Freethought & Rationalism Archive

aa5874 · 11-24-2008, 08:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by CMc

Quote:

Originally Posted by aa5874

Well, if you do not use the NT as evidence for Jesus, it is all over. There is no other information for Jesus except for forgeries.

The information in Josephus about Jesus is similar to that found in the NT, where a character is raised from the dead after three days, so if you find the NT is not evidence for Jesus, then the forged TF is of no use.

Josephus presented John the Baptist as a mere human baptising people, who was executed by Herod, but the forged TF presented Jesus as a supernatural entity who did ten thousand wonderful things and rose from the dead.

Christianity is an ambiguous word. A Christian of antiquity could believe in Simon Magus, a magician, according to Justin Martyr. And the word "Christ" predated Jesus by hundreds of years.

The term Christ is based on the Greek for "anointed one" which refers to the Hebrew "Messiah" which was foretold in the OT. The concept had been around for centuries before it was attached to the myth of Jesus.
I conceded initially that the Josephus TF was probably not authentic. The content of the NT would not qualify as evidence for historicity of Jesus. The existence of the NT and the beliefs it contains are evidence for the existence and nature of Christianity itself and for the myth of Jesus. My opinion is that the most plausible origin for Christianity and the myth of Jesus is simply to extrapolate back from the myth to the origin of the myth which would be a charismatic preacher, with some the details stripped of their supernatural and messianic trappings being accurate. There would be no way to know which details are accurate.

It is not possible at this time for you to claim that you have the MOST plausible origin of Christianity when your plausibility cannot be tested for its veracity. What you think is most plausible may have never occurred, it may be completely false.

spin · 11-24-2008, 08:31 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by patcleaver

Quote:

Originally Posted by spin

Could you please, seriously, specify exactly which internal evidence?

Why do you reduce a multiple solution problem to only two choices?

Here is a range of choices:

Historical
Mythical
Fictional
Error/misinterpretation-initiated
Dream/fantasy-initiated
Delusion-initiated

spin

I agree with you that all of these are possibilities, but some of them are much more likely than others. I think that there is internal evidence in Mark that makes fiction the most likely alternative.
1) The scenes in Mark are all based on portions of the Jewish Scriptures and there is so much of it that it is difficult to believe that it was not done intentionally.

Once a figure enters a tradition, the telling tends to manipulate the material. What we are interested in is the initial cause: how it got into the tradition.

Quote:

Originally Posted by patcleaver

2) Mark is written (at least partially) in Chiasmus and all known narrative Chiasmus are fiction.

To me the notion of chiasmus has been overdone, including analyses regarding Mark.

Quote:

Originally Posted by patcleaver

3) R. G. Price (Malachi151) lists a lot of other good reasons at http://www.rationalrevolution.net/ar...ospel_mark.htm and I agree with most of them.

By no means was the list meant to be exhaustive. It was just to show that the historicist/mythicist dichotomy was ridiculous.

Quote:

Originally Posted by patcleaver

Also, no matter how much you loath MM, you should have listed Propaganda - it is certainly a lot more likely than history.

I don't loath mountainman. He's just ground this silliness into the ground and can't see that it's dead. New recruits arrive and have no tools for dealing with it. I did a poll two years ago to see what people thought of this stuff then and the vast majority thought it was crap then. What has changed? He's bothered people with it for another two years. He can't see that it has been falsified. He can't see that his protagonist is ill-equipped to be the inventor of a new religion and an enforcer of it. Eusebius is in fact a heretic-lite and he's stuck away in Caesarea. Ossius was Constantine's religion man and he helped ex-communicate Eusebius. So, not only is there no evidence for the theory but there's sufficient evidence against it. And mountainman will continue to trumpet his folly. He's on my ignore list because he doesn't have the tools to do the job and will only waste people's time while he continues to thump the stuff.

spin

patcleaver · 11-24-2008, 08:36 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ben C Smith

Quote:

Originally Posted by patcleaver

The reason that Christian apologists postulate an historical Jesus is that if you accept that there is an historical Jesus, then you will not claim that "Jesus is a myth" or "Jesus never existed" which is the strong case against literal Christianity.

