Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Back Again · 10-20-2009, 10:42 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by RogueBibleScholar

However, there were reports of volcanoes upon the attack on Jerusalem, which is not surprising, since Vesuvius was about to destroy Pompeii in 74 CE and may have had an early eruption; and there may have been others at the basis of this claim.

I believe Pompeii was destroyed in 79CE although I doubt the 5 years difference diminishes your points.

RogueBibleScholar · 10-20-2009, 12:40 PM

Ahh, you want something to convince people. I don't know of a lot of sources of stuff to use to point out things in conversations about shortcomings of the biblical claims; but I can direct you to some books that have a lot about it. They could, however, be much better distilled for conversational impact. Four come to mind:

Joseph Wheless, Forgery In Christianity (1930): written a long time ago, but full of eye-opening scams that permeate Christian history.

Joseph Wheless, Is It God's Word? (1926): a less focused version of the previous, but has lots of great info it does not contain.

Helen Ellerbe, The Dark Side of Christian History (or via: amazon.co.uk) (1995): a modern review of some of the oft-encountered but rarely quoted problems with Christianity.

Richard Elliot Friedman, Who Wrote the Bible (or via: amazon.co.uk) (1997): a scholarly book that shows that most of the Pentateuch (i.e. the first five books of the OT) was not written by directly by Moses as many believe, along with a passage in the NT; which calls them the books of Moses. Instead, they seem to have been compiled from sources centuries later, which probably, but not necessarily, contain some of the writings of Moses; and have numerous contradictions of fact between the sources.

The stuff I'm saying about the parallels between Josephus and the Gospels is pretty new scholarship, and is probably unknown to most mainstream scholars, and has not been well evaluated in print by any modern scholars yet either. Yet, while there have been many critics of the biblical narrative, they have not gained the traction that, e.g. the Late Exodus theory and the Documentary Hypothesis (i.e. the modern equivalent of the Wellhausen theory) have - since they have identified very probable alternate versions of some parts of biblical history. I think that once this idea makes it out into the larger scholarly community, it will become as important as those. You will not, however, find as much consensus on it, since these parallels are unknown to most, vs. the other two. If you want to see the full measure of the parallels, however, I have a list of parallels I believe is more complete than Atwill's up on my website, but he provides much important background information which I do not. You can find it at:

The Alternative Bible Scholarship Site

To see the videos on his site, click on them, and hit pause, to let the player download the video. Once it has downloaded a lot of it, you can hit play, and it should work unless you have a very slow computer.

Cheers,
The Rogue Scholar

Toto · 10-20-2009, 12:48 PM

Atwill's work is not exactly new or unknown in this forum. You can find some old threads here and in the archives (I forget if Atwill himself participated. There are also some threads by followers of a rival alternative scholar with a slightly different take.)

RogueBibleScholar · 10-20-2009, 07:13 PM

I would be interested in knowing who that other scholar you have in mind is. That's not much to go on, as it is. I'm aware of people who think that Jesus is a allegory for Julius Caesar, but IMHO, they cannot produce 1/20th the evidence Atwill does. Just some language from Julius' imperial cult, which would be expected if Atwill were right, anyway.

RS

Toto · 10-20-2009, 07:43 PM

The other guy is Carotta. I don't think any of the regulars here think that highly of his work. Atwill has not actually proven his case, but he seems a cut above the usual crank with a new theory on Christianity.

Here's the last Atwill thread from the archives, where Atwill participated (changing the encoding to Unicode may improve readability)

http://www.freeratio.org/thearchives...d.php?t=187373

spamandham · 10-21-2009, 10:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Julio

These three verses broadly represent the inconsistency of Jesus’ teaching concerning the coming of what he labelled “The Kingdom of Heaven/God”:

1. “The kingdom is at hand”, implying that Jesus and cousin John Baptist knew exactly about it; [“From that time Jesus began to preach, and to say, Repent: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” Mathew 4:17]

2. “The day or hour nobody knows”, implying that the first statement was a strategic error [“But of that day and that hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels which are in heaven, neither the Son, but the Father.” Mark 13:32]

3. “Not for you to know”, implying that the original message had been a flop [“And he said unto them, It is not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the Father hath put in his own power.” Acts 1:7]

Put into perspective, Jesus and John were hastening their followers to expect the Kingdom of God to come SOON. A year or two later, it was apparent that the original urgency had been exaggerated.

