Doug Shaver

I've gotten about halfway through the book, and I can't take any more of it right now. If there is anything in the remainder that is relevant to what I'm about to say, anyone who wants to is welcome to correct me.

From Origen, we learn nothing at all about Celsus except that he wrote a book, a polemic against Christianity, called A True Discourse. Origen reveals nothing about Celsus' life and nothing directly about Celsus' sources of information about Christianity.

What Origen does give us is his opinion of, among other things, Celsus' reasoning and the depth of his research. He continually accuses Celsus of contradicting himself, of being indiscriminate with his sources, and of ignoring relevant sources.

Now, I'm certainly not going to take Origen's word for it that Celsus was guilty of any of those things. However, to whatever extent Origen's judgment was right, then to that extent we can't believe what Celsus said; but, to whatever extent Origen's judgment was wrong, then to that extent we can't believe what Origen said about Celsus. Either way, Contra Celsus is not a reliable source of information about what Jews believed about Christianity at the time it was written.

But, for the sake of discussion, let's stipulate that Celsus did write that Jesus was a magician and was born of adultery. The most we can infer from that is that he was reporting that some Jews did believe that about Jesus. We can infer nothing about why they believed it. They certainly were not being told it, at that late date, by anyone who was in a position to know whether it was true. An entirely reasonable hypothesis, I suggest, comes from the observation that by Origen's time, the gospel stories as we now know them were circulating in many Christian communities, and so, many non-Christians would have been aware that Christians believed those stories about Jesus -- but they would have had no reason to suspect that the stories had no connection at all with historical fact. This was not the Information Age. If you're living in the late second cenntury and come across a religious sect that claims its founder was martyred during the early first century, you're going to take it for granted that the sect had a founder who was martyred during the early first century.

But, you probably won't believe the bit about him being born of a virgin and performing real miracles. What you might do, though, is what I have seen done time and time again in these forums by people claiming to be skeptics. You might think that the stories are entirely true except only for the supernatural elements. And so, every time the story says Jesus healed someone, you will think that someone who seemed sick seemed to get better. And if the story says Jesus did this hundreds of times, you will believe that he performed this trick hundreds of times. If the story says his disciples saw him walk on water, you will think that he somehow tricked them into believing he was walking on water. You won't think anything was made up. Instead you will think that some things were misperceived or misunderstood or exaggerated, but it all, in some very loose sense of the term, really happened.

And so we get his mother's adultery. According to the stories, she got pregnant before she married Joseph, and according to the stories, Joseph was not the father. That much of the story you believe. But then the story says she was a virgin, and that part you don't believe. Ergo, she was an adulteress. QED.

Christians are by no means the only people who have ever read the gospels with unwarranted credulity. Their adversaries have been doing it, too, from Day One.

andrewcriddle

Hi Doug

This thread is about whether Celsus believed in a historical Jesus and by extension whether his informants and sources so believed.

I entirely agree that Celsus' belief on the basis of his Jewish informants that there was a real Jesus (a religious charlatan about whom Christians were telling lies) is not as such evidence that there really was a historical Jesus.

It is however, IMO evidence against the suggestion that non-historical understandings of Jesus were of any importance in the second half of the 2nd century CE. IE It is evidence that, at least from 150 CE onwards, eveyone interested in the issue accepted that there had been some sort of a historical Jesus.

Andrew Criddle

aa5874

Who were the Jewish informants of Celsus, and couldn't it have been Greek informants?

And, as far as I know, the more lies a person discovers about an event, the more the event is regarded as fictitious, or should I say, mythical. A pack of lies is no guarantee of historicity.

It

andrewcriddle

Celsus according to Origen appears to have claimed to be giving the Jewish account of Jesus.

His account has similarities with later Jewish traditions.

Andrew Criddle

Doug Shaver

I can't disagree with that. At the same time, I cannot resist noting that for roughly a thousand years, the only people doing anything to maintain the documentary record were orthodox Christians.

I am of course keenly aware that nothing can be proved by reference to unknown documents that hypothetically could have existed. The fact remains that this is one situation where absence of evidence is most assuredly not evidence of absence.

mountainman

Granted, but the real problem remains placing this Day One
into some form of historical context. When was Day One?

Noone can agree (through lack of evidence) exactly when
it was that the gospels were first published and became
available for the spiritual "edification of tax-payers".

mountainman

It is certainly not what I'd call evidence.
It's more like a hypothetical supposition.

Doug Shaver

The evidence does leave room for quite a range of estimates.

Being unaware as I am of any reason to doubt the dating of the extant manuscripts, though, I'd say they must have been in circulation by no later than the late second century. As for the consensus that they were written during the late first century, I have yet to see an argument that I find compelling, so I lean toward early second-century composition, but I allow some likelihood that they incorporated some orally transmitted stories that were circulating sometime in the later first century.

mountainman

My position is to work backwards. Carbon dating give us an upper
bound in the fourth century. So as you say, the evidence does
leave room for quite a range of estimates. As you are aware, I am
inclined to temporarily reject the paleographical assessments that
are ---- yes, I do agree, by consensus - but how good is that
set of consenses in context with the technological certitude ---
argued by various proponents of 1st and 2nd century theories.

Thus we do at least appear to have an upper and a lower bound
between the fourth and the first centuries, and I am totally and
passionately enthusiastically hopeful, that new technological
breakhtoughs, and new archeological discoveries, can shed light
in this area of ancient history studies.

Doug Shaver

We're not talking about using a paleographical analysis as the foundation on which to build an entire history of Christianity. Paleography is just one tool among many others, and it would be problematic if it contradicted the others, but apparently it does not.

I have seen clear explanations of how paleography works, and I don't see any theoretical problem with it. If anyone is going to challenge its application to any particular document, I think the burden of proof is on the skeptic to explain why it should not be trusted in that particular case.

I'll be delighted to see them when they happen, but until they happen, we can only work with we have. You can't base a theory on something you wish you had.