Doug Shaver

Idiosyncratic writing does not offend me in itself. Your contempt for your readers, however, is totally offensive.

Why his rather than anyone else's?

The question is whether we have a good reason to believe it happened. A consensus among academics might be a good enough reason, or it might not.

OK, except for one quibble. We're not explaining away any evidence of a historical Jesus. We are arguing that it is not actually evidence for Paul's believing in a historical Jesus, but rather evidence of his believing something else.

No, Doherty says nothing of the sort.

Maybe they did. How would you know one way or the other?

Who would have preserved the documents in which those conflicts were recorded?

Until it is proved that the acceptance was in fact rapid, there is nothing to explain.

gnosis92

i :love: my readers. txtspk is very popular among teens these days, due 2 cell phones IM. other iidb posters use imo imho lol mj ot etc
if I can edit the original post I'll do so 4u. I posted about odes of solomon without response

We don't have to use Ehrman's definition but it's what works for me. Anything is possible. MJ and HJ are both possible. Let me say this, I think MJ is certainly possible. Of course, HJ is also possible. It's also possible a UFO crashed in Roswell and that Shakespeare didn't author his plays. I'm mostly concerned with what is probable. What probably happened. I would be willing to accept MJ over HJ if MJ is substantially more probable than HJ. I don't see any reason to dispense with the criteria of dissimilarity a priori.

I was of the understanding that Mark was what transitioned the original MJ to HJ, and that this happened to the extent that we have no records of the original MJ other than the small select documents Doherty offers into evidence (which is ambigous to say the least) i.e Pauline epistles, Hebrews, Revelation, Odes of Solomon, etc. This transition from MJ to HJ appears to have been rapid. If the MJ theory is correct, and Paul, the churches he established, and all his friends and people he identify by name, spreading the gospel (i.e junia) were all originally MJ's, somehow this disappeared by the second century where the early Church fathers were HJ, and anti-X figures like Celsus and Pliny and Tacitus may have met Christians (or got their information independent of Christians which would be even more problematic for MJ'ers) who were HJ'ers. Paul and his disciples and the people he converted and befriended and identified by name, were widely spreading the MJ gospel as early as 40-50CE, but by around 100-120CE the records are only of HJ.

On the "human sounding passages" "born of a woman, born of the seed of David, in the days of his sarca" I suppose Doherty's account could be correct, that they are reconstructions of OT and midrash, but they could also be understood in light of a HJ who lived and died a decade or two earlier.

If the original MJ'er of Paul, and the churches Paul himself established in Corinth, Phillipi, Galatia, and in Rome, were all MJ'ers, they had several decades to entrench themselves in the early Christian movement, and spread their MJ ideas widely, but once Mark and its derivatives (LUke, Matthew, John) were published, they disappeared without a murmer by second century apostles, heretics (i.e Marcion, Valentinius) and anti-X (i.e Celsus).

Doherty and other MJ identify Mark as being the first to transform the original MJ to HJ.

On the other hand, if Paul's immediate audience understood the human sounding passages in light of a HJ, it would explain the success of Mark and other HJ gospels acceptance in the first and second century.

The author of Acts knew of Paul as preaching a HJ, not MJ, and the author probably wrote 30-50 years after Paul died, so I would describe the transition of MJ to HJ to be rapid, esp since the author of Acts doesn't make any mention of Paul as an MJ but as a HJ.

gnosis92

I see this as a separate issue from my argument, that if MJ were true MJ'ers had almost a century to entrench themselves among the early Xians and set the course for the movement that was mystical, or a mystery religion like Mithra, rather than "historical".

