Vinnie

Another non-response.....

Its amusing that Doherty deems this his "best" argument as well.... :notworthy


Vinnie

spin

Doesn't the discussion about relics take us away from the Jewish religion. It plainly was/is not a religion that deems relics of any value. xianity is after all supposed to be an offshoot.


spin

Layman

Vinnie, you should write this stuff up. I have always thought this argument was completely baseless. It's never spelled out. It's never supported. They have no response for the 100-200 year absence of relics and pilgrimages despite strong belief in the HJ.

It's just silly.

But, even silly ideas need correction. So put this up on your site Vinnie. You'll be doing the internet a favor.

rlogan

I too agree with Layman. Write this up.

I have yet to see you logically deliver any meaningful argument.

Thus far:

No veneration A.D. 30 to (choose date) disproves myth.

Show me how that follows.

Layman

It's not about disproving myth. It's about negating one of the arguments that is supposed to support the Jesus Myth. Perhaps the worst one I have ever heard.

rlogan

Including "relics" in there is a muddy-the-water technique of the apologists masquerading as historians.

If some monumentally important event like crucifixion does not have a pilgrimage by the disciples, then the apologists say - well you can't prove they were selling ear rings from A.D. 30 to (choose year).

That's proof of HJ to the apologist.

rlogan

I'm all ears. Show me how it negates anything. Lay it out front to back. Start with the premise. End with the conclusion.

Ted Hoffman

Layman and Vinne, please stop being silly. Mythers do NOT need to explain why there was no relic-consciousness in the early first century. HJ proponents do.

Its a question Doherty raised and Fredricksen responded that relic-consciousness started in the 3-4th century. Doherty responded that that does not preclude that there was no relic-consciousness in the early 1st century and also that the fact that relic-consciousness started in the 4th century is not an explanation as to why there was no relic- consciousness in the 1st century.

Secondly, relic consciousness or the absence of it, is not used as an explanation for Jesus being a myth but is one question mythicism can answer while HJ proponents cannot manage to fit into their theory.

In the absence of a better explanation as to why there was no relic-consciousness in the 1st century, the argument remains untouched that there was no relic consciousness because there were no relics, no calvary, no cross, no historicalbirth place.

If you want to offer another explanation, offer it, if you cant refute this explanation, shut the hell up.

This is incorrect. List 10 christians that believed in a HJ in the late first century.
Fredricksen seems to argue that relic-conscious Christians emerged in the 4th Century. Didn't you read the exchange?
From this point on, I will not waste time responding to issues that do not challenge Christ-myth theory.

I will again, ignore the fact that you have imported 'internal clashes' into my statement (it assumes Christianity was a monolithic, unified movement). Next time you attempt to construct a strawman, I will insist you get it out of the way before we proceed.
You seem to have latched onto the second part of my statement only. Does that mean you agree a HJ took time before it became 'accepted' or became 'common'?

About opposition or rejection:
You mention something about the Marcionite controversy (where is Yuri?). Let me start with that.
1: Marcion
Marcion's Christ was docetic and remained purely spiritual even on earth. The idea that Jesus could have existed inthe flesh was antithetical to his beliefs. For these beliefs (opposing the idea of a HJ), he was expelled from the Church in c. 144. And he formed his own church which rivaled the Roman one. After some years, it had spread over much of the empire.
Marcion's rejection of Judaism and its scriptures catapulted the Roman church to do exactly the opposite: the (Roman) Church adopted Jewish scriptures as its own heritage. Marcion, OTOH, embraced Pauline writings, which he found to be consistent with his own gnostic leanings. The Church countered this by adopting the 4 Gospels and Paul's 13 letters to make up its canon.
John Knox Marcion and the New Testament p.140 states that this choice of 4 gospels out of over a dozen more was not a chance affair. They were regarded as more authentic, but, most importantly were best candidates for making a canon because they could be beaten to shape to provide support for the beliefs of the current orthodox circles to counter Marcionism. A HJ, contra Marcion's spiritual Jesus, began to take shape.

Doherty says that this counter "became an ambitious, multi-pronged attack" that involved rescuing Paul from the lap of the gnostics and establishing a wider apostolic base of authority. Documents from 'christian' communities all over the empirr were collected and purported to have been written by Jesus' apostles: Peter, John, James, Jude etc. The legendary 12 thus gained more authority and the streams they formed together with Paul's rivulets (linking Paul to the Jerusalem apostles in Acts of the apostles and isolating Marcion) fitted into the gathering river, and swept off Marcionism from the banks of the raging river.

This war against Marcionism literally gave birth to Christianity.

