skepticdude

Isn't it obvious that the embarrassment must be humilitating to the story's author, and not just any random person, to fuction as criteria?

Would you argue that the crucifixion may have been embarrassing to the author of Mark, when in fact that event was crucial to his purpose of telling about a resurrected Messiah? I don't see how something embarrassing to a story character constitutes something embarrassing for the story author. If the author uses the embarrassing pericope to help further or support some other part of his narrative, then its not embarrassing for the author but apologetics, which reduces its historical probability.

I don't understand you at all here. Can you give any example whatsoever of somebody knowingly telling a falsehood, when they knew of no way they could be benefitted by it? What exactly is wrong with the generalization that people lie to benefit themselves in some way, not for no reason, absent a mental disability of some sort?

Not at all. I take Galatians 2 to be historically trustworthy, generally, (thought not the part about James giving him the right hand of fellowship)because it is clear that Paul both disagrees with the Jerusalem gospel, yet cannot wave off James and Peter entirely, since they were too close to the truth for such a full excommunication.

When Paul, speaking of the pillars James Peter and John, says "whatever they were, makes no difference to me, God respects nobody" (Galatians 2:6), he surely knew that such cavelier attitude would be embarrassing to him, since anybody may then approach him and say "how dare you trivialize the Christ-ordained authority of James!" Paul was giving ammo to his opponents with such embarrassing admissions.

There seems to be a kernal of historical truth to Acts 15, since the entire affair shows that the key players in Christianity did NOT accept Paul's status as inspired, or else they wouldn't have given the time of day to the Judaizers, let alone a theological say-so in a doctrinally important council. Acts 15 did not perfectly white-wash the truth, though it probably did as much as possible to soften the truth without looking obviously false. The author would therefore have known that he may run into others someday who remembered this council differently. So acts 15 passes the criteria of embarrassment, since it counts as something the early church would like to have forgotten and does not wholly function to merely advance the author's agenda as much as a more edifying story more easily made up would have.

In the Book of Revelation, it starts out with Jesus delivering a "verbal spanking" to 7 churches in Asia. Since an author is more likely to lie to make him or his cause look good, not bad, while the message of Jesus here makes certain churches look bad, I'm confident that the rebuke supports a measure of historical trustworthiness to the claims. The idea that the bad deeds listed of the churches are just a literary device to give Jesus reasons to show his deity via threats of punishment seems weak. The "seat of Satan" in 2:13 has been confirmed by archaeology, though I don't have the specific issue of biblical archaeology in front of me at the moment.

Lastly, the criteria of embarrassment is used in courts of law to persuade juries that a witness is generally truthful. When a witness admits partial guilt or something embarrassing, when they have nothing to gain and everything to lose, the court usually cannot find a reason why they would lie in the effort to hurt their lives and reputation, and accepts such testimony as truth. That is exactly the reasoning behind the criteria of embarrassment: people don't lie to make themselves look bad. but to look good, and this principle holds true enough in general that a probability judgment about an author's uncorroborated testimony can be pivoted on it's use. Therefore, whatever admissions an author makes, that make him look bad, or would provide ammo to his enemies, is likely to be true.

skepticdude

How many times have you hammered that "final" nail? Keep it up, and there won't be any more coffin for the criteria of embarrasment to lay in.

skepticdude

Umm...the fact that one account must be false, has nothing to do with the criteria of embarrassment. Supposing Matthew was wrong, it could simply be due to his choice to prefer the sort of midrash current in the first century, not because he thought it would benefit his cause somehow.

yeah, so? I'd assign a low degree of historicity to the pericope because it advances the authors' theological agenda, and appears false since the Jews expected a military messiah that would free them from occupation, not a moral teacher that would die for their sins and make them victorious in the spirit world. I don't see how the criteria of embarrassment (which only comes into play when somebody asserts that a pericope caused embarrassment to the author) has nothing to do with this.

skepticdude

But the question must be, is the story of the spitting in somebody's eyes, embarrassing to the person upon whom the story's historicity hangs (i.e., the author)? In this case, clearly not.

I sure don't. No historian says everything outside certainty is a waste!

Agreed, his request demands more from the CoE than it's users ever claimed it could do.

I disagree, the crucifixion is wholly necessary to advance the author's agenda to promote a savior risen from the dead. The crucifixion is only embarrassing to the story characters, not the author. As such, nobody should say the crucifixion is probably historical because it was embarrassing. It wasn't to the person upon whom the historicity of the story hangs, the author. In addition, as has been pointed out many times in other forums, the details about how Jesus was put to death and his manner of burial conflict with the standard procedures known to be in play at the time. Even if we didn't know this, I'd think the crucifixion constitutes nothing more than apologetics, the very opposite of embarrassment, since without a dead savior you can't have a savior rising from the dead. I'd therefore cite the crucifixion as a heavy apologetic overtone that diminishes the liklihood of historicity of the story.

Because it led to a tale about a ressurrected man who by death, defeated death, and other fortune cookie nonsense that people take delight in when they seek answers to ultimate questions.

Not to authors who needed that event so they could then talk about a savior risen from the DEAD. Not to authors who indicate that Jesus death was good because it was a "ransom". Jesus death is stuff to be very proud of for first-century authors.

