No Robots

Careful, now. I can fire that baby up any time I like.

Looks more as though you like to take extended sabbaticals. Must be nice.

Right now I'm reading Invisible Man, and I wish I sounded like Ralph Ellison. I'm what Brunner would call spiritually reproductive: I don't really have the ability to be creative, but I know what I like, and I'm pretty good at reproducing it.

Ray Moscow

OK, I don't think he has a PhD in biblical studies, but our friend mens_sana believes in an HJ though not in the supernatural Jesus (or at least he did the last time we discussed it). Perhaps he can explain why.

One reason he cited was the baptism of Jesus by JTB. He reasoned that such awkward bits were more easily explained by the HJ than by other theories.

I just throw this in as an example of how a scholarly person could accept the HJ as a probability without accepting the religious or supernatural stuff.

Ray

Ray Moscow

I don't represent scholars in this field, but to me it seems that:

an HJ position assumes, or believes there is evidence to support, a real person who was the root of at least some of the Jesus Christ stories.

a MJ position assumes there was not, or believes there is insufficient evidence to support, a real person who is the root of at least some of the Jesus Christ stories.

spin

I don't know why this is so hard to understand but we don't just have a simple dichotomy of HJ/MJ, unless of course you're using a sloppy understanding of "myth". Myth deals with religious explanations its "story" contains. If Jesus is a "fictional" figure, ie actively invented by writers, then he is certainly not mythical, but fictional. If Jesus jumped onto the scene through some other means, he is neither mythical nor fictional.

Think of the wife of Pilate -- not heard of in Mark, but has come into Matt apparently to tell of a dream she had. Well, Pilate almost certainly had a wife. Readers of the gospel would take her to have been real and she eventually became an orthodox saint, Procla.

My favorite has always been Ebion, the founder of the Ebionite movement according to the church fathers, but who never existed. Tertullian knew of him and argued against him. Epiphanius even knew of his hometown.

Neither Procla nor Ebion are mythical, nor are they fictional. Jesus may have been the fruit of Paul's vision in Gal 1:12, but it is probable that his proselytes believed he was real.

So, the various positions are:

1. real
   1. god-man
   2. miracle worker
   3. just an ordinary guy
2. not real
   1. mythical
   2. fictional
   3. traditional

Oh, and maybe more.


spin

Vivisector

It's easy to understand an intense "dislike of having been lied to." Goodness knows I held hard feelings on the topic for a long time (my parents were Baptist, so the lying started at a very young - and impressionable - age). The obvious risk is for those who still experience that dislike to lose their objectivity. It seems axiomatic that Christians will find it difficult, to say the least, to be objective in the HJ/MJ discussion. But we atheists/agnostics/whatevers shouldn't give ourselves a free pass, either.

I suggest that most of us, to varying degrees, feel the urge (or necessity) to defend our ideas. After all, who among us is walking around out there with ideas in our head that we know to be wrong? And even if we're shown convincing evidence of our error, then I think we should be honest in acknowledging that it can be very, very difficult (impossible for some) to admit to a mistake. Just look at our President.

I'm atheist, so my world won't crumble if I learn that Jesus was a purely mythical construct. But on the basis of what I know, I take an HJ position. I'm okay with discussions of evidence, hypotheses, speculation, whatever. I find that interesting. What I find most disappointing is when we (atheists/agnostics) don't follow the same rules that we reasonably ask (demand?) that Christians respect in conversations and debates.

Examples? How about whom we consider to be a legitimate scholar, for one. This one's easy. In just about any other field, it's someone with a terminal degree and a record of scholarly publication - both in the field in question. We demand it from Christians who froth at the mouth about Creationism, we should demand it from atheist MJers. M.S. degree? Ph.D. in progress? 50 peer-reviewed articles on dendrochronology? Sorry - maybe folks like this have great ideas (even the right ideas), and they might make a contribution, but they aren't legitimate scholars - not yet, anyway. Again, just think of what we'd demand before considering a Christian to be a legitimate scholar in the context of ID or "creation science."

We also tend to suspend our expectation of a "plain reading" of the texts." I can't recall how many discussions I've been in where my (the atheist) side basically said, "But the Bible very plainly says ..." only to have the opposing (Christian) side try to convince me that the plain reading wasn't plain at all. In the MJ/HJ context, it seems to me that the MJ position is opposed to the plain reading in almost every instance where a Christian writing is being considered - whether it's Jesus's brother, his family, whatever. Ad hoc explanations are conceived and forcefully advocated (e.g., the "Brothers of the Lord") as irrefutable evidence why the plain reading must be abandoned. To me, it's all too similar to listening to a Christian explain how both accounts of Judas's death are true at the same time.

