youngalexander

Ah, but it does. If Carrier had responded with a cool scholarly analysis, pointing out Ehrman's transgressions, not at length but pithily, he would likely have won the encounter, leaving Ehrman with little but abject regrets.

As it stands, Ehrman walks away from the discussion with quiet dignity leaving Carrier fuming on the sidelines.

Grog

I don't think the discussion is over. And I don't think Ehrman has regained dignity...not in my eyes.

jdl

I've only made a small start on Jesus: Neither Man Nor God, not really enough to entitle me to a comment on it. My criticism of Ehrman's criticism is his apparent requirement that Doherty constantly remind his readers that some scholars he cites don't agree with his "complete overall thesis". That's just ridiculous.

Joseph

Steven Carr

And, of course, that is just slander by Ehrman.

http://vridar.wordpress.com/2012/03/...erring-ehrman/

Oh, I was wrong again.

Ehrman *doesn't* accuse Doherty of quote-mining ie taking a sentence or a few words out of context.




'Ehrman charges Doherty with quoting “at length” scholars who agree with him.'

Gosh, Doherty is so sneaky that he does the opposite of quote-mining - the opposite of taking a few words or a sentence out of context.

He quotes people 'at length'. (not just a 'cite')

No wonder Ehrman was upset by this.

All those lengthy quotes to read, when his graduate students were busy on other projects.

GakuseiDon

No problem. Then once you've finished the book, let us know which scholars disagree with the idea that the pagans believed in a "World of Myth". List them out, according to Doherty's book.

aa5874

No, let us talk about Ehrman. The OP is about him.

Ehrman implied Mythicists are VIOLENTLY opposed to traditional religion--See page 338 of "Did Jesus Exist?".

I think Ehrman has crossed the line. It is clear that he is NO longer arguing rationally he is trying to intimidate and create fear. This may be a violation of human rights.

Ehrman needs to explain why he has resorted to implying that mythicist are VIOLENT.

There is something wrong with Ehrman.

Carrier is right when he claimed Ehrman is incompetent.

youngalexander

I was going to leave it there, but something caught my eye in another thread the Hoffmann Comment

Now I ask you, is that edifying? Should Carrier, PZ, or indeed anyone reply in kind? Last weekend I attended a Celebration of Reason. We here in this forum are involved in a global cultural movement in which the MJ/HJ question is but a minor sideshow. Observe how Hoffmann rattles his cage, the bewilderment of Ehrman when confronted by modern Mythicists. We must needs conduct our affairs with the calm dignity of evidence backed reason.

There are powerful forces of unreason out there - they are becoming restless!:constern01:

thief of fire

Your link seems to be saying that the forces of unreason are
mythicist nutters not those who believe in an historical jesus.. Who is the guy who runs that site?

That link is a scathing attack on Carrier who is held in high regard by many mythicists right here on this forum.

Thanks for the link, as it looks like there will be some interesting stuff to chew on.

Ted Hoffman

Ehrman barely scratches the surface. Its no wonder he calls his response the "fuller response." He could not muster the "fullest" or full response. The net result of his response is ineffetive and the fourteen charges stand except in the three cases where he has admitted error.
In fact, in all the cases, Carrier's criticism stands. Ehrman admits errors in some in some cases, he makes tangential arguments in some cases. In some, he insists he is right even when he patently isn't.
There are at least fourteen separate charges against Ehrman that Carrier exposes and addresses. I have listed them below with Ehrman's treatment of them.

1. Ehrman charges that mythicists dont have degrees in early Christian history. Carrier and Price do. So this is a false claim. On the No-Serious-Scholar Fallacy - Carrier cites examples including Price, Thompson, and Arthur Drodge who have questioned the existence of a HJ.
Ehrman does not address this charge.

2. Regarding the Priapus bronze, Ehrman claims “there is no penis-nosed statue of Peter the cock in the Vatican or anywhere else except in books like this, which love to make things up.” Here Ehrman begrudgingly admits that he should have phrased his argument better. The charge stands.

3. Regarding the Doherty Slander, Ehrman claims that Doherty "...fails to point out that not a single one of these scholars agrees with his overarching thesis”
Again, here Erhman has no defense. He made a false charge and when called out on it, he claims Carrier misses his point then begrudgingly admits, "It is true that Doherty acknowledges that scholars disagree with him on this, that, or the other thing."
Enough said. The charge stands.

4. Regarding The Pliny Confusion, Ehrman commits two mistakes, one of citation and another of treating a hypothesis as a fact.
Ehrman admits fault about the wrong reference. Then he says he did not treat the hypothesis as a mere conjecture because he did not want to confuse readers. In other words, he admits he is giving readers "crap" because they are not scholars. He writes, "I did not write this book for scholars. I wrote if for lay people who are interested in a broad, interesting, and very important question... I was not arguing the case for scholars, because scholars already know ..."
So again, Carrier's Charge Stands.

