aa5874

Again, your post is just ridiculous and blatantly erroneous.

My position is that gMark is a MYTH FABLE about a Ghost from Nazareth.

Look at Mark 1

In gMark, It was the same Jesus from Nazareth that WALKED on the SEA, TRANSFIGURED and resurrected on the third day.

I can ONLY accept gMark as a MYTH FABLE about a Ghost from Nazareth.

HJers are attempting to use MYTH FABLES as historical sources for "historical Jesus of Nazareth" AFTER discrediting the very same Gospels.

It is HJers who are ABSURD. They REJECT many parts of the Markan story and still BELIEVE Jesus was a man from Nazareth using the very discredited gMark.

jakejonesiv

Hi AA,

So what? I am not a HJ'er, so your arguments against them are worthless against me. Skeptical scholars have rejected the supernatural elements of the gospels for a long time. You harp on this like you have find some grand new truth when you are in fact merely repeating the obvious.

But at least you have admitted in your own words that the mythical GHOST was said to have came from Nazareth in GMark.

So why Nazareth? Why not Capernuam or some other location? Aren't you the least bit interested in going beyond your "baby stuff" and investigating how the fictions in the gospels were constructed?

Jake Jones IV

jakejonesiv

Hi AA,

I thought you said "Paul" was a liar, so why do you keep quoting him?

Jake

TedM

If this text is talking about a charge that Christians are foolish because they worship only man who was crucified (as opposed to a divine spirit who was crucified by demons that didn't recognize him), that would be more supportive for Doherty, but as you make clear this focus is on the connection between Christian wickedness and a wicked founder, which the writer rejects.

I am not sure what Doherty is seeing here. Does the context around this passage or elsewhere in Minucius' article support his rather odd interpretation here?

TedM

George I agree it is a major point to consider. Thanks for sharing.

aa5874

I am SHOWING you the LIES of "Paul".

Where are the LIES of "Paul "found?

They are FOUND in the Pauline writings.

This is so basic.

LOOK at a LIE in 1Co 15

I WANT people to SEE that the Pauline writer was a LIAR. The dead RISE NOT.

EarlDoherty

I don’t see how you think this gets you out of trouble, Don. Of course the pagan in MF is making it clear that the charge is that Christians are wicked because they worship a wicked man. But that’s not the sum total of your “prima facie” reading claim. It’s only the lead-in. Your procedure is to impose another element and make that a part of your case for a different understanding of the passage.

The text says, and says only, that Octavius, the Christian, ridicules this accusation (like he does all the others) by saying that it’s ridiculous because who would worship a wicked man, a crucified criminal, who would put their trust in a dead mortal? (Good question, that.) Any reasonable prima facie reading of such a response would be to acknowledge that Octavius is ridiculing the accusation that Christians do indeed worship a crucified criminal, just as he has ridiculed the idea that they worship the head of an ass or the genitals of their priests or sacrifice children. Is that, then, your prima facie reading, Don? Are you admitting that? Fine. Considering that on this thread you have been championing the acceptance of your view of the prima facie reading of various passages, I guess you agree with me. Minucius Felix is a Christian (of some type, which opens up a whole other front for discussion which I did in my book) who heaps scorn on the idea that Christians worship a wicked and crucified criminal.

Of course, I realize that you acknowledge no such thing. What you have done, here and in the past, is to force Octavius’ words into containing an implication of the opposite. It’s ridiculous to think that we would worship a wicked man, but in this case the man wasn’t wicked and so it’s OK. It’s ridiculous to think that we would put our trust in salvation in a mortal, but in this case the man wasn’t a mortal, so it’s OK.

If you can show anything in the text, any slightest of implications no matter how remote, any logical inferences that do not simply import such ideas from elsewhere (and please don’t force me to demolish your misuse of Tertullian yet again!), that the ideas in italics above are anything but your own and countless past exegetical inventions to desperately try to rescue this document for orthodoxy, please produce it. Never mind all the question-begging and red herrings.

Yes, the first part of this is quite clear. Your interpretation of the Latin is entirely legitimate. It would be equivalent to a modern accusation that some sect worships the likes of Ted Bundy or John Wayne Gacy. It’s when you get to the second part that you, even here, start to introduce implications which cannot be divined from the Latin text. You have phrased it as though Octavius is implying that the man was not “actually” evil. Well, “actually” is not in the Latin text, nor anything like the implication that you are trying to sneak in with it. Such a response is NOT “clear.” It is your (and others') imposition in order to supply something which, as I said, Felix could have made abundantly “clear” but does not, rather conveying precisely the opposite.

What you are claiming for this one accusation would be equivalent to claiming that in regard to his responses to the other accusations he must be implying that, no we don't worship the head of an ass but rather the image of Jesus' head, or no we don't worship the genitals of our priests but rather the knees on which they pray for us, or no we don't eat the bodies of sacrificed children but only bread representing the body of Christ. Are you going to suggest that these implications are contained in the text as well? Things like this an orthodox Christian might have countered with (more than one scholar has lamented that he did not), but Felix failed to do so, any more than he countered with the objection that the crucified man was neither a criminal nor a mortal. None of them are found or implied in the text. For all the accusations equally, he simply condemned them.

So let’s stop this eternal dancing around the issue. The “prima facie” reading of Minucius Felix is that Octavius condemns the idea that Christians worship a crucified man to the same extent that he condemns the ideas that they worship an ass, priests’ genitals and eat sacrificed children. And a literary-critical analysis of the entire passage, as I have provided in my Appendix 10 of Jesus: Neither God Nor Man, demonstrates this beyond the shadow of a doubt.

Hopefully, this posting will answer Ted's more recent one on the subject. I see nothing "odd" in the above interpretation of the text.

Earl Doherty

aa5874

I have NO obligation to INVENT any story about Jesus. I can only SHOW you what is WRITTEN in the NT Canon.

Can you change any part of Plutarch's "Romulus"?

NO.

Can you change any part of Homer's ILIAD?

NO.

In the NT CANON we have FOUR MYTH FABLES about the Child of a Ghost born in Bethlehem and did virtually NOTHING in Nazareth for 30 years.

I have NO INTENTION or OBLIGATION to believe any part of the Jesus story is about historical events nor do I have any OBLIGATION to PRESUME that certain parts are history WITHOUT any credible corroborative historical sources of antiquity..

None of the authors even claimed that they were writing history and non-apologetic sources do NOT record any character called Jesus of Nazareth.

By the way, I am not an HJer and it is useless arguing against MYTH Jesus unless you have SOURCES of antiquity to contradict.

MYTH JESUS is the ANSWER.

TedM

Earl, isn't the author simply rejecting the idea that Christians worshipped heads of asses, genitals of priests, and a wicked man who was crucified? IF that is the case, then where is the argument for a MJ here?

jakejonesiv

Hi AA,

Which four myth fables "myth fables" mention Jesus being a child of a Ghost?

Here are two texts that can be construed to indicate that Jesus was the child of the Holy Ghost.
http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/...35&version=WYC

I need two more to get to four.

Jake


Jake