I say separate b/c it's entirely possible that Paul did have detailed knowledge of Jesus, and he shared this orally, there are hints of this w/ "words of the lord" and his "silence" on MJ details are the result of Paul responding to very specific issues raised by the occasion of his letter (i.e in 1 Corinthians, he was asked about the Lord's supper so he provided HJ detail his reader would have understood, in explaining why it was a solemn moment). Since Paul believed Jesus was coming at any moment, and his theology did not require Jesus teachings, but only the resurrection, and evidentally Paul was a pharisee who believed in apocalpticism and resurrection, there would not be a need for HJ details in his letters in many instances. Acts does present Paul preaching orally of a HJ, not MJ, and its author does not seem to know of Paul or early Xians as MJ.

Toto

Those small select documents are pretty much what we have of early Christianity.

I don't think that anyone has asserted that Mark invented the idea of a HJ. A historical character gradually developed out of the theological requirement that the Savior be fleshy as well as divine. Mark wrote what might have been an allegorical tale. Later, Christians who wanted to tie their authority in the church to a historical founder interpreted Mark as history.

The second century was a period of ideological disputes within the early Christian church. There were a variety of heresies, and we don't know that we have a record of all of them. What is now orthodoxy was not established until close to the end of the second century, and did not fully triumph until the 3rd.

That doesnt' sound like a rapid change to me - there is over a century between Paul and Irenaeus, the great heresy hunter. That century included the Jewish War, the destruction of the Temple, the Bar Kochba rebellion, and other interesting times.

We have no record of Mark being widespread in 100-120.

You still have not established when Mark was "published" or became widespread. If you read Doherty, he finds the JM still influencing writings in the mid-2nd century.

Please stop repeating this. It is not true.

The author of Acts was also the author of the gospel of Luke, which was based on Mark. The Saul/Paul figure in Acts has little to do with the author of the Epistles.

Toto

Yes, that is separate from your argument. But if you are going to construct grand theories of Christian origins, you need to be aware of the limitations in your data. At least be aware that Acts is not generally a reliable historical source, especially for the content of Paul's preaching.

And be aware that the Gnostics lost their fight with the orthodox. People have argued here over the question of whether the Gnostics included people who could be considered Jesus Mythicists, but at least there was not unanimity in the first century.

Toto

I'm not sure what you are saying here. There is respectable academic opinion that the epistle to the Romans was originally written as a free standing essay or possibly to the Ephsesians.

Interpolations in the Pauline Epistles by William O. Walker Jr.. The argument has been developed by people with more Greek than I have.

Using Occam's Razor is a cop out. We know that the copies we have of anciend documents were produced by generations of scribes. Does assuming a scribe who made an interpolated copy versus a scribe who copied the document without interpolations involve any more agents?

If you try to introduce a document in a court of law, you bear the burden of proving that it is accurate and without forged parts. Why should Biblical scholars get away with merely asserting that their documents are pure?

Rick Sumner

I don't see how this is relevant, without showing that said church holds the positions you need to have originally existed.

Which means nothing. I didn't say that the argument couldn't be developed. Though, as an aside, if you don't know Greek, how do you know an argument based on it is right? It seems that assessing the strength of the argument is out of your range.

We can assume interpolations all you like. You aren't suggesting simply that interpolations exist. You are suggesting that specific interpolations exist, and suggesting that someone who thinks otherwise owns the burden of proof.

If you think that the application of Occam's Razor is a "cop out" here, it can only be because you don't understand how it works. You don't need a random entity who offered undefined interpolations, you need a specific entity, who offered specific interpolations. You can't just suggest that such an entity exists, and then expect gnosis92 to prove he doesn't. The onus is on you to show that such an entity does exist.

Bear in mind again that the question isn't whether or not such an argument can be formulated, it's who owns the burden of proof. It's telling that nobody publishes papers sharing your opinion. Nobody publishes a paper saying "If this is interpolated, so and so is wrong, so he needs to prove it isn't." It is, again, thoroughly counter-intuitive.

To illustrate this, one need only look at the scholar you cited above. While I can't access Walker's book at present, I can access his paper in CBQ 50, Text-Critical Evidence for Interpolations in the Letters of Paul. He does not agree with your assertions about who owns the burden of proof when suggesting specific interpolations. See especially pps 624 on, which lays out specific criteria for identifying specific interpolations using text-critical evidence. If you can't access the paper, I can pass it on.

