gurugeorge

It's a modern-day euhemerization - but it (and the modern-day "quest") need not necessarily be the first attempt.

Do you see? The term is being used to describe the very tendency by more or less rationalistically or naturalistically inclined thinkers to historicize the woo-woo. It was part of an overall Hellenistic trend.

Used in this context, the point is that Jesus was all woo-woo to start with, and he only looks kinda-sorta historical because of previous attempts at historicization (euhemerization) being layered into the myth.

And I thought quite carefully about using the term to describe what I mean long ago, thank you very much, as I'm sure Carrier did too

GakuseiDon

But euhemerism was not done to make a myth historical. Euhemerism is the belief that the original myth was historical. It's just that the subject was only a man around whom legends grew.

I don't want to harp on about this, but you are taking a good word, with a known meaning, and then trying to make it mean something else. You may as well redefine "incarnation" as not having anything to do with "in flesh". It is just bad apologetics, trying to get buzz words into there to make your views sound more respectable. When it comes to Euhemerism, the Gospels are the "before" picture, not the "after" one. Even if there is a historicization being layered into the myth, I can't think of any step that would fall under "euhemerism", since that step would end up with just a man. No virgin birth, no resurrection.

As you know, my hobby is learning about ancient thinking, particularly Greco-Roman's views of the world. If Plutarch's Isis and Osiris makes some people's eyes glaze over, it doesn't do that to me. I love it! Get a nice glass of red wine, sit down and read the first half of Minucius Felix's Octavius, where the character is blasting Christianity. Really wonderful stuff!

So it grates when people make stupid comments on what people thought back then. How many examples of euhemerism have you seen where the myth is of a "celestial being" put in a historical setting? I've never seen anything like that. Open up any book on Greek myths and look in vain for such an example of euhemeism, or examples of Doherty's "World of Myth" concept, or for anything explaining how Plutarch had Osiris incarnating, dying and rising again in the sky. Why don't scholars write about any of those things? Why can't we look into scholarly works and find "World of Myth" articles? Because the authors are scared it might impact on Christianity??? Nonsense! Why would they care about, or even know of, any such thing? It's not there because Doherty's theories are all woo-woo, just as your definition of euhemerism doesn't reflect anything from the scholarly world.

Gurugeorge, call "taking a celestial being and giving it a historical setting" anything you like, but it is not euhemerism.

James The Least

Yes. It could be that the purpose of Mark's gospel was to provide a myth of the Jesus character predicting the fall of the Temple and a theological framework for why God passed judgement on "the Jews." The destruction of the Temple was anchored in history. "Jesus," like Daniel and the prophets, was an omnipotent theological construct who could exist anytime the evangelists needed him to exist. His main purpose was as a prophet of the Gentiles, who now imagined that they had a direct connection to Theos Hypsistos and therefore "superceded" Judaism and owned the copyright on the Hebrew scriptures as well.

aa5874

Well, euhemerism CANNOT be applied to the Jesus character because WE know how Jesus Christ was fabricated.

The source of the Jesus character is BOLTED, I say, BOLTED to the Canonised Gospels.

Just go get a BIBLE.

You don't really know how ancients thought because you have would realised that Jesus came from mis-intrepetation of the Words of the Lord--Hebrew Scripture.

The very authors of the Jesus story, unlike Greek and Roman Mythology, STATED clearly ALL the events of the Jesus story was the fullfilment of the Words of the Lord according to the Prophets.

When Jesus was to be born of the Virgin that was done so that ISAIAH 7.14 could be fulfilled.

When Jesus RODE an ASS it was because an ASS was to be RIDDEN according to Word of the Lord. See Zechariah 9.9

When Jesus RODE TWO ASSES it was because it was believed the word of the Lord said so.

Nowhere in Greek and Roman Mythology you have the FABRICATORS show EXACTLY how their Myth character was INVENTED and BOLTED the Source of their INVENTION to the INVENTED.

