James Brown

In keeping with Joseph Campbell's hero mythology, as an aside, I see Anakin Skywalker scoring about 13 (1,4,5,8,9,10,11,12,15,16,18,20,21)

Luke Skywalker gets about 10 (although he isn't dead yet): (1,2,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11)

I admit that some of the points are very arguable.

Bede

Ipetrich,

It seems you have made the not desperately new discovery that some of the accretions to the story of Jesus are legendary and reflect contemporary expectations about heros and gods. Well done.

What you have failed to do is show us any evidence that Jesus was mythical. If we stick to earliest sources of Paul and GMark, he scores very poorly on the Raglan scale. On this basis, we would have to conclude that he isn't mythical.

Best wishes

Bede

Chris Weimer

Lord Raglan's list doesn't offer any indication of historicity.

Why? Lowly parents is irrelevant to the hero status? Many mythic heroes had a divine parentage. Nearly all of them, in fact, did.

I seriously doubt Lord Raglan would have interpreted it so narrowly. LPetrich lists Lord Raglan's heroes here:

Clearly it is your personal opinion, and entirely irrelevant to this discussion, which strives to interpret the criteria so narrowly.

This is contrary to the entire uderstanding of Greek hero worship and 99% of all literature on the subject. Hercules and Theseus, Aeneas was well within the Roman period, a totally different mentality, both did nothing great without first resorting to their divine parentage. Neither would, in fact, have been anything without their divine parentage. Heroes weren't heroes because they were great men, that's a modern misunderstanding, but were heroes because they were from the Gods.

The burden is on you to show that it really is a metaphor.

Different times, different places. As I said again, Jesus couldn't have had a real kingdom. To begin with, he's too well within the historical time frame to have such a thing tacked on (it would be all too easy to see who were the real kings of Judaea and if ever there was one called Jesus). Secondly, for him to rule the kingdom is antithetical to what he was teaching. You can't just rip him out of context and expect to fit some pre-made list - a rather arbitrary one at that if you define it so narrowly!

Besides, there were other "heroes" who do not fit the bill of conquering a kingdom. Buddha is one. Socrates is another. When dealing with clearly historical figures, a pre-made list with strict interpretation is absolutely useless.

The no childhood details and mother's virginity is still quite common despite Jesus.

Who cares what Lord Raglan is famous for or not? We're discussing this list and how Jesus fits into it. If you want to make a comparison with Campbell's work, then I suggest you start a new thread for it.

The Bishop

- mention of Anakin Skywalker gives us at least one "mythic hero" who died in a pit!!

When you either justify or withdraw your rudeness in response to something which is obviously a personal opinion, perhaps I'll bother to answer your other questions.

Clivedurdle

I thought Hebrews and Revelation were very early as well. How does the Raglan score work there? Melchizadeck, bright and morning star. Not that heroic or mythic really!

I would also like to see a Pauline Jesus Raglan scale as well! Born of woman, according to the flesh, come to mind immediately.

And if I remember Vork, hasn't he and others shown Mark is classic literature, so assuming we are looking at history is dangerous!

The Bishop

Why on earth is my personal opinion irrelevant? Why is it "clearly" my personal opinion, and not lpetrich's personal opinion which interprets the criteria so broadly?
Mary doesn't even fit that broadened criterion.

I simply don't understand this section at all:So, shouldn't it be the other way round, then? Isn't the mention of details of the infancy (and precocity if applicable) the thing that fits the mythological criteria? I just don't understand this at all. Cf: lpetrich's assessment of JFK includes, "No infancy details makes this irrelevant. (0) " (Same for Darwin) There were no details of his infancy? So that's a 1, then. Or, there were no details of his infancy, so it's irrelevant, so that's a 0. Or is it that if you actually searched round enough documented paperwork of schools, plus the memoirs of acquaintances you might well find infancy details simply because he's a recent historical figure. Or does the PT109 adventure classify as "youthful stories that predate the Presidency" and therefore counts. This whole thing about the "infancy details" just leaves be bogeyed. (lpetrich's own list of criteria pushed it to position 10 from 9).


If he couldn't have a real kingdom, why is it being counted in his mythological favour? Why is it some fault of my narrow interpretation when Buddha and Socrates didn't have kingdoms, when we could simply say that all three of them score 0 on this issue? Why, fundamentally, is Jesus being treated differently from all other subjects of the "mythological heroes" test?

