aa5874

I don't know what the fuss is all about, mythicists are independent thinkers, many times on the fringe. Their approach to the non-histocity of Jesus is always diversified and they seldom agree in every aspect.

I would be alarmed if all mythicist addressed the issues surrounding the non-existence of Jesus in an identical and predictable fashion. The mythicists has to constantly review his position, look at ways to improve his arguments, in effect, an evolution of ideas. He has to look for errors in his presentation, he has to be dynamic and adapt as new information sufaces.

I dread the day when all mythicists are asked to think exactly alike, to interpret data the same way, or are pressured to do so, in their quest to show that Jesus most likely never existed.

Ted Hoffman

Which publications detail your position?
I wouldn't (like many here) give a rats ass about what people with Doctorates in Star Trek (Divinity and Theology) think regarding historical questions, especially when the bulk of that guild are strapped with theological commitments, and especially when one is appealing to them as an authority.

That there is genuine 'scholarship' amongst mainsteam NT scholars is a joke - very few amongst them are scholars in the sense of objective researchers who have no prior commitments. And NT scholars like JD Crossan and JP Meier have admitted as much. Do you want me to quote them?

I think its rather naive of you to even think opinions being peddled by Bede have any value in a discussion like this. Bede routinely slants evidence and misrepresents positions. Doherty has addressed all those alleged scholarly refutations on the Jesus myth. Thoroughly. Are you even aware of this? What is Bede's response to Doherty's treatsie on the same? Richard Carrier is a mythicist yet Bede purports to include him in that list. Have you been keeping up with discussions on these matters?
I am a goer in this forum, yet I never participated in that poll. But regardless, you know that appeal to numbers is fallacious.

Solitary Man

What about Doctorates in Religious Studies? Or Classics? Or Anthropology? Or Archaeology? Let me guess, you don't give a rat's ass about them either?

And Acharya S. is what, exactly? If NT scholarship is a joke, Doherty and Price are knock-knocks.

As is an ad hominem, yet you engaged in it anyway.

Ted Hoffman

Let me know when you are done with guessing and are actually interested in my answer.
My point is, one cannot purport to derive authority from such a guild of people who lack objectivity. Neither Price, Archaya or Doherty appeal to credentials and instead it is their work. One has to examine their arguments and decide. The same applies to all NT Scholars. Some NT Scholars, like Hans Conzelmann and raymond Brown were clearly serious people. But they dont derive any appeal from belonging to the same gang as Meier and others. It is purely their work that speaks for them.
Where?

schilling.klaus

most of them are as biased as their brethren of the divinity department

someone who took the trouble to gather the results of good old solid
honest intellectuality, unadultered by academic pressure and bias

Klaus Schilling

Solitary Man

Actually, I'm not really interested in your answer, to be honest. I'm just pointing out how incredibly naive you are to be so unfamiliar with the field yet feel that you somehow have the authority, like fundies bashing evolution, to bash what you cannot even come up to.

Where?[/QUOTE]
Particularly: That there is genuine 'scholarship' amongst mainsteam NT scholars is a joke

Solitary Man

Do you ever back up your assertions? Or are you just the perpetual claim machine?

Ted Hoffman

Dominic Crossan, The Historical Jesus: The Life of a Mediterranean Jewish Peasant (1991), xxvii.
Finding the Historical Jesus: An Interview With John P. Meier
As quoted by Jacques Berlinerblau in The Unspeakable in Biblical Scholarship

Clivedurdle

This is fascinating that the rest of the planet openly discusses whether x or y really existed, and it is understood as a legitimate question for example about Lao Tzu.

What happened that xianity is somehow reified and made holy that it is taboo and a shibboleth to ask equivalent questions about Jesus?

We are looking at an in group, that interestingly for some reason includes atheists, who are protesting too much and going around harrumphing well of course Jesus existed, just like Adam, and Noah, and Moses.....existed!

Why are xianity and Jesus given special treatment and thought to be an exception?

If it looks like a duck, quacks like a duck it is an elephant?

Clivedurdle

Michael Woods In Search of Myths and Heroes p 148, quoted specifically in the context of the Queen of Sheba. The chapter then goes on to provide evidence that she probably did exist!:devil1: