JoeWallack

JW:
Here's a tidbit for you aa. Orthodox Christianity reports to us that Marcion had a huge following for a time. They say that Marcion's father was an Orthodox Bishop. So presumably Marcion would have been well instructed with whatever evidence there was for the Historical Jesus at the time. Yet Orthodox Christianity reports to us that Marcion's Gospel started like this:

http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Itha...7/Gospel1.html

"In the fifteenth year of Tiberius Caesar,
Pontius Pilate being governor of Judea,
Jesus descended [out of heaven] into Capernaum, a city in Galilee,
and was teaching [in the synagogue] on the Sabbath days;
And they were astonished at his doctrine,"

And God knows what Marcion's original actually said.



Joseph

BABE or BABY, n.
A misshapen creature of no particular age, sex, or condition, chiefly remarkable for the violence of the sympathies and antipathies it excites in others, itself without sentiment or emotion. There have been famous babes; for example, little Moses, from whose adventure in the bulrushes the Egyptian hierophants of seven centuries before doubtless derived their idle tale of the child Osiris being preserved on a floating lotus leaf.

http://www.errancywiki.com/index.php/Main_Page

Febble

Thanks. Yes, I'm agnostic on the issue too, but from a position of ignorance of what is even known. Also, being a psychologist, I'm all too aware of how narratives are constructed in line with expectations and causal assumptions. I think one reason I am not persuaded by the arguments that Jesus was an entirely mythical figure is that I'm not persuaded that myths tend begin as complete fabrications, or at least not the kind of myth that the gospel myths would be if they were myths. Legends, sure, and tall tales.

But a lot depends on the date of the gospels. The later they are, the more mythical they are likely to be, I would have thought. Interesting point about Paul and Mithras.

Febble

No, really, this is not logical. By this "logic" if you read a newspaper account of a real event that got the birthdate of one of the participants wrong, you would conclude that the entire report was false.

spin

You'll note that myth is not a word that I use to deal with this subject. And you'll notice that the sources of traditions can be so very different from the way a tradition appears in a later era.

Another probable source in the Jesus tradition is that of personified wisdom. Wisdom was there at creation, She was the breath on the mouth of god as he spoke the world into existence. She was the word of god and nothing was created except through her. She came down to this world and walked among the people. Those who listened to her received what she taught. They received wisdom, though many rejected her teaching. In the Greek diaspora Wisdom jumped sex, becoming the logos. You can see how the wisdom tradition developed here. We are fortunate to have good sources to follow it. When it was absorbed into the Jesus tradition. We have a master who walked the world preaching the wisdom of god. Is there any myth in the evolution of the logos tradition? I don't see this as a creation of a story in line with the myths that I know. This is evolving contemplative "revelation".

Traditions are built on what came before and that usually doesn't allow one to distinguish "real" source from any other source.

But traditions can clearly be built on non-real sources. My favorite non-real person is the eponymous founder of the Ebionite christian "heresy", one Ebion. Tertullian argued against Ebion's ideas. Epiphanius even knew where he was born. Nevertheless, there was no Ebion. He didn't exist, though I don't consider him a myth, for he was not mythical in conception. The name Ebionite comes from a Hebrew word meaning "poor", )BYWN, not from a founder of the movement.

Once a tradition exists it gathers accretions, by hook or by crook. (It is thought that the Arthurian tradition is based in reality, but there are many accretions which certainly don't go back to an Arthurian reality.)


spin

Malachi151

So how would you explain the 30,000+ gods, goddesses, and imps of the "pagans" at this time? What of Zeus, Dionysus, Atlas, Hera, Hercules, Apollo, etc., etc.?

I argue that the closer the Gospels are to the time of the supposed life of Jesus the more likely it is that Jesus didn't exist at all.

The Gospels are discounted by their content, not when they were written. The longer the time between the supposed life of this person and the writings about him, the more time there was for legend to grow.

If the first Gospel were written in 40 CE and claiming that Jesus died in 35 CE, then the whole story would certainly be totally fabricated and the Jesus character would just a pure fiction.

The the Gospel of Mark, as I argue and believe, was written as fiction, then all of these arguments about dating are totally mute. The only thing that we can use to supposedly "date" the life and death of Jesus is the Gospels themselves. Talk about when they were written is a lost point, since its in reference to to a story element that is itself only attested to in the Gospels.

Febble

Well, I expect they started as explanations, and got embroidered. I assume that happened with the Gospels too. The question is: what were they explanations of? The most obvious answer here would seem to me to be "a man".

But, having confessed to being a Christian, I should make clear again: I am perfectly open to the idea that Jesus was mythical, it's just that it's a relatively new idea to me. So, you have a reasonably intelligent Christian to convert, and being a scientist, I am responsive to reason and evidence. Please make your case.

Malachi151

Well, I doubt that all of the gods and "mythical figures" of the other cultures are based on real human beings. Maybe some of them are, but not all of them. Do you think that "Mithras" was a real person? Why or why not?

What arguments can you apply to Jesus that don't apply to Mithras?

This piece looks at a lot of the pre-Jesus stories that prefigure the Jesus story. I can see very easily how these stories would evolve into the Jesus one.

http://www.rationalrevolution.net/ar...h_followup.htm

Furthermore, if the Gospel of Mark was the first writing to really set Jesus in history, and prior to that he was viewed as an abstract heavenly concept, then there really isn't much of a challenge to this. Again, if Mark was an intentional fiction, this is really no different than people thinking that Huckleberry Finn was a real person a few years after Mark Twain's book became popular.

Febble

Sorry, missed the second half of your post:

Hmmm...

OK.

So your argument is that Jesus is not a mythical character but a fictional one? And that it must be fictional because it can't be true?

OK. I'll think about that.

Febble

I don't know anything about Mithras, so I couldn't say. I'm just dubious at the notion that someone sat down to write a piece of fiction. I certainly wouldn't assume that all myths started with real people. I think many of them were probably attempted causal explanations of natural events.

Time, mainly. I think your argument only works if the Mark was a deliberate work of fiction, not the development of a legend over time. I'm not convinced it is actual fiction.

Or be incorporated.

Thanks.

Well, except that Huckleberry Finn is a novel, part of a genre. Is there anything like Mark in contemporary literature?

But OK, I'll think about the suggestion that Mark's gospel is a setting down of a pre-existing myth. I'd be more convinced, in a way, if it were Matthew or Luke. They seem more like myth-telling to me.

Toto

There is some confusion here. Johnny Skeptic was quoting Richard Carrier. I have added quote tags to indicate where Carrier is speaking. Check the original link.