Jeffrey Gibson

I believe the question was whether you believed that there was a cathedral in York in the 300s. Do you know or not?

Well, where specifically -- and how diligently -- have you looked? What is the nature and extent of your research on Ossius and Nicea? What have you actually read of the primary evidence on the Council -- or for that matter -- the ancient accounts of it?

Jeffrey

Didymus

I took some time, Pete. What's the main point you're trying to make with this?

Ddms

gentleexit

Very true, his theory is too simple to be plausible. But Pete's "cut to the chase" does expose conventional wisdom's unsteady ground.

Take one. Why did Constantine wait until 324 and a move east to start building basilicas? If he was a "Christian" from 312, thanks to that vision over Rome? It's a valid question. Pete has a simple answer. The same simple answer he has for four whole centuries. But this unimpressive answer doesn't invalidate the question or make it uninteresting.

(On this one, I see an enthusiasm that soared with that move east. That Nicea et al cleared up a muddle of beliefs and left Constantine with ten or so years of "clarity" in which he built and promoted. The Roman vision is a later day composition. I have no direct evidence for this - no "Oh how unmuddled I am now" statement. I just find it plausible based on reading his words and of the lack of building work before 324.)

spin

York was where his father's troops were stationed. His father died, the troops declared for him.

This explains why his coins featured Sol Invictus up to around 315 CE.

You didn't look at any of the links I provided in my previous post to you. Please do so.

According to Athanasius (who was present at Nicaea), History of the Arians 42, Ossius

... is the president of Councils, and his letters are everywhere attended to. He it was who put forth the Nicene Confession, and proclaimed everywhere that the Arians were heretics.

spin

spin

Pete's "cut to the waffle", is more like it.

I wouldn't be convinced about anything regarding Constantine's conversion. I don't know when or if it really happened. As I pointed out to avi his coins featured Sol Invictus until around 315 CE.

Could be, but I'm not that interested in Constantine. I'm more interested in less crap on the forum. That would be helped by eliminating Eusebian Christogenesis from the table as a non-starter and getting back to things we should be dealing with in our understanding of the development of the earliest christianity.


spin

gentleexit

Only thing I'd add is that "Pete" topics tend to be the only ones that discuss the fourth century which is when most Christianity happened. The early early stuff (Oh is this Paul letter real? Is Jesus real? Let's look at Tacitus again) gets all the play otherwise. And talking about threadbare, tired and uninteresting ...

spin

There are lots of things to deal with, but it requires a wider perspective as to the options. I'm happy with Tacitus (1. it's historically of little use, as the text was written in the 2nd c.; 2. it's a forgery). I don't think there is enough evidence to say whether Jesus existed or not. The lines have been drawn as to which letters were Pauline. What needs to be dealt with is how much of each of those remaining letters is Pauline and not interpolation. What is the real relationship between the messianism of John the Baptist and the christian religion? How exactly were the gospels written and over what time frame? What can we know of the earliest christians? What were the real relations between christians and Jews? Was christianity born in the diaspora? Why does Mark seem to have been written for a Roman audience and why are the Aramaic fragments of so little value? There are lots of juicy questions out there that need work.


spin

mountainman

Dear ddms,

Originally it was a response to Transient's questions:
Behind the scenes in antiquity we have an historical figure Apollonius of Tyana who appears to have a good "index of historicity", especially following the discovery of monumental evidence in his name. He was an author.

Eusebius quotes Apollonius as an authority on the nature of the unnecessary nature of sacrifices of any kind (to any god). In fact, I think the Eusebian quote is the longest extant preserved quote from Apollonius. Eusebius is also attributed authorship of the text "Against Hierocles" which is a polemical attack on the question of the divinity of the sage and philosopher and author Apollonius of Tyana, in many books. A number of academics have already seen a great parallel between a number of the details of the life of Apollonius and the "life" of Paul.

It would appear that we have a regime who were vigorously writing the legitimacy of Apollonius of Tyana out of the literature, while at the very same time we have a program of destruction from the same regime of the Hellenistic temples (to Asclepius and Apollo for example) with which Apollonius was purportedly associated, such as the large temple at Aegae.

An examination of the history of the book "The Life of Apollonius of Tyana" by Philostratus c.216 CE is interesting. The book could never be published on its own for some time because for some reason the publishes decided, for hundreds of years, to preface the work with the polemic of Eusebius against Apollonius. In this way, the antidote of Eusebius was always applied first to the pure poison of Philostratus. The controversy between the two figures of Jesus and Apollonius was magnified in the fourth century.

My claim is that Apollonius was well known in the first four centuries, but that Jesus was unknown until the fourth century. The Life of Apollonius of Tyana does not mention jesus, or christians, or anything remotely like the canon in the early third century because Jesus and His State Monotheistic Religion was not yet invented. In real life Apollonius preaches philosophy and morality to a succcession of Roman emperors, and escapes their custody. Constantine does not want such a philosophical Hellenistic (Pythagorean) hero figure running rampant in the empire - even in the memory of literature, so he fabricates the canon which has the new hero Jesus (a fictive Jewish sage) detained in custody and executed. Constantine wanted to deal with a dead god who could never rise any higher in the minds of the civilians in Constantine's state autocracy.

Other people who may have provided material for the fabrication of the canon 312 to 324 CE were the followers of Mani, then regarded as political heretics for some decades. The writings of Mani were perhaps also available, alongside the writings of Apollonius of Tyana in one or more of the libraries in Rome c.312 CE. So to summarise, I put forward the name of Apollonius of Tyana to the question "If Jesus did not exist then who did, and how did the stories start?"


Best wishes,


Pete

mountainman

Dear spin,

Turn the coin you are reading over. Heads and tails. Have you ever played two-up? How exactly were the NT apochyphal gospels written and over what time frame? My thesis provides an account of not only how and when the NT canon was written, but who authored it. My thesis also provides an account of how, when and who wrote the other side of the "christian literature coin" which we today call the new testament apochrypha. Who shoved "The Acts of Pilate" up Constantine's rear end in the early fourth century?

I hardly need to state that my detractors who subscribe to the mainstream series of theories subscribe to the following. The NT canon was written by unknown authors in an unknown century (which might be the second). The NT non canonical literature was written by unknown authors in unknown centuries between the second and the fifth century. What sort of monstrous ambiguity is this mainstream theory, especially in view of the utter lack of archaeological anchors before the fourth century.


They were transcendental with respect to history.

Best wishes,


Pete

mountainman

Dear gentleexit and spin,

Eusebius represents "An attempt to traverse as it were a lonely and untrodden path" of the earliest christianity. What if the path is indeed untroden and fictional? Dont you think its about time to at least explore the option of conducting a systematic review of the evidence on the assumption that its all bullshit? Nobody had the opportunity of answering back to Constantine or to seriously question his legitimacy. When Constantine died, the new state monotheistic Roman religion was already too powerful to be disbanded. The pagan priesthood was scattered and half-dead. Basilcas now stood where their ancient and reverred temples to Asclepius and Apollo once stood. Academic scholars have argued up and down this lonely and untrodden path (ie: Eusebius' "Christian history") for centuries. The only thing that is becoming clearer is the ever-increasing amount of fourth century forgeries.

Best wishes,


Pete