gstafleu

The two are obviously closely connected. I think the point is that if you have some hypotheses about his life (he went here, he did this), then you can adduce evidence for that and judge if the evidence supports the hypothesis. Or you can adduce evidence that goes against the hypothesis, and so try to falsify it. But if you have no hypothesis, it is difficult to do anything with evidence because it is not "aimed" at anything, so to speak. In other words, evidence without a hypothesis is not really evidence, it is just data (I think Vork made this point in another thread).

Spenser

Thanks for the complete non-answer Chris. Your sarcastic example fails miserably, you exist and since it is impossible for you not to have a grandfather, he existed. Further he probably had a social security number which can lead to where he worked, lived Etc. I wasn't asking where Jesus went every day of his life. We are talking about a significant historical figure, if he did indeed exist, and yet there seem to be no actual places you can say he went historically nor anything he specifically did, just that he probably did something along the lines of the mythical stories of the Gospels. Maybe that's true and that's all he did and his life really is that obscure but it definitely doesn't seem enough to blow off the concept that he never existed at all. All there seem to be of him are stories that definitely involve the work of fiction and to me that still seems a shaky thing to base history on.

I came in here fairly neutral and the topic and ended up leaning towards the mythical side from what I've read in this and a few other threads. I had no bias and I certainly wasn't out to try and piss you off. It's just from an outside perspective a HJ is certainly suspect. I realize you are far more educated on the topic than I am but simply translating certain words and phrases differently doesn't seem to be enough to get to the root of the story. You seem to base his existence on Paul's letters, am I wrong? Paul never claims to have met Jesus has he? What of the apostles? I've tried to absorb a lot here but I do admit so far some of it is over my head...

No Robots

This is the wrong approach. We are looking into the existence of a man. Before you start, you must forget about god altogether. It seems that many mythicists simply cannot divorce Jesus from god. This just shows how effective traditional religious propaganda is, and how difficult it is to free oneself from it.

Spenser

You are missing my point all together, even though I mentioned God it really had nothing at all to do with God. It was simply lack of belief in an assertion of existence with out evidence to suggest otherwise. IOW, Does X exist? One is justified in saying 'no' until the burden of proof for X's existence has been met...

No Robots

Why can't you just say this, then: "I am entering this the same way I'd enter the debate on a man"? Let's leave god and "X" out of it. I still think that you associate this man with god in a way that makes you treat the former as you treat the latter.

Spenser

No, its just I started at IIDB in the Existence of God forum and referred back to the way I handled that subject. I would expect the same sort of evidence for the existence of any god, man, object or thing...

Ted Hoffman

There are just too many wrong-headed assumptions and ill-informed assertions in Weimer's last response to me for me to leave them without correction.
I have corrected Weimer's incorrect assumption that gods dont die, with the examples of Tammuz and Inanna. Plus references.
Weimer is also assuming, without good reason, that Christ was a common man, who was later deified (a process called apotheosization IIRC). Again this is incorrect because it entails that Weimer assumes what he is supposed to prove. It means that his argumentation apparatus is strapped with contested and questionable baggage.
When Weimer asks: "please show how you are certain the earliest Christians held Jesus to be divine", any experienced eye can tell that that question is actually a cry for help. He is interrogating his assumptions and needs our help in validating them.
Not to worry Chris: here is help.
Empty declarations are worthless here Chris. This is not theologyweb or neotestamentica.
There was a time that the easiest "reading" of the earth was that it was flat. They were wrong. In the same fashion, you are not well familiarized with the issues at hand to be able to judge what is a "simple reading" from what is not.
The important thing is the "correct reading".
Your reading is simple, simplistic and wrong.
Again, dead wrong. Haven't you read any books at all? This passage is widely regardded as a post-pauline interpolation.
Raymond Brown (An Introduction) argues that the passage has been interpolated. For the following reasons:
1. It constitutes a second thanks-giving letter. p.463
2. "The statement that the Jews 'are the enemies of the whole human race' resembles general Pagan polemic, scarcely characteristic of Paul." ibid
Other reasons - by Udo Schnelle in The History and Theology, p. 48
3. Romans 9-11 contradicts 1 Thess. 2.14-16
4. It references what has hapenned to the Jews as a model to a Gentile Christian church.
5. Prior to the first Jewish war, there were no prolonged persecutions of Christians by Jews in Palestine.
6. The use of the imitation concept in 1 Thessalonians 2.14 is singular.
7. The aorist eftasen (has overtaken) referes to the destruction of Jerusalem.
Read more here

So, when do you intend to address Doherty's arguments? It is becoming quite boring to watch you mistake your opinions for ideas.
Please copy and paste where you show how one argument failed.
You have to demonstrate that they are weak. We dont care what you think or feel. What we want are your arguments.
If you have no arguments to back your thoughts, your thoughts are worthless.
You will have to do the work of rebutting arguments here Weimer. Mealy-mouthed dismissals wont fly.
Dont tell me you dont know who Sanders is. Or is it the case that you dont understand how to apply that particulsr fallacy?
I have not attacked you. Crying wolf wont help either. You have to present your arguments or counter-arguments, not your opinion.
Like in which passage?
I have already commented on this sad excuse elsewhere so I wont say much. It appears that you do not even know what a methodology is.
I ask again: which theme?
My point was that they can't all be the same person. My point remains.
According to you, who was the historical Jesus?

