J-D

It may be that people in antiquity believed that a story of resurrection was plausible, but if so they were wrong. Some people in modern times find it plausible, but they're also wrong. Many people both in antiquity and in modern times find plausible many things which are not in fact plausible. The evidence which makes resurrection stories implausible was just as much available in antiquity as it is now. What has changed between antiquity and now in relation to many stories (like resurrection stories) is not that they have become less plausible (because of the emergence of new evidence) but that people have become less inclined to give them undeserved credit for plausibility.

There is evidence against the plausibility of an account which describes a person dying and then returning to life which does not count as evidence against the plausbility of an account which describes a person being crucified and dying (or an account which describes a person being crucified and not dying).

In the same way, the evidence that there is no God was just as much available in antiquity as it is now. A change in the frequency of people accepting it proves nothing about the strength of the evidence.

dog-on

What you are describing is not history.

Historians do not ad hoc select elements. There must be some evidence that can back up any particular element they wish to extract, or they are simply writing historical fiction.

Using your method, any character in ancient literature becomes, defacto, historical, to some extent.

Was Madusa simply a woman having a bad hair day? Enquiring minds want to know...

J-D

I didn't say that historian select ad hoc. You put those words in my mouth. Of course that's not how history should be done. History must and can only be done by using sources selectively, but the selection is not supposed to be arbitrary. Of course there have to be reasons why some elements are selected and others are rejected. I have never suggested anything to the contrary.

dog-on

Indeed.

Now, how is extracting information about the hero in a fictive text, for which there is no other contemporary evidence to justify such extraction, not ad hoc?

DancesWithCoffeeCups

Plagiarized in full from here. The Publishers Weekly review.

aa5874

So, it a USELESS EXERCISE to attempt to fabricate alternative explanations for the resurrection when Jesus was just plausible and not actual.

The NT and Church writers presented a Plausible God/man called Jesus Christ, no credible evidence can be found for his reality.

The God/man characteristics and the resurrection to save mankind from sin are integral elements of the Jesus story.

In effect, it is just as RIDICULOUS or FALSE to claim Jesus of the NT did not resurrect as the claim that Jesus of the NT was just a man.

In the same way, it is False or Ridiculous to claim Homer's Achilles was not the offspring of a sea-goddess and did not die when an arrow pierced his heel.

Without any credible evidence, alternative explanations for a most plausible resurrection of Jesus of the NT are useless.

J-D

You have not yet presented any evidence that the text as a whole is fictive (as opposed to containing some fictive material, which is not disputed). That is the point at issue.

J-D

I'm not talking about explanations for the resurrection, because there never was a resurrection. The dead do not come back to life. What I'm talking about is explanations for the text, which does exist. Saying 'it's not true' does not by itself constitute an explanation of its existence.

No evidence has been presented that all of the statements about Jesus in the canonical Gospels are actually false. Consider, for example, Luke, Chapter 23, verses 6 and 7. I don't know that what it says there is true, but I also haven't seen any evidence which would demonstrate that it's false. Other examples: Mark, Chapter 1, verse 9; Matthew, Chapter 4, verses 18 to 22; John, Chapter 2, verses 13 to 16.I don't know why you call that story plausible. It isn't.Not necessarily.No evidence has been presented to support this claim.

badger3k

Tim can't even quote from the book itself? Was this the first source you found, or the only one - the "christianbooks.com" is interesting. I'll ask again, Tim, what scholars, period, have you read, and what books?

Just off the top of my head I can name Ehrman, Price, Carrier, Mack, Callahan, Freke & Gandy (though I am hesitant to call them scholars, given the quality of their work, but they do point out other views), Pagels, Doherty...there are more, and that's leaving out archaeological papers (and papers on higher criticism). I also have quite a few Teaching Company lecture series, by various scholars. The only reason that I have not looked at the arguments of some, such as the Dutch Radical School that Price mentions, is that I don't speak German and most of their work has not been translated (or at least, not translated at an affordable price). I admit to not reading Crossan, mainly because I think he make some unwarranted assumptions as to historicity right from the start, but he is on my list to get around to.

That's not meant to be any argument from authority, just pointing out that I have read other viewpoints, looked at the evidence they bring, and read and considered their arguments. Have you? It's easy to parrot one scholars viewpoint, but if you haven't looked at the arguments, then, well, you might as well just lift quotes out of book reviews.

aa5874

You mean the text about the resurrection! The OP is about the text that deals with the resurrection.

All explanations are irrelevant without evidence or corroborative sources. Some people believe Gods exist and can resurrect, some people don’t. The Church writers claimed Jesus the God/man, an offspring of the Holy Ghost of God, truly resurrected.

The Pauline writer called Paul has already explained that the God/man needed to resurrect to save mankind from their sins.

NOW, what explanation do you have for the text about the non-event called the resurrection?

No evidence has been presented that ANY SINGLE EVENT about Jesus and his disciples did occur.

I have not seen any evidence to demonstrate that Luke 23.6-7 is true.


[B]I have not seen any evidence that any single event about Jesus and his disciples is true.
Quote:
I don’t know why you claim that Jesus the God/man who resurrected was not plausible when there are sources of antiquity that can show or appear to show that people believed Jesus the God/man did resurrect.

Writers called Paul, Peter, James, John, Jude, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Tertullian, Origen, Ignatius, Clement, Eusebius, Jerome, Chrysostom and many more appear to believe that Jesus the God man who resurrected was plausible.
Quote:
You are not making sense. The fabricators of the Jesus stories claimed Jesus was Divine and resurrected and that his resurrection was for the salvation from sin.

These are integral parts of their stories. Please see the Gospels.

Do you want to re-write the Jesus stories?
Quote:
Would you find it ridiculous for someone to try to disprove that Achilles was the offspring of a sea-goddess and that he was shot with an arrow in his heel?
I would.
Jesus of the NT was a god/man who did resurrect to save mankind from sin. IT is ridiculous to even attempt to disprove such a myth.

JESUS of the N.T resurrected, it was part of the story. See Mark 16.6.