andrewcriddle

One of the issues with the interesting material quoted by youngalexander is that, at least in its present form it is probably 2nd century CE, and illustrates the process by which middle platonism develops into neoplatonism.

The ideas in the later hermetic treatises were probably not fully developed in the 1st century CE (poimandres as a very early hermetic treatise is probably different). The same is probably true for much of the overtly gnostic material from Nag Hammadi (some of it may well be independent of Christianity but that is another matter)

In order to explain the thought of Paul we should be wary IMO of material that probably substantially postdates him. Paul may or may not have been a middle platonist but it is anachronistic to treat him as a neoplatonist.

Andrew Criddle

jakejonesiv

Hi Andrew,

If the Pauline writings are dated to the second century, then there is no anachronism.

Jake Jones IV

youngalexander

M M & Magic: Firmament
The vault of the heavens: it was generally viewed in the ancient world as a solid crystal sphere, constantly rotating, to which the stars were fixed; later it was thought of as the eighth sphere surrounding the seven spheres of the planets.
Which is fine if the cosmology subscribes to such structure, but not all of them did, at least not in a consistent manner.
I thort that this was a purely pagan discussion? This is Paul (Eph 2.2) giving vent to his astral gnosticism. It is usually translated as 'air' but generally applies to the seven spheres below the firmament, provided of course that is the cosmology in question.
It is not the quotes with which I am primarily concerned, they were merely illustrative. I chose the tractates because they are pagan, middle platonic or contemporaneous, discussed and located gods, and exhibited a variety of cosmologies. That they do not conform to the vegie god refitted as savior model is not my problem.

Eugnostos the Blessed has a hierachy of gods, each in their own sphere. Altho there is mention of chaos, the remaining structure (if any) is delightfully vague. There is no mention of daemons. The forth god, presumably the nearest to earth, is 'The Savior'. Thus we have a pagan savior god, not on earth, not allegoric. Is this not what you asked for?

Lest it be thort that there is something non-kosher about this 'Savior', let me introduce the christianised version of Eugnostos The Sophia of Jesus Christ . The Nag Hammadi Library, (Harper & Row) introduction says of this
The former is without apparent Christian influence, while the latter is heavily Christianised. Research thus far tends to the conclusion that Eugnostos the Blessed is nearer the original.
Thus contemporary Christians thort enough of the Savior to make him their own.

The Discourse on the Eighth and Ninth seems to be a ten sphere cosmology. Daemons are not mentioned, but perhaps implied in the lower seven spheres. God is 'possibly assumed' in the tenth.

Asclepius 21-29 This Coptic excerpt from Asclepius shows both Hermetic and Gnostic traits. On the one hand, certain passages seem quite pantheistic: God is in every place, and beholds every place. Yet dualistic emphases also occur...
A few pars above the previous 'demon' quote is

"Asclepius, it is good, as I shall teach you. For just as ... (2 lines missing) ... of soul and life [...] of the world [...] come forth in matter, those that are good, the change of the climate, and beauty, and the ripening of the fruits, and the things similar to all these. Because of this, God has control over the heights of heaven. He is in every place, and he looks out over every place. And (in) his place there is neither heaven nor star. And he is free from (the) body.

"Now the creator has control in the place that is between the earth and heaven. He is called 'Zeus', that is, 'Life'. Plutonius Zeus is lord over the earth and sea. And he does not possess the nourishment for all mortal living creatures, for (it is) Kore who bears the fruit. These forces always are powerful in the circle of the earth, but those of others are always from Him-who-is.

So between earth and heaven we have 'Zeus'. A god, not a demon. Not on earth, not allegoric. There are other gods and forces as well. The cosmology here is quite different to the previous examples, altho there are certain similarities.

