J-D

The objection is the same as before: that you do not appear to be acknowledging that it is possible to arrive at a conclusion without starting by assuming it.

mountainman

One list of postulates is presented at post #16

Another list was presented at Post #19, which are marked as CRITERIA and which must logically be supported by a series of corresponding postulates, but these postulates have rarely been made explicit:


And then at Post # 20 a third list of postulates was presented for discussion from the archives:


Your claim that I "haven't identified any different postulates as most of us define the term" is demonstrably false. I have been calling for postulates and we have had an exchange about the postulates relating to the Pauline Letters.


You seem to forget that is is quite valid to argue that given the provisional truth of the postulates P1, P2, P3 etc .... then massive theoretical discussion ... the conclusion is that the postulates can be considered "proven" as working postulates in the field.

It is quite reasonable that some people take the conclusions of other theories of history and then state them as postulates for another theory. This has been going on for centuries and centuries. It is easy to be confused by the differences between the way postulates are used with respect to the ancient historical evidence in the field of ancient history, and way postulates are used with respect to theories in the field of physics and science, where there is provision for repeatable scientific experiments.

History seems to work over time sometimes by simply refining the postulates about the evidence and reprocessing the same evidence. New evidence mandates a reprocessing. etc As someone earlier mentioned, its a bit like a massive WHAT-IF generator. The experiment has been run, we are examining the past not so much via the evidence as about our hypotheses about the evidence.



It's pretty obvious to even newcomers here that there is an invective for example between those investigators who are exploring the postulate of the HJ, and those who are exploring the antithetical postulate of the MJ. To a lesser degree we see a similar invective between those who CLAIM / POSTULATE / HYPOTHECIZE that "Paul was a genuine historical character" and those who are exploring the antithetical hypotheses that "Paul was NOT a genuine historical character.

People obviously have attachments to their own postulates, and it also appears to be true that SOME PEOPLE are running with postulates that must be infered from their statement, and which are not explicit, but which can be made explicit after an examination of their statement.

The examination of our basic postulates in all theories of the history of christian origins reveals that both the HJ and the MJ are not conclusions from the evidence, but postulates / claims / hypotheses formulated from the evidence by the investigators. In an earlier response you indicated that some academics make these postulates quite explicit, while others OMIT them in an explicit form. The logic of this omission is being questioned.

The postulates are all hypothetical as are any theoretical HISTORICAL conclusions. I can only explain the existence of invectives between the investigators as arising from their own conviction that their postulates about key evidence, and perhaps each and every item of evidence being examined (and thus conclusions) are superior in some fundamental manner to those of their colleagues. (They are no colleagues of mine !!! etc)

Sometimes the indication is that people who start from these different positions actually dont have anything much to say to each other, other than "There is no evidence to prove the HJ" or "There is no evidence to prove the MJ" etc etc etc ad nauseum circuhilarium ..... in short, its been a traditional mud slinging event about "Show me the evidence I dont postulate exists! "


What I am trying to say is "Show me your specific postulates about these specific evidence items one by one by one ....".

RE-ENGINEERING THE GENERAL THEORY OF THE HISTORY OF CHRISTIAN ORIGINS


I have used the term re-engineer above. What I mean by it is a total rebuild of a general theory from the ground up for someone who is completely new to the field. The process involves a set of very simple antithetical postulates:


(1) About the historicity of "Jesus":

"Jesus is a genuine historical character" (HJ postulate)

OR

"Jesus is a fabricated historical character" (MJ postulate)



(2) About the historicity of "Paul":

"Paul is a genuine historical character"

OR

"Paul is a fabricated historical character"



(9) CHRONOLOGY: About the century in which the history of christian origins first commenced:


the 1st century

OR

the 1st and 2nd centuries

OR

the 2nd century.

Voila! By simply selecting three very simple postulates we have outlined the fundamental framework of most of not all of the theores of the history of christian origins that have been discussed here and elsewhere, for years and indeed centuries. I am nit deny there will be a great difference in the details discussed by each theory. I am not denying that most theories cover a great deal more issues that those that are directly related to these three postulations above.

However my claim relates to the basic structure and the theoretical conclusions of the mainstream and fringe compettive theories of the history of christian origins, and with which most of us are quite familiar.

J-D

Actually, we don’t need those documents to know that there was a person called Paul. There’s plenty of evidence that there have been many people called Paul. There still are. The question isn’t whether there was somebody called Paul. The question is, more specifically, what the possible explanations are of how and why the name ‘Paul’ came to be attached to particular texts as an ascription of authorship and whether there is any basis for estimating the relative likelihood of those different possibilities. That in turn breaks down into still more specific questions. For example, there is a question whether the ascription of authorship to a ‘Paul’ was made by the original author or was a later addition—or whether it was the ascription was original for some texts and a later addition for others. Whether the ascription was original or a later addition (for any given text), there is more than one possible reason for it. For a given text, one possibility for ascribing it to ‘Paul’ is to associate it with other texts already ascribed to that ‘Paul’: for example, the name ‘Paul’ might have been attached to (say) 2 Thessalonians as a way of indicating (truly or falsely) that it had the same author as 1 Thessalonians. Another possibility is that ascribing a text to ‘Paul’ was intended to associate it with somebody known in person to the intended audience as ‘Paul’: for example, if somebody calling himself ‘Paul’ had been in Thessalonica and become known to a group of people there, attaching the name ‘Paul’ to a letter sent to that group of Thessalonians might be intended to indicate (truly or falsely) that the letter came from that specific ‘Paul’ personally known to them. Still another separate question is whether the name ‘Paul’ as attached to a given text came perhaps from somebody whose true name was ‘Paul’ or perhaps from somebody whose true name was not ‘Paul’ but who used that name (that is, not just in that particular text)—and if so, what motive there might have been for adopting the false name ‘Paul’.

