freetrader

Response to Diogenes the Cynic (#126)


The ones directly "coerced" by Paul then proceeded to coerce hundreds more to make a god out of this obscure alien Christ figure who had no connection to them or any recognition among them. It is silly nonsense to suggest that Paul could have had such power to impose such an unrecognized deity figure onto others, out of the blue. This does not happen. You cannot give any other examples from history where anything like this happened.

New Deities are created out of recognized hero figures, not out of something unknown and unrecognized and alien to one's culture.

And it was Constantine who was coerced into adopting the Christ symbol as a rallying point. He chose this for pragmatic reasons, and it swept him to victory. Had there been some other symbol that would have worked better, he would have chosen it.


Jesus was a nobody -- Sai Baba is not.

He has had at least 60 years of preaching and doing a magic trick or two to win over his followers. Given some charisma and talent (maybe some psychic power?) and a long career of performing to the targeted market, one can become mythologized into a god in one's own lifetime.

aa5874

But, it is recorded in writings of antiquity that mythical entities did perform miracles. The mythical God called Aesclepius had miraculous powers of healing. This Myth, Aesclepius, did NOT have to exist for there to have been stories of miracles.

The God of the Jews and his son Jesus need not exist for people to claim some God of Judaea performed miracles. I think all the Egyptian and Greek/Roman Gods of antiquity that supposedly performed miracles never did exist at all. I guess that miracle stories can be figments of someone's imagination or just plain invented fiction.

Miracle stories probably predate the book called Genesis. There are a host of mythical candidates for the supposed miracle called Creation. Just tell me which one of the MYTHS of antiquity must have existed for such an invented miraculous event.

Jesus Christ or ATUM?

There is no external corroborative source for any miracle in the Gospels. When Josephus fell from his horse he went to a physician and when he took three crucified close acquaintances from their crosses, he took them to a doctor.

Josephus wrote not one single thing about Jesus or his disciples carrying out miracles anywhere in Judaea and another writer, Philo, who wrote about 40 books, never did mention the name of Jesus Christ at all as a miracle worker or a Messiah.

It would appear miracles stories about Jesus were simply invented and backdated. The words ONCE UPON A TIME were cleverly omitted from the Gospel stories it would seem.

freetrader

Response to Susan2 (#128)


No, this is not one person alone coercing others. This might be a power elite imposing something onto others, but not one person alone.

The original context of this is the example of the Apostle Paul imposing his "risen Christ" deity onto Greeks and Romans. The whole idea is nonsense. If the Christ figure Paul was promoting did not already have currency with this audience, he could not have persuaded them to adopt his Christ figure.

It is silly to suggest Paul had some kind of power to foist this new god onto an alien culture where Jewish beliefs were not respected, and a new god which had absolutely no reputation or respect with this foreign audience. And there is no suggestion that Paul had any political power or influence with those in power to enlist their aid in foisting this new deity.


This is not imposing an alien god onto them. He imposed instructions in the already-established well-recognized religious traditions and Scriptures.

This is not analogous at all to the case of Paul supposedly imposing a totally alien messiah hero figure onto Greeks and Romans who had no connection with those Jewish traditions from which the new god figure came.


Yes, but this is not what Paul allegedly did in spoon-feeding his new alien risen Christ figure out of the blue to the Greeks and Romans who supposedly slurped it up submissively for no reason. In all the above examples, those imposing the teachings are a large group holding political power. The example we were discussing was of ONE PERSON only, St. Paul, with no political power whatsoever, somehow imposing his new hallucinated risen Christ figure onto an alien culture which did not recognize at all the religious traditions of this missionary fanatic and his subjective hallucinations about the Jesus character.

There's no analogy of what you're talking about to the case of Paul coercing these foreigners to adopt his new god that he popped on them from nowhere.


This is really out of place with our topic of how the Jesus figure got promoted and disseminated among the Greeks and Romans.

The claim, clearly false, is that somehow one man alone, the Apostle Paul, was able to foist this new deity cult onto the Greeks and Romans, with no political power, with no clout on the School Board or anywhere else, and he foisted this alien idea onto a culture that was totally unfamiliar with it.

Once again, no example can be given from history of one person foisting anything like this onto hundreds or thousands of others. Such a crusader fanatic would have been treated with contempt and ridicule.

freetrader

Response to Susan2 (#129):


Added to WHAT story? What story existed to which the miracles could be added? What was the purpose of adding them to something that basically did not exist? You have to have a starting point.


No, this does not explain how an unrecognized nobody got mythologized into a god. It would explain how a credible hero figure already popular and respected would get mythologized as part of a promotional effort to enhance his reputation and his mission, which is always the case with miracle stories.

Even for children, the Santa Claus figure began with a real person (St. Nicholas) who had a long career and an established reputation and recognition as a Catholic priest who eventually was canonized. So even for children you have to begin with a figure who already has popular appeal or respect.