The Paraphrase Of Shem tells us that there are three primal powers: Light, Darkness and Spirit between them. This is revealed to Shem by a Gnostic redeemer Derdekeas.
Derdekeas descends to the realm of evil to rescue the fallen and entrapped light of the Spirit and of the mind of Darkness. During his stay in Hades, Derdekeas experiences the hostility of the powers of Darkness, and goes unrecognised. He puts on "the beast", apparently the body, and in that disguise he advances the cosmic work of salvation. After his stay on earth he receives honor...
Which, while all very primeval, does bear interesting 'features of NT Christology'.

In the first place as far as location is concerned, the cosmologies of these pieces are all quite different, while nevertheless having certain common characteristics; spheres for instance. It is for this reason that I object to your specification of location. Pagans were all over the place. You appear to wish to straightjacket the discussion into Paul's version of astral cosmology. Not all pagans agree with it.

Secondly, it is not just about daemons in the air. There are all manner of gods floating about there as well. They may not conform to your desired type, but that is just the way things were. Why should pagan ideas of cosmogony, soteriology or eschatology fall into line with Paul's notions?

You ask where did pagans place Attis, Mithras, Osiris etc.? Is this a meaningful question? Plutarch regards the 'wanderings and dismemberments' as allegoric. Does this mean he thinks that Isis and Osiris are fictions? On the contrary, he regards Isis as a 'principle of nature'. Where are principles of nature located? In the 'air' perhaps!

I have a particular interest in Mithras and have visited several Mithraeum at Ostia, Rome and Aquincum, seen several splendid statues of the slaying, read various articles and Manfred Clauss' book (with the amazing reversed image on the cover). Yet for my money, I think (at least provisionally) that Ulansey's theory seems to fit like a five fingured glove. Thus, to the initiate, Mithras probably was a celestial meme.

As to the vegie gods turned savior; Tammuz, Adonis, Attis, Osiris, Dionysus, Bacchus and their consorts etc. After they had passed thru the blender of Roman civilisation they were perceived as allogories of cosmic renewal. However, as M M & Magic: Dying God (H. Chadwick) puts it;
"the earlier in time the history of each cult is traced, the more individual and dissimilar they come to appear. The crux of the matter is that the meaning of the rites and myths may differ profoundly according to the social and cultural context". Thus there is no neat answer to their location. No doubt pagans believed a whole host of things from literal ancient history to forces of nature - including existence in the 'air'.

It is a shorthand for:
1. 'air' meaning "lowest level of the "air" and extended ever upward through the various layers of heaven".
2. The common understanding amongst the ancients that gods & demons did operate in the 'air'. What we might call a meme.

GakuseiDon

Sure, no doubt that the literature shows different conjectures on this. But if someone claimed that the firmament existed in another "dimension", I think we can reject that due to lack of evidence, even though there were conflicting views about what the firmament was. It is what happened below the firmament that I am interested in.

That is the cosmology in question -- what existed below the firmament. I think you'll find that the seven spheres existed ABOVE the firmament, not below. Air existed from earth to moon. Above that, opinions varied -- perhaps air, perhaps fire, perhaps another "pure" substance altogether.

I've seen the air divided into two areas: wet air (from earth to the clouds) and dry air (from clouds to the sun), but I've never heard of distinct spheres below the firmament. Can you give your source for the notion that there were 7 spheres between the earth and the moon, please?

No. Those gods exist ABOVE the firmament. I'd like to concentrate on what the pagans believed happened BELOW the firmament.

Doherty claims that Christ entered the "sphere of flesh", the area of corruptibility below the firmament where Christ could suffer and die. He also says that the pagans placed the stories of their gods in a similar location, the so-called "sublunar realm". Thus, this is where the stories of Attis being castrated was thought to have taken place, according to Doherty.

Plutarch describes Osiris as a god, pure and uncontaminated from matter. The difference is that (according to Doherty) some pagans believed that the stories about the gods actually happened in some way, but in another "dimension". Plutarch didn't appear to believe the stories happened at all, either above or below the firmament, but he certainly believed in the gods existing in a pure form ABOVE the firmament.