Consider that Matthew, Mark, and Acts were all written long after Jesus is purported to have lived. They would not have dutifully recorded a rambling theology, but instead, the final version.

Since what we see is an evolving theology, that evolution must have nothing to do with what a possibly real Jesus or John actually taught, and instead simply reflects the evolution of the church itself.

The 'kingdom of god" underwent several makeovers. Our job is to figure out why.

Julio · 10-22-2009, 05:51 AM

"The 'kingdom of god" underwent several makeovers. Our job is to figure out why."
Why?
Why do we need to figure out what the "kingdom of god" was all about, AFTER 2000 years of "research"?...
By this time no one needs to figure out anything about that "fabulous" kingdom.
We found out, meanwhile, that kingdoms are dangerous systems of despotic & tyrannical monarchs and better leave Jesus alone in the archives as the religious dinosaur that he is now, as far as kingdoms of gods are concerned.
Not that you do not understand this clearly, but I wished Christians would discount this rusted "kingdom" as a mental disease of that Jewish junior christ of twenty centuries ago!

spamandham · 10-22-2009, 07:19 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Julio

Why?
Why do we need to figure out what the "kingdom of god" was all about, AFTER 2000 years of "research"?...

This is BC&H. Most people in this subforum have an interest in Christian history, and participation is voluntary.

Quote:

We found out, meanwhile, that kingdoms are dangerous systems of despotic & tyrannical monarchs and better leave Jesus alone in the archives as the religious dinosaur that he is now, as far as kingdoms of gods are concerned.

I seems to me that "kingdom of god" had nothing to do with monarchs or earthly kingdoms in the early church.

arnoldo · 10-22-2009, 02:39 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Julio

These three verses broadly represent the inconsistency of Jesus’ teaching concerning the coming of what he labelled “The Kingdom of Heaven/God”:

1. “The kingdom is at hand”, implying that Jesus and cousin John Baptist knew exactly about it; [“From that time Jesus began to preach, and to say, Repent: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” Mathew 4:17]

2. “The day or hour nobody knows”, implying that the first statement was a strategic error [“But of that day and that hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels which are in heaven, neither the Son, but the Father.” Mark 13:32]

Wrong implication. It is a jewish idiom.

Quote:

Matthew (Mattityahu) 24:36, as it is written, "But of that day and hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels of heaven, but My Father only." Because Rosh HaShanah was understood to be the hidden day, this statement by Yeshua is actually an idiom for Rosh Hashanah. Thus it should be given as proof that He was speaking of Rosh HaShanah because Rosh HaShanah is the only day in the whole year that was referred to as the hidden day or the day that no man knew.
http://www.hebroots.org/chap7.html#CHAP7

AtheistGamer · 10-22-2009, 08:29 PM

Hmm. I've been reading Mack's book "Who wrote the New Testament?". He says the Kingdom of God was a social movement created by the historical Jesus. Once everybody started turning the other cheek, obeying the golden rule etc., a literal kingdom of God would replace the screwy world that was first century Palestine. Or something to that effect.

In any case the kingdom of God never came, and neither did the end of the world that was supposed to precede it.