Plus 3 camel hairs, an eyeball from a squirrel, 2 drops of quicksilver . . .

This mumbo-jumbo has little to do with our topic. None of the above would do anything to get people to adopt an alien god they did not already recognize.

freetrader

Response to Diogenes the Cynic (#130):


No, we're talking about ONE PERSON. You're fantasizing that one person, St. Paul, on his own, by himself, went to the Greeks and Romans, and in a period of about 10 years (maybe 15 at most) foisted onto hundreds of them (and soon thousands) a new deity figure totally alien to their culture.

Even if we agree that Buddhism was foreign to China originally, it required several centuries for this religion to become adopted by Chinese. The ones who brought this new religion to China were thousands of migrants, not one lone fanatic with his personal hallucinations, as you're describing Paul and his "risen Christ" product to sell to the Greeks and Romans.

Further, those Buddhist migrants were not missionaries trying to introduce an alien god to the Chinese, as Paul was trying to evangelize the Greeks and Romans. They just took their Buddhist religion with them, and over the centuries many Chinese were drawn to this new religion, and they were very impressed with the long distinguished career of its founder, who had become familiar to them and was not any new rabbit-out-of-the-hat figure like Paul was trying to sell to the Greeks and Romans.

So again you are failing to give an example of any precedent for the fantastic feat you're attributing to Paul.

It is not true that one person can foist such a thing onto an alien culture and win over hundreds or even dozens of them to such a hallucination he had. One or two wackos -- perhaps.

freetrader

Response to Diogenes the Cynic (#131):


If and when a real healing does take place, without medical science, it is and was extraordinary, both today and also in primitive cultures. Such reported events or stories were not as common at that time as you suggest.

The "exorcism" is really also a healing story. The Matthew account says the victim was blind and dumb, while the Luke account says only that he was dumb. Inability to speak is an illness to be cured and the victim is not just a crazy nut needing to get a psychological slap to the head to knock him to his senses.

Some of the exorcism stories were probably cases of mental illness, by our modern understanding, and were legitimate healings also. We don't have to assume these were just nutcases spitting out green liquid and spinning their heads around and talking in weird voices.

Some illnesses, including brain disorders, and also inability to hear or speak, also inability to control one's body movements were interpreted by those people as something caused by demon-possession. In these cases there was a real body malfunction which required some form of cure to the physical conditions of one's body, so they are essentially the same as healings of conditions like blindness and leprosy and paralysis and so on.

Details about the demons are perhaps the explanations by the witnesses who saw the healing, or they may be additions contributed by the later writers, giving their slant on such healings. The factual material is the healing, not the demons crying out or doing mischief when they're expelled.

In addition to these two healing acts there is also a third reference to the miracles of Jesus in Q:

Luke 7:18-23
And the disciples of John told him about all these things, and John having called near a certain two of his disciples, sent unto Jesus, saying, "Art thou he who is coming, or for another do we look?" And having come near to him, the men said, "John the Baptist sent us unto thee, saying, Art thou he who is coming, or for another do we look?" And in that hour he cured many from sicknesses, and plagues, and evil spirits, and to many blind he granted sight. And Jesus answering said to them, "Having gone on, report to John what ye saw and heard, that blind men do see again, lame do walk, lepers are cleansed, deaf do hear, dead are raised, poor have good news proclaimed; and happy is he whoever may not be stumbled in me."

These references clearly indicate that, whenever the Q document was written, there was at that time already a tradition of Jesus as a miracle-worker.

spamandham

Someone wrote a biography about Jesus, including impossible quotes he never said (such as quotes of him praying in solace, or quotes of him talking to the devil in the desert...there was no-one there at these events to witness them) and impossible miracles that never happened.

Are you honestly trying to claim that ancient people had no imagination and could not simply invent stories?

spin

Yours is post #237 and he's only up to responding to post #131, so don't hold your breath waiting for a response. He might get to you next week. What freetrader is actually saying is:

I believe they are early because no one can give an explanation that is reasonable to me as to how the miracle stories could have emerged later as fictions.

His requirements seem strictly subjective and unfulfillable.

And notice the use of "fictions". This sort of oversimplification prohibits analysis. He will have no problem with William Tell and his arrow or Arthur's round table, but Jesus's miracles... they're a different kettle of fish altogether.


spin

Doug Shaver

The same way all fictional stories get invented. There are no time restrictions for inventing stories, and that includes stories about real people.

The only actual assumption you're making there is that the stories must be true.

The only evidence for the stories themselves is late evidence. They don't show up in any document that you can prove was written before the second century.

freetrader

Response to Diogenes the Cynic (#132):


I will disagree a little on this. There are at least two major points of incompatibility of Judaism to the Greeks/Romans:

1) Judaism rejected all idols and statues, whereas the Greeks and Romans could not live without them. This was a major barrier between the two cultures, which caused friction.