For Doherty, Paul believed that Christ actually entered the "sphere of flesh" -- the sublunar realm -- at which point Satan crucified Christ (perhaps on a tree). Christ broke bread, suffered, died and resurrected in that "sphere of flesh". For Doherty, pagans had similar ideas about the stories of Attis being castrated, etc.

I just don't think that the evidence is there to support Doherty. The evidence appears to suggest that the pagans believed that the stories of their gods were set on earth, or they were allegorical, thus didn't happen at all. There was no "sphere of flesh"/"sublunar realm"/"dimension" that I've been able to find, where pagans placed the stories of their gods.

However, pagans and Christians certainly placed the activities of daemons/demons in the area between the earth and the moon. But these activities that are listed appear to show that the daemons were LITERALLY in the air around us, not in some alternate dimension.

But where is Zeus actually located? Where are the stories of Zeus located? Zeus here appears to be more similar to Plutarch's Osiris than, say, Tacitus's Jupiter.

I agree that there were variations about what was ABOVE the firmament. But that isn't where Doherty places Christ's crucifixion. There were fewer variations about what was below the firmament, IMO because the people of those times could look up and actually see it.

As a cosmological force, perhaps. But did people who believed that think that Isis went around trying to find the pieces of Osiris? If we can go by Plutarch, no. They would have regarded such stories as allegorical. Did Paul believe that Christ's crucifixion was allegorical? No, he doesn't appear to.

Doherty appears to give credence to the idea as well. But where did the pagans place Mithras's actions? Does the evidence support Doherty's claim? Not that I've seen.

I think we needed to be guided by what the evidence shows.

Is there any indication that the stories of the gods were placed in the 'air', i.e. that the story of Attis's castration was placed there? That appears to be what Doherty is claiming, though I'd be interested to see if that matches your understanding of what Doherty is claiming.

andrewcriddle

One problem from a mythicist point of view in dating Paul in the 2nd century is that it makes the Gospels and Paul contemporary (without a very very late date for the Gospels.)

IE the argument that historical type claims about Jesus are absent in the earliest Christian documents and only show up a good deal later, loses its credibility.

Andrew Criddle

jakejonesiv

Hi Andrew,

You are assuming a straight line development of Christianity. First Paul, then the gospels. However, both arose from separate roots in the early second century and were afterwards combined.

For example, Justin had gospel material (although it was still very fluid) but no Paul. The Pauline material was introduced from the Marcionites.

Ultimately, Pauline Christianity seems to be derived from some sort of mystery cult in which the god's name was Chrestos, and the gospels were ultimately derived from an allegorical interpretation of the Septuagint where one could read of Iesous before there ever was a New Testament.

This was worked about about a century ago by G.J.P.J. Bolland and G.A. van den Bergh van Eysinga.

Jake Jones IV

GakuseiDon

Perhaps it is time to clarify the question of the cosmology of around Paul's time, at least as I understand it. This may help to reframe the debate a little, and make things clearer. If I am wrong about the pagans' ideas regarding cosmology, then my argument against Doherty needs to be re-addressed. I'll stress that I am a layman, and I haven't read all the pagan literature available on the topic. However, IMHO I've read enough to put a big question mark over Doherty, but we shall see.

I'll start by quoting myself from this thread: http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?t=175903

Four species of rational beings

Plutarch notes the belief that there were four "species of rational beings": (1) gods, (2) daemons, (3) heroes , and (4) humans. Plutarch put "demigods" into the "heroes" category. Some thought that there was a procession of change: from men to heroes, heroes to daemons, and, for those daemons that become "thoroughly purified by means of virtue", from daemons to gods.[1]

Pagans placed the true gods as existing above the firmament. Daemons lived in the air or on earth, and could be good or evil. Men, heroes and demigods were powerful beings who lived on earth, though the latter two could become spirits or daemons. Plutarch wrote that "Thales, Pythagoras, Plato, and the Stoics do conclude that daemons are essences endowed with souls", and that "the heroes are the souls separated from their bodies, some are good, some are bad". [2] These "essences" lived in the air, though, and not in any "world of myth".

