fattychunks

This was presented (copy and pasted) to me to persuade me that the MJ method of historical interpretation is supposedly flawed. i've been looking on the forums here and at infidelguy.com to see if this was ever addressed anywhere because it is rather new to me. if anyone can drop a few links here that could help me better understand the points in this, i'd appreciate it
..............

The rest can be found at Holding/Turkel's Tektonics site here.

Peter Kirby

Credits belong to JPH (Turkel).

regards,
Peter Kirby

Diogenes the Cynic

Peter, do you happen to know if the Holding material is linkable online anywhere (Tektonics maybe)? I'd like to be able to truncate the quoted material in the OP and link to the rest if possible. Thanks for the heads up on the credit.

Peter Kirby

Sure!

http://www.tektonics.org/jesusexist/jesusexisthub.html

regards,
Peter Kirby

fattychunks

oh excellent, peter thanks. that should help my search some

Diogenes the Cynic

Much appreciated, Peter. Thanks.

Peter Kirby

Since the positive evidence for the historicity of Jesus is equal to or greater than the positive evidence for the historicity of Gamiliel, I can see two credible mythicist responses:

(1) The weak mythicist, the one who merely doubts an existence of Jesus due to an insufficiency of evidence, would be forced to consign Gamaliel also to the list of characters whose historicity is not positively known.

(2) The strong mythicist, the one who doubts--or goes further to pronounce false--the historicity of Jesus due to positive indications, would not be forced to dismiss Gamaliel similarly, although she could do so. Such a mythicist could hold that there is so-called prima facie evidence for both a Jesus and a Gamaliel, yet there are contextual indications that count against the historicity of Jesus, such that doubt or denial is rational due to such specific considerations of the case. Such a context does not adhere in the case of Gamaliel, so he can slide by on the "first glance" appraisal of historicity.

regards,
Peter Kirby

Toto

I can see some clear differences. Gamaliel is not portrayed as a god or a supernatural being, or as violating the laws of nature. He is also not a mythic archetype. There would be no particular motive for anyone to historicize him if he were mythic, and no apparent motive for later followers to forge evidence to prove his existence.

For Jesus, there are indications that he was a real person, but also clear motives for historicizing a myth or for forging evidence on the part of later followers. These tend to discount those indications and tip the balance of probabilities in favor of mythicism.

The few fragments of history that indicate Gamaliel was a real person are enough to tip the balance of probabilities in favor of his existence.

But when it comes down to it, I have no problems saying that the evidence for Gamaliel's existence is equivocal. He might be in the same category as Confucius, who I think probably is mythical.

Chris Weimer

Is this type of mythicism really rational? I tried to make the same point earlier that merely because the details of someone's life and/or primary evidence of their existence has not survived, that does not invalidate their existence. Take my cousin, for example. You don't know jack about her, but how you can say that she doesn't exist is far beyond what is rational.

Remember, we work in probabilities. Proof is for mathematics and for those who don't understand historical concepts.

Then the burden would be on the strong mythicist to show why the context of Jesus is better thought of in a mythic setting. So far, very few have actually stepped up to this plate: and the half of them are crackpots (Freke, Gandy, "Archaya S"). Who besides Doherty has really stepped up to the plate for mythicism?

And no Peter, I was not labelling you as either. You know me better than that.

Chris

Peter Kirby

Please note carefully the phrasing "merely doubts" and "historicity is not positively known." Just as we know that there are planets that we cannot see or detect or identify in any way at present, we know that there were people about whom who we (some--or even all--people in the present day) know absolutely nothing to be true. To claim that Jesus existed is akin to claiming that there is a planet circling the star 2423 in the Andromeda galaxy that supports bacterial life in its upper atmosphere. It's not an incredible claim, it might even be true, but it would also be rational to withhold assent until an individual sees the evidence. It's also quite possible that some people (say, astronauts and astronomers, or any intelligent beings actually in the Andromeda galaxy) would discover and know the truth before others do.

Take the historical Oddyseus, and, for the sake of argument, let him be a real person. Oddyseus is not a mythicist with respect to himself. Agamemnon is likewise not a mythicist with respect to Odysseus. If Homer really did his homework, he might have had enough evidence to believe rationally in Odysseus. But, unfortunately, we don't know enough about Homer to know if he did his homework well, or for that matter did any at all beyond poetry exercises. So we don't have quite enough evidence to make a strong claim of historicity for Odysseus, i.e., doubt about the historical Odysseus is rational. This is even in the absence of good evidence that there was no historical Odysseus.

Something like that, yes.

I can't really think of anyone else. But one home run can win a game. It reminds me of a comment made by Albert Einstein, when a book was published titled, "100 Scientists Against Einstein." He replied, "Why a hundred? If I were wrong, it should only take one to show it."

Who has stepped up to the plate for historicism?

regards,
Peter Kirby