Perhaps euhemerism can be applied to Roman and Greek mythology but ANCIENTS wanted people to KNOW exactly where Jesus the Son of God came from and had the FORE-SIGHT to BOLT it to their Canon.

Behold the Bible--the Word of Lord according to the Prophets.

EarlDoherty

Now I can see why you have such trouble grasping my arguments!

Perhaps George did not put it in the clearest way possible, but as I see it, he is not saying that "euhemerism" was the actual process that took place, since he (and I) do not regard the Gospel Jesus with all its mythology (and the absence of anything else) as having begun with an historical man in the standard euhemeristic process.

What he means, if I interpret him correctly, is that historicist scholars have interpreted what happened as a euhemeristic process, since they start with the assumption that an HJ existed as a man, to whom was attached a mythology. Of course, they are wrong, particularly as the existence of such an original historical figure has not been demonstrated, or very weakly so.

Instead, the process as mythicists interpret it started with an entirely mythical celestial figure and on him was overlaid an historical veneer. That, of course, is not euhemerism, but its reverse. Where euhemerism comes into play is simply in the arguments of the historicists, who insist on reversing that reversal.

Hope that's clear. Finally.

Earl Doherty

EarlDoherty

Mark's Gospel is an allegory for the faith and preaching movement of which he was a part (one based in a Q-type community). Its Jesus figure represents the teaching and activities of the movement itself. Look at the famous allegory of Pilgrim's Progress. Is Pilgrim a real person? No, he symbolizes what Christian believers have to go through to gain salvation. "What must I do to be saved?" Pilgrim asks. The allegory presents the answer for the reader, with many lessons given along the way, just as Mark provides.

But Mark has also fashioned another allegory within his Gospel. It is an allegory of the life of Moses. Mark's Jesus (continued by Matthew and Luke) is fashioned to conform to the biblical model of Moses and the granting of the old covenant. Even the miracle sets in Mark conform to the Exodus miracle pattern. To fashion an allegory to Moses, it is much more efficient to embody it in a symbolic character rather than try to make the sect as a whole, with its multiplicity of prophets and activities, fit the Moses prototype. If Mark's readers identify with his Jesus, who is identified with Moses, then all the symbolism of the Moses myth attaches itself to the readers' image of their own sect. The one thing Mark has added is the death and rising dimension, which is probably dependent on a syncretism with the Christ cult of those like Paul.

To some extent that strategy, minus the death and rising, first appeared in Q, with a founder figure (whether he was named Jesus or not, or whether before Mark he became directly associated with the heavenly Son of Man which the sect anticipated, is not clear) gradually being developed in the Q mind to symbolize an originator of the sect's teachings and activities. Mark probably built on that, though it still cannot be said that he regarded his Jesus of Nazareth as an historical figure.

No problems that I can see with regarding Mark's Gospel as an allegory.

Earl Doherty

Toto

I think Euhemerism is the assumption that the myth grew out of a historical non-mythical person. I don't see your problem with using this term for the Christian treatment of Jesus - at least some of them inherited gospel stories and assumed that there was a historical person behind them.

Are you assuming that the mythicist case requires that some Christians took what they knew in their hearts was a myth and invented a historical person for fraudulent purposes?

Perspicuo

What would those issues be?

I personally think Joseph Smith was a liar, a conman, a cheat.

GakuseiDon

Thank you.

Gurugeorge, compare Earl's point above with your earlier comment (my emphasis below):

andrewcriddle

I'm sorry I wasn't clear. When Zechariah puts a crown on Joshua and delivers a speech beginning, "Behold the man whose name is the branch (or the rising)..." would this be understood by Philo on the literal level as meaning that Joshua/Jesus is named as "the branch" or "the rising" ?

At first glance it seems that this is what the passage means but there are serious difficulties increased in the Septuagint version.

(In terms of the original meaning of the original text, it is likely that a passage in which Joshua and Zerubbabel are crowned together has had the references to Zerubbabel removed resulting in a text that is difficult to understand in a consistent way.)

Andrew Criddle