Many pagans had a 'euhemeristic' view of the gods. They believed that some of the stories about the gods were told about humans or demigods around whom legends had grown. For example, Tacitus, writing around the same time as Plutarch, refers to Isis as a contemporary of Moses. [3]

More sophisticated philosophers like Plutarch believed that some myths held an allegorical meaning, and thus were not thought to have occured at all, either on earth or in a "world of myth". They were tales describing the actions of natural forces, which nevertheless were reflections of the natures of the gods themselves.

There is more that I can add. Some thought that daemons were caught up in a cycle where they are driven from one element to another. At least one ancient writer thought he was a daemon who was incarnated as a man. It seems that, regardless of where the stories of the gods were placed, there appeared to be a belief that there were daemons, on the ground and in the air around us. Even Plutarch -- who regarded the gods as allegorical and places them above the firmament -- seems to have had this belief.

But in none of this is there any suggestion that the stories of the gods took place anywhere other than on earth. For example, I believe that it is wrong to place Attis's castration in the air just because daemons were placed there. Thus your quotes regarding daemons being thought to exist in the air isn't adding support for the idea that the stories of the gods took place there.

In some ways, the pagans had beliefs similar to how some Christians think of the stories in Genesis: some think all stories are true, some think that some of the stories are true, and some think that none of the stories are true (i.e. they are allegorical or symbolic). Now, let's say that someone inspired by Doherty claimed that the stories in Genesis were thought to have happened in another "dimension". Vork would "grok" such a concept. Toto would remind us that we shouldn't expect to understand the mental gymnastics required by people to believe in such a concept. The problem though isn't that people couldn't have thought that way, it is that, despite Vork's and Toto's assurances, there is no evidence that they did think that way.

Doherty to me appears to be conflating categories disasterously in order to produce "evidence".

Some examples:
(1) In the Ascension of Isaiah, he proposes a "Platonic higher-lower" relationship between demons and humans. Such a thing is unprecedented. Could people have thought that way? Sure, why not. Did they think that way? No, they certainly didn't. The "Platonic" relationship was between the pure realm (for the "Middle Platonists", this was above the firmament) and the corruptible world. Thus pagan beliefs go against Doherty.

(2) "Born of woman" seems to be a strong indicator of that which some claim that Paul doesn't do: place Jesus on earth. There is no other place where Paul could have placed this, unless Paul was talking allegorically. Could Paul have been speaking allegorically? It's possible, but there are quite a few examples of where that expression is used to indicate mortality. Combined with "seed of David", "seed of Abraham", etc, then the most parsimonous solution is that Paul regarded Jesus as literally being born of a woman. Doherty counters this by saying that pagans believed that some of their gods were also born of a mortal woman -- but I believe that the evidence shows pretty clearly that this was because they thought that their gods were literally born on earth. Thus pagan beliefs go against Doherty.

AFAICS, Doherty's only response has been to insist that there is a "failure of imagination". I think it should come down to evidence rather than imagination. If the evidence can be interpreted in terms consistent with the views of other writers of that time, then that favours that interpretation. The reason that people can "grok" Doherty's theory is because Doherty is appealing to modern sensibilities: we can understand it because we have grown up with the idea of "dimensions" coexisting with our own. Coupling that with a plea towards ignorance, i.e. "we can't hope to expect to understand how people thought then!", his readers are left with: (1) a conviction that Doherty is on to something without really understanding what he is saying, and (2) a reluctance to check into the nuts and bolts of his theory since they won't expect to understand it.