Apples and oranges. I should have been more specific. You are comparing a mythical figure with legendary figures.
You need to read Otto Rank's In Quest of The Hero, to know the difference. Or should I explain that to you too? Dont be shy, just ask.
Or read The Messiah Myth.

yalla

Can I throw an unsubstantiated speculation into the ring..please? Based on a comment above.
I was reading somewhere about Judaism's denigration of women...their impurities and the rituals associated, the restrictions on temple attendance etc after sex etc..
It occurred to me that in the dichotomy of flesh v spirit in Paul's Romans and the various subsets contained therein that "born of woman" fits well into the "flesh" category as a metaphor for sin/body. That is, the impurity of women is associated with the impurities of the flesh and contrasted with the purity of the "spirit".
As such it need not, just from this angle, refer to a woman giving birth to JC literally.
I suspect that might be part of the virgin bit of the Virgin mary, a virgin being less impure than a sexually active woman.
Just an idle thought.
Comment?
cheers
yalla

Chris Weimer

This is an empty assumption. You're only assuming that he was significant. He most likely was not. If you assume beforehand that Jesus was significant if he was historical, then of course you set the bar way too high for anyone who argues that Jesus was not historical.

No one is blowing off the concept that he never existed at all. I used to hold that concept myself. But of course, if you simply ignore the arguments I've held with Ted, Doherty, Toto, etc...

There are stories which smell like fiction to me too, and I don't base my history on it.

And that's a fine position to hold. You haven't pissed me off. However, in this debate, you must realize which arguments are acceptable and which arguments are. Have you noticed that Earl Doherty and Ted Hoffman spend much of their time reanalyzing Paul's quotes of Jesus' historicity?

Have you noticed why so many push for the dying and rising gods? It's because asking for where Jesus went and what he did automatically assumes that we can know where he went and what he did, but not only that, it also assumes that having that information is somehow to be used as verification for existence. It's not, never has been, and should never be.

I used my grandpa as a parallel to this. We must know he exists logically. (Well, Jesus isn't a logical deduction - it's a deduction of available evidence, but I'll get into that later). However, we, including myself, know nothing of him - not where he went, not what he did. I don't know, and neither do you. So using those as criteria just doesn't work. It's asking too much.

It's complicated for sure, and I don't blame you for your ignorance. Heck, I always assumed for the most part the gospels were fairly accurate minus the supernatural stuff (along the lines of the Jefferson bible). Then I read the American Atheist's website, which Frank Zindler has pushed for an entirely mythical Jesus. Upon further investigation, I found that several of his statements were not only misleading, but some downright false, though it's probably most likely due to his sources. He's not fond of footnotes, see, and it's hard finding out where he gets this stuff from.

Back to the point - the Historical Jesus is a theory, in the scientific sense of the word, meaning it should explain the evidence. The other real theory is the Mythical Jesus. These two theories rest of several things. One of which is where Paul claims that Jesus was born human. Note that the MJ theory does not dispute that this is evidence for a human Jesus, if it really was referring to a human. Instead, they interpret the passages as Paul claiming that Jesus was divine and not human.

Assuming he meant human (because you seem confused on how it is evidence at all), Paul is writing early enough to still know the original pillars of Christianity, who knew the Lord. He also claims that the Jews crucified Jesus. Now that Jesus was crucified by the Jews, and that he knew the original members of the cult, that places Jesus, if he existed, not too long before his letters.

Is this consistent with what we know? Well, Paul is a self-admitted latecomer, claims that his gospel differs from the pillar James, who in turn preached of a strict adherence to Judaism.

So we would assume that the earliest Christians were Judaizers, then. My own work on the Gospel of Matthew has shown that this is very consistent with what we know.

Outside the construction of the historical Jesus, the Gospel of Matthew has been consistently dated to the latter half of the 1st century CE. Personally I'd put it between 85 and 95 CE. By this time, from the looks of Matthew, we have a strong tendency for Christians to think of themselves as different from Jews. This may be the norm, or it may be a minority, but Matthew is an attestation to it.

So when combing through Matthew, I found an odd occurrence that most people seem to gloss over. In the genealogies in both Matthew and Luke, only two name are the same after David and before Joseph. Such a coincidence is highly unlikely - especially since the names occur in the same manner - Salathiel and his son Zorobabel (Scheatiel and Zerubbabel). Who were these folks? Zerubbabel is an important figure in Judaism. Zerubbabel, along with Jeshua, were in charge of rebuilding the temple after the exile. As the story goes (Ezra 4) the foreigners came to Zerubbabel and asked to help rebuild the temple with them. The answer was a resounding NO! The Temple was only for the Jews - any outsiders are forbidden.

Fast forward (narrative-wise) several hundred years. We have a man, named Jeshua, who later authors claim was the Messiah, who had early followers who were strict Judaizers, and was claimed to be be crucified on Passover.

The theory, then rests on its consistency. What we have is a ripe situation for a real Jesus to gain a following in. Jesus, claiming to be the Messiah, crucifed on the cross on Passover. From history we learn that people claiming titles like Messiah etc... usually are rationalized away after the death. The death on Passover was too easy - the Passover Lamb sacrifice! Perfect fit.

But problems occur - with Jesus as the Passover Lamb, then parts of Judaism become inconsistent - if Jesus died and conquered death to save people from sin, then surely the ritual sacrifice and other Temple-centric Laws became null. And with the destruction of the Temple in 70 CE, Gentilic Christianity gained a strong foothold over any leftover Jewish traces. That's when Jesus primarily turned into GodChrist.

Chris Weimer

Yeah, you can quit with the strawman beating now. We all know you can beat up a dummy. Perhaps next time you can take the argument to court.

I'm sorry PL, but if you can't grasp what I'm saying, then I think the fault lies on your part. I ask you to reread what I said carefully. Perhaps you can even do a line-by-line exegesis so I can show you where you err.

Afterall, I wouldn't want anyone else to be misled, now would I?