2: Early Apologists
The 5 or 6 major apologists up to the year 180 and after that: Irenaeus, Tertullian, Clement of Alexandria and Origen, though clearly anchored in the Gospel tradition, fail to mention a HJ in their defenses of Xstianity to the pagan - except for Justin Martyr. Theophilus, in his treatsie To Autolycus (c. 180) was converted after reading Jewish scriptures. He ridicules pagans for believing dead men could resurrect (they believed Aesclepius and Hercules resurrected). Athenagoras (c. 180) who was articulate and a philosophical thinker wrote a lot on Xstianity but mentioned a HJ. The Epistle of Diogentus (anonymous) - a defense of Xstianity (c.130) doesnt mention a HJ. Tatian, Justin's pupil, a Christian wrote to the Greeks c.160 in defense of Xstianity but never mentioned Christ or Jesus in his writings. Plus many other.

Now,the question is, how could all these apologists, invariably all christians and invariably engaged in defending christian beliefs to pagans, defend Christianity without mentioning Jesus - a founder figure? How could they do that without explaining the history and origins of their movement?
Commentators have interpreted this silence to mean they were silenced by pagan philosophers like Galen aho had challenged them that the xstian thinkers had their ideas based on revelation rather than philosophical argument, and further, ridiculed the idea of a crucified god: that the Heathen 'politic' had made it unfashionable to mention a HJ - hence they chose to keep him tightly locked in the closet. This explanation is inadequate - for many reasons.

Doherty explains:

"There seems to be only one proper way to interpret all this. We can assume that most, perharps all, of the philosopher-apologists had encountered the Gospel story and its figure of Jesus of Nazareth. But with the exception of Justin, they had chosen not to integrate him into their own faith, not to identify this reputed historical founder-teacher with their divine Logos and Son of God, not to regard him as the source of christian teachings.
This is only possible if the Logos religion the apologists subscribe to, especially at the time of their conversion, was lacking a figure of Jesus of Nazareth..."The Jesus Puzzle, p.283

Thus, the idea of a HJ was, for a while, untouchable and was ignored. The apologists mentioned, who were mostly educated, regarded the idea of HJ as a myth and were comfortable with presenting Christianity without a HJ, which, clearly, they felt was illegitimate.
Thus they rejected the gospel graft.

3: Minucius Felix

From the treatsie Octavius, whose putative author was Minucius Felix we find an interesting dialogie. Its argued that Tertullian's longer Apology borrowed from it (and not vice versa) because, as a rule of thumb, the borrower tends to expand on what is borrowed and doesn't chop and shorten it.
In the dialogue, the word Christian appears many times, but not even once does 'Jesus' or 'Christ' appear. No appeal is made to Jesus' resurrection. Octavius' brand of Xstianity rejects pagan deities and revolves around God. In Chapter 9, he, through Cecilus' mouth, rejects the idea of a man who suffered for them and died on the cross - he states that the group holding such beliefs should be rooted out:

This abominable congregation should be rooted out...a religion of lust and fornication...And some say the objects of their worship include a man who has suffered death as a criminal, as well as the wretched wood of his cross; these are fitting altars for such depraved people, and they worship what they deserve...
Doherty asks: "Could a Christian author who believed in a crucified Jesus and his divinity really have been capable of this manner of presentation?". Even though, through Octavius' mouth, he refutes these slanders, other statements indicate that the author disbelieved in man-gods and presented in the Gospels. For example, he states "Men who have died cannot become gods, because a god cannot die...why, I pray, are not gods born today, if such have ever been born?"
Then he proceeds to ridicule the idea of gods procreating.
Thus he not only rejected the idea of gods copulating, but rejected the idea that a man was born who was a saviour figure.

4: Others
Maybe I will need to Check, but Irenaeus, Celsus and others, IIRC, including some others could add to this list.

Conclusion

The idea of a HJ was rejected, ridiculed or ignored and the idea itself created rifts in the riotously diverse christian communities as manifested by the Marcionite controversy. Rifts that were wide enough to necessitate a concerted effort to build a canon to ground the faith upon, after which those 'communities' that diverted from the main body were systematically exterminated. A few decades later, Christianity was the main religion in the Roman empire and all oppositions to the HJ were quashed. Books burnt, inquisitions carried out and heretics wiped out. Interpolations were made, councils passed resolutions and politics went to bed with religion.

Vinnie

LMAo! You want their names? LOLOLOLOLOL

I am thinking communities, dude. Not individual peeps. The communitied behind various Gospels and the ones that received various epistles. Almost every audience behind every work in the entire first Christian century clocks in for me (close to 50 works?) but I am willing to work under only later texts (third stratum up?) to give the mythicists a chance to argue.

Vinnie

Vinnie

Actually, please read the discussions before you respond to them. Whoever suggested that mythicists need to explain why Paul does not venerate the tomb of Jesus or talk about a piece of the cross?

Vinnie