Toto

Michael Grant is dead, and his simple assertion that the gospels could be treated as history seems to have been part of his popular writing, not a scholarly opinion. Can you find a living historian who thinks that there is history in Mark?

And of course, showing that there is a literary allusion does not prove that the text is not historical, but it removes any basis for assuming that it is historical. That leaves you with no evidence of history.

Solitary Man

Yes, quite a few. James Crossley, Martin Pickup, Michael Vines, Steve Mason... As I said, which ones do not think that there is any history in Mark? As far as I know, it's only the Dutch Radicals and the Jesus Mythers.

Ben C Smith

Well, sure, but I was actually contrasting this kind of history, whatever you want to call it, with biography.

I suggest we start a long, tedious thread on the topic, in which we investigate the matter from every possible angle, argue from obscure Greek and Latin morphemes, and exchange insults whose meanings are apparent only to the initiated.

Ben.

schilling.klaus

This proves that most decent, trustworthy scholars state that there's no history in Mark's gospel, as opposed to ignoble naivelings who believe in Mark's gospel holding any water as history.

Klaus Schilling

CountryPreacher

If you recall I quoted Armstrong as saying that "Mark's Gospel, which was the earliest is usually regarded as the most reliable." I only suggest that when Matt and Luke also use either Mark or a document used by Mark re. the man Jesus, that it supports my thesis that Jesus was an actual person in history. Just because Matt and Luke contradict Mark on other points is not a negation of my thesis. The case is made for just the opposite. On the central point that there is a man called Jesus they agree, but the disagreement on other points proves that there was no underlying conspiracy, and for your point to have any validity there must be a conspiracy.

Then - Paul is contemporary to Mark in time of writing. And Paul is clearly anti the early church in Jerusalem. For your "conspiracy theory" (I assign it as such as I believe for your position to be valid, you must have the NT be a conspiracy) to hold, Paul needs to be in theological agreement with Peter and James, not contrary to them, and of course that is not the case.

Then Peter writes about the same time as Mark as well. Archobald Hunter (Formen Professor of divinity and Biblical Criticism, King's College, Aberdeen University) states that Peter is to be dated about A.D. 67 He goes on to make the point that "In the First Epistle of Peter we seem to be in touch with primitive Christianity. The letter does not read like a document emanating from the end of the first century or the beginning of the second. Alike in its doctrine and in its church organization, it shows no sign of the later ecclesiastical developments; rather, it reminds us of the faith and practice of the earliest church as portrayed in the opening chapters of the Acts of the Apostles."

The books of Peter and Paul are contemporary to Mark, but not like Mark in style or tone, but but still supportive in the historical confirmation of a man called Jesus.

I suggest that any objective study of the historical nature of "The Jesus of History" can reach no other position that in the affirmative.

CountryPreacher

I just did as you asked. Please reference that post as to your need for me "to contextualize the gospels as being written in a time when the writers could get the information they deal with from contemporary sources. Note I only use Mark with validation from Paul and Peter.

Toto

Even if Matt and Luke thought that Mark was history, it doesn't show that Mark thought his story was history. And it doesn't take a conspiracy theory to produce an invented story accepted as fact - it happens all the time.

Most scholars date Paul's writing to around 50-60 CE, and Mark wrote between 70 and 140 CE. You might think that this is sort of contemporary, but Paul is generally assumed to have written before the fall of the Temple, and Mark afterwards.

Not clear how this follows.

Cite? EarlyChristianWritings dates 1 Peter to between 80-110 CE, and cites reputable scholars who note that the letter is unlikely to have been written by St. Peter, as it is in cultured Greek.

I suggest that your evidence is not that good, and you are overstating your case.

Toto

Crossly, Pickup, and Vines are listed as professors of religion or Biblical studies, not history. I do not recall Steve Mason offering an opinion on the historical value of Mark. In face, he seemed relieved that he could identify the shorter reference to (James the brother of) Jesus as establishing the existence of the HJ.

On the other hand, Dennis MacDonald sees Mark as a literary creation drawing on Homer, but still thinks there was a historical Jesus. Does he see any history in Mark? It's not apparent. Burton Mack, another scholar who is not a mythicist, does not seem to find any history in Mark. He notes in Christian Myth: Origins, Logic, and Legacy

spin

Cute, but no you didn't. (See below.)

Your refusal to refer to the archives here while pointing others to secondary materials of your own that are not up to date does not display good faith.

Awful historical methodology that way. You cannot contextualize either Paul or Peter in history, so what you are doing might be like comparing "La Morte d'Arthur" with "The Sword and the Stone" or "Monty Python and the Holy Grail". You have no way of knowing.

The context you need is a stable one, such as seen in mainstream Roman and Greek historical studies. You contextualize with known materials. Tacitus makes sense to us because we can confront extremely many of his facts with known data. We can see the building that Claudius did; we can use the coins that Tiberius minted; we have statues of Augustus and his family. We have a very rich nexus of datable information that makes dealing with any written source relatively easy. Josephus becomes a much harder source to use because any context for him is far less rich. Archaeology goes a long way to give him credibility and working predictively from his information has led, for example, to his vindication with regard to the siege of Masada and the location of the Roman camps around it. We can cross-references his content with coins and statues, but naturally the cultural remains are sparse in comparison to Rome and the literary remains are wanting.

This reflects the sort of problems historians are facing trying to make sense of the materials, yet here are you using "Mark with validation from Paul and Peter" with gay abandon. You must see the paucity in your methodology, when you know nothing independently about any of your sources.

Who is Paul as a source? Do we bring in another undated uncontextualized work Acts to answer that question? We just take a further step into the swamp. Who is Peter as a source? Surely you can see the problem you face.

We work from what we already know to incorporate knowledge from "new" sources. That way you build on a firm basis. You don't use unknowns as a knowledge base. You build a house on a (known) solid foundation, otherwise the house may not stand. House-builders don't take risks.


spin

CountryPreacher

Do you come by such an ignorant conclusion by accident, or do you have to work at such abject stupidity?