Johnny Skeptic

http://seekerthoughts.blogspot.com/2...ion-jesus.html

Minimalist

Believers "believe." It is one of the biggest problems with them.

Antipope Innocent II

Those writers might be expected to mention the "Jesus of Christianity" (ie the one said to walk on water and raise people from the dead). I'd emphasise "might" - I'm dubious as to why even that Jesus would be of any interest to, say, Petronius or Statius.

But I can't see any reason at all why they'd mention Yeshua ben Yosef the Galilean preacher and village exorcist. After all, they don't mention any other dirty peasant preachers from Palestine, so why would they be expected to mention this one?

So their silence has some merit as an argument against the "Biblical Jesus" but not against the "HJ" called Yeshua.

dog-on

Didn't Tacticus actually refer to someone named Chrestus?

spin

Statius was quite interested in the religions of his time as his poem the Thebaid shows.

(It's not sure that the writer of the Satyricon was the 1st c. figure.)

The 'HJ" called Yeshua' is merely an intellectual construct: there is no way to connect it to anything that happened in the real world. At least Jesus was a figure in ancient literature.

But your other point why writers should be expected to mention a miracle worker is worthwhile thinking about. We basically have knowledge about Apollonius of Tyana because one single writer felt inclined to record him, as in the case of Alexander of Abonoteichus whose account was preserved by Lucian. They didn't make onto the classical writers' circuit. It was only out of interest that an account of them was preserved. That's analogous to the gospels.


spin

Antipope Innocent II

So he might mention Jesus. Or he might not. Woody Allen is very interested in New York, but if he doesn't mention 9/11 in any of his films would that be good evidence, in 2000 years, that it didn't happen?

"No way"? Nonsense. The gospels, at least, said some kind of teacher and exorcist called "Jesus" (ie Yeshua) had been around just a few decades before. Even if you buy Doherty's contorted and contrived attempts at explaining away Paul's even earlier references to the same person (which I don't, and I'm in good company there), it's garbage to say there's "no way" to connect the Jesus of the gospels to a someone who had existed and around whom religious legends had arisen.

And one that the vast majority of scholars, regardless of their religious beliefs or lack thereof, have no problem with connecting to an historical Yeshua. That alone makes any stentorian announcement that there is "no way" to do this look pretty ridiculous.

Indeed - which is another reason these arguments from silence are so weak. Given the paucity and fragmentary nature of our surviving sources, expecting them to preserve mentions of distant rumours of some alleged wonders performed by some Jew in the backwaters of a distant province just because we'd like them to is expecting a bit much. And that's even if they'd noticed these rumours in the first place or mentioned them if they noticed them.

The non-wonderous, preacher-and-exorcist Yeshua is even less likely to have been noticed by aristocratic Greek and Roman historians, natural scientists and exorcists.

Some of the less sophisticated versions of this argument from silence seem to suppose there was a permanent CNN-style News feed on big screens in Rome and Paterculus and Pliny would have been bombarded with live feeds of the wonders of Jesus as they strolled through the Forum if Jesus had existed. I realise no-one here is quite that dumb, but this argument from silence still carries about as much water as a leaky string bag.

mountainman

Outside of the literature tradition their are certain
epigraphic inscriptions to Apollonius of Tyana, and
to other "spiritual masters" such as "Thrice-great
Hermes" whom the Arabic Hermetic literature tradition
associates with Balinus, or Apollonius of Tyana.

Moreover we have later commentators in the fourth
century, such as Ammianus who vouch for the
historicity of Apollonius. What is problematic in
the field is the large rehetorically charged calumny
of Apollonius and Philostratus by Eusebius, who
quotes the literature of Apollonius in his work.


The gospels were lavishly
and politically published by a supreme imperial
mafia thug at Constantinople, c.331, with the
attendent execution of the Hellenic priest
Sopater, and the poisoning of Arius.

The 'Life of Apollonius' was calumnified by Eusebius.
Robert Lane Fox writes that Constantine's initial hit
and destruction of traditional temple property, and
the execution of Hellenic priests was at the temple
of Aegaea, due to Apollonius' association with that,
and other temples.

Your analysis fails to take into account the utter
destruction of the Hellenic literature under the
christian (Nicene) regime spear-headed by the
boss himself. The fourth century preservation
of literature is a process which needs to understand
why it was that many, if not all, of the great
libraries, were burnt by the "newly emergent
christian rabble".

The classical writers circuit of the third century
was renown as "The Second Sophistic", a coin
termed by Philostratus, who wrote the biography
of Apollonius which has miraculously survived.

The Second Sophistic literature included Philostratus'
"Life of Apollonius" which was calumnified by Eusebius,
and whose temples were first hit hard as an example,
by military power, by Constantine --- before Nicaea.


Now to address the thread proper:
http://freethought.mbdojo.com/josephus.html

This serves a purpose to expose the unexamined
postulate of the existence of Jesus for the first
century, and is very well documented, largely to
slabs taken from Remsberg, and constructions
thereon.

This review needs to be expanded.

1) To include epigraphy and papyri and other citations
in the field of archaeology ---- for the first century.

2) To include the second and third centuries as above.


The review should be entitled:

Examining the unexamined postulate
that Pre-Nicene Christianity existed.

The results should prove interesting
to academic and layman alike.

Many thanks for this reference to the first
century historians Johnny Skeptic.
It is a very coherent document.
IMO it needs expansion to take
into account the Pre-Nicene.




Pete Brown

spin

You can save this irrelevance. I was merely dealing with this statement of yours:

I'm dubious as to why even that Jesus would be of any interest to, say, Petronius or Statius.

This "ie" is your problem. There is nothing "ie" about it. You can assume what you like -- that's what HJism is all about: bald assumption -- but there is not a scrap of evidence for a Yeshua behind the gospels and they merely talk about a Jesus.

I don't buy Doherty and you've got no evidence.

Appeals to authority are inherently ridiculous as is the reification of literary figures.

That's why I mentioned this. However, it isn't food for any substantive claim. The total stupidity of HJism is that one assumes a beast called Jesus (or whatever name you want to inject) existed, then one tendentiously whittles away the more unacceptable claims until one is comfortable with the remnants.

Just as any "non-wonderous, preacher-and-exorcist" Jesus or Fred or Algernon.

You might be right.


spin

Jo

Which I think is a very important point in regards to the authenticity of the biblical Jesus.

Just a side note: Yehoshua ben Nazarene as opposed to Yehoshua ben Yosef.

EDIT: I enjoy reading your posts, Pete. What do you think of Simon ben Kochbar or even Yehoshua ben Pantera?

spin

Oh fun and games, "ben Nazarene" indeed. Howls of derisive laughter.


spin