I often marvel at our (atheists) ability to discern interpolations when there is absolutely no textual basis for supposing they exist. The approach seems to be to carefully examine the text containing the offensive word or sentence, and then to see if the word or sentence (or a combination of surrounding words and/or sentences) can be removed in such a way that the text (or, more often, the English translation of the text) still makes some sort of sense. If so, then we have successfully identified an interpolation. This approach works astonishingly well. However, I don't think we would tolerate for an instant such a lack of rigor and objectivity from our Christian opponents.

Finally, I think we (atheists) should avoid double standards as we discuss criteria that should be satisfied before considering an individual from antiquity as historical or mythical. If we want to declare as mythical anyone without a DNA sample on file at the FBI's repository, anyone without a valid US driving license, or whatever, that's fine. We should simply be ready to apply the same standard to any other ancient figure. No, we should apply the standard to other ancient figures to ensure that the standard makes overall sense. I suspect that, if we were to do so, we'd find many cases of well-known people whom we were unable to declare, with certainty, as "historical." But if that's the case, then so be it - let's admit it, move on with one standard, and learn to live with something less than certainty.

I apologize for the rant and hope you understand that I didn't specifically have you in mind as I wrote this. It's only that I, too, hate to see Chris leave, because I admire his expertise and insights. Your post simply provided me with a convenient springboard.

Cheers,

V.

Vivisector

I think you're exactly right, and I'd be happy to follow any convention that someone smarter than me can come up with. It seems obvious that the simple "MJ" and "HJ" categories are sufficiently nebulous to have often derailed discussions.

Cheers,

V.

gstafleu

If the gospels are mythical documents then the Jesus of the gospels is a mythical entity, regardless of any "historical core" that at one point may or may not be discovered. If the gospels are supposed to be evidence of the historical core, they can only be so to the extent that they are not mythical. Which of course brings us back to good old question: what model of Jesus is it that is historical? If, as e.g. Price holds (and maybe Mack?) the gospels are 100% myth, then the Jesus from the gospels is 100% myth and we cannot deduce a historical core from the gospels--maybe we can deduce it from somewhere else, but not the gospels.

Gerard Stafleu

gurugeorge

Good post, but I must just point out that what counts as a "plain reading" is an aspect of the very nub of the argument. What counts as a "plain reading" is just the very thing that needs to be ironed out first, before we can begin to answer questions of historicity or otherwise, given the distance in time, mores, intellectual and cultural climate between now and then (and this also counts for what was a "plain reading" then too of course, relative to whatever milieu one is talking about). As Doherty points out, very often, when you take a look at the broader religious and cultural climate of the time, the HJ reading of some relevant bits of text we have is not the "plain reading" at all, either now or then, and it's taking the "plain reading" as HJ-style that causes some of the perennial square-peg-in-round-hole problems of NT scholarship.

Is the "plain reading" of:

[3] For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures,
[4] that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures,
[5] and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve.
[6] Then he appeared to more than five hundred brethren at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep.
[7] Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles.
[8] Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me.

really that Paul is talking about a human being who was at one time known personally by Cephas and "the twelve"? Really? Where do you get that connection from? I would suggest, trying on for size, that the "plain reading" is rather that of a mythical/mystical entity, unknown as a human being by any of the people involved - Paul, Cephas, "the twelve", the "five hundred".

Also, consider: "plain reading" of which rescension of the text, which version, etc., etc.? There's a sense of "plain reading" (not yours of course, just making a point) that would have us stick to the "plain meaning" of the KJV as meant by 17th century English scholars! The whole point of philological investigation, of historical investigation, as I (an amateur) understand it, is to dig deeper.

aa5874

Your position is in effect a double standard. You have one standard for the God of Moses and another standard for his son, one you reject by scientific facts and the other you accept without historical findings.

The Jesus of the NT, son of a Ghost, has been presented as a belief within the framework of theology, no extant historical writings independent of this theistic presentation have confirmed or can place this figure, Jesus, the offspring of the Ghost, at any location, or in any century.

If you believe that the Jesus of the NT was a figure of history, yet cannot provide the history to support your belief, then you are operating at the same standard as those who believe the God of Moses exists because they feel so.

Toto

I recall reading what Joseph Campell wrote at some point, and I think I remember that he fudged the question and never came down on one side or another.

So an exact quote would be helpful.

But Campbell is not a historian, not the person we are looking for. His specialty was mythology.