complex and unique ideas within the Christian texts that virtually demand an earlier tradition.

Here are a few; the eucharist, the odd interplay between the Jews and Pilate in the passion story, the symbolic obsession with fig trees - something poignant in the first century since the support beams of the temple were constructed of fig (at least, according to Crossan in "Excavating Jesus"- have not double checked this), but that would have no context in the 4th century without a prior tradition of some kind...

If your position were that Constantine synthesized Christianity from pre-existing proto-christian Jewish traditions, I think your position would be much stronger than I perceive it.

Flaming Moe

I may be over my head here, and I know its a contentious subject anyway, but if Justin accused the Mithraists of copying Christiany and he is thought to be from the 2nd century then could that be enough to show that Christianity, in some form, was around at the time?

Doug Shaver

On the supposition that there was no secular reference whatsoever to Christianity before the 4th century, I would still consider the extant Christian record sufficient to establish Paul's existence. I am not one of those who think nothing written by any early Christian can be credible.

There are a few scholars who think Paul was just as fictional as some of us think Jesus was. I've read some of their arguments. They are intriguing, and they raise some very good questions, but I haven't found them persuasive yet.

Toto

This is not a contentious subject, and most people would agree with you. Only Pete (mountainman) takes the position that Justin Martyr's works were forged at a later time.

mountainman

If you dont dispute the C14 we have the fourth century as the ground of the earliest new testament related texts.


These are all internal considerations and the playground of textual critics. The external considerations surrounding the corpus of literature related to the new testament requires a date, and there is none. These is not one single shred of an unambigous external citation to the existence of what was to become a fourth century emperor cult prior to the fourth century.

Peop[le will find all sorts of concordances in a fiction story and/or a compendium of such. Does this make the fuiction true?

My explanation spamandham is a political explanation of the words of Arius and the words of Julian against this fiction by Constantine. I do not require any form of ecclesiatical choir in harmony. Deal with the apochrypha in an external fashion. The apochrypha are a minefield for the internal specialists and textual critics. They have been referred to as a textual critic's nightmare. I explain the apochrypha as satire and parody: simple political polemic by the very infra-structure of the priesthoods of the temples which Constantine attacked and destroyed and publically desecrated with great force and pomp and display of military might. The could not fight the Boss with the sword. They took up the pen and wrote the non canonical texts.
See the text NHC 6.1 - TAOPATTA for example.

The simplicity of this approach can be depicted diagramatically as follows .... what we need to do is to seek evidence by which this model of the chronology can either be refuted and/or confirmed in any way, shape or form.






Best wishes,


Pete