Freethought & Rationalism Archive

No Robots · 03-26-2008, 09:21 AM

The doubts which have been cast upon the historical reality of Jesus are, in my judgment, unworthy of serious attention.--Frazer, The Golden Bough (3rd ed.), p. 412.

Yellum Notnef · 03-26-2008, 09:23 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by No Robots

The doubts which have been cast upon the historical reality of Jesus are, in my judgment, unworthy of serious attention.--Frazer, The Golden Bough (3rd ed.), p. 412.

You da man! (whatever the hell that's supposed to mean):Cheeky:

Amaleq13 · 03-26-2008, 09:58 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MarkA

Is this some sort of semantic game that Jeffrey is playing as well?

No, I believe he is trying to clarify the semantic game played by the Catholic Church.

Quote:

Jesus was conceived by a union between the Holy Ghost and Mary.

I believe that is precisely what the Church is trying to avoid (ie connecting the magical baby Jesus womb appearance with messy conception activities) by using significantly different terminologies in referring to either miraculous birth.

Mary was the product of sex but the conception was somehow magically rendered immaculate.

Jesus was somehow magically brought into existence within the womb of Mary so there is really no need to refer to any messy biological processes since they were not actually involved.

ETA:

Quote:

Originally Posted by MarkA

I do not know what a noob is but I am sure you can enlighten me.

Netspeak for "newbie" or rookie

andrewcriddle · 03-26-2008, 12:10 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MarkA

Where is Asclepius said to have undergone the experience that Jews of Jesus day thought "resurrection" involved and entailed?

He was killed by Zeus and then resurrected by him. Dead and then brought back to life. I think Jews would understand that experience.

It may be worth noting that the resurrection of Asclepius seems rather late in the tradition. (Ovid may be our earliest surviving witness.) In the original versions Asclepius is killed by Zeus, Apollo takes revenge for the killing of his son and suffers for it.

The idea of Asclepius being resurrected seems to be a Hellenistic mechanical reworking of the story in order to reconcile the story of Asclepius the (living) God with that of Asclepius the (dead) Hero.

Andrew Criddle

Jeffrey Gibson · 03-26-2008, 02:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mountainman

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jeffrey Gibson

Here's a review of Hart that appeared in Bull. Hist. Med., 2002[INDENT]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jeffrey Gibson

Why?

And where in Edelstein & Edlestein do the pair make the particular "comparison" between, or the claims about, Jesus and Asclepius that Hart makes?

You haven't read Edelstein & Edelstein, have you, Pete?

The point is Jeffrey that Hart has.

(Translation: "No, I [Pete] haven't]

No, Pete, that's not the point. The point is whether Hart has or has not misrepresented what Edelstein & Edlestein have to say about Asclepius, let alone about Asclepius and Jesus and whether you know if this is the case.

Quote:

And his coins analyses are novel and quite thought-provoking. The appearances of Alscepius and/or Salus on the imperial coinage from the first century through to the year 324 CE - the year Constantine became the supreme being.

Constantine hammers the asclepia.

You haven't read Hart either, have you. Where does he actually say this?

BYW, do you know who Salus is?

Jeffrey

mountainman · 03-26-2008, 07:11 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jeffrey Gibson

Quote:

Originally Posted by mountainman

And his coins analyses are novel and quite thought-provoking. The appearances of Alscepius and/or Salus on the imperial coinage from the first century through to the year 324 CE - the year Constantine became the supreme being.

Constantine hammers the asclepia.

You haven't read Hart either, have you.

I have posted a review and summary of Hart. Do you read anyone's posts before you start compiling your lists of questions?

Quote:

Where does he actually say this?

If you are referring to the last line: "Constantine hammers the asclepia." then Hart does not say this in so many words. Paraphrased Lane-Fox says this.

Quote:

BYW, do you know who Salus is?

Do you read anyone's posts before you start compiling your lists of questions? Since this question is answered by Hart. Here is the relevant section of my notes on Hart ....

Quote:

p.207

Roman Coins: Asclepius and Salus

"Salus, the daughter of Aesculapius, survived the fall
of paganism. She is depicted on an early coin of the
Christian era that was minted by Fausta, the second wife
of Constantine I: this shows on the reverse a "baptised"
version of Salus, portrayed without a serpent but holding
two children. The users of this coins would receive a
cryptic message that the daughter of Aesculapius has
repented and been converted to Christianity.

p. 208:

First HEALING SAINTS: Cosmas and Damian
Twins -physicians martyrys death in 287 CE

The sick continued to pray to Saints Cosmas and Damian
in much the same way as supplicants appealed to
Asclepius and Hygieia. The twins became patron saints
of physicians and pharmacologists in the fourth century
CE until the 16th century.

After the reformation, the staff of Asclepius replaced
the icons of Saints Cosmas and Damian.

As an afterthought, Cosmas and Damian are inventions of a christian forger living after the time of Eusebius, who had to salvage some of the memory of the asclepius tradition and shovel it into the inauthentic forgery of christianity. Who was the christian forger who first introduced the glaringly fraudulent characters of Cosmas and Damian to be considered as "historical"? Do you know the name of this forger?

Best wishes,

Pete Brown

Jeffrey Gibson · 03-26-2008, 08:56 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mountainman

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jeffrey Gibson

You haven't read Hart either, have you.

