Metacrock

http://www.geocities.com/metacrock20...s/versions.htm

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http://www.geocities.com/metacrock20...ergospels.html

Metacrock

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http://www.geocities.com/metacrock20...ergospels.html

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http://www.geocities.com/metacrock20...ergospels2.htm


The pre Markan Material (see link) puts the erlieast Gsopel narrative writting in AD 50. That's pretty early to be mythology circulating, as it is so close to the dates of the actual alledged events. It's also pertty long before the destruction of the temple to justify claims of fictional developments related to the fall of the temple.

Rick Sumner

I could swear Peter already took this to task. . .

Regards,
Rick Sumner

Metacrock

"Took it to task?" YOu guys really need some kind of lessons in logic. I've noticed this before. Every time a skeptic disagrees with any kind of point in anything, you go "that's been defeated." "It's been cruched, it's dead, he took it to task."

the guy complained about two things in argument. He didn't like all the sources I used, but he didn't disagree with the major point of the argument. He also found a couple of sources along about the end of the second century where they began fudging a bit on one or two of those 11 points. That's no where near what it would take to kill this argument.

he didn't do anything to disagree with the premise that myth proliforates and the single version reamaining stable might be seen as a high probablity of factual content. NO he certrainly said nothign to disuade one of that view.

he also did not do anything to indicate that the fictional nature of the Gospel, if it were fictional, would reamin stable for so long. If the Gospels were just stories they would have multipled in versions from the outset. the more people liked them the more they would have come up with their own versions.

This is hardly "taking to task."

another thing that gets me about this habit of declairing an idea dead because part of it has been disagreed with,no ever can tell me what was disproven. They always just have a veg impression and that's enough for them. why don't i start posting and saying "I've beaten Doherty a million times." OK I've taken the mythers to task!

Rick Sumner

Actually, if memory serves, Peter found an alternative version of every point you claimed there was none for. In fact, memory does serve. He posted the article on his site, if that helps refresh your memory:

http://www.christianorigins.com/variants.html

Feel free to review Peter's article, it seems to have slipped your mind.

Regards,
Rick Sumner

Metacrock

Bull. You telling me there's a version that says Jesus wasn't crucified? Now we've been through this. this comes up every time. Gosptic belief that it was an illusion of Jesus and not really jesus doesn't count. Because it still assumes that a being was seen by people on earth which appeared to be real and that it appeared to be crucified. That means they assume the facts of the story even though they explain them differently.

Most of his points were like that, or they were from late second century on. He never got under the basic premise of the argument.


Then there's this:


Over against this argument, I contend that there is at least one document from the fourth century or earlier that reveals that some people did not agree with at least one of the basic details above. I will show my contention by actually pointing out disagreement with each of the eleven. But note well that only one of the eleven has to fail in order for the claim to be false that these basic details were unalterable. It is as though I am firing eleven cannon balls, and only one has to hit to sink the No Alternate Versions argumentative ship.


I remember this argument. this was painful. The whole idea that what I'm saying has no merit if one of those points is breached is...I hate to say anything insulting about the guy because I like him a lot...but it is unresonable.

It's just not logical that if the arbitrary dates I picked out turn out to be blurred then the argument is wrong and bad and untrue, that's crazy. There's no magic about saying fourth century, I just picked that out at random. But in the over all scheme of things there is no mass profussion of storeis. there's basically one story and all these details hold until well into the second century,if not longer.

Rick Sumner

Actually, it comes from the Talmud, where Jesus was stoned and then hanged. That doesn't have much to do with Gnostics.

I'm no mythicist, and nobody is appealing to Gnosticism, so this is quite irrelevant.

You might want to read the rebuttal, rather than presuming what it says. Just a thought.

Regards,
Rick Sumner

Metacrock

Ok look, time out. Just time out! let's come together and have a meeting of the minds ok?


Now the spirit of this argument is that we don't find a lot of other versions of Jesus' story. There is basically one story. But Peter is going to try and disprove that. Does he? NO! He quibbles with my formulations, which I admit are arbitrtary. He does nothing to get under the basic premise of the argument.


On point one, does he disprove it? No,. he quibbles with it. He quibbles with the dates in Luke. Maybe it was 33, mabye it was 34, maye he was born in 30, maybe in 4 who knows. the point is in all the stories he's a man living in society like anyone else, and it's basically in the first quarter of the frist century. He does nothing to disprove that, but proudly floggs the usually apologetical banter about Luke's dating. Who cares? That's not another version.

he does not produce another version of point 1!

He produced some statments by verious writters as late as 4th century, (my cut off date by the way). But that's not really a "version." He does not show a Gospel or a narratival telling of the story that changes this point. He produces some writter at a late date speculating on it.

point 2

I am not aware of any tradition in which the mother of Jesus is given a name other than Mary. But there is disagreement on whether Mary was a virgin when she conceived Jesus.


so there you have it. There is no other version of the name Mary. some differed about her virginity, so what? and when? They did it late didn't they?

Origen quotes the Jewish interlocutor of Celsus in Contra Celsum 1.32: "when she was pregnant she was turned out of doors by the carpenter to whom she had been betrothed, as having been guilty of adultery, and she bore a child to a certain soldier named Panthera." This is a tradition that denies the Virgin birth.