To some extent these questions also have a relationship with still other separate questions about the authorship of each of the individual texts under discussion: which (if any) of the things the text says about is author are true. For example, the text of Philippians makes a point of describing the author as a Pharisee: is that true and, whether it’s true or false, why is it mentioned in the text?

An important step in trying to answer any of these questions is being sufficiently specific about just which question you’re trying to answer. Vagueness breeds confusion.

J-D

If those three possibilities are, as stated, mutually exclusive, then, since one of them is ‘unable to tell’, the other two must be ‘able to tell’.

If we’re talking about what is in fact the case, there are just two possibilities, ‘X is the case’ and ‘X is not the case’; if we’re talking about what we can tell, there may be three possibilities, ‘We can tell that X is the case’, ‘We can tell that X is not the case’, and ‘We cannot tell’. On the other hand, we can talk about what we begin by assuming to be the case, with these three possibilities: ‘We begin by assuming that X is the case’, ‘We begin by assuming that X is not the case’, and ‘We begin without making an assumption either way’.

The process of investigation should take us from what we begin by assuming to finding out what we can tell. Just because we begin without making an assumption either way, it does not necessarily follow that we cannot tell. If you suppose that the only way we can tell what is the case is by assuming it to be the case, you are incorrect. In fact, you can never tell what is the case just by assuming it to be the case.

J-D

You have made clear that you intend the two descriptions to be exclusive possibilities but you have not made clear whether you also intend them to be exhaustive.

You're wrong in either case, but there are two different ways you might be in error.

mountainman

What I have proposed is a postulate reserved for the expression of an assessment of historical authenticity. In respect of this attribute the descriptions are exhaustive in the simple case. This does not imply that other further postulates cannot be made about anything else apart from the assessment of historical authenticity. Other postulates are certainly required, for example related to chronology or what the evidence actually represents (eg: it is an inscription, it is a papyri fragment, it is a codex, etc)

In the positive sense a postulate can be selected that the evidence is to be considered genuine. In the negative sense, and mutually exclusive the negative postulate can be selected that the evidence is to be considered fabricated. In the case where it is to be claimed that the evidence cannot be contrued as either authentic or fabricated, the middle option is selected.

This is not setting things in cement, but just for the present instance of consideration. At another time, one might select a different postulate against this evidence item, and "reprocess" the conclusions. What I mean by "Reprocess" stems from the fact that there are perhaps 100's of evidence items, and each of them have their own series of antithetical postulates as described above. The process being described is therefore allowing for all the possible combinations and permutations of the selected postulates against all the evidence items. The theoretical conclusions are therefore being generated by reiterating the process of the selection of postulates.

I have tried to depict this in the schematic below, but the REITERATIVE NATURE of the process I am describing may not be clearly understood.

Doug Shaver

Yes, that is what I'm saying. My reason for assessing its probability as I do is that is it known to have happened in several other cases. Documents are known to have been written by obscure people claiming to be famous people, and the actual existence of those famous people is in most cases uncontested. I regard that as sufficient to establish Paul's existence as the default inference from the existence of documents attributed to him. Any alternative hypothesis, I would argue, requires additional evidence sufficient to undermine the default, i.e. we need some positive reason to think it unlikely that Paul existed notwithstanding that somebody used his name to add credibility to his writings.

I don't deny that Paul could have been a figment of early Christian imagination, but I have yet to see, from anybody in this forum or anywhere else, a cogent argument taking that proposition from "it's possible" to "it's probable."

Doug Shaver

Right. If we don't agree with you, we just aren't really thinking.

aa5874

What a self-serving statement!!! You will not see any argument that undermines your flawed logics.

The existence of a character called Paul is NOT probable simply because there are letters with the name Paul.

It has been SHOWN to you that an epistle with the name PAUL is claimed to be written by TERTIUS.

SEE ROMANS 16.22 The character called PAUL did not have to exist for the Epistle to the Romans to have been written.

Your claim that Paul probably existed is LOGICALLY FLAWED unless you can't see.

Now, please identify where and when in the history of antiquity that Paul was FAMOUS?

Name a credible non-apologetic source that mentioned Paul??

Philo, Josephus, Tacitus and Suetonius wrote about events during the time of the so-called Paul and NOWHERE mentioned the name Paul or that Paul was Famous.

You must NOW see that you PRESUMED Paul was FAMOUS when you really have ZERO sources to support your claim.

The reasoning you provided is hopelessly FLAWED when you claim Paul probably existed.

mountainman

Trading dogma is hardly critical thinking is it?




It does help critical thinking to state your disagreement in specific terms.