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From Michael Hoffman's review on Amazon:Sunday Mirror articles from johnallegro.org

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A digression has been split to here

Malachi151

The fact is that I have no relevant degree and no relevant credentials, which I think only serves to prove my point about how bad the scholars are in this field.

My degree is in Biology, though I'm looking to go back soon for a Masters in Anthropology, which will be vaguely relevant.

My writings on this subject are by no means authoritative and are nothing more than self-published, yet, I think that many people can see from them just how poor the state of so-called scholarship is in this field.

I think a lot of points are made in my works on this subject that are easy to see and easy to validate, yet they continue to go largely addressed by the so-called scholars, on both sides.

(As far as I'm concerned, both "Jesus - A Very Jewish Myth" and "The Gospel of Mark as Reaction and Allegory" totally put to rest all of the so-called "pagan gods" and "astrotheology" claims of many people who are famous and have made thousands of dollars selling books on this subject. Likewise, a think that stuff like my assessment of the evidence for "James" being a literal brother of Jesus (which BTW I have come up with more evidence against this since the writing of that book) shows the complete inadequacy of common arguments put forward by "scholars" in the "Historical Jesus" camp. They obviously aren't even looking a the evidence.)

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Posts that are not helpful to the discussion have been split off here

ChristMyth

I'm most usually just a lurker in this area of the boards, but I have a few questions:

1. Does a persons credentials have anything to do with the arguments they present? Is it possible for an amateur to produce a better argument than a scholar despite the absence of those credentials?

2. What criteria is used by "scholars" to prove a HJ? If there is ample amount of evidence to show there was a HJ in the Gospel accounts, why is JM even an issue? Wouldn't the academics in the field just point to the evidence and say "There, check that out and come back, then we'll talk."

3. If the JM position is such a non-issue with scholars in Ancient History (or whatever field you have agreed counts as "relevant"), why has no one produced an adequate rebuttal? Stating that the JM position isn't even worth considering and then waving it off isn't much of an argument.

Christmyth

Zeichman

Not if the amateur lacks certain prerequisites for the credentials: knowledge of primary source languages, knowledge of otherwise relevant texts, knowledge of relevant theories, knowledge of history of interpretation, knowledge of relevant fields (anthropology, sociology...), etc.

What's funny is that almost all professionals don't care about this. As far as they're concerned it isn't an issue, just like you said.

I think I went over this a bit in the Jesus Project thread, but
1) there is little consensus among JM advocates
2) JM has long been associated with kooks and quacks
3) many JM advocates are stuck in the past and utilize atrocious methods (Pagan Origins of the Christian myth)
4) People have offered rebuttals, though they were few
5) Why write extensively about something that no one in your field is debating? I think I used the analogy of arguing that ice cream tastes good. You're not going to sell many books on such a boring and non-controversial topic, and it's not going to be worth your time.
6)It is clear that a lot of JM advocates have only a cursory knowledge of scholarship of the field of NT studies; there's little point in rebutting those who have done little research
7) Scholars who do not spend a fair amount of time online do not encounter JM stuff. There is very little presence offline of the hypothesis.
8) One of two things happens when students are MJ, a) the professor offers as refutation of the view and has no need to seriously consider it, or b) the student does not take a class in biblical studies because of the perceived worthlessness of the field and thus enters something of an echo chamber.

I'm sure there's more, but I need to get back to work.

ChristMyth

Thanks for the answers Zeichman. Unfortunately, I'm still unclear as to the criteria that professionals use to determine a HJ. Is it just an assumption made on their part, or is there actually evidence to support their claim?

Thanks again

Christmyth

PhilosopherJay

Hi Andrew,

Thank you for pointing this out.

Incidentally, regarding Bertrand Russell, in case you did not know, here is the relevant quote from his book Why I am Not A Christian

The statement, "Historically it is quite doubtful whether Christ ever existed at all, and if he did we do not know anything about him," qualifies him as a Jesus mythicist.

Russell's The History of Western Philosophy, I believe, is still the most widely-read history of philosophy book ever written; although, I find it too tendencious and cannot recommend it to beginning Philosophy students. With the possible exceptions of John Stuart Mill, John Locke and Thomas Hobbes, he is the most famous British Philosopher in history; so his academic credentials are in order.

Warmly,

Philosopher Jay

gurugeorge

Sorry Z a) isn't clear here - are you saying the professor refutes the greenhorn's MJ idea, or doesn't seriously consider it because he feels he has no need to, or what? (It looks like you might have meant to put "offers text X as refutation of the view"?)

Zeichman

Sorry, what I meant was that the professor would probably briefly refute the idea by appealing to Josephus or something along those lines.

I think most important evidence is what is assumed in the text. Read Luke 7:18-35, which goes back to Q. Several elements seem to assume the historicity of Jesus here. I'm not going to elaborate on them for reasons of time, but here's a brief overview:
1) A dialogue occurs between Jesus and a figure known to have been historical (John the baptist)
2) the son of man (Jesus) is charged with being a party animal in contrast to John, who was an ascetic
3) Jesus is a "child of Wisdom" as is John
4) John sends his disciples to Jesus (i.e., Jesus is assumed to be accessible to people; there is no indication that he is a supernormal being)

I could go on, but I've got stuff I need to do.

If this is too obtuse, let me know and I'll try to clarify