maryhelena

Stephan, I'm not sure if you are referencing Nazareth or Nazarene here....

From the Gospel of Marcion on the Gnostic Society Library:

So, from that it looks as though Marcion kept the Nazareth, minus the being brought up there, reference, but deleted the following "Jesus of Nazareth" reference in verse 34, from gLuke.

ie he kept the Nazara reference but not the Nazarēnos - which of course makes sense if Marcion wants his Jesus to come down, descended, to Capernanum....

archibald

This is such a giant, often repeated strawman.

Look, I don't know about mcalvera and won't speak for him, but historians are well used (I don't know how many times I have to post this blindingly obvious point) to sifting through religious texts for information which can be deemed likely (not assumed by any means at all) to be historical (or more often, in the case of religious documents, to have been believed to have been historical by the writers of the text). It doesn't mean that historians and their methodologies are correct, but they come to conclusions based on their methodologies, and their conclusions are of course only what they consider to be the better explanation. Even an ancient historian will not use the word 'proof' very often. And furthermore, a heck of a lot of writings from ancient history are heavily tainted by religious considerations, a heck of a lot of the texts are religious, and if ancient historians (or we) were to rule out using them we would have to eliminate a horde of other characters also. If anyone does that, then yes, that is being consistent, so the point becomes one of consistency, rather than conclusive evidence. How many characters from the NT would you like to consider eliminating?

Now, it is plain that most mythicist positions have to make more unevidenced assumptions, usually in order to chip away at the actual evidence rather than presenting much of their own, other than speculations and ambiguities. I do not see the value in trying to suggest otherwize, unless one is so taken by one side of the argument that one can't think objectively about it.

dog-on

Actually, it seems to me that taking the texts, in their entirety, kinda begs a mythicist position.

It also seems that a historicist is forced to cut away a vast amount of the actual text itself, to even begin making their case.

So, I am not sure what you are trying to say here.

archibald

Regarding the existence or not of Nazareth, surely we would be more warranted to think that it did exist, based on evidence?

It doesn't mean much either way, of course. Perhaps a slight HJ hint, but since it could have been cited for a variety of reasons, not much of a hint at all.

As I said, I am more curious about the thinking process which appears to be evident in thinking it more likely that it did not exist, than in the implications of same.

MCalavera

The Gospels are meant to be taken as historical documents albeit with theologically driven motives and agendas so that one can't treat it as objectively historical documents. Thus, we have to sift through the text to see what's likely and what's not.

But I don't think for one second they're meant to be taken on the whole as simply allegories that aren't to be taken literally and historically. That would one hell of an assumption to make without something to back this idea up.

Just making things clear concerning how I see it.

archibald

Well, that makes two of us then, because I don't know what you are trying to say either.

MCalavera

What's this logical fallacy called again where you try to make your opponent's position as ridiculous as you can in order to try to convince that your position must therefore be the correct one?

dog-on

It depends on what you are considering to be evidence. As far as I am concerned the only evidence is textual. Do you have any other evidence besides textual that you think I should consider that is relevant to this discussion?

If not, do you disagree that in order to construct a historical Jesus, one must "trim the fat"?

Whereas, a mythicist could simply eat the entire steak without so much as a burp?

archibald

Presumably that's rhetorical. Everybody already knows that all the early evidence is textual. This is not unusual for similar figures. I am getting a brain hurt from repeating this over the last few months.

Yes. Again there is nothing unusual in this whatsoever, even if we are not dealing with religious texts. A lot of Herodotus has to have similarly fruity fat trimmed, and he is cited as one of the fathers of historical writing. Do you have a point?

He could, but I don't see what this has to do with anything, or why it would be justified to do so. I suggest it wouldn't, on grounds of consistency. If you are trying to suggest that doing so implies parsimony, I think you're mixing something up.

archibald

Dog-on, in my nutshell thread (which is not meant for debate, so I will bring it up here instead), you seem to say that there was a contemporary who refuted Jesus' existence. Who is this?