Youngalexander, I went into detail here because I want to be clear about what evidence I expect to find if Doherty is correct. Showing that pagans believed that daemons lived in the space between the earth and the moon doesn't mean that pagans placed the stories of their gods there. If you could show that the stories were supposed to have actually taken place other than on earth -- rather than being allegorical -- then that would be evidence for Doherty. The closest thing so far has been the story of the sun playing checkers with the moon, but Plutarch seems to regard this as symbolic rather than a story that actually takes place "elsewhere".

youngalexander

When referring to the cosmology of "the period designated by historians of philosophy as the 'Middle Platonic' begin[ning] with Antiochus of Ascalon (ca. 130-68 B.C.) and end[ing] with Plotinus (204-70 A.D.)". in general terms, it may be fine to describe a ten sphere system say. Geocentric earth, followed by the seven 'planets', the fixed stars as eighth (ie. firmament) and some pure beings above in the ninth and tenth.

However, for the detailed discussion that we are engaged in this will not do. It is too simplistic. We have a span of 4 centuries during which significant cosmological debate and 'research' took place. True, we are attempting to concentrate upon the 1st C.E., but as usual owing to the lack of data, we are forced to circle around it to some extent. It is nevertheless essential to appreciate that there was no standard notion of cosmology at this time.

No GDon, you are entirely mistaken in this. The quote I gave from Man Myth and Magic: Firmament is the generally agreed version.
Britannica (1911) "In ancient astronomy the firmament was the eighth sphere containing the fixed stars surrounding the seven spheres of the planets".

[OT: when we were thirteen, a friend of mine discovered that the family library had both a 1911 & 1913 Britannica. Being the man of the house he threw the 1911 out. A few years later we would have a good laugh about this. After all, nothing much happened before 1911, did it!]

Catholic Enc. "The notion that the sky was a vast solid dome seems to have been common among the ancient peoples whose ideas of cosmology have come down to us. Thus the Egyptians conceived the heavens to be an arched iron ceiling from which the stars were suspended by means of cables.
According to the notion prevalent among the Greeks and Romans, the sky was a great vault of crystal to which the fixed stars were attached, though by some it was held to be of iron or brass".

That is, the firmament was the place from which the fixed stars were hung. Clearly above the planets (which include the moon & sun of course).

Wiki "For Jewish and Christian astronomers familiar with Greek astronomy, the firmament was the eighth sphere carrying the fixed stars, which surrounded the seven spheres of the planets in the geocentric model".

We need to get this clear, before I muddy the waters again. Sphere (geocentric) has a good exposition.

In the geocentric model of Classical Greek astronomy according to Plato, Aristotle and others, the stars and planets were carried around the Earth on spheres or circles, arranged in the order (outwards from the center):

Moon (lunar sphere)
Sun,
Venus,
Mercury,
Mars,
Jupiter,
Saturn,
fixed stars (heavenly sphere), the firmament, including the zodiac, corresponding to the celestial sphere.

This is the general version I mentioned in the opening. However, see what the article goes on to say:

In the fully developed Aristotelian system, the spherical Earth is at the center of the universe. All heavenly bodies are attached to 56 concentric spheres which rotate around the Earth. (The number is so high because several transparent spheres are needed for each planet.) The Moon is on the innermost sphere. Thus it touches the realm of Earth, which contaminates it, causing the dark spots (macula) and the ability to go through lunar phases. It is not perfect like the other heavenly bodies, which shine by their own light.

In philosophy, the pristine perfection of the mechanics of the spheres was associated with the perfect harmony of the Musica universalis (attributed to Pythagoras, whose system was not geocentric but had the Earth together with the other planets circle around a mystical central fire). In contrast, the mortal world below the lunar sphere (the sublunary sphere) was affected by corruption and decay.

So there is the sublunary sphere, but very far below the firmament. It is this scheme that you appear to be arguing. If all pagans of the time accepted it you might be able to make a case. Regretably this is not so, as witness Pythagoras above. Yes, I know, he is a lot earlier than 1st C.E., but there were Pythagorians about at that time. In fact, reality was a good deal more complicated than that - it usually is! Consider the next sentence.
"Although the basic tenets of Greek geocentrism were established by the time of Aristotle, the details of his system did not become standard".
The Ptolemaic system is too late for us, and would only have gained widespread acceptance slowly in the ancient world.