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10-20-2009, 12:40 PM	#12
RogueBibleScholar Junior Member Join Date: Sep 2009 Location: Europe Posts: 35	Ahh, you want something to convince people. I don't know of a lot of sources of stuff to use to point out things in conversations about shortcomings of the biblical claims; but I can direct you to some books that have a lot about it. They could, however, be much better distilled for conversational impact. Four come to mind: Joseph Wheless, Forgery In Christianity (1930): written a long time ago, but full of eye-opening scams that permeate Christian history. Joseph Wheless, Is It God's Word? (1926): a less focused version of the previous, but has lots of great info it does not contain. Helen Ellerbe, The Dark Side of Christian History (or via: amazon.co.uk) (1995): a modern review of some of the oft-encountered but rarely quoted problems with Christianity. Richard Elliot Friedman, Who Wrote the Bible (or via: amazon.co.uk) (1997): a scholarly book that shows that most of the Pentateuch (i.e. the first five books of the OT) was not written by directly by Moses as many believe, along with a passage in the NT; which calls them the books of Moses. Instead, they seem to have been compiled from sources centuries later, which probably, but not necessarily, contain some of the writings of Moses; and have numerous contradictions of fact between the sources. The stuff I'm saying about the parallels between Josephus and the Gospels is pretty new scholarship, and is probably unknown to most mainstream scholars, and has not been well evaluated in print by any modern scholars yet either. Yet, while there have been many critics of the biblical narrative, they have not gained the traction that, e.g. the Late Exodus theory and the Documentary Hypothesis (i.e. the modern equivalent of the Wellhausen theory) have - since they have identified very probable alternate versions of some parts of biblical history. I think that once this idea makes it out into the larger scholarly community, it will become as important as those. You will not, however, find as much consensus on it, since these parallels are unknown to most, vs. the other two. If you want to see the full measure of the parallels, however, I have a list of parallels I believe is more complete than Atwill's up on my website, but he provides much important background information which I do not. You can find it at: The Alternative Bible Scholarship Site To see the videos on his site, click on them, and hit pause, to let the player download the video. Once it has downloaded a lot of it, you can hit play, and it should work unless you have a very slow computer. Cheers, The Rogue Scholar

10-20-2009, 12:48 PM	#13
Toto Contributor Join Date: Jun 2000 Location: Los Angeles area Posts: 40,549	Atwill's work is not exactly new or unknown in this forum. You can find some old threads here and in the archives (I forget if Atwill himself participated. There are also some threads by followers of a rival alternative scholar with a slightly different take.)

10-20-2009, 07:13 PM	#14
RogueBibleScholar Junior Member Join Date: Sep 2009 Location: Europe Posts: 35	I would be interested in knowing who that other scholar you have in mind is. That's not much to go on, as it is. I'm aware of people who think that Jesus is a allegory for Julius Caesar, but IMHO, they cannot produce 1/20th the evidence Atwill does. Just some language from Julius' imperial cult, which would be expected if Atwill were right, anyway. RS

10-20-2009, 07:43 PM	#15
Toto Contributor Join Date: Jun 2000 Location: Los Angeles area Posts: 40,549	The other guy is Carotta. I don't think any of the regulars here think that highly of his work. Atwill has not actually proven his case, but he seems a cut above the usual crank with a new theory on Christianity. Here's the last Atwill thread from the archives, where Atwill participated (changing the encoding to Unicode may improve readability) http://www.freeratio.org/thearchives...d.php?t=187373

10-22-2009, 05:51 AM	#17
Julio Banned Join Date: Sep 2008 Location: Johannesburg Posts: 5,187	"The 'kingdom of god" underwent several makeovers. Our job is to figure out why." Why? Why do we need to figure out what the "kingdom of god" was all about, AFTER 2000 years of "research"?... By this time no one needs to figure out anything about that "fabulous" kingdom. We found out, meanwhile, that kingdoms are dangerous systems of despotic & tyrannical monarchs and better leave Jesus alone in the archives as the religious dinosaur that he is now, as far as kingdoms of gods are concerned. Not that you do not understand this clearly, but I wished Christians would discount this rusted "kingdom" as a mental disease of that Jewish junior christ of twenty centuries ago!

10-22-2009, 08:29 PM	#20
AtheistGamer Regular Member Join Date: Jan 2009 Location: Central Iowa Posts: 128	Hmm. I've been reading Mack's book "Who wrote the New Testament?". He says the Kingdom of God was a social movement created by the historical Jesus. Once everybody started turning the other cheek, obeying the golden rule etc., a literal kingdom of God would replace the screwy world that was first century Palestine. Or something to that effect. In any case the kingdom of God never came, and neither did the end of the world that was supposed to precede it.

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