Right, they bring up the anti-Gospel propaganda and put that over as a "version." NO that's not a version of the story, that's just the emeies saying the oppossite, and obviously doing to so conter the known facts. But it doesn't suit what I'm talkinga bout which is a version of the story told by those who support it and put over as another version of the story.

If it's fiction, there would be other story tellers that tell their versions. Why would there be propaganda and Jews denying the virign birth and trying to imply mary was a prosititue if he was just a fictional character. Obviously they regarded him as a real historical character.

In fact, there is disagreement on whether Jesus was born at all. Hippolytus of Rome writes in his Refutation of All Heresies, book 7, chapter 19: "Marcion, adopting these sentiments, rejected altogether the generation of our Saviour. He considered it to be absurd that tinder the (category of a) creature fashioned by destructive Discord should have been the Logos that was an auxiliary to Friendship--that is, the Good Deity. (His doctrine,) however, was that, independent of birth, (the Logos) Himself descended from above in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, and that, as being intermediate between the good and bad Deity, He proceeded to give instruction in the synagogues. For if He is a Mediator, He has been, he says, liberated from the entire nature of the Evil Deity. Now, as he affirms, the Demiurge is evil, and his works. For this reason, he affirms, Jesus came down unbegotten, in order that He might be liberated from all (admixture of) evil."



But again that's the Gnostic deniel that confirms the original story. They are chaning the story which implies that they knew the original verison. They change it for dotrinal reasons.


Ok so as before, I remember now. I need to tweek the argument. But the basic point of it is still good.


3) Same principal players: Peter, Andrew, Philip, John, Mary Magdalene.
Here is some data on the "principal players" mentioned in early Christian writings.

1 Clement mentions Peter and Paul.

The Ignatian Epistles mention Peter and Paul as well as Mary.

The Gospel of Thomas mentions Thomas, James the Just, Simon Peter, Matthew, Mary, and Salome.

The Gospel of Peter mentions Mary Magdalene, Simon Peter, Andrew, Levi the son of Alphaeus, and most likely others in the lost portions of the text.

The Apocalypse of Peter mentions the twelve disciples but not by name.

The Secret Book of James mentions the 'twelve disciples' as well as James, Peter, and John.

The Preaching of Peter mentions the 'twelve' as well as Peter.

The Gospel of the Egyptians mentions Salome.

The Gospel of the Hebrews mentions James the Just and Simon.

The Gospel of the Ebionites mentions Simon Peter, John and James the sons of Zebedee, Simon, Andrew, Philip, Bartholomew, James the son of Alphaeus, Thomas, Thaddaeus, Simon the Zealot, and Judas the Iscariot.

The Gospel of the Nazoreans mentions Simon.

The Traditions of Matthias mentions Zaccheus whom they call Matthias, the tax collector.

The Apology of Aristides mentions the 'twelve disciples'.

The epistle of Polycarp mentions Paul and 'the rest of the apostles'.

Papias mentions Andrew, Peter, Philip, Thomas, James, John, Matthew, and Judas.

The Gospel of Mary mentions Mary, Peter, and Andrew.

The Dialogue of the Savior mentions Judas, Matthew, and Mary.

Second Clement mentions Peter.

The Epistula Apostolorum mentions John, Thomas, Peter, Andrew, James, Philip, Batholomew, Matthew, Nathanael, Judas Zelotes, and Cephas as well as Joseph and Mary.

I have also written an essay on the tradition of The Seven Apostles.

It is apparent, then, that the main players are not fixed in early Christian literature. Indeed it is one of the most fluid variables.



The problem there is he does not demonstrate a banch of different stories with differet cast of characters. Just because souce A only says Peter, and source B says Peter and John doesn' mean they contradict. All these characters are in the Canonicals. It's not like he has a source where the Aposltes are Tony, Frank, Fred, and Floyd. So this is just a silly point.

The lists can very I didn't include all those guys in my 11 points.

4) That Jesus was known as a miracle worker.
This point I may have to concede, if only for the reason that anyone could be a "miracle worker" in ancient times, and the rules of riposte dictate that the refutation of a claim to miraculous powers is the charge of magic or devilry. These two charges are found frequently enough, expressing disagreement over who Jesus was and what he did.


see here your assertion is wrong. he admitts he can't overcome point 4. So that is wrong!