It is worthwhile considering just why Aristotle's system did not become standard, because it bears critically upon the discussion in which we are engaged. Greek astronomy for our purposes started with Plato who developed a 'two-sphere' model. I would suggest at the outset that you think of it as a 'two-region' model, because the regions involve spheres and that is a touch confusing. The details of what followed are not important as far as we are concerned, but the overall consequences are.
Plato proposed that the seemingly chaotic wandering motions of the planets could be explained by combinations of uniform circular motions centered on a spherical Earth.

Eudoxus rose to the challenge by assigning to each planet a set of concentric spheres.

Callippus, a Greek astronomer of the 4th century, added seven spheres to Eudoxus' original 27...

Aristotle described both systems, but insisted on adding "unrolling" spheres between each set of spheres to cancel the motions of the outer set.

The Eudoxan system had several critical flaws.

Apollonius of Perga (c. 262 BC–c. 190 BCE) responded by introducing two new mechanisms that allowed a planet to vary its distance and speed:

In the 2nd century BCE, Hipparchus, aware of the extraordinary accuracy with which Babylonian astronomers could predict the planets' motions, insisted that Greek astronomers achieve similar levels of accuracy. Somehow he had access to Babylonian observations or predictions, and used them to create better geometrical models.
... [he] criticized other Greek astronomers for creating inaccurate models.

And so forth... It was an exciting voyage of discovery. However, because these guys could not divorce their physical theories from their theology/philosophy they persisted with an incorrect model - geocentrism. Thus the details of the models were quite diverse as they attempted to fit their theological parameters to the observations.

What then did the theologians and tractate writers make of this? To the extent that they would have been aware of such devlopments it no doubt had some effect, but surely they were much less inclined to be constrained in their musings by physical observation and theory.

Intrigued by the question of firmaments, I examined the various essays and tractates which we are discussing for 'firm', 'sublun', 'lunar' & 'moon'.

Plutarch: Isis and Osiris contains only one mention of firmament in the Eudoxus quote on pg2. There are numerous lunar/moon references as we know.

Paraphase of Shem This is the paraphrase: – For you did not remember that it is from the firmament that your race has been protected. Whatever that means. No lunar.

Asclepsius - none

Discourse on the Eighth and Ninth - none

Eugnostos however goes from the sublime to the ridiculous.

And when those whom I have discussed appeared, All-Begetter, their father, very soon created twelve aeons for retinue for the twelve angels. And in each aeon there were six (heavens), so there are seventy-two heavens of the seventy-two powers who appeared from him. And in each of the heavens there were five firmaments, so there are (altogether) three hundred sixty firmaments of the three hundred sixty powers that appeared from them. When the firmaments were complete, they were called 'The Three Hundred Sixty Heavens', according to the name of the heavens that were before them. And all these are perfect and good.

Plenty of firmaments, no moons. Go figure?

You mean sublunary presumably, so I shall not hold you to that.

Yes, well Earl can argue his own case. Mine is that here are four different cosmologies, only one of which (8th & 9th) conforms (perhaps) to the model you desire. Asclepsius has Zeus 'between earth and heaven' (ie. firmament) but clearly including the sublunary sphere and there are other 'forces' which may be as well. Shem is unclear, but wonder of wonders, I also found in Eugnostos this passage:

The first aeon, then, is that of Immortal Man. The second aeon is that of Son of Man, who is called 'First Begetter' ("who is called 'Savior'" added in Codex V). That which embraces these is the aeon over which there is no kingdom, (the aeon) of the Eternal Infinite God, the aeon of the aeon of the immortals who are in it, (the aeon) above the Eighth that appeared in chaos.