That may be why Christian apologists hold to an HJ. Why, in your opinion, do Christian, Muslim, atheist, and agnostic nonapologists do it?

Ben.

Muslim's believe that Jesus was a Prophet. Historical Jesus is just as important to Muslim apologists as to Christian apologists.

Do you have any evidence that the consensus of Jewish or rationalist or agnostic or atheist apologists are claiming that Jesus is historical.

Do you know of any non-Christian historians, who are aware of the evidence against the historicity of Jesus, who still claim that Jesus is historical.

spamandham · 11-24-2008, 09:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bacht

It seems reasonable to compare Mark with Old Testament narratives like the Elijah/Elisha cycle, which makes it mythical more than historical.

That's not a bad way to look at it, but it might also make sense to compare it to other period hero biographies, as Talbert has done in "What is a Gospel". If we do that, I think it's proper to conclude that pre-existing ideas were probably folded in, which then still allows for (but does not argue strongly for) a historical core. "Fiction" is not a good model. Something like "fan fiction" is closer, where it is not known whether the main character is legendary or mythical.

To me something that is a combination of period hero biography and traditional Jewish mythicism seems most parsimonious. That explains the portions of obvious midrash, the portions of obvious Hellenic origin, and fits what we would expect from Hellenized Jews.

Ben C Smith · 11-24-2008, 09:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by patcleaver

Do you have any evidence that the consensus of Jewish or rationalist or agnostic or atheist apologists are claiming that Jesus is historical.

Please answer the question. If Christian apologists argue for an HJ because their beliefs require one, why do atheist nonapologists argue for an HJ?

Unless it is your view that no atheist nonapologists hold to an HJ, this question ought to be answerable, right?

Quote:

Do you know of any non-Christian historians, who are aware of the evidence against the historicity of Jesus, who still claim that Jesus is historical.

Of course.

Ben.

spamandham · 11-24-2008, 10:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ben C Smith

If Christian apologists argue for an HJ because their beliefs require one, why do atheist nonapologists argue for an HJ?

...it's the "in" thing to do?

I'd actually like to understand this as well.

No Robots · 11-25-2008, 08:04 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by spin

You didn't make any response to this issue, which should show that one of your foundations is probably on sand.

The who, what, when, where and why of the composition of the Gospels as we have them is an utter mystery. However, we can easily see that they are drawn from oral material from the ammé haaretz.

Toto · 11-25-2008, 08:44 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by No Robots

...
The who, what, when, where and why of the composition of the Gospels as we have them is an utter mystery. However, we can easily see that they are drawn from oral material from the ammé haaretz.

The only think that we can easily see is that the gospels were written in Koine Greek and make many literary allusions to the Septuagint. We have no particular indication of oral material

No Robots · 11-25-2008, 08:50 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Toto

The only think that we can easily see is that the gospels were written in Koine Greek and make many literary allusions to the Septuagint. We have no particular indication of oral material

In order to adequately undertake literary analysis, you have to examine the documents as a whole and within their entire context. Viewed in this way, the Gospels as we have them are indisputably drawn from oral material originating with the ammé haaretz.

Toto · 11-25-2008, 08:57 AM

You just claimed that the context is a mystery, so what do you know about the context?

View Poll Results: What do you think the probability of a historical Jesus is?
100% - I have complete faith that Jesus of Nazareth was a real person.	8	6.15%
80-100%	10	7.69%
60-80%	15	11.54%
40-60%	22	16.92%
20-40%	17	13.08%
0-20%	37	28.46%
o% - I have complete faith that Jesus of Nazareth was not a real person,	21	16.15%
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11-25-2008, 08:57 AM	#80
Toto Contributor Join Date: Jun 2000 Location: Los Angeles area Posts: 40,549	You just claimed that the context is a mystery, so what do you know about the context?

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