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Old 05-23-2012, 03:14 PM   #81
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Well, give up this loser crap about specialists and get on with the evidence.
If you recall, this "loser crap" about specialists began with a comment I made that had nothing to do with whether specialists are/were right or wrong, merely what their responsiblites were in general in terms of engaging with non-specialists, whatever the field. I explicitly did not limit this to historical Jesus studies, or even history, but ALL fields.
You seem to have totally forgotten the context in which you made your first faux pas.

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Oh, yes, you would. You're selling this faith in specialists stuff.
That's certainly how you responded to my first post, however poor your assumption,...(Prolonged squirm omitted)...

This "pedastal" bit and your diatribe about "religious specialists folk" touting credentials has nothing to do with the point I made in the beginning, as I repeatedly tried to point out, but apparently you were so keen on ripping apart and argument I never made you ignored that fact.
The "religious specialists folk" development is a nice small example of how traditions stray from reality.

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I really don't care about their qualifications if they'd shut up about others' qualifications and put forward a functional evidence based argument and not just the incessant sorry claims of best explanation based purely on opinions about plausibility. It's still ontology without epistemology mixed with credentialist ad hominem.
Who is "they" and where are they doing this?
Many rs folk from Ehrman to Casey, authors of the popular works of the historical Jesus, re bloggers.

[Attempted bait and switch on credentialism omitted]

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For some scholars in the historical Jesus business (take Casey's last stand) it is a matter of rehearsing evidence. There is no interaction with it to evaluate it.
First, "Casey's last stand" was an internet post, and stands in stark contrast in form, type, style, erudition, and just about everything else to the two monographs I have read by him...
(Does the revelation not help you to understand the writer behind the works? And hopefully those two monographs don't include his "Jesus of Nazareth", but two of his Aramaic gospel analyses.)

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...Second, I suspect much of this has to do with the fact that while views such as those espoused by Doherty and Price are (to say the least) almost completely absent within historical Jesus studies, they are nothing compared to some of the mythicist theories as expressed on the internet or in some books like The Jesus Mysteries which are so riddled with errors they are about as well-researched as Holy Blood, Holy Grail. Some mythicist views are so bizzare and so utterly filled with factual errors (and so oft repeated) that I can sympathize with the frustration of scholars who spend years researching only find their works critiqued by people who have no idea what they are talking about, and in their frustration they lash out and include within this category people like Doherty and others like him. Third, too few of those who castigate historical Jesus scholarship have taken the time to read more than a number of popular books on the subject (if that). Many start with something like The Jesus Mysteries and what is available on the internet and then read something like Ehrman's latest rag and take it as representative of the state of historical Jesus scholarship.
What I get out of this is that you'd like to think that historicist shit doesn't smell like mythicist shit. Understandable given your tendency, but I think you're wrong.

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Hegemony works wonderfully when you aren't aware of its shaping your thought and approach.
Yet it is within the works of those like Dunn, Wright, Meier, etc., that I find an comprehensive evaluation of how historical Jesus scholarship came to be, what epistomologies shaped various trends, how various philosophies of history and historiography effected the history of historical Jesus scholarship, and even how the authors themselves are not (and cannot) be free of biases.
How do people working within the permitted activities of a hegemony relate to an understanding, or a sidestepping, of that hegemony?

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Classics is a hybrid discipline. It's partly history (though not necessarily), partly literature (though not necessarily, etc.), partly culture, partly anthropology, partly linguistics and philology. That warps your vision of the matter.
History is a hybrid discipline. It's part sociology, part philosophy, part anthropology, and so forth.
Rubbish. History is relatively simple to comprehend. It's the attempt to reconstruct the past. The evidence may be extremely diverse, but history is not in itself hybrid at all.
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Old 05-23-2012, 03:51 PM   #82
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But Dr. Betcher is not part of the Historical Jesus guild.
That was kind of the point. Here's a scholar who isn't involved in historical Jesus research yet still references Doherty, despite his lack of "credentials."
An Anglican theologian who talks in creative post-modern odes about spirit and pneumatology. No quite my idea of scholarship, but to each his or her own.

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You think John Dominic Crossan is an "evangelical Christian"? ...
Sorry for not being clear - the editors of the book, and the authors of the chapter in question, are evangelicals.

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The point was that Doherty is also referenced in this critique, but there is no discussion of his lack of credentials or statement about why some non-PhD is being included in a discussion/review of a work of scholarship. He's simply included.
And dismissed. But at least not ignored, as he usually is.

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I'm not sure what this is supposed to prove. Doherty is reflecting back a criticism that was made of him.
Not really (although perhaps this is just my limited experience with the apparently bitter battle of blogs). Doherty has been criticized for not being an expert at all (i.e., for having no real academic credentials which would make him qualified) not for having a doctorate which is supposed to be "higher" than a PhD, but in the wrong field. Grant had a Litt.D and had academic appointments.
It is your limited experience with the debate.