Yeah, like Paul, who turned everything on it's head, and insisted that the crucifixion was the most glorious favor God ever did the world (thus advancing his agenda).

One complication is that Jesus may very well have initially viewed himself as a regular military messiah, his mission failed, he caused enough of a rebellion to be put to death, and the resurrection was invented for the same purpose the virgin birth was: to cover up the embarrassing truth. The idea that the crucifixion wasn't embarrassing to the authors, isn't hurt by this complication; it still qualifies as advanding the author's agenda, whether he made it up or not, which therefore means it wasn't embarrassing to him.

aa5874

Courts do NOT use the criteria of embarrassment. Courts rely on evidence.

I have been a juror and I have never ever heard a judge tell jurors to determine truthfulness of witness by looking for embarrassing details.

In a court you need corroborative evidence, not embarrassment.

Toto

The rule in courts is that statements against interest (sometimes statements against financial interest) are considered sufficiently reliable to be an exception to the hearsay rule. But the jury still decides if they are the truth or not.

Take urban legends. They all must have started with someone who told a falsehood of some kind, but that person got no benefit, other than the entertainment value of telling a good story.

It has been my experience that lots of people make up stories, just as entertainment, or as jokes, or because they forgot the real facts, or for no reason at all. If you regard this as a mental illness, it's pretty widespread.

And ancient historians in particular made up stories for the moral instruction of their readers.

rlogan

The "criterion of embarassment" is one of the stupidest contradictory arguments in all of apologia.

First of all, the whole "Christ Crucified" is an extremely important religious concept marketed to adherents and potential recruits.

Sacrifice was absolutely imperitive for religions. Expiation. Universal practice of the lands in question, regardless of their specific religion. Roman Gods. Jews. Etc. Sacrifice was not just practiced, but hugely ritualistic. Detailed. Regular.

The highest order innovation in Christianity - the whole damned point - is Christ Crucified. For us. So that we may be saved.

Now for anyone to buy into this stupid deceptive argument about "embarassment", you have to be a DUPE.

Because obviously Christians are PROUD of this crucifixion. They ADORE their martyrs.

So kiss my butt with this "embarassment" argument.

I am not a fool.

Solo

IOW, the idea of having the sentence first.

From what we know it was "marketed" by Paul. We do not know if it was "marketed" by other factions. Reading Paul, I personally doubt it. Paul confirms that the idea was "embarrassing",

1 Cr 1:18 I know very well how foolish the message of the cross sounds to those who are on the road to destruction. But we who are being saved recognize this message as the very power of God. (NLT)

So despite the vehemence of your objections the cross (i.e. the crucifixion of Jesus, as I read it) was an embarrassment to some of the followers of Jesus.

Sacrifice was not just practiced but hugely ritualistic., hmmmm.

How does that relate to the probability that if Jesus existed his followers would have been embarrassed (before the community at large) by his execution as an impostor/evil-doer/common criminal, etc., and conversely, if he did not exist, the probability that such pseudo-historical account of him would not have gained a foothold ?

Buddha was not killed; Muhammad was not executed; Nanak (founder of Sikhism) was not molested by either Muslims or Hindus even though he denied the validity of both religions. No major Jewish prophet was "sacrificed".

Now how would evaluate the probability that if Jesus really was executed, that an apologia for the cross would have had to be supplied for the religion to continue ?

Here is a point to contemplate: there are many examples in history where a shameful epithet or fact becomes a badge of honour designed to counter-shame. Some recent examples: Louis Armstrong referred to himself as "nigger" during a reception by the British Royals in 1930's (consider also the n-word in the gangsta/ghetto counterculture). Most people don't know this but the word "feminism" when it first hit the streets carried hugely negative connotations. Rebecca West a.o. popularized it and made it a worthy label of woman's independence ( cca 1916: 'called 'a feminist' every time I act different than a prostitute or a doormat'.) Rod Mechelem in the 1990 called his 'men's movement' magazine "Backlash". "Chetnik" connoted a mindless butcher in Tito's Yugoslavia but became an honorific title in Serbia under Milosevic and Arkan. ....etc, etc.

Looks to me, you are worried you might be seen that way.

Jiri

aa5874

Look at 1Cor1.18.

You see the word "foolish" don't you? Show me where you saw the word "embarrassment"?

I don't think "foolish" and "embarrassment" means the same thing.

Look at the passage again, the first sentence, 1 Cr 1:18, " I know very well how foolish the message of the cross sounds to those who are on the road to destruction..... "

The passage clearly referred to non-believers or those on the road to destruction.

Now look at the last sentence of 1 Cor1.18"......But we who are being saved recognize this message as the very power of God. "
(NLT)

It is extremey clear now that believers accepted the message of the cross as the very power of God and not foolishness at all.

1 Cor1.18 totally destroys your argument.

It is not true that the pasasage 1Cor1.18 made any mention whatsoever of believers who were embarrassed by the message of the cross

Analyst

One reason I did find the Jesus myth possible is that the gospels describe a series of magic tricks or illusions. We had things like loaves and fishes, water into wine, raising the dead. If you view surviving a Roman crucifixion as the ultimate illusion it makes a kind of sense; like surviving the electric chair or the gas chamber -- and the Nazis at the same time. But reading between the lines the suggestion is that the 'trick' went wrong and the apostles tried to cover it up.

But I still go with the gospels = comic books theory.