2) Jews generally refused to pay the expected respect to the emperor and so were denounced by Romans as disloyal or unpatriotic and were often ostracized and punished.

I don't think you can identify any comparable barriers today between Americans and Buddhists.

Nevertheless, the comparison of how 1st-century Greeks/Romans related to Judaism and how Americans today relate to Buddhism (and also to Hinduism and Islam) is not a bad analogy to consider. It's true that some Greeks and Romans converted to Judaism. Let's say the two situations are comparable.

When Americans convert to an eastern religion, do they adopt as their god a new guru-messiah-avatar figure who has no history or tradition or wide recognition within the eastern culture? who just popped out of a bottle from nowhere?

No, what happens is that they adopt some traditional respected religious figure, such as Krishna or Buddha or Mohammed, or one of the many traditional avatars or Bodhisattvas or other famous religious god-man or prophet figures who go back centuries and have a school of disciples which accumulated over a long time period.

But what you're saying Paul did with 1st-century Greeks and Romans is totally unlike anything, today or 100 years or 1000 years ago, that any crusader or evangelist ever did in the way of introducing people to a new religion.

You're saying they adopted an obscure nobody "risen Christ" figure with no reputation whatever to become their savior-god, and they did this solely from the authority of this alien Jewish renegade fanatic who got his "information" totally from his own hallucinations and from nowhere else. That this unlikely new hero symbol came out of an alien culture with mostly a negative reputation only makes the whole laughable scenario that much worse, but even without that drawback this scenario is unprecedented and ludicrous and not to be taken seriously.

Converts to these eastern religions, today in America, do not resemble at all those ancient Greek and Roman converts to Christianity who were won over by Paul (in the way you hypothesize). There has to be some major factor, something unprecedented, to explain how these converts would be persuaded to adopt this unrecognized messiah figure who had no status or tradition behind him.


To say they "didn't know any better" does not explain how Paul was able to sell his unlikely "risen Christ" novelty to his audience. If it's true that the gullible will buy any rabbit the evangelist pulls out of his hat, then you could name other examples of this from somewhere in history, and yet there are no other examples.

It DOES matter what the promoter claims in his preaching -- he can only go so far in being preposterous. There's a limit. He cannot pop out something totally obscure and unrecognized on them and get many converts.

The explanation for Paul's success is that the Christ figure he was selling was already familiar to his audience, not something new that he hallucinated himself, but already known through a popular word-of-mouth tradition circulating through the Mediterranean world and eventually put into writing in the form of the NT gospel accounts.

This circulating tradition had to be something easily understood by ordinary people and which had credibility with them and spread rapidly over several years. Also it had to be something convincing without them having to experience directly any charisma Jesus may have possessed, since this new oral tradition was circulating and spreading to new adherents after he had been eliminated from the picture. Without such a spreading oral tradition as this, it's impossible to explain how Paul could have succeeded at recruiting his new Greek and Roman converts.


No, it is not true that Americans today convert to eastern religions in any way like you're describing the Greeks and Romans converting to Paul's personal hallucinations. People convert to a religious teaching that offers them traditional heroes and symbols, not to a new instant messiah figure who pops in out of nowhere.

Whatever "eastern wisdom baloney" Americans buy today is always attached to long-standing renowned teaching figures who go back centuries, or also to a current popular teacher with a long illustrious career. They do not worship a fly-by-night instant guru of no repute. If they connect to a small-time local imam or yogi etc., this is always someone who teaches the ancient traditions and prophets or heroes rather than popping out some new instant god figure never before heard of.


If your description of him is correct, it was babble, because he was trying to foist onto them some hallucinatory visions of an obscure unknown messianic object unrelated to them. What you're saying he preached would have been incoherent nonsense to them, probably less intelligible than the rantings of David Koresh or Charles Manson.


No he did not tell them any such rubbish (except the "eternal life" part). You are just peddling your own hallucinations with this dribble.


You can't find the above left-wing talking points in Paul or anywhere else during that period of history, not even condemning slaveowners or slavery. We're talking about the 1st century AD. Miracle fiction stories had some limited appeal.


The fictional ones, yes, even a nickel a dozen. But not reports that were credible, where there were several different corroborating reports in circulation, including from eye witnesses, as well as from 1st- or 2nd-hand indirect witnesses.

Credible accounts of such events were important and rare and would get a serious response. When there was disinterest it was because the stories were not credible and were discarded as fictional or just not taken seriously.

One form of de facto disbelief is just to shrug off or ignore the stories or those who tell them, though nominally going along with them. But in the case of the healing acts of Jesus, where there was an accumulation of corroborating reports, the accounts were taken seriously and the portrayal of Jesus as having real power became confirmed. And from this he became deified as a teacher with authority.