Wells in particular has been criticized for having a PhD in the wrong field.
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Old 05-23-2012, 04:26 PM   #83
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If you recall, this "loser crap" about specialists began with a comment I made that had nothing to do with whether specialists are/were right or wrong, merely what their responsiblites were in general in terms of engaging with non-specialists, whatever the field. I explicitly did not limit this to historical Jesus studies, or even history, but ALL fields.
You seem to have totally forgotten the context in which you made your first faux pas.
I posted it right below what you quoted above.



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[Attempted bait and switch on credentialism omitted]
What?

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(Does the revelation not help you to understand the writer behind the works? And hopefully those two monographs don't include his "Jesus of Nazareth", but two of his Aramaic gospel analyses.)
I was referring to Aramaic Sources of Mark's Gospel and Aramaic approach to Q, but I probably should have included vol. 343 of the Library of New Testament Studies his The Solution of the 'Son of Man' Problem. Those are the only three books/monographs that I've read by him, although I may have read an article or two as well. And I've always considered Aramaic approaches to Greek texts fraught with complications that Casey treats all too lightly.



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What I get out of this is that you'd like to think that historicist shit doesn't smell like mythicist shit. Understandable given your tendency, but I think you're wrong.
Clearly there are differences, even if the methods employed by historicists are all crap. If you can point out an academic work (and I don't mean something simply written by an academic) which is riddled with factual errors rather than problematic methods, assumptions, and conclusions by all means do so.

A larger issue, however, is to lump the enormous amount of diverse scholarship behind historical Jesus studies together in the way one can with the better mythicists. There are a handful of authors like Price who, while in the extreme minority, are nonetheless of a qualititatively different sort than Freke and Gandy. I find their methods to be quite flawed, but whereas (for example) The Jesus Mysteries simply compares Christ to Mithras without alerting the reader that the mystery cult version likely dates after the gospels, Doherty does say "Although Mmithras was an ancient Persion god, the form his cult took in Hellenistic times is a Greek version. Some scholars locate its inception in Asia Minor about 100 BCE, others as late as the latter first century CE." (p. 116).

However, the historicists are far, far more diverse as far as their historical approaches and skill are concerned. More importantly, even if any attempt at reconstructing the historical Jesus is doomed to fail, it is quite a different thing to say he never existed. The former can be a statement about the problems with determining what is historical in our sources (or is a statement that no such elements exist). The latter requires an alternate explanation for the origins of christianity which do not result from a historical person who became shrouded in myth and legend by the time anything substantial was written about him. It is here that even those most skeptical and critical of the whole quest for the historical Jesus break from the mythicists. They regard the quest as futile because no methods are capable of seperating fact from fiction in the gospels, and thus we are left with the bare skeleton of some guy Jesus who inspired a following and was executed, and whatever else might be accurate in what we have too inexorably tied into the myth to be recovered.

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How do people working within the permitted activities of a hegemony relate to an understanding, or a sidestepping, of that hegemony?
What hegemony? What we have are people trained in different field, in different places, interacting with one another on a diverse range of topics in numerous different arenas, and as a result a wide divergence in opinions, approaches, methods, etc.


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Rubbish. History is relatively simple to comprehend. It's the attempt to reconstruct the past.
1) Anything is relatively simply to understand when you vastly over-simplify it. I can just as easily (and erroneously) say "Linguistics is a relatively simple thing to understand. It's an attempt to understand language."

2) According to many, history is as much a novel construction as it is a re-construction.

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The evidence may be extremely diverse, but history is not in itself hybrid at all.
Neither is classics if I define it so simplistically: "It's easy to understand: it's the study of Greece and Rome".
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Old 05-23-2012, 04:38 PM   #84
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talks in creative post-modern odes about spirit and pneumatology. No quite my idea of scholarship, but to each his or her own.
I don't tend to read theology either (which is what the paper is about), but that really doesn't matter here. This is a formal academic piece in an academic journal.



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Sorry for not being clear - the editors of the book, and the authors of the chapter in question, are evangelicals.
Ah. My mistake. Thanks.





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It is your limited experience with the debate.

Wells in particular has been criticized for having a PhD in the wrong field.
I wasn't referring to Wells, however (whose PhD isn't in ancient history or related to it, yet he has not been ignored and in the books/papers I've read his credentials aren't part of the critique; in fact, he changed his view in response to Dunn's 1985 critique of his work). I was referring to Doherty. You stated that Doherty was just applying to Grant what had been said about him (Doherty). Am I wrong in thinking that critics of Doherty on the web have simply said Doherty didn't have any expertise at all (or something similar)? Or do many actually say his expertise lies elsewhere or isn't in NT studies.
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Old 05-23-2012, 05:30 PM   #85
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What I get out of this is that you'd like to think that historicist shit doesn't smell like mythicist shit. Understandable given your tendency, but I think you're wrong.
Clearly there are differences,
None of any meaningful significance to me.

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How do people working within the permitted activities of a hegemony relate to an understanding, or a sidestepping, of that hegemony?
What hegemony?
Good answer.

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Originally Posted by LegionOnomaMoi View Post
What we have are people trained in different field, in different places, interacting with one another on a diverse range of topics in numerous different arenas, and as a result a wide divergence in opinions, approaches, methods, etc.
It's just a rehearsal of your previous position. Your "[w]hat hegemony?" speaks more eloquently.