First of all, it's not just Biblical scholars, it's any area of ancient history. You couldn't just raise the possibility of interpolation in Herodotus, and then ask the one lobbying authenticity to prove that parts aren't interpolated either.

Secondly, you might note that this isn't a court of law. That it, in fact, has nothing to do with a court of law. That, in fact, because a court of law has different aims, dealing with different subject matter, it also has different rules of evidence.

Thirdly, you aren't simply suggesting that the document has interpolations, you are suggesting that it has specific interpolations at specific parts and then asking gnosis92 to prove it doesn't. Tell me Toto, how well would that stand up in a court of law?

Finally, nobody asserted that the document was pure. You suggested that specific interpolations might exist, and treated the simple possibility that such interpolations existed as though it was a refutation until gnosis92 shows otherwise.

To reiterate: I am not disputing whether or not you can make an argument. I am not disputing whether or not you can meet the burden of proof. I am disputing who owns the burden of proof. I am disputing whether gnosis92 is obligated to defend every reference against interpolation.

Regards,
Rick Sumner

Toto

I have not said anything about the burden of proof - that's your formulation. The burden of proof is a legal concept, which you yourself say is not really applicable here.

Walker discusses the idea of a burden of proof and where it should lie. He does note that it might seem, given the widespread corruption of Christian documents, that anyone asserting that a passage has not been interpolated should bear the burden of proof on that issue, and he doesn't give any good reasons for rejecting this. He does adopt a compromise position of putting the burden of proof on anyone claiming an interpolation, but making it a fairly easy burden to meet.

I have not put any burden of proof on gnosis92. But he is claiming that he is interested in what is most likely. If he is going to use that standard, he has to consider the likelihood of interpolations as part of his calculation.

gnosis92

Well thanks :wave:

gnosis92

It's just as likely that there were many HJ documents are lost, that Q was always understood to speak of an HJ, that the early Xians, including the earliest to write about Paul, Acts and the forged letters (titus, timothy) to understood Paul as writing of an HJ.

If the gospels were even later than you suggest, it makes it all the more remarkable that when they are attested, that MJ under Paul had that much more time to establish and entrench themselves.

We know from experience about how religious institutions are created and perpetuate themselves, and given the original Xians had more than a 100 years b4 HJ gospels were written to spread their message, that they disappeared rather rapidly in the second century does not seem historically probable.

re: http://pages.ca.inter.net/~oblio/puzzle8.htm

"All the Gospels derive their basic story of Jesus of Nazareth from a single source: whoever produced the first version of Mark. That Matthew and Luke are reworkings of Mark with extra, mostly teaching, material added is now an almost universal scholarly conclusion, while many also consider that John has drawn his framework for Jesus’ ministry and death from a Synoptic source as well. We thus have a Christian movement spanning half the empire and a full century which nevertheless has managed to produce only one version of the events that are supposed to lie at its inception."

http://pages.ca.inter.net/~oblio/puzzle12.htm

"As the midrashic nature of the Gospels was lost sight of by later generations of gentile Christians, the second century saw the gradual adoption of the Gospel Jesus as an historical figure, motivated by political considerations in the struggle to establish orthodoxy and a central power amid the profusion of early Christian sects and beliefs. Only with Ignatius of Antioch, just after the start of the second century, do we see the first expression in Christian (non-Gospel) writings of a belief that Jesus had lived and died under Pilate, and only toward the middle of that century do we find any familiarity in the wider Christian world with written Gospels and their acceptance as historical accounts. "

If the Gospels were written say 120 and did not achieve popularity and wide circulation until 150, that Iraneous and Polycarp and Marcion and gnostic authors of GJudas seemed to only speak of X as a HJ not as a MJ, in comparison to a full century or more of competing claims by Paul and the alleged MJ counter-claims, seems to me to be pretty rapid adoption of HJ and disappearance of MJ.