RPS

Since the majority position among scholars seems to be that the Testimonium was altered but not created out of whole cloth, why do you think serious scholars, some of whom aren't even Christian, accept the obvious fraud? The best thing an academic can do to help his/her career is to overturn the consensus afterall.

Freke and Gandy are embarassing. They make McDowell look good.

Doug Shaver

There is none, but that is the wrong question. The right question is: What was the common understanding of that phrase among Paul's readers?

It doesn't matter how "brother of the lord" is commonly understood nowadays, or how it came to be understood within a couple of centuries after Paul's lifetime. How did Christians in ca. 50 CE understand it, and how do we know that?

Clivedurdle

Maybe that is because to be a creationist you have to accepted the lawd into your heart and of course jesus is historical - it is all part of the package!

I really wish these xian historicists would understand the very powerful - and central - mythological aspects of their current beliefs "Jesus is alive" christ is risen" "with this body".

The language is so "plainly" mythological and epic it is ridiculous!

The converse is true about atheists accepting hj into their hearts - it is assumed BY XIANS that to be a xian you have to accept an historic Jesus, who argue this as a key "fact" - god so loved the world etc.

As far as I am concerned, if you want to be a xian you are better off being a mythicist! There is a huge tradition in the churches of mysticism - I am arguing OK, go with it properly if you want to be religious!

(Some of my arguments might not quite make sense out of context - see thread on magic in s and s, especially about voodoo and hoodoo!)

http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?t=164670

(Edit - F&G - I thought one of them was a well respected gnostic commentator, and RPS, try Jesus and the Goddess - I can't see it as that different to Spong!)

Clivedurdle

OO! Have I been quote mined!!?

Geetarmoore

No. Not one single itsy-bitsy tiny bit. The mere idea is foolishness.

I was a Christian before I was an atheist. I believed in the HJ as an atheist before becoming an atheist mythecist.

The MJ case makes the most sense to me, with all of the available information at hand. Any historical position for Jesus just adds more questions, and apologetic excuses. Why does Paul write like he does, without knowledge of the life of Jesus? Why are the Gospels so late? Why are they all written based on Mark, and not each independent stories? Why do Luke and Matthew not agree on where to insert the Q sayings? Why are there real (not exaggerated) parallels to Egyptian gods and ideas?

The idea that Mark 6:1-6 or the use of the phrase "Brother of the Lord" can be used to prove an HJ is pretty ludicrous, in light of all the evidence that Doherty can bring to his case.

I know people whom I call "Brother", who are not my literal brother's in any way. When I was a practicing Christian, the minister called us all "Brothers in Christ.".

The bible is filled with absolute bullshit, but somehow, this one piece of fiction in Mark can be held up as proof that Jesus existed? It's laughable. If you accept that the story in Mark 6 wouldn't be told in a mythic tale due to Jesus' failure, then you must also accept that, while he couldn't do the big, exciting miracles, he did indeed heal people while he was there, in the same story!

If this is the case, and this is what you believe, then have fun at Church on Sunday, because Jesus is going to be pissed when he finds you you've been ignoring him all this time.

What? Ohhh... So that story is all true, except for the parts that aren't then? Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight......

Geetarmoore

I think it's because that from the MJ'ers perspective, the case for myth is so strong, that any rational thinking person should see it as such. That they don't, can be maddening.

People who reject the MJ position, IMO, reject it on much flimsier evidence than that MJ position is built upon.

Josephus often comes up as a nod to HJ. To me, based on who he was, who he was writing for combined with his other writings, his testimony here (in any flavor) is totally out of character to what would be expected, were he not a closet Christian. If someone could make the case that he was a Christian in hiding, then I'd look at it again.

Ted Hoffman

Shouldnt there be an anti-posting rule against people who feel "loppy", whose hearts are about to "leap out" and who see themselves as "drugged out zombies" because of taking anti-seizure medicines, posting false and purposefully annoying claims about other people?

guy_683930

Chili-

You must be psychic. I'm a math major.

guy_683930

That's not entirely true, Bishop. There could be JM'ers who believe in God, or for that matter, in Jesus, but they simply believe he was a supernatural being who didn't have a life on earth. Gnostic groups come to mind for the second part especially.

McD

I was going to overlook Toto's out of context comment, but since you brought it up: even Wells does not regard the T.F. as an "obvious fraud".

I also didn't really appreciate how, to make his case against me, Toto took that one small snippet of my post from the context. In context, what I said was:

It was not the case that I thought the Testimonium was legitimate and the guys I am talking about thought it was a fraud and were disappointed and angry with me. The case was that I took a position on the Testimonium that was (and is) identical to the position of GA Wells and they thought that was nuts. If I didn't agree with them that the whole thing was an interpolation written by Eusebius then "fuck off" and beyond that I better also accept that Eusebius also wrote the Chrestus/Christus references in Tacitus and Seutonius as well.

The guys I was talking about spent too much time listening to Madalyn Murray O'Hair, reading Kersey Graves and just flat out making shit up. Unfortunately, too often, from my experience, the man on the streets MJer falls into exactly this mold. I have met a few who were smart. Most of them were dopes.

But before you get too pissy about what I am saying, keep in mind... PLEASE keep in mind, that I have probably have had deep conversations with less than a dozen Mjers. If you knopw anything about sampling size, you will know that this isn't a large sample, which is why above I stated that I can't speak intelligently about the average man on the streets MJer, but thus far it ain't looking so good.

OK so now, that I have pissed off the MJers again, let me just say, that the average man on the streets HJer is a fucking uninformed idiot too. I have met plenty of people who aren't Christians -- maybe they are atheists or otherwise irreligious -- and are passive or even active HJers and they don't know diddley squat.

The conversations usually start out hopeful: we both establish that we aren't Christian, then establish that, in our opinion, there might have been, or even probably was a man named Jesus at the core of the Christian cult.

Then suddenly, they start saying some dumb shit like "Well and it's been proven that Jesus learned magic in Egypt and then studied Buddhism in China" or one dumb bastard who said ""Roman medical records show that Pilate did have a habit of washing his hands. It was probably a nervous habit."

And it's getting worse. With the popularity of the DaVinci Code book and now the movie, there will be a whole new generation of uninformed idiots who think they are going to be qualified to speak intelligently on the subject of Jesus History/New Testament criticism.