GakuseiDon

It sounds more like Papias is writing:
Jesus -> disciples/elders -> those who attended the elders -> Papias

And that isn't too bad at all. Papias knew people who knew the disciples.

And so? Irenaeus, at least according to himself, had personally heard Polycarp, whom was "instructed by apostles, and conversed with many who had seen Christ."

So: Jesus -> apostles/those how had seen Jesus -> Polycarp -> Irenaeus.

Again, not too bad. And we have a letter written by Polycarp (my bolding):
http://www.earlychristianwritings.co...p-roberts.html

For neither I, nor any other such one, can come up to the wisdom of the blessed and glorified Paul. He, when among you, accurately and stedfastly taught the word of truth in the presence of those who were then alive. And when absent from you, he wrote you a letter, which, if you carefully study, you will find to be the means of building you up in that faith which has been given you...

I exhort you all, therefore, to yield obedience to the word of righteousness, and to exercise all patience, such as ye have seen [set] before your eyes, not only in the case of the blessed Ignatius, and Zosimus, and Rufus, but also in others among yourselves, and in Paul himself, and the rest of the apostles...

It sounds like there was a body of oral tradition amongst the Philippians about what was taught personally by earlier Christians.

Polycarp also writes:

"For whosoever does not confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh, is antichrist;" and whosoever does not confess the testimony of the cross, is of the devil; and whosoever perverts the oracles of the Lord to his own lusts, and says that there is neither a resurrection nor a judgment, he is the first-born of Satan...

Note that Paul claimed that Jesus Christ came 'in the flesh'. Polycarp appears to be quoting from one of the letters by John. Paul never claimed there was no resurrection and no judgment. So Polycarp isn't talking about a Paul-derived theology here as being heretical.

Yes, I know, I know: one or more in the chain could have been lying or interpolated. Or we can throw our hands in the air and claim we don't know anything **for sure**, therefore we don't know anything. Still, someone remembering the words of someone who 'conversed with many who had seen Christ' is not too bad.

Doug Shaver

I have not read the previous posts closely enough to have formed a clear idea of what your definition of evidence is, muddled or otherwise. But I know this much. The debate will be both interminable and futile until all members of the debate focus on all of the evidence.

GakuseiDon

Celsus didn't write that.

As for the rest: No-one on this board is arguing that everything in the NT is true. I think everyone agrees that the Gospels contain propaganda and fiction. Justeve's point is that no-one claimed that the Gospels were ALL fiction, and the rest of your examples are irrelevant AFAICS.

ApostateAbe

I think your arguments are sound, and such is a big part of the reason why I emphasized that I do not adhere primarily to the Criterion of Embarrassment or other criteria narrowly applicable to New Testament scholarship. My methodology is Argument to the Best Explanation, as laid out under the heading of "Argument to the Best Explanation" on the Wikipedia page of Historical method. I hope by now I have made my preferred methodology perfectly clear.

Using that methodology, we do not have to adhere to the rule that a probability of embarrassment implies the probability of historicity. Not even a strict adherence to the Criterion of Embarrassment would require that (the criterion is about tendencies, not absolutes), but we most certainly are not bound to that rule when we are merely trying to find the best explanation through comparing various explanations and judging them according to explanatory power, explanatory scope, plausibility, consistency with existing beliefs, and less ad hoc.

In the case of Mark 12:1, we are certainly not required to think that the embarrassment as reflected in the redactional edits in Matthew and Luke would be hard to explain except for historical truth. Mark's character of Jesus is actually different from Matthew's and Luke's character of Jesus. Mark's Jesus is not always of the same mind as God. For example,

Mark 13:32
But about that day or hour no one knows, neither the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.

Mark's Jesus is certainly a heroic character and better than everyone else, but God is not always of the same mind as Jesus. In Mark, for example, Jesus seems very much unwilling to be crucified.

Mark 15:34
At three o’clock Jesus cried out with a loud voice, ‘Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?’ which means, ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?’