Now, even tho this is hardly the 'standard' cosmology, this looks a lot like earth as first aeon, sublunar (with Savior) is second aeon, with whatever it is that follows, but clearly below the Eighth, which is the firmament.

The point that I have been making is that the cosmology was not fixed. The accompanying theology is anything but fixed. The pagans were all over the deck as regards what was in the 'air'.

I could add examples. andrewcriddle mentioned
and Poemandres, the Shepherd of Men of which it is sed;
The seven rulers of fate discussed in sections 9, 14 and 25 are the archons of the seven planets, which also appear in Plato's Timaeus and in a number of the ancient writings usually lumped together as "Gnostic". Their role here is an oddly ambivalent one, powers of Harmony who are nonetheless the sources of humanity's tendencies to evil.

If we look at early Neoplatonic writings such as the non-Christian Gnostic Zostrianos who is baptised in each of the thirteen aeons as he ascends to the Triple Powered Invisible Spirit, we find yet another variant. There are a number of others of similar, but variant vein.

Educated, literate pagans, as the writers of these pieces must have been, constituted a tiny fraction of 1st C.E. society (2%? according to Crossan). If they put forward such a mish-mash of ideas, what hope did the 'average illiterate peasant pagan' have of making any sense of it? Unfortunately they have left no written records and thus we are left to interpret those of the educated elite. This is why Plutarch is so valuable. He provides many 'they say' stories, which somebody, somewhere, sometime probably believed. I reckon that it might just have been 'average pagans' and their ilk.

Johnny Skeptic

If Satan exists, why do you assume that Paul knew anything about how he acts? In 1st Corinthians, Paul says that it is not surprising that Satan masquerades as an angel of light. Now how in the world could Paul have known that with a reasonable degree of certainty? It is just as reasonable to assume that it is actually God who is masquerading as an angel of light.

GakuseiDon

Yes, you are right, and I am wrong. I was thinking that you meant there were separate spheres between the earth and the moon, and responded on that basis. But when I reread your comments, you were talking about between the Moon and the firmament, and you are correct that some put spheres of varying numbers there. I've caused this confusion by using the concepts "sublunar" and "below the firmament" interchangeably. Depending on the subject being discussed, sometimes they are, and sometimes they are not.

Still, I'm not aware of anything that might affect Doherty's argument, nor my objections to his argument. Those spheres are there to explain the movement of the planets -- the stories about the pagan gods don't appear to be set in any of those spheres, nor are they affected by the number of spheres. I see someone suggesting that the planets helped to make the soul more pure, so that it can ascend beyond the firmament, but nothing like Attis being castrated in such a location.

Yes and no. There were disagreements, particularly about what existed above the firmament, but even then there was some consistency. If someone today claimed that the people of Paul's time thought that unpure creatures (like demons) roamed free above the firmament, would you say that this is unlikely from what we know? If that is the case, then you have to admit that there is some consistency there.

And there is even more consistency about the nature of the cosmos between earth and moon. True, the number of spheres used to explain the movement of the planets differed, but does that affect the points being discussed? IMO it doesn't.

I totally agree that we shouldn't rule out that they thought any one particular way, however on the other hand we shouldn't accept that they thought a particular way without evidence either.

I'm not sure what you are arguing here, YA. How does this affect my argument?

Yes, you are right, since ultimately Doherty uses what happens in the sublunar region to explain "in the flesh" statements. However, if there is anything pertinent about the region between the Moon and the firmament, I'd be interested in reading about it.

Again, yes and no. I totally agree we shouldn't rule out any particular belief, but on the other hand we shouldn't assume a particular belief without evidence to support it.

Yes, that is what I suspect also.

Based on your earlier comment, I don't want to confuse your case with Doherty. Still, I'm a little confused what your case is. What do you make of the use of spheres between the moon and the firmament on the beliefs of pagans about the stories of their gods? Or, how do you see it affecting the mythicist case, or my case against Doherty?