yalla

I'm not home so I'm witing this rather imprecisely, no references to book/chapter/verses, but I think most here will recognise the references.

I think it is Price who notes that "Mark" denigrates the disciples as not understanding the 'reality' of JC, his actions and mission.

Prices suggests that this at least partly a literary device to allow the disciples to ask, in their ignorance, questions of JC that are in reality to allow JC to explain answers to the readers.

They are the 'straight' men in a hero/sidekick duo.

So we have the disciples being portrayed in a poor light for literary purposes not because the incidents wre necessarily real and historical.

It could be claimed, via the criterion of embarrassment, that such incidents are real and historical because they denigrate the disciples, one disciple Peter? is called 'spawn of satan, are therefore embarassing and must be real. But that would ignore the literary function of the stories.

Again Price, I reckon it was him, points out that in later gospels Peter comes more front and centre, there are stories where earlier faux pas were made by unnamed disciples but named, often Pete, in later gospels.

He sees this, despite being embarassing to the image of the disciple, as being the result of sectarianism within the broad Christian movement, the writer[s] were from a non-apostolic group. Its political writing in these examples, not history.

Still later, and from memory I think we are into "Luke' by now, he writes that that author sees it necessary to 'reclaim' the image of the discipes as an authorative bridge between the time of JC and the later church[es]. Apostolic succession.

In each of these cases we are seeing incidents change in their purpose for ploemic/propaganda purposes, historicity is irrelevant, the message is in the politics.
Is it embarassing that 2 of the disciples are portrayed as ambitious and wanting to be in the inner circle in heaven and are castigated by JC for such?

If some, whoever, whenever, consider that to be embarrassing, at least for the image of the disciples the 2 in particular, does that may the story historical?

Some apparently thought so because in a later gospel the words of the 2 are instead laid at the feet of their mother.

Which story, if either, is true?

Of what help is the criterion of embarrassment in trying to decide such?

aa5874

So, it was your intuition and not the criterion of embarrassment that made you switch position. And you are even claiming that you have no solid evidence for your intuition.

Now, how can you claim that the words of Jesus as written was actually spoken by Jesus, when it could have been the words of the author himself?

The criterion of embarrassment cannot help you if the Jesus story was total fiction, that is, if the story was fabricated by an unknown writer who made up the story about the so-called prophecy.

You should realise that your intuition has no truth value or historical validity without evidence.

Solo

Read the argument again: it presents a demonstrably invalid inference of ownership. Premise 1 defines a "working wagon" as one which has wheels. One may not extend that definition to imply either restricted notion of ownership (admitting only a sole owner) or, absolute freedom from claims or liens on the vehicle by other parties. Therefore Jacob "owning" a wagon in a working condition does not in any way guarantee that Jacob also "owns" a wheel on that wagon.

Jiri

Toto

I think that this and some of your other objections are a bit trivial. People often use shorthand references to well known concepts. Of course, Richard meant the "myth that Attis was castrated."

Another quibble over something that makes no difference.

To be even more precise, let's call the story/report of Attis' castration a factoid*, just to separate it out from the surrounding parts that may be added on.

So, a factoid is either true or not, and if it is not, someone at some time in history invented it. Presumably, it has survived because now it is believed to be true, but we are concerned about whether there is a historical core of truth to that factoid.

The point of Richard's exercise here is to separate out the various strands of logic and illogic that underly the imprecise search for the historical Jesus. If this criterion means nothing on its own, it does not add anything to the other criteria. And if all the criteria considered separately mean nothing, they add up to nothing.

I think that is the essence of the Criteria of Embarrassment. I think that the people who use it just do not speak very clearly. Part of this exercise is forcing some clarity on the process. The theologians and historians who write about the search for the historical Jesus can write very well, and you can get caught up in the flow of their words and think you understand something. But you need to analyze it logically.

Remember, this is an exercise.

* this is not the original meaning of factoid, it has come to be used to mean an isolated claim of fact.

Toto

But this is also a problem with using the criterion of embarrassment for any part of the gospel stories, including the crucifixion, is it not?

Toto

Pete vs Jeffrey split

Toto

Is this quibble the best you can do?

ApostateAbe

It is intuition grounded in the observation that people tell lies to make themselves look good, not to make themselves look bad. You say that the criterion of embarrassment can not help me if the Jesus story is total fiction. I don't think so. The criterion can help me arrive at that conclusion if there is almost nothing embarrassing to the authors contained in their fiction. There is profoundly embarrassing material in the gospels, so it is more difficult for me to draw the conclusion that the Jesus story is entirely fiction. But that argument can be trumped by other evidence.

Toto

dispute over meaning of "report" split

Johnny Skeptic

Aren't many religious writings probably the result of innocent but inaccurate revelations, not lying? Today, many Charismatics have innocent but inaccurate revelations.