On Jesus being in league with the devil, we need look no further than the canonical four (Mark 3:22 etc.). On Jesus as a magician, the Jewish Encyclopedia notes:

that wasn't one of my 11 points. But certainly the canonicals do not say that Jesus was in league

According to Celsus (in Origen, "Contra Celsum," i. 28) and to the Talmud (Shab. 104b), Jesus learned magic in Egypt and performed his miracles by means of it; the latter work, in addition, states that he cut the magic formulas into his skin. It does not mention, however, the nature of his magic performances (Tosef., Shab. xi. 4; Yer. Shab. 13d); but as it states that the disciples of Jesus healed the sick "in the name of Jesus Pandera" (Yer. Shab. 14d; 'Ab. Zarah 27b; Eccl. R. i. 8) it may be assumed that its author held the miracles of Jesus also to have been miraculous cures. Different in nature is the witchcraft attributed to Jesus in the "Toledot." When Jesus was expelled from the circle of scholars, he is said to have returned secretly from Galilee to Jerusalem, where he inserted a parchment containing the "declared name of God" ("Shem ha-Meforash"), which was guarded in the Temple, into his skin, carried it away, and then, taking it out of his skin, he performed his miracles by its means. This magic formula then had to be recovered from him, and Judah the Gardener (a personage of the "Toledot" corresponding to Judas Iscariot) offered to do it; he and Jesus then engaged in an aerial battle (borrowed from the legend of Simon Magus), in which Judah remained victor and Jesus fled.

The accusation of magic is frequently brought against Jesus. Jerome mentions it, quoting the Jews: "Magum vocant et JudÃ?i Dominum meum" ("Ep. lv., ad Ascellam," i. 196, ed. Vallarsi); Marcus, of the sect of the Valentinians, was, according to Jerome, a native of Egypt, and was accused of being, like Jesus, a magician (Hilgenfeld, "Ketzergesch." p. 370, Leipsic, 1884).


we can distinguish between anti-christian propaganda and version of the sory. Obviusly his enemies could say anything about him, why would they even bother if they knew he was fictional. So that's not really telling the story over differently with diffrent basic facts and presenting it as a friendly version by followers. It's just enemies trying to defame him.That really shouldn't count.

All can be accounted for in like manner

Metacrock

That was like fourth century or latter.So that' beyond the cut off. There is no profussion of stories, not one other version before the end of the second century at least. I think that makes the point.




maybe he doesnt in that article but some do. That has been argued against this argument.




I just did.

Peter Kirby

It may be helpful, for those both new and old to this discussion, to review its history to date. It begins with this thread (though it was on Meta's site before then):

A Good Indication That Jesus Existed

This thread ran around the same time:

Evidence for Jesus existence is solid

I subsequently started a thread to which Metacrock did not show up:

How Many Versions Are There?

Then there was my post that got put on my web page as an essay, largely unchanged, since it got no substantial criticism when I offered it to IIDB over a year ago:

Jesus Variants

Comment from Hugo Holbling: "That was an awesome post, Peter."

Comment from Asha'man: "Very sweet post, Peter." He added: "Jewish writings identify a Jesus much earlier than the Christian tradition, nearly a century earlier. He may have lived during the reign of King Jannai (104-78BC), and may have died during the reign of Jannai?s wife Helene (78-69BC). He was a student under a famous rabbi (Joshua ben Perachiah), but was condemned because ?'Jeschu had practiced sorcery and had corrupted and misled Israel.?" (reference to the book Did Jesus Live 100 BC?)

WinAce comments: "In my travels around the net, I've seen only a few posts where one side was so unabashedly and one-sidedly kicked in the rear."

Metacrock's reply included the final comment: "that's the flaw in the whole argument. it doesn't present any alternate stories, it's missing the point!"

Bizarrely, Metacrock expects someone refuting his argument to the HJ from No Alternate Versions to present the varying stories as having historical credibility: "But what is the historical validity of Epihanius anyway? What kind of position was he in to know the historical tradition anyway?"

This flies in the face of what he said was his point earlier: "I didn't say that all of these sources are documentation for all 11 points. I said that in all the extrabibical extracanonical works there are none that flat out contradict them. ... [The list] is just to show many there are, and none of them do actually contradict the 11 points. Doesn't really matter how late they are, because I do use earlier ones." Metacrock suggested that the point was that all sources, even ones as late as the ones on his list (many in the third, fourth, fifth, or later centuries), don't go against the "11 points" because they were just too well-known to be true to deny.

Eventually it seems to reduce to the idea that, even if there are disagreements on points, the ancient sources at least don't claim non-existence: "it proves they regarded him as historical--that was the original point remember? It's saying he existed, it doesn't deny that!"

The conclusion to the second reply from Metacrock: "Now I admit that my argument needs work. and I thank Pete for forcing me to confront this fact, and for showing me many of the sources I should have dealt with. Once again, I am in awe of his diligence and thank him for his good will discussion. But I don't think the argument is killed off. I think it has potential, even though it may need work."

(This got transformed in a comment from Meta in a recent thread to the statement that I thought it had potential.)

My response (given Meta's non-participation in an earlier thread devoted to the question):

"Do you really believe that? If so, define 'alternate stories.'"

Meta: "I've said it all along Peter; how he died, where he died, who his major side kicks were, where he was born, what he did; that sort of thing."

Kirby: "That's not a definition, in general, as to what is required to say that a story with differences is an alternate version. For example, among the things the synoptics say Jesus did, they say that he had a temple cleansing at the end of his ministry, shortly before being crucified. The Gospel of John says that the temple tantrum happened at the beginning of his public life, with two years or more before he was executed. Is that an important difference? You seem to be committed to saying that it is not. But you haven't stated in general what would make a difference important."

What the? The thread ended there?

An explication of what qualifies as an important difference between stories would allow the discussion to go forward.

best,
Peter Kirby