Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Clivedurdle · 06-12-2009, 10:27 AM

Michael Wood in In Search of the Dark Ages (or via: amazon.co.uk) comments

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There is no myth in British history, and few in the world, to match the story of King Arthur

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In the eighteenth century Gibbon contented himself with noting that "the severity of the present age is inclined to question the existence of Arthur"

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Macauly in the early nineteenth century thought him "no more worthy of belief than Hercules."

Why has Jesus got a get out of jail free card? Is it because the myth and the dream is so powerful - everlasting life, the conjoining of heaven and earth, the lion laying down with the lamb?

This is not any old myth, this is a Marks and Spencer myth. Apologies to non viewers of British adverts!

Interestingly, Woods, when discussing Boudica, notes that a very wealthy financier who wanted to make loads of money was speculating in early Roman Britain by the name of Seneca.

I wonder if he hit on a story to make his fortune...

Clivedurdle · 06-12-2009, 12:34 PM

Augustus and Jesus
Boris Johnson - the Tory party shadow minister of higher education in his book The Dream of Rome compares them.

He starts p80

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It is time to consider the growth of Roman imperial theology and the extraordinary parallel growth in Christian theology. I hope to show that this last can be seen as a reaction to - and rejection of - the cult of the emperor and the values of Rome.

Let us begin with the coincidences.
No, they aren't entirely coincidences. They can't be

Augustus has Horace and Virgil drawing on themes from Isaiah, Johnson notes the Sibylline oracles are a mixture of Greek and Jewish religious arcana, and Horace and Virgil explicitly break with precedent and ascribe divinity to Augustus.

Augustus is a wonder child, a living Jupiter, a present god on earth.

The Sibyl sees Augustus in the underworld. Virgil's Eclogue - he will free mankind from sin "The goats will come home by themselves with milk filled udders."

Oh and one other thing - Augustus is the son of God.

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Julius Caesar was deified on his death, and from 42 BC onwards his adoptive son was known as Divi Filius, which means Son of God.

Within the same period of fifty years the same phenomenon grows up in two ancient and proud traditions, the Romans and the Jews.....Is it really a coincidence that in the same short space of time both cultures are visited by a man who bucks tradition and calls himself the son of God? Is it really sensible to say that the Roman experience had no influence on the Christian story?

There is more - the slaughter of the innocents told by Seutonius in relation to Augustus, a copy of the annunciation - this time with Apollo as dad.

Augustus' birthday celebrations are echoed later by xians. Conception is nine months earlier than birth - 23 December.

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So what do you think happened when the gospel writers came to tell the story of Jesus? Do you think they were influenced by the idea of a son of god that had suffused the entire Roman Empire, including Judea? Of course they were.

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To put it at its most schematic, the two contemporary 'sons of god' were to institute or at least articulate two rival value systems. For centuries they co-existed, until the one was finally superimposed on the other.

Christianity triumphed, but it was largely thanks to the imagination of Augustus that the Roman imperial method lasted for so long; and it was the success of the imperial system that made Christianity possible.

http://www.freeratio.org/showthread.php?t=205276

And Seneca was having big problems with emperors.... What was that about Irony in Mark?

show_no_mercy · 06-12-2009, 01:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Clivedurdle

Oh and one other thing - Augustus is the son of God.

I'm sure this has already been posted in BC&H, but check out the "Priene Inscription"

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birthday of the god Augustus was the beginning of the good tidings (i.e. ευαγγελιο[ν]... "gospel") for the world that came by reason of him

Clivedurdle · 06-13-2009, 12:06 AM

www.craigaevans.com/Priene%20art.pdf

Has anyone proposed Seneca as the writer of GMark with actually the character of Jesus being Seneca?

Putting his personal battles in a Jewish context makes wondrous ironic sense!

Doug Shaver · 06-13-2009, 07:06 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Clivedurdle

Why has Jesus got a get out of jail free card?

In fairness to the historicists, we do have documents attesting to his existence that are almost contemporaneous with him. As apologists never tire of reminding us, they are more nearly contemporaneous than our sources for certain other people whose historicity is never questioned. For Arthur, that is not the case.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Clivedurdle

Is it because the myth and the dream is so powerful - everlasting life, the conjoining of heaven and earth, the lion laying down with the lamb?

That helps, no doubt, but it wouldn't explain the persistence of historicism among atheists and other non-Christians.

Yellum Notnef · 06-13-2009, 11:00 AM

Doesn't the 1700 year long pounding into the western world that Jesus was/is real and is God have something to do with the persistence?

1700 years of persistant and hopeful persausive bullshit is a lot to break free from even if you're an atheist.

Clivedurdle · 06-14-2009, 04:00 AM

I do wonder if Mark is a comedy. We also have lots of travelling - not quite as epic as Jason but still ending in the Holy City!

Jesus and the Argonauts? Take my gospel to the ends of the world?

Doug Shaver · 06-14-2009, 06:52 AM

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Originally Posted by Fenton Mulley

1700 years of persistant and hopeful persausive bullshit is a lot to break free from even if you're an atheist.

Good observation. Just because you're a freethinker doesn't mean you've stopped being a social animal.

andrewcriddle · 06-14-2009, 07:07 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Doug Shaver

Quote:

Originally Posted by Clivedurdle

Why has Jesus got a get out of jail free card?

In fairness to the historicists, we do have documents attesting to his existence that are almost contemporaneous with him. As apologists never tire of reminding us, they are more nearly contemporaneous than our sources for certain other people whose historicity is never questioned. For Arthur, that is not the case.

FWIW and IMHO there probably was a minimal historical Arthur. A 6th century CE Northern British warlord who fought the Saxons. However he probably had nothing to do with the famous British victory over the Saxons at Mount Badon.

Arthur may possibly be of interest in relation to the question as to how much of the tradition about a historical figure can be wrong, without the figure becoming in effect non-historical.

Andrew Criddle

Clivedurdle · 06-14-2009, 03:01 PM

Quote:

almost contemporaneous

At least two generations with probably a major war in between, and most of it looking like cover albums?

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06-13-2009, 12:06 AM	#4
Clivedurdle Contributor Join Date: Mar 2003 Location: London UK Posts: 16,024	www.craigaevans.com/Priene%20art.pdf Has anyone proposed Seneca as the writer of GMark with actually the character of Jesus being Seneca? Putting his personal battles in a Jewish context makes wondrous ironic sense!

06-13-2009, 11:00 AM	#6
Yellum Notnef Banned Join Date: Sep 2002 Location: Gone Posts: 4,676	Doesn't the 1700 year long pounding into the western world that Jesus was/is real and is God have something to do with the persistence? 1700 years of persistant and hopeful persausive bullshit is a lot to break free from even if you're an atheist.

06-14-2009, 04:00 AM	#7
Clivedurdle Contributor Join Date: Mar 2003 Location: London UK Posts: 16,024	I do wonder if Mark is a comedy. We also have lots of travelling - not quite as epic as Jason but still ending in the Holy City! Jesus and the Argonauts? Take my gospel to the ends of the world?

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