No Robots

Well, exactly. And I think that is what both Goodman and Spinoza are saying.

But that's precisely the questioner's problem: the answer to his question cannot be historical, but only interpretive.

He is saying that the physical question can only be resolved philosophically.

dog-on

Indeed, that is what he is saying, agreed.

But that is, in the end, what all "real" scholars say when it comes to the question of HJ and what annoys me when some of these same scholars scoff at the (at very least) equally likely scenario that we are looking at myth, all the way down.

No Robots

I don't think most scholars really have thought through this issue. Nor do I think that they would in general object to the idea of Christ as myth, any more than they objected to the idea of Christ as god.

However, if we do engage philosophically with the text in its cultural context, then the case for Christ as myth does fall away.

I will give credit to mythicists and agnostics, though, in that, by insisting on the importance of this subject, they bring to the fore questions that most scholars would prefer to ignore.

spamandham

Christ *is* myth.

There might have been a historical Jesus, but there is not a historical *Christ*.

No Robots

"Christ" is the Greek translation of the Hebrew "Messiah", meaing "The Anointed One." It is a title. Applying it to Jesus of Nazareth is like applying "Buddha", ie. "The Awakened One," to Lord Siddharta. Some scholars try to maintain a distinction between "the Jesus of history" and "the Christ of Faith," but this is just obscurantism.

spin

This is called non-argument by mutually unaccepted assertion.


spin

No Robots

What part of my assertion do you not accept?

spin

"[M]utually" refers to those participating in the brief interchange I cited.

One doesn't argue by assertion. Saying "the case for Christ as myth does fall away" without a tinge of support is as meaningful as saying "Christ *is* myth". Neither participant accepts the other's assertions. Unsupported assertions usually don't deserve to be accepted and I guess that applies both ways to both of you.

I don't see either of you getting past this non-argument form.

How about if you both look at the notion of "christ", which you wish to believe is simply a(n apt) title, but which spamandham wishes to believe is not a title but something that can be classed as "myth". We have some basic what to your positions. However, it would be worthwhile if you look into the evidence around the significance of the terms in play, both "christ" itself and "myth". As a start, do you both work with enough overlapping significance for the terms to manage to converse meaningfully with each other?


spin

avi

?the "only" way?
? "really" read the text?
If we apply this yardstick to other myths, like Paul Bunyan, does the myth acquire historicity?
Isn't the "only" way to read any document, in any language, the literal way, not some imaginary, hypothetical interpretation, unless the text has been deliberately encoded? If this point is correct, and if one assumes that the four gospels are not intended as some kind of cryptic metaphor, then, isn't the "only" way to read them, the literal way, rather than by employing some fanciful "interpretive" analysis?

I do not comprehend your notion of "really" reading something. Do you apply this same measure to the Quran, and the Bhagava Vita? How about Newtonian mechanics? Does one only "really" read Shakespeare if one is an actor performing on stage?

I suppose then, that you wish to suggest, that one seeking truth about historical subjects of inquiry, must first attain a state of devotion to a particular philosophy, in order to comprehend the accuracy of this or that historical event....In the case of the Trojan war, for example, with the excavations not yet completed, I guess you would suggest that archaeological interpretation of the buried remnants of Troy requires a belief in the historicity of Hector, Achilles, Paris, Helen, and Menelaus.

Perhaps I simply lack sufficient grey matter to comprehend the notion of "really" reading something....To my simple minded way of looking at life, there once was a great city, Troy, and it was destroyed. There may or may not have been some shenanigans involving good looking babes. There was not however, any warrior, named Achilles (or any other name,) who had a goddess for a mother, and who was invincible in battle.

Yes, I am not a true believer, so, perhaps, I don't understand how to "really" read Homer. The "only" way that I can read fanciful stories about raising people from the dead, walking on water, and ascending to heaven, is as myth.

avi

Are you certain? The historicity of Siddhartha Gautama is not universally accepted. His life span is uncertain, with widely divergent dates for his birth and death--approximately 500-400 BCE, give or take a century. There is however, near universal acceptance, among believers, that he represented, by his ascetic demeanor, a model for living which is summarized by the word, Buddha.

The situation with Jesus of Nazareth or Capernum, or wherever, is quite different. Not only are his dates suspect, so too are his accomplishments. Even the most embellished of all accounts, however, does not correspond to the Hebrew concept of Messiah--a sort of prince of the Davidic line, who will unite all the tribes of Israel, and conquer the oppressors, not a humble preacher, without wealth, without an army, without any significant followers, at the time of his death by execution under the Roman oppressors--similar to the death of Spartacus, except that Spartacus led an army against the Romans.

Indeed, a good argument can be made, that the religion derived from his Greek nickname, Christ, supposedly a translation of the Hebrew word Messiah, did not gain any real strength until Constantine declared it the official religion of the Roman Empire. Certainly the Jews themselves, did not consider Iesous to be the Messiah.

That's quite different from the acceptance of the title Buddha, to the case of Siddhartha, for in that situation, the overwhelming majority of supporters of the ideology, agreed with issuance of the title. If the Jews would have flocked, en masse, to Jesus, after his premature demise, then, one could argue that Christ and Messiah are one and the same.

The folks who flocked, however, were not Jews. They were the chaff, not the wheat. They were the "forgotten ones". They were Gentiles, northerners, easterners, often non-semitic culturally, and linguistically, people who rejected, whole heartedly, the Jewish laws, customs, and regulations. They are the ones, not the Jews, who incorrectly equated Christ with Messiah.