Vinnie

Based upon my reading or all early Christian writings and lots of books by credentialed scholars who make careers out of studying them and the historical Jesus.

If you want an argument: the contemporary primary source data we habve for Jesus' alleged followers and all that later secondary evidence. Of course this is based upon my dating of the four Gospels and Thomas as being writting no later than 100 C.E.

Plus I can make a wicked argument now that I have come over to the side that thinks Mark did not like the Twelve all that much and undermines them constantly whereas Luke didn't like Mark and esteemed the Twelve and others. It makes Mark a hostile witness.

For starters:

Let us now List Some Specific Followers of Jesus and their attestation:

Peter 4x-6x (Paul, GThomas, GMark, GLuke's List of Twelve, GJohn, Special L (5:1-11)).
John 3x-5x (Paul with Acts confirming, GMark, GLuke's List of Twelve, and GJohn confirming Zebedee).
Mary Magdalene 3x-5x (GMark, GJohn and GLuke 8. Also Paul and GThomas mention an unspecified Mary)
Mary 1x-3x (GMark and Paul and GThomas mentioning an unspecified Mary. Don't know who.
Salome 2x-3x (GMark, GThomas and GEgyptians
Matthew 2x-3x (GMark, GLuke's List of Twelve and GThomas)
Thomas 3x-4x (GMark, GLuke's List of Twelve, GJohn and GThomas)
Andrew 2x-3x (GMark, GLuke's List of Twelve, and GJohn
James Zebedee = John's brother 2x-3x (GMark, GLuke's List of Twelve and Zebedee confirmd in GJohn)
Levi 1x-2x (GMark and GLuke's list of Twelve. Levi is also an toll collector potentially fitting the EmCrit.
Philip 2x-3x (GMark, Guke's List of Twelve and GJohn)
Judas Iscariot: 3x-4x ( or more) )GMark, Luke's List of Twelve, GJohn, Stray trdition behind Judas' death found in M and L. The EmCrit also factors in here.
Philip 2x-3x (GMark, GJohn and GLuke's list of Twelve

There are a few other members of the Twelve we have not addressed. The point here is for MA. We see that there is a host of texts supporting the notion that Jesus had followers. There are also agreements between a host of texts on the names of specific followers of Jesus. We have very good multiple attestation of sources and forms here.

Very strongly is the names mentioned by Mark and GThomas independently. That is multiple attestation of source and form and one is a hostile witness as I proved here:

http://www.after-hourz.net/ri/markmary1.html

And if you think THomas was not a first century text and it is dependent upon the synoptics then bring it on

There are a bunch of other reasons as well which I won't get into at this time. Also above some of my attstations centers on Luke having a access to different traditions about the twelve than Mark given the differences cannot be seen as redactional (See Meier v. 111). Also, even if John is dependent on Mark he still preserves some indepdnent traditionms about the followers of Jesus so saying John is dependent upon Mark is not a valid rebuttal.

Vinnie

Vinnie

Okay. This is to all the rude participants of this thread with reading comprehension problems:

Thread titile:

Your opinion on JC?

You have your initial argument from me at any rate.

Thank you very much for listening

Vinnie

Gawen

Well...I was going to post my opinion per the OP, but since the thread seems to have....fallen....

No sir...ain't gonna do it. Not at this juncture....

Besides, I don't feel like listing everything I read to justify my opinions.

Tristan Scott

No Mr. 'n' Glad that wasn't Mageth that made that statement, t'was me. I just assumed that since you were throwing your un-named credible scholars out on the table with your that I could throw mine out there too.

You appear to be arguing against a strawman here.

godfry n. glad

Excuse me. I didn't realize that this thread was specifically for voicing uninformed opinions.

To a certain extent, I wonder where these opinions have originated as most HJ theses, in my mind, have posited an historical Jesus as an a priori assumption and work from there using creedal propaganda materials (the NT materials) to attempt to describe what the "real" Jesus was "really like". It has always struck me as a bit delusional.

I apologize for misunderstanding and misstating Mageth's position.

For scholars dealing with the historicity of Paul and the epistles, check with the Radikalkritiks of the German and Dutch schools of New Testament research. Hans Detering and other scholars publishing in this country under the auspices of the _Journal of Higher Criticism_, where the likes of Doherty, Price and other mythicists and "minimalists" (in regards to Hebrew Bible mythology) seem to have coalesced in the US, have radically variant positions on the historicity of Paul from those held by what I understand to be the mainstream NT scholars in the US (From Funk, Crossen and the Westar crowd to Wright, Habermas and the burgeoning horde of apologists being belched out of bible colleges across the country).


Proceed with your "Don't Ask" program; I shall retire from this thread.

godfry

Mageth

godfrey:

Excuse me. I didn't realize that this thread was specifically for voicing uninformed opinions.

I, for one, do not consider my opinion "uninformed".

To a certain extent, I wonder where these opinions have originated as most HJ theses, in my mind, have posited an historical Jesus as an a priori assumption and work from there using creedal propaganda materials (the NT materials) to attempt to describe what the "real" Jesus was "really like". It has always struck me as a bit delusional.

Personally, I don't think starting with the a priori assumption of a mythical Jesus would be correct, and from your first post I don't think you do. You and I have both declared our agnosticism; in doing so, you seem to be starting from, or are at least currently at, the same position as me (with you leaning to one side and I to the other).

I don't see how, given a document that claims a person existed in history, researching that claim starting out with the agnostic assumption that there is a probability that the person did exist in history (which is how I stated my position at least once), and examining that document, critical research on that document, and any other sources available to try to determine what that person may have been "really like" (with one possible option of what the person was "really like" being that the person never really existed) can be characterized as "delusional". It seems to be a perfectly rational approach to me.

I apologize for misunderstanding and misstating Mageth's position.

Thanks.

Nom

Dead on. I mean, if you're going to strip all the mythological elements out of the Gospels in search of the "real" Jesus...well, waitaminnit, why then should I give a rat's ass about the real Jesus? If there was no Virgin Birth or walking on water or replication of food and drink or raising of the dead or, or course, Resurrection (and there wasn't), then the whole Christian edifice crumbles at its foundations. Yet many appear to believe this and still call themselves Christion. Delusional is a good word.

Mageth

(Umm, that appears to be a "no true Scotsman" fallacy. Typically, it's the literalist Christians we see committing that fallacy when discussing those that hold to more liberal forms of Christiainty.)

.....

And yet, Christianity exists.

And that's what I'm interested in learning about: how did this new religion that is today so prevalent in our society get its start? I seek to understand the true history (what of it may be found) behind this religion.

BTW, there are very intelligent thinkers I respect very much who, while recognizing that Jesus was mythologized and that the Gospels are embellished legends if not entirely mythical, still find truth and meaning in the "Christ message" (Bishop John Shelby Spong is one; Joseph Campbell is another). Personally, I respect them much more, and consider them much less delusional (actually, I don't consider them "delusional" at all), than those who blindly insist in a literal, linear reading of the Gospel accounts.

Indeed, if only more, if not all, Christians (and Moslems, etc.) would do so, and recognize the commonality of the metaphors behind their "faith documents", much of the strife in the world would disappear quite rapidly. I'm all for Christianity etc switching from the mistaken literal interpretation of the Bible and other documents to a metaphorical interpretation, an interpretation based on human need and not God's need.

To me, someone who is willing to recognize that the "faith documents" that established their religion are largely mythical and have unfortunately been interpreted literally and thus abandon that literal interpretation in favor of a metaphorical interpretation is not "delusional", in my book. Indeed, their honesty illustrates clearly that they are not delusional, but instead willing to cast off whatever delusions they once had about the myths in question. The fact that they may still try to find some metaphorical meaning in the myths may seem "delusional" to some, but not to me.

Heck, I'm an atheist, and I find things in the myths of the Bible that are meaningful, just as I might in any work of fiction. There's a lot of extra baggage there, true, but I don't exclude myself from still recognizing what of value may be found there.

Simply put: just because a story is a myth or fiction does not mean it is useless and does not preclude it from conveying some metaphorical truth about the human condition.

capnkirk

Jesus was NOT a Christian!!! That's my opinion, and here's why.

While there just isn't sufficient space here to provide an in-depth explanation for the claim that Jesus wasn't Xtian, I will offer one critical fact that deals a "hammer blow" to the Jesus = Christ concept:

Over the last two hundred years, comparative work on the gospels has slowly but surely established certain results and conclusions. One such conclusion (which most Christian scholars try to ignore) is that it has become embarrassingly obvious that all references to christ in the gospels are the result of translational problems. There simply was no word in either Hebrew or Aramaic that carries the deific overtones that christ does for Christians. ‘Christ’ is derived (via Latin) from the Greek word (krestos) that essentially means “good� or “great�. Jewish scholars translating the Septuagint (c. 200 BCE) first used the term as the closest available Greek translation for the Hebrew term we call Messiah (which literally meant “anointed one�). They applied this translation everywhere anointment was described in the Old Testament (OT); all the Davidic kings and High Priests were anointed and were called messiah. It was not until Paul, writing in Greek, used krestos to describe the Christ figure familiar to all modern Christians that the term first came to mean a divine being. Since Paul came after Jesus was executed, all references to Christ in the Gospels must be mentally retranslated back into the Hebrew meaning of messiah, a non-deific human entity. This realization sheds considerable light on how Christians developing the gospels after Paul’s death read the familiar christ-figure back into the proto-gospel materials available to them. Ergo, Jesus could not possibly have been a Christian!!

Tristan Scott

Maybe that is all because most of the ancient peoples from which Judaism and Cristianity came mythicized their "truths" as a means of communicating them and demonstrating their applications to life. Modern mainstream Christianity is repelled by this because from a fundamental standpoint it is the ju-ju and magic described in scripture that has become paramount. The message; the "truths", have been lost or rendered secondary to the supernatural.