gnosis92

you know, an earlier post got deleted, not sure why.

Doherty is aware that Paul does talk about a flesh-and-blood Jesus, which he labels "human sounding passages" such as born of David, born of a woman, born under the law, on the night he was betrayed, brother of the Lord, which he, in order to preserve the validity of a hypothesis rejected by every academic historian, re-interprets allegorically.

Bart Ehrman, Dominic Crossan, Burton Mack, Elaine Pagels and other respected historians at respect universities take these human sound passages at face value, Paul meant what he said, he refered to a Jesus of history.

You can interpret Paul's letters in the backdrop of a real historical person named Jesus, or you can interpret Paul's letters the way Doherty's MJ camp does, as a heavenly Christ crucified in the spiritual realm. However, there are specific reasons why academic historians prefer the former as opposed to the latter. The former makes sense of the human sound passages, the latter does not.

The question I have for MJ is this:
1- Do you think that the specific audience of Paul's letters, whom he identifies by name, would have interpreted Paul's letters, especially human sounding passages, the way Doherty does, or would they interpreted them for what they plainly say?

2- is there any christian, pagan, or greek author in the first or second century that interpreted the human-sounding passages in Paul the way Doherty does? as speaking of a mythical jesus crucified in heaven? on the other hand, there are individuals including Marcion and Iraneous who interpreted Paul as meaning what he plainy said.

3- Is it credible that anyone would join Paul or the early Christian movement for the sake of a MJ, as opposed to a HJ?

4- If Jesus is entirely mythical, why does Paul preach christ crucified, rather than simply re-invent the myth itself?

5- Are there any credible historians who today accept Doherty's MJ interpretation of Paul? are there any credible historians who think that Paul's audience and Paul himself understood his own passages in the manner required by MJ, or any Pauline scholars who agree with Doherty MJ?

6- The MJ lacks contextual credibility; Paul was writing to specific churches he founded, or in some cases, others founded, and as Bart Ehrman explains, Paul was a pharisaic Jew and the MJ understanding seems to be highly uncharacteristic of literalist pharisees.

The MJ interpretation of Paul's human sounding passages would not survive peer review, since the reviewer would ask questions like this, although MJ camp has an opportunity to respond. It's why the HJ is accepted by respected academics, and taught at respected Universities, like evolutionary biology, it meets accepted standards of evidence for antiquity and it remains the most understandable reading of the Pauline corpus, including the human-sounding passage.

Amaleq13

Your post did not get deleted. It is still here, within the thread to which it responded. The duplicate of that post that was created as a separate thread was deleted (I assumed the creation of a new thread was inadvertent since the post mentioned being within the appropriate thread).


Amaleq13, BC&H moderator

RUmike

One thing that bugs me is... if Paul's MJ was the "real" Jesus, and there was no historical figure, how was it that everything from the gospels and later completely forgot about it? Why did it not survive in some sect here or there? It does not seem plausible to me.

spin

Why is it that fathers such as Tertullian, when dealing with the Ebionites had not only conjectured an eponymous founder of the sect, one Ebion, but they also had pseudo-historical data about this imagined Ebion?

This sort of modern musing will not help get anywhere near the problems related toa historical Jesus.


spin

gnosis92

nor me either, but that's why i say it would not survive peer-review.

nonetheless i would be facinated if Doherty published in peer-reviewed journals of New Testament studies, and respected University academics commented.

i have not read, nor do i plan to read, primary sources such as philo, josepheus, early church fathers clement and papais, nor study closely archaelogy of first century palestine, but there are scholars who have. that's the job of University academics. apparently the MJ idea was considered and rejected as unhistorical.

spin

As I said on the other thread you posted this stuff, your desire to remain ignorant of what you should know about is the sort of wilfulness which makes you say things that are not very meaningful.

Toto

Many Christian heretical sects did not survive. You don't see any modern Docetists today.

Why would you expect this sect to survive all of the heresy hunting of early Christianity?

gnosis92

so is it your position then that the MJ Doherty's interpretation of Christ as a strictly heavenly figure, based on the authetic Pauline corpos, would be an interpretation that survives peer-review?

I have read Ehrman's books including misquoting Jesus and introduction to New Testament studies and Ehrman believes Paul does speak of a flesh and blood historical Jesus. I read the passages Doherty calls human sounding, as well as the entire Pauline corpus, and of the two competing interpretations, MJ and HJ, it seems clear Paul was speaking of a historical Jesus.

why do you think the human-sounding passages do not mean what they plainly say is a better interpretation than interpreting to mean what they plainly say?

Do you think Paul's immediate audience whom Paul clearly identifies and address by name would read Paul as meaning a MJ or a HJ?

there are atheists who chime-in who haven't read philo, josepheus etc cetera either.

If you are convinced there was no HJ, you could read the Pauline corpus as speaking of a heavenly Christ, and re-interpret the human sounding passages away, but it's not clear to me that this is what academic historians do when studying ancient texts and reconstructing history.

spin

That is not a position Ihave professed anything about. I have professed that you are making relatively meaningless statements not based on knowledge of the ancient materials, so you are blissfully ignorant of the issues by your own confession.

I haven't taken the time to consider all of Doherty's arguments because I am engaged in oter fields, so I won't comment on them.

However, you seem to be giving the "I need something better than the addiction I've got before I'll change subliminal argument. Ie, you are just another person looking for methodone for your heroin addiction.

It's very hard to know what Paul plainly said, as we don't know whether the texts which bear his name coherently represent his work. Once we can establish this we have to find some means of datings his efforts and that cannot be with the undated Acts. You need to know when he was writing and what his literary context is to be able to say a lot about what he plainly says.

If one can appreciate the notion of orthodox corruption of scripture, how can one necessarily know much about Paul's audience? If orthodox corruption involves normalising the rough edges of Paul, who after all was originally preserved by Marcion, how can we discern??

I'm not an atheist, but at least I have read and use the ancient sources. Get off your rocking horse and get serious about these issues.


spin

spin

I'm not convinced either way. I'm sick of people who are.


spin