KrisK10

Steven,

My position hasn't moved. If a person claims some event that only happened to them (because they lied or had some hallucination), there would be no correcting influence in the historical record that it didn't happen. The legends of interest to us are those that arise despite other people around who knew better. The guards at Jesus' burial location are a good one. It never happened IMO. And yet it arose as a legend within 2-3 generations (30-35 years for each generation) after Jesus' death (i.e. Mathew written before 135 C.E.). Not a big deal, such legends arise all the time, but there are tons more in the case of Jesus. So we are looking for an example of large scale rapid legend around an historic individual. I think the Alexander the Great literature is the closest anyone can get. The essence of Muller's challenge is to find a comparable example of such legends accumulating around an individual in the same amount of time. Muller saw that time as 30 years. But 2-3 generations will work too for those who do not see such traditions like the guards circulating orally within 30 years of JEsus' death.

Soon after the guards at the tomb legend appeared but obviously no later than when Matthew was written.

I don't know, but the point is that that legend too arose within 2-3 generations of Jesus' death.

Steven, I think we are talking past each other.

Kris

KrisK10

That's correct, the birth event was around 4 B.C.E. If I remember correctly, even Muller admits that that should not be included in his 30 year criteria. That Paul did not mention the virgin birth is my #1 reason for saying that it is a legend (not in Mark is a slightly different matter)

Kris

KrisK10

Yes. That is my point, and the point of Muller, and the point of traditionalists who use this argument. I think the Alexander the Great literature is as close as any example gets.

Kris

KrisK10

Gerard,

I'd say that that is incorrect. A historical person will leave interactions with historical people who can counter legends that are hung on that person's identity.

Kris

Amaleq13

I thought their point was that such a comprehensive mythofication* was unbelievable and they attempt to support it by pointing to examples which are not as comprehensive. Those comparisons are not valid for the reason you describe.


*patent pending

gstafleu

A historical person with a detectable historical footprint, yes. But the less of a footprint such a person has, the more freely legend can develop. In the limiting case, where there is no person, legend, now called myth, can develop without any such restraint. And since you are proposing a person with a minimal footprint, I would suggest that the 30-70 year argument only provides a minimal distinction between the two scenarios (HJ and MJ).

Gerard Stafleu

KrisK10

Exactly. Their point is that such a comprehensive mythofication was unbelievable and they attempt to support it by pointing to examples which are not as comprehensive. However, the Alexander the Great literature is I think a dangerously close approximation of the same phenomena and the Christian literature is plausibly an exception for the reason I noted -- Jesus was not historically significant during his lifetime or in the century after to anyone but those that thought of him as a God; therefore it makes sense that we don't have any corrective records like there was for Alexander the Great. How often do historians investigate someone who was not famous in their time or shortly after? I'd say rarely. It is in these cases that the historical core can be easily lost. Sherwin-White's incredulousness about a legendized Christian literature seems to miss this point.

Kris

KrisK10

Well said and I agree. Jesus had minimal historical footprint and so it makes sense that there would be no accurate historical records to correct the legendary ones.

Kris

Toto

The non-mythical works on Alexander were not written to counter the fictionalized works. I think you are dealing with two parallel trends: there are historians who try to reconstruct what happened (more or less) and story tellers who want to create a good story and mythologize their hero. I suspect that most of the ancients would have accepted these as two different efforts and not try to fact check the mythology.

I don't think that Sherwin-White thought that he was establishing a rule of history. I don't think he actually thought through the question at all.

KrisK10

I didn't mean to imply that that is why they were written. I just meant that that is the effect they have when later historians try to figure out what really happened.


I think he thought he was. In fact, I think he thought he was just stating in more precise terms what was already generally accepted.

Now that I agree with.

Kris