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Rubbish. History is relatively simple to comprehend. It's the attempt to reconstruct the past.
1) Anything is relatively simply to understand when you vastly over-simplify it. I can just as easily (and erroneously) say "Linguistics is a relatively simple thing to understand. It's an attempt to understand language."

2) According to many, history is as much a novel construction as it is a re-construction.

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The evidence may be extremely diverse, but history is not in itself hybrid at all.
Neither is classics if I define it so simplistically: "It's easy to understand: it's the study of Greece and Rome".
The Einsteinian notion of "make it as simple as possible, but no simpler" jumps to mind. I reduced history--I think reasonably--to one act, no matter in which context it is done. The process might be misguided or hindered by all kinds of hurdles, but it still aims to clarify details of the past. Your oversimplification of "classics" hides the fact that it involves history, literature, Greek and Latin philology, anthropology and other pursuits all for themselves limited only to the theme of Roman and Greek studies. I think you are just being perverse. (And I'm making no criticism of classics.)
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Old 05-23-2012, 05:35 PM   #86
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.....The latter requires an alternate explanation for the origins of christianity which do not result from a historical person who became shrouded in myth and legend by the time anything substantial was written about him.....
Again, you present a BAIT and Switch argument by completely and conveniently forgetting that HJers claim Paul is an EARLY witness to an historical Jesus.

Why do you constantly Bait and Switch???

An early Paul destroys ALL CLAIMS that Jesus was mythologised LONG after he was dead.

Paul supposedly preached Jesus was the Messiah, the Son of God, in the likeness of God, was LORD, and was RAISED from the dead for over 17 years.

An EARLY Paul suggests that Jesus was MYTH from the very start.

If Paul was early then he claimed his Jesus was NOT human since 37-41 CE.

If Paul was early then he claimed Jesus was RESURRECTED since 37-41 CE.

If Paul was early then he claimed the resurrected Jesus VISITED him since 37-41 CE.

Please, no more Bait and Switch.

Jesus was MYTH and falsely shrouded in history.

Early Paul claimed Jesus was God's own Son.
See Galatians 4.4
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Old 05-23-2012, 05:44 PM   #87
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talks in creative post-modern odes about spirit and pneumatology. No quite my idea of scholarship, but to each his or her own.
I don't tend to read theology either (which is what the paper is about), but that really doesn't matter here. This is a formal academic piece in an academic journal.
Is it?

Anglican Theological Review" is a quarterly journal of theological reflection. In the spirit of sound learning that has been the hallmark of Anglican divinity, our aim is to foster scholarly excellence and thoughtful conversation in and for the church."


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... You stated that Doherty was just applying to Grant what had been said about him (Doherty). Am I wrong in thinking that critics of Doherty on the web have simply said Doherty didn't have any expertise at all (or something similar)? Or do many actually say his expertise lies elsewhere or isn't in NT studies.
They have specifically said that he doesn't have the right degree.
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Old 05-23-2012, 07:55 PM   #88
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None of any meaningful significance to me.
Clearly.




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The Einsteinian notion of "make it as simple as possible, but no simpler" jumps to mind.
This is the same Einstein who found the nonlocality of quantum theory and the incongruity between quantum mechanics and GTR so displeasing that he not only came up with the "cosmological constant" (his biggest mistake, according to him) and devoted years trying to refute instantaneous correlation at a distance because the simple answer (nonlocality) was too simplistic an explanation?


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I reduced history--I think reasonably--to one act, no matter in which context it is done. The process might be misguided or hindered by all kinds of hurdles, but it still aims to clarify details of the past. Your oversimplification of "classics" hides the fact that it involves history, literature, Greek and Latin philology, anthropology and other pursuits all for themselves limited only to the theme of Roman and Greek studies. I think you are just being perverse. (And I'm making no criticism of classics.)
And your description of history "hides" far more. If I say "study of Greece and Rome" this includes the literature of Greece and Roman, their languages, etc. Just like your definition "reconstruct the past" is accurate, but it "hides" the fact that it involves (among many other things) literature, anthropology, etc. But as all of these are used to "reconstruct the past" you can vastly over-simplify it like this. Likewise, "studying greece and rome" can involve "literature, Greek and Latin philology, anthropology and other pursuits", but as it is still about Greece and Rome, I can simplify.
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Old 05-23-2012, 08:14 PM   #89
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There are serious problems we all have to face because of the current devaluation of the notion of evidence and of the corresponding overappreciation of rhetoric and idealogy as instruments for the analysis of the literary sources.
Indeed.

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There are no archaeological sources that stand up to critical scrutiny.
None at all? Or just with respect to christianity? And what archaeological sources do stand up to what scrutiny?


The usual. i.e is there a secure and unambiguous christian archaeological relic dated before the 4th century?
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Old 05-23-2012, 09:51 PM   #90
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The usual. i.e is there a secure and unambiguous christian archaeological relic dated before the 4th century?
How is that "the usual"?
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