5. Regarding the The Pilate Error, Ehrman argues, incorrectly, that “Tacitus is precisely wrong” in saying Pilate was a “procurator” (p. 56).
Ehrman first says he is surprised at this charge, then claims that he does "work hard to make sure I do not get things like this wrong", but after Carrier's criticism, he "decided to look into it." How does he do that? He does not go to sources, he asks a colleague a leading question whether Pilate could have been both a Procurator and a prefect at the same time. His anonymous colleague says "prefect and procurator are simply two possible titles for the same job"
So Ehrman was wrong as Carrier argued even though he does not admit it even in the face of the email from his colleague.

6. Regarding The “No Records” Debacle, Ehrman declares that “we simply don’t have birth notices, trial records, death certificates—or other kinds of records that one has today” (p. 29). Carrier disagrees and says, "we have thousands of these kinds of records"
Here Ehrman feebly argues that he was understandably misunderstood by Carrier and that when he made the "no records" remark, he "was thinking of Palestine." Again, here the charge stands. He (Ehrman) contrasted the time of Jesus (Roman record keeping) with "today" in his argument and not Palestine from the rest of the Roman empire.
Again, The charge stands.

7. Regarding The Tacitus Question: Ehrman says “I don’t know of any trained classicists or scholars of ancient Rome who think” the passage about Christians in Tacitus is a forgery (p. 55). Carriers says Ehrman is wrong and didnt check and cites two scholars.
Ehrman objects and erects a new qualification and says the scholars Carrier cites "were writing fifty years ago, and so far as I know, they have no followers among trained experts today." So the only scholars that qualify must be alive and have followers among trained experts today. Appeal to novelty anyone? Shifting goalposts?
Ehrman then cites a lengthy email from an "expert" colleague that does not help clarify matters but Ehrman leaves the matter by claiming "I think that’s enough to settle it."
Again, The charge stands.

8. Regarding The “Other Jesus” Conundrum: Ehrman says the fact that “the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus were recent events” is “the view of all of our sources that deal with the matter at all” (p. 251). Carrier argues that "This is false."
Here Ehrman has no defense and feebly argues that Carrier took his words out of context and argues some tangential points but leaves Carrier's charge intact.

9. Regarding That Dying-and-Rising God Thing: Ehrman argued that in fact “no ancient source says any such thing about Osiris (or about the other gods)” (p. 26). Carrier argues that Ehrman is wrong because he relies solely on Jonathan Z Smith.
In his defense, Ehrman maintains that "Osiris’s body does not come back to life. Quite the contrary, it remains a corpse... It is his soul that lives on, in the underworld. Not his body in this world." Then he cites Plutarch and shares his own personal interpretation of the passages. Unlike him, Carrier rests on the shoulders of other scholars on the matter when he says "...beliefs about Osiris’ death and resurrection long predate Plutarch is established in mainstream scholarship on the cult: e.g. S.G.F. Brandon, The Saviour God: Comparative Studies in the Concept of Salvation (Greenwood 1963), pp. 17-36 and John Griffiths, The Origins of Osiris and His Cult, 2nd ed. (Brill 1980)."
Ehrman has no support and Carrier seems to be right when he wrote, "If Ehrman had acted like a real scholar and actually gone to the sources, and read more widely in the scholarship (instead of incompetently reading just one author–the kind of hack mistake we would expect from an incompetent myther), he would have discovered that almost everything Smith claims about this is false." Ehrman wants to make it a simple matter of interpreting Plutarch differently and concludes, "Carrier and I could no doubt argue day and night about how to interpret Plutarch." Ehrman stands alone. Carrier stands with other scholars.
Again, The charge stands.

10. Regarding The Baptism Blunder: Ehrman says “we don’t have a single description in any source of any kind of baptism in the mystery religions” (p. 28). That is outright false, says Carrier.
Ehrman does not address this charge.

11. Regarding The Dying Messiah Question: Ehrman declares “there were no Jews prior to Christianity who thought Isaiah 53 (or any other ‘suffering’ passages) referred to the future messiah” (p. 166). False, Carrier says and explains, "Dead Sea pesher (11Q13) or the 1st century targum that both explicitly evince this belief."
Ehrman does not address this charge.

12. On The Matter of Qualifications, Carrier says, "Twice Ehrman says I have a Ph.D. in “classics” (p. 19, 167). In fact, my degrees are in ancient history, with an undergraduate minor in Classics (major in history)"
Ehrman admits error on this.

13. Regarding The Methodologically Absurd, Carrier argues about the bankruptcy of Ehrman's methods like using hypothetical “Aramaic sources” to argue the existence of a HJ.
Ehrman does not address this charge.

14. On "Faking it", Carrier argues that Ehrman pretends he is "unaware of the routinely fabricatory nature of ancient biography"
Ehrman does not address this charge.

thief of fire

Just out of interest, who are the scholars Doherty quotes who do agree with his overall thesis?