TedM

All you are doing is speculating as is Stark. How does Stark get 40%? Why not 36%? How does Stark know the net effect of persecution is positive growth at 40% per decade? You are putting out the speculation upon speculation to support an apparant 'belief' without supplying any real evidence. For all you seem to know, why can't you see this obvious fact? Paul says in Col 1:5-6 "..the gospel which has come to you, as indeed in the whole world it is bearing fruith and growing". His journeys covered thousands of miles and many cities, yet you apparantly prefer to believe that there were only a few hundred Christians around.. Why?

I have yet to see what evidence has been presented for the size/growth of Christianity pre 100AD. Is there any? To assume a constant growth rate during this period--and especially during the first few years is absurd.

ted

Johnny Skeptic

“Bearing fruit and growing� gives no indication at all of the number of Christians in the 1st century. It doesn’t make any more difference how many miles Paul covered than it would be how many miles the founders of any other religion covered.

Regarding “All you are doing is speculating as is Stark,� are you not doing exactly the same thing by taking the New Testament at face value and trying to force history to agree? Approximately how many Christians do you believe there were in 40 A.D., 50 A.D., 60 A.D., 70 A.D., 80 A.D., 90 A.D. and 100 A.D.? Please quote external historical sources. If you don’t have any, then use your own arguments. You criticize Stark, but you haven’t offered anything credible to the contrary.

TedM

Actually I'm not taking the New Testament at face value, as you presume. There are many things in it that I thing were myth. Johnny, we are BOTH speculating. I used some arguments which you have yet to respond to, but my main point is that from what I've seen here your conclusions about the earliest populations are based more on a lot of speculation and very little real evidence, as are mine.

ted

andrewcriddle

I have tried to explain why I think Stark's arguments are of little value for estimating the number of Christians in the very early church.

Unless you explain why you disagree with me I'm not sure there is much point continuing this part of the argument.

(NB 'Stark says so', is not a valid reason for disagreeing with me, please evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of Stark's methodology for yourself.)
I asked you earlier in another thread to clarify whether you are suggesting that the whole passage 1 Corinthians 15:3-11 is an interpolation, or just the phrase about 500 witnesses, please could you clarify this now ?

Andrew Criddle

Johnny Skeptic

Since you say that we are both speculating, can we also speculate that by 60 A.D. there were only 1,000 Christians in the Roman Empire?

Which arguments did I not respond to? I will be happy to respond to any arguments that you make.

TedM

Sure, if you want to.

From a prior post:

1. It's an argument. It is not provable. He could be wrong, as could I. It is a fact that SOME people DID renounce their faith under persecution, and it is highly likely that the threat of persecution discouraged some from becoming Christians also. Whether the net effect is an increase or decrease it not knowable no matter how much we try to speculate.


2. Your long analysis of Isaiah 53 is irrelevant to my point. I"m not defending it as valid, just as a viable reason for early growth. Apparantly Jesus' suffering was close enough because the fact is that Isaiah 53 WAS used to support growth of the religion--Paul quotes parts of Isaiah 53, and aspects of that chapter WERE deemed Messiac. Verse 2 is much like 11:2, and midrash of the times supports the belief that it was Messiac. To not see connections to the passion narrative is to be very obtuse. The narratives point out that Jesus was silent before his accusors, the 'rich man in his death' is close to the rich Joseph of Ar..., grave with the wicked is close to crucifixion with criminals. Your argument doesn't address my point: It WAS USED to support growth. Obviously it WAS used because it was deemed Messiac AND there were similarities to the story of Jesus early on.


3. My understanding is that Josephus provides pretty good external evidence of Messiah mania, and that it is widely accepted among scholars that the people were desperately seeking Messiah.

gotta go,

ted

Toto

Keep in mind that Stark is a social scientist, using sociologists' tools. He is only concerned about finding a general trend, not in the exact numbers.

His estimates were only designed to show that Christianity did not start explosively, and grew at about the same rate as other "New Religious Movements" that he had studied in current times.

andrewcriddle

Can I add one point.

