thief of fire

Ehrman makes it look too easy. First he mocks mythicists in his book. The mythicists are outraged and offended at being disrespected, and set themselves up as Carrier did here. Then Ehrman calmly responds and look good.
Anyone who reads the book will apparently see a scholar mocking mythicists, and anyone who follows this on the web will see Carrier coming off second best.

Ehrman 2 mythicists 0

aa5874

Carrier was better that is why Ehrman had to respond. If Ehrman does NOT respond to Carrier--Ehrman is history.

Carrier went straight to the heart--Ehrman is incompetent.

jdl

Overall, not a bad response from Ehrman. He managed to keep a level tone this time, though he must be suffering memory lapse when he hypocritically accuses Carrier of "overblown rhetoric". No one else has forgotten his Huffington Post article. His reply under the heading "The Other Jesus Conundrum" is adequate. He can have that one as far as I'm concerned.

It's hard to assess the technical stuff (e.g., Tacitus, procurator/prefect, etc.). Seems we won't know where the pendulum swings until Carrier makes his reply.

In general, though, Ehrman relies too much on pleading guilty to bad writing or saying he was just "simplifying" for a popular audience, as if this should forgive misrepresentation and errors of fact. Carrier's major point was that it's exactly this popular audience that will be mislead by sloppy writing and oversimplification. Ehrman fails his duty of care, and fails to admit it.

Easily the weakest part of Ehrman's defence is when he tries to maintain his criticism of Doherty:

Carrier finds fault with my claim, about Earl Doherty, that he “quotes professional scholars at length when their view prove useful for developing aspects of his argument, but he fails to point out that not a single one of these scholars agrees with his overarching thesis” (p. 252). He points out that Doherty does in fact indicate, in various places throughout his book, that the argument he is advancing at that point is not accepted by other scholars. As a result, Carrier states, my claim is nothing but “falsified propaganda.”

It is true that Doherty acknowledges that scholars disagree with him on this, that, or the other thing. But the way he builds his arguments typically makes it appear that he is writing as a scholar among scholars, and that all of these scholars (with him in the mix) have disagreements on various issues (disagreements with him, with one another). One is left with the impression that like these other scholars, Doherty is building a tenable case that some points of which would be granted by some scholars but not others, and that the entire overall thesis, therefore, would also be acceptable to at least some of the scholars he engages with.

Are you reading this, Earl Doherty? It's fundamentally misleading that you build an argument in exactly the way real scholars do. Don't you see how this will trick and confuse your readers? Stop behaving like a "scholar among scholars" and giving people "the impression" that you're "building a tenable case".

Joseph

Grog

Ehrman has previously demonstrated that he is not incompetent. I think in this instance the material he had on hand wasn't particularly strong.

thief of fire

This criticism seemed similar to one often made of creationists. That being they will quote some scientist or Journal as a way to bolster their case for creationism without mentioning that the author or scientist is arguing for or implicitly accepting evolution.

jdl

The charge generally issued to creationists is one of "quote mining". That is, taking a sentence or a few words out of context and interpreting them in a way that contradicts the surrounding text. The criticism of Doherty is that he will cite an article (for example) that isn't arguing anything to do with Jesus' existence and fail to mention what the author's opinion is on that unrelated issue.

Joseph

aa5874

You think Ehrman was mis-led into writing "Did Jesus Exist?".

Ehrman was HUFFING and PUFFING about his book.

Now, the book is reviewed Ehrman is found to be Incompetent by Carrier.

Diogenes the Cynic

Carrier's review was over the top, overly concerned with pouncing on trivial mistakes such as Ehrman accidentally saying "10th letter" instead of "10th book" (this is not something worth "falling out of one's chair" over, it's basically akin to a typo, and I have to believe Carrier knew that), hyperbolic, overly defensive, gratuitously ad hominem and hypocritically uncharitable given Carrier's own plea for such charity himself. I think Carrier may have written the review more emotionally than he should have. It comes off as defensive and uncharacteristically angry (I've generally thought that one of Richard Carrier's strong points is being able to remain even tempered, polite and non-polemic, but it looks like he may have written this review while angry and perhaps should have calmed down some. I know it's hard to be calm when one's own work is under attack, but Carrier went too far in returning fire).

One of the the aspects of internet discussion which can be both good and bad is the microscopic dissection and parsing of other people's words in search of any kind of minor error, apparent contradiction or perceived insinuations. The sport is to find a way to make somebody "wrong" about something and then it can be argued that he's wrong about everything.

It is virtually impossible to be clinical enough with language to be able to seal off any and all unintended interpretations, perceived contradictions, perceived hidden motives, etc. Attempts to clarify result in more parsing of words, more found "contradictions." accusations of "backpedaling," etc.

Often this kind of uber-scrutiny is good, and scholars should not be afraid to have that kind of a colonoscope applied to their work (although I think maybe Ehrman is still suffering from "internet shock" - that existential horror that newcomers to the web experience when they see what human beings are really like under the skin), but a lot of the time (probably the majority of the time), it's not about attempting an honest intellectual engagement or objective assessment of work, it's just a game to find something wrong, to find some kind of error or accident or perceived bias which can then be used as a pretext for dismissing everything else the person says.

The acrimony over Acharya's Priapus statue is an example of this kind of thing. Ehrman wasn't precise enough with his words. he said "there is no Peter the Cock in the Vatican treasury," which is accurate, and he is admittedly dismissive, but it leaves the door open to interpret him as saying the statue doesn't exist at all. He aggravated this perceived implication by saying that she "makes things up."

Yes, he could have been more clear. He could have checked to see if the Pripaus statue actually existed, and it probably would have been more effective just to say "that statue is Priapus, not Peter."

Acharaya responded that she never actually claimed the statue was Peter, which is technically true if you read her carefully, but she does not say the statue is NOT Peter and she seems to be intentionally trying give the reader the impression that it IS Peter. Since it is not, it really provides no support for any part of her argument that Peter was a penis god of some sort.

The thing is, that whole scuffle was immaterial to the real argument and basically just a distraction. It makes absolutely no difference to either historicist theories ot mythicist ones whether a statue of Priapus with a dick for a nose really exists in the vatican, or whether Ehrman was too supercilious in dismissing it.

It would also be impossible for Ehrman to respond to every single objection, accusation or message board critique from every amateur scholar in the world. He would never be doing anything else.

thief of fire

Ok this is pretty close.

Here is the criticism. Ehrman makes it look worse than you indicate. I am not sure how you think Hooker's opinon that the "suffering and death" occurs on earth and not in heaven would be an "unrelated issue". If I understood you properly

youngalexander

As much as it pains me to say this, one cannot but agree. Most intemperate, unfortunately so.
Case of repent at leisure perhaps. The proximity of Proving History's release & associated anxiety may have gotten the better of him. Pity, a missed opportunity. I do not know much about history but having followed this debate for the last eight years I rate DJE as a fairly poor effort. The hypotheticals are just plain laughable & Ehrman casually demonstrates that there is not much else. Hence my previous remark that I was beginning to wonder which side he was batting for.

The MJ case is clearly not easy to make as it requires a paradigm shift amongst many vested interests. Carrier probably has the best case that may be made to date, altho that is yet to be demonstrated. Ehrman was very urbane and civil which made a rather stark contrast. Carrier will need to be spot on his game with Vol II, for he has won no friends in the establishment with that diatribe.