Luke completely loses any sign that Jesus had any unwillingness to be crucified. Luke's Jesus goes through the whole crucifixion thing like a boss, showing more concern for the people around him than for his own pain and defeat.

Matthew's portrait of Jesus is closer to Mark's portrait (Matthew keeps the above quote in his own account), but there are key differences between the two. There is another passage where Matthew likewise edited the source material of Mark to make it less embarrassing and more in line with Matthew's idea of Jesus. We can see it by comparing Mark 10:17-18 and Matthew 19:16-17.

Mark 10:17-18
As he was setting out on a journey, a man ran up and knelt before him, and asked him, ‘Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?’ Jesus said to him, ‘Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone.

versus

Matthew 19:16-17
Then someone came to him and said, ‘Teacher, what good deed must I do to have eternal life?’ And he said to him, ‘Why do you ask me about what is good? There is only one who is good. If you wish to enter into life, keep the commandments.’

In Mark, Jesus says that he is not good, the same as everyone else. In Matthew, Jesus says... something else. Mark's idea of Jesus is that he is much better than most at least but still less than perfect, and Matthew's idea of Jesus is that he is perfect.

It is not necessary to conclude the historicity of these passages in Mark simply because they show embarrassment. We would conclude embarrassment and historicity only if that is the most fitting explanation. If we can instead conclude that such passages merely reflect Mark's idea of Jesus as being heroic but not perfect nor of the same mind as God, then that is all the explanation we seem to need in many such cases.

ApostateAbe

I am in agreement.

aa5874

It is NOT practicably possible for any member to focus on ALL the evidence.

A case or an argument can be maintained once there is ENOUGH evidence.

I do not know of any case or matter that has been settled using ALL the evidence.

jgoodguy

In addition, the nature of the evidence available means that it is interpreted differently across the membership. It is not like a measurement that can be replicated by anyone with the correct instrument.

aa5874

When the "Argument to the Best Explanation" is applied to the NT then the BEST explanation is that Jesus was TOTAL MYTH.

We have actual written EVIDENCE in the NT that describes Jesus as the Child of a Ghost, the CREATOR of heaven and earth, that he ACTED as a Ghost, that he walked on water, was IDENTIFIED by a voice in a CLOUD as the Son of God, transfigured, resurrected and ascended to heaven.

"The Argument to the Best Explanation" when applied to the NT does NOT at all support HJ the apocalyptic preacher since it has ALREADY been shown that NO such evidence EXISTS in the NT.

ApostateAbe, you PROVIDE AD HOC explanations based on PRESUMPTIONS. The Argument to the Best Explanation cannot be APPLIED to unsubstantiated claims or PRESUMPTIONS but ACTUAL WRITTEN EVIDENCE.

As soon as ApostateAbe introduced the Canonical Gospels as EVIDENCE then he is OBLIGATED and MANDATED to show EXACTLY how Jesus was described in the EVIDENCE that is PRESENTED.

In gMatthew and gLuke, part of the EVIDENCE presented by ApostateAbe, Jesus was described as the OFFSPRING of a Holy Ghost and a Virgin. See Matthew 1.18-20 and Luke 1.26-35

ApostateAbe's argument that Jesus was just a man has been DESTROYED by the very EVIDENCE he presented.

In a court trial, such a piece of evidence if presented by ApostateAbe may have regarded as PERJURY where evidence that was claimed to show Jesus was a man actually show Jesus was a Ghost.

In effect, when the Gospels are examined, they TOTALLY contradict any claim by AposateAbe that Jesus was just a man.

Toto

Is this not what the debate is actually about?

If we all agreed that the gospels were good evidence, we would agree on a historical Jesus. But we don't.

ApostateAbe

I don't know if you read all of the post that you quoted and trimmed just now, but it contains some important argumentation essential to what I am saying. If we all agreed that the gospels were good evidence, then the best-fitting explanation may be that Jesus was merely a myth. Having "evidence" does not mean putting any degree of trust within the claims contained within the evidence. The evidence standing alone is perfectly neutral. The best belief is only about finding the most probable explanations for the evidence.