Johnny Skeptic suggested that Pliny's measures against Christians in Bithynia in 112 CE could have been a preemptive strike against a very small minority.

Pliny's own account (Book 10 letter 96) suggests otherwise This suggests that a non-trivial fraction of the town population were Christians or Christian sympathizers.

Andrew Criddle

Johnny Skeptic

Regarding item 1, you said “Whether the net effect is an increase or decrease it not knowable no matter how much we try to speculate.� How does that help your arguments? In ‘The Rise of Christianity,’ Rodney Stark says “The dynamics of stigma and sacrifice have the following direct and formal consequences (Iannaccone 1992). First: ‘By demanding higher levels of stigma and sacrifice, religious groups induce higher average levels of member commitment and participation.’ Second: ‘By demanding higher levels of stigma and sacrifice, religious groups are able to generate greater material, social, and religious benefits for their members.’�

Stark also says “Second, persecutions rarely occurred, and only a tiny number of Christians ever were martyred – only “hundreds, not thousands� according to W.H.C. Frend (1965:413). Indeed, commenting on Tacitus’s claim that Nero had murdered “an immense multitude� of Christians, Marta Sordi wrote that “a few hundred victims would justify the use of this term, given the horror of what happened� (1986:31). The truth is that the Roman government seems to have cared very little about the “Christian menace.� There was surprisingly little effort to persecute Christians, and when a wave of persecution did occur, usually only bishops and other prominent figures were singled out. Thus for rank-and-file Christians the threat of persecution was so slight as to have counted for little among the potential sacrifices imposed on them.�

Stark is a consummate researcher. His bibliography in ‘The Rise of Christianity’ is twenty pages long.

Regarding item 2, there is plenty of scholarship that states that Isaiah 53 is not Messianic. Here at the Secular Web there are about 71 articles on
Isaiah 53 and about 79 articles on Messianic prophecy. A good deal of scholarship also states that there is not sufficient evidence to conclude that Jesus was buried in Joseph of Arimathea’s tomb. Is there any credible external evidence that Joseph of Arimathea even existed? Regarding Joseph, The Britannica 2002 Deluxe Edition and the Microsoft Encarta Encyclopedia both say “according to all four Gospels.� The Britannica 2002 Deluxe Edition goes on to say that “Joseph is accorded a long history in later literature. In the apocryphal Gospel of Peter (2nd century), he is a friend of Jesus and of Pilate. In the apocryphal Gospel of Nicodemus (or Acts of Pilate; 4th/5th century), Jews imprison Joseph after Jesus' burial, but he is released by the risen Lord, thus becoming the first witness of the Resurrection. In Robert de Boron's verse romance Joseph d'Arimathie (c. 1200), he is entrusted with the Holy Grail (cup) of the Last Supper. A mid-13th-century interpolation relates that Joseph went to Glastonbury (in Somerset, Eng.), of which he is patron saint, as head of 12 missionaries dispatched there by the Apostle St. Philip. In Sir Thomas Malory's Morte Darthur (15th century), when Galahad receives the vision of the grail, he sees Joseph standing at the altar dressed as a bishop.� Ted, apocryphal literature, a 13th century interpolation and an obviously bogus 15th century literary work do not help your arguments at all.

As numerous articles here at the Secular Web show, there are not any good reasons to assume that Jesus fulfilled any Old Testament prophecies. Micah 5:2 says “But thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting.� Ephratah is mentioned twice in the Old Testament as a place, but it is also mentioned twice as a person. Jesus did not become ruler of Israel, so he could not possibly have fulfilled the prophecy even if he was born in Bethlehem. There are a number of articles here at the Secular Web that dispute the claim that Jesus was born in Bethlehem.

Even if some people did believe that Jesus fulfilled supposed Messianic prophecies, there is no way to reasonably prove how many people.