The Bishop

Erm, no, aren't they very late? Aren't they amongst the very newest parts of the entire Bible?

lpetrich

First, I've found another site on Lord Raglan's Hero Pattern; it mentions evaluations for:

* Krishna
* Moses
* Romulus
* King Arthur
* Perseus
* Jesus
* Watu Gunung of Java
* Heracles
* Mohammad
* Beowulf
* Buddha
* Zeus
* Nyikang, a cult-hero of the Shiluk tribe of the Upper Nile
* Samson
* Sunjata, the Lion-King of Ancient Mali
* Achilles
* Odysseus
* Harry Potter
* Czar Nicholas II

I agree with JamesABrown that Anakin and Luke Skywalker are high scorers. But the Star Wars saga cut off in the middle of Luke's career, so we can't know for sure how George Lucas had wanted to end his career and his life.

So you consider all of this to be pure fiction:

Prophecy-mongering
JC's genealogies
JC's conception by divine impregnation (virgin birth)
King Herod vs. JC
JC's parents fleeing to Egypt
JC triumphing over the Devil
JC's followers repudiating him:
- The citizens of Jerusalem changing from giving him a hero's welcome to wanting him dead
- His disciples fleeing
- Peter denying that he ever knew JC
JC's unusually fast crucifixion death
JC's resurrection

?

Paul's Christ was mostly heavenly; the only counterevidence I've ever seen offered is stray comments like that he is "born of woman, born under law" (Born under law?).

Mark does not include any birth stories, though he does include JC's crucifixion and resurrection.

Mary fits the "virgin" part, though I will concede that it's doubtful that she fits the "royal" part.

Lord Raglan himself pointed out that we seldom learn of anyone's childhood. What he was saying was unusual was mentioning some event in infancy then skipping over their childhood.

I wouldn't be surprised if someone had recorded some details of JFK's infancy and childhood, but there isn't some spectacular birth story followed by skipping over his childhood.

In fact, I was able to find some details of Charles Darwin's childhood, though not his infancy; he was not very different from other boys.

He wasn't exactly exiled into his PT109 service; he signed up for it. And the closest he came to defeating a reigning king or other great enemy in his land was his defeating Richard Nixon in the 1960 Presidential race.

andrewcriddle

IMO Lord Raglan's List is consciously or unconsciously biased to increase the score of Jesus Christ.

If one compares it with a list of characteristic themes in Greek Myths such as that of GS Kirk ( Myth pps 187-189) There are important themes common in Greek Myth which are neither in Raglan's List nor in the life of Christ.

Kirk's list is as follows

1/ Tricks Riddles ingenious solutions to dilemmas.
2/ Transformations into another shape
3/ Accidental killing of a relative lover or friend
4/ Giants monsters snakes
5/Attempts to get rid of a rival by requiring impossible task
6/ Fulfilling a quest
7/ Contests and Competitions
8/ Punishment for Impiety
9/ Displacement of Parents or Elders
10/ Killing ones own child (or trying to)
11/ Revenge
12/ Avenging one's Mother
13/ Family Disputes
14/ Deceitful Wife
15/ Deceitful Daughter
16/ Incest
17/ Founding a City
18/ Special Weapons
19/ Prophets
20/ Mortal lovers of Gods and Goddesses
21/ Perils of Immortality
22/ External Soul
23/ Unusual Births
24/ Imprisonment.

This gives IMO a beter idea of what Greek myths (the most relevant parallel) are like than does Raglan's List; and the life of Jesus Crhist would not score particularly high using such a list.

Andrew Criddle

lpetrich

Andrew Criddle, why not calculate some "Kirk scores" in the fashion of "Lord Raglan scores"? I'll start off with Jesus Christ himself.

1. JC would beat the Pharisees in arguments with his unanswerable one-liners.
4. JC successfully resisted the Devil's temptations, making the Devil give up.
8. Judas Iscariot's coming to a bad end?
9. JC was mostly indifferent to his parents and sometimes snotty to them.
17. I'm not sure if founding a religious sect would qualify.
19. JC both made prophecies and fulfilled prophecies.
20. The Holy Spirit with JC's mother.
23. Related to 20?
24. JC gets crucified, though not imprisoned for more than a day or two.