In item 3 you said “My understanding is that Josephus provides pretty good external evidence of Messiah mania, and that it is widely accepted among scholars that the people were desperately seeking Messiah.� Please quote your sources. Consider the following from a web site at http://www.holysmoke.org/sdhok/jesus5.htm:

Josephus: "Now there was about this time, Jesus, a wise man, if it be lawful to call him a man, for he was a doer of wonderful works; a teacher of such men as received the truth with pleasure. He drew over to him both many of the Jews, and many of the Gentiles. He was (the) Christ; and when Pilate, at the suggestion of the principal men amongst us, had condemned him to the cross, those that loved him at the first did not forsake him; for he appeared to them alive again the third day, as the divine prophets had foretold these and ten thousand other wonderful things concerning him; and the tribe of Christians, so named from him, are not extinct at this day. (Book XVIII, Chapter iii, Section 3).�

John E. Remsburg: "For nearly sixteen hundred years Christians have been citing this passage as a testimonial, not merely to the historical existence, but to the divine character of Jesus Christ. And yet a ranker forgery was never penned.

"Its language is Christian. Every line proclaims it the work of a Christian writer. 'If it be lawful to call him a man.' 'He was the Christ.' 'He appeared to them alive again the third day, as the divine prophets had foretold these and ten thousand other wonderful things concerning him.'

"These are the words of a Christian, a believer in the divinity of Christ. Josephus was a Jew, a devout believer in the Jewish faith -- the last man in the world to acknowledge the divinity of Christ. The inconsistency of this evidence was early recognized, and Abrose, writing in the generation succeeding its first appearance (360 A.D.), offers the following explanation, which only a theologican could frame:

“If the Jews do not believe us, let them, at least, believe their own writers. Josephus, whom they esteem a great man, hath said this, and yet hath he spoken truth after such a manner; and so far was his mind wandered from the right way, that even he was not a believer as to what he himself said; but thus he spake, in order to deliver historical truth, because he thought it not lawful for him to deceive, while yet he was no believer, because of the hardness of his heart, and his perfidious intention.�

Remsburg: "Its brevity disproves its authenticity. Josephus' work is voluminous and exhaustive. It comprises twenty books. Whole pages are devoted to petty robbers and obscure seditious leaders. Nearly forty chapters are devoted to the life of a single king. Yet this remarkable being, the greatest product of his race, a being of whom the prophets foretold ten thousand wonderful things, a being greater than any earthly king, is dismissed with a dozen lines."

The Christ, by John E. Remsburg, reprinted by Prometheus Books, New York, 1994, pages 171-3.

The Britannica 2002 Deluxe Edition says “As a historian, Josephus shares the faults of most ancient writers: his analyses are superficial, his chronology faulty, his facts exaggerated, his speeches contrived. He is especially tendentious when his own reputation is at stake. His Greek style, when it is truly his, does not earn for him the epithet ‘the Greek Livy’ that often is attached to his name.�

In say 75 A.D., what means did people have of checking things out? The claim of the 500 eyewitnesses is not identifiably Pauline, and there are not any good reasons at all to discount the possibility that it was originally made in the 2nd or 3rd centuries.

Regarding the disciples, how many of them were still alive in 75 A.D., where were they and what did they claim about the Resurrection? Dr. Robert Price told me “We don't even really know who ‘the disciples’ were, much less how long they lived or what of the gradually forming gospel tradition they ever heard of.�

Johnny Skeptic

Even if it was not a preemptive strike, my arguments are still good. Increases in the rate of growth of the Christian Church might not have started until after 90 A.D. If Jesus did not bodily rise from the dead, then the Christian Church would not likely have begun to grow more rapidly until after the deaths of the supposed still living eyewitnesses, which would have been late in the 1st century. Until then, people would have said "Hey, we were there and we didn't see any risen Jesus."

I am aware that many skeptics subscribe to the argument that Paul believed in a spiritual Resurrection rather than a bodily Resurrection. That might have been the case, but I wanted to placate Christians in order to have a better argument based on their belief in a bodily Resurrection.