I have posted a review and summary of Hart. Do you read anyone's posts before you start compiling your lists of questions?

I meant all of Hart, not just certain sections.

Quote:

If you are referring to the last line: "Constantine hammers the asclepia." then Hart does not say this in so many words.

Does he say it in any words at all? If so, where?

Quote:

Paraphrased Lane-Fox says this.

He does? Where?

[QUOTE]Do you read anyone's posts before you start compiling your lists of questions? Since this question is answered by Hart. Here is the relevant section of my notes on Hart ....

Quote:

p.207

Roman Coins: Asclepius and Salus

"Salus, the daughter of Aesculapius, survived the fall
of paganism.

Was she always known as the daugther of Aesculapius/Ascelpius?

She is depicted on an early coin of the
Christian era that was minted by Fausta, the second wife
of Constantine I: this shows on the reverse a "baptised"
version of Salus, portrayed without a serpent but holding
two children. The users of this coins would receive a
cryptic message that the daughter of Aesculapius has
repented and been converted to Christianity.

p. 208:

First HEALING SAINTS: Cosmas and Damian
Twins -physicians martyrys death in 287 CE

The sick continued to pray to Saints Cosmas and Damian
in much the same way as supplicants appealed to
Asclepius and Hygieia. The twins became patron saints
of physicians and pharmacologists in the fourth century
CE until the 16th century.

Umm, what does Hygieia have to do with Salus? Are you saying they are the same?

And are you going to answer my question of whether Hart misrepresents what Eldlestein & Edlestein say about Asclepius and Asclepius and Jesus? Do you know?

Quote:

As an afterthought, Cosmas and Damian are inventions of a christian forger living after the time of Eusebius, who had to salvage some of the memory of the asclepius tradition and shovel it into the inauthentic forgery of christianity.

Does Hart say this? Or the Edlesteins? OR Lane-Fox?

Jeffrey

mountainman · 03-26-2008, 11:55 PM

ABOUT CONSTANTINE's HAMMERING

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jeffrey Gibson

He does? Where?

Quote:

Originally Posted by FOX

Persecution of the Old Religions

p.666: "The postscript to his Oration at Antioch was to be rather more robust: torture of pagans "in authority in the city" so that they admitted religious fraud.

p.671: The list of pagan sites to have suffered under Constantine:

Mambre: a site of great holiness in the Hebrew testament

Jerusalem: shrine of Aphrodite, stood on the site of the crucifixion and sepulchre.

Aphaca: an offensive Phoenician centre of sacred prostitution.

Didyma: Christians seized a prophet of Apollo and had him tortured.

Antioch: Christians seized a prophet of Apollo and had him tortured.

Aigai, in Cilicia: christians raised the shrine of Asclepius.

p.672: "In the early 340's, we find the first surviving Christian texts which asks for something more,
the total intolerance of pagan worship." [FN:25] - Firmicus, De Errore 16.4

[Editor: After the rule of Constantine things went from bad to worse.
See the list of citations from "Demolish Them!",
published in Greek, Athens, 1990, by Vlasis Rassias.]

FOX: "Why were these latter shrines singled out so promptly?

(1) At Aigai, the pagan wise man Apollonius was believed
to have "turned the temple into an Academy":
this temple, or a nearby shrine, had been honoured
with a fine pagan inscription
in honour of "godlike" Apollonius,
perhaps as recently as the reign of Diocletian.

[Editor: This is an intriguing citation.]

(2) Porphyry had compiled books of Philosophy from Oracles
which publicised texts from Didyma.

(3) At Antioch, prophets were duly tortured and obliged to confess "fraud".
These reprisals are the counterpart to two written works by Eusebius,
his polemic against the books on Apollonius and his "Demonstrations of the Gospel,"
which disproved Apollo's oracles by quoting them against themselves.

[Editor: Constantine puts a big scare into the opposition religions.]

p.673: "Constantine, said Eusebius, sent his emmisaries into
"every pagan temple's recess and every gloomy cave." [FN:28] - Eus., V.C. 3.57.4

"Intolerance had never been rooted in the long history of pagan and religious thought.
After Constantine, many pagans could still extend to the new worship
a tolerance which its exclusivity refused to extend to them."

"Eusebius tells how his [Constantine's] agents broke up divine statues
and exhibited their stuffing as mere rubbish." [FN:30] - Eus., V.C. 3.54.6

p.674: The age of Constantine has been aptly described as "age of hiatus":
we can carry this notion to our major theme, the "presence of the gods".

p.679: "In the early fourth century, two aging Christian authors
had shown possible ways of "defusing" the words of the pagan gods.
Eusebius had dismissed them as demonic and used them to refute their authors,
whereas Lactantius had quoted them with Christian improvements
and claimed them as proofs of the Christian faith ... In the first
flush of the "new empire", it must have been on the christians' initiative
that torture was applied to Apollo's prophet at Didyma and to others at Antioch,
"people taken from the magistrates of the city".
They were not humble, ignorant people, Eusebius asserted proudly:
they were people of "wonderful and noble philosophy",
at Antioch civic notables, at Didyma a "prophet and philosopher",
last of the long line of cultured voices who had kept philosophy
running in oracles, the voices of Polites, Theophilus, Macer and
the rest. [FN:48] - Eus. P. Ev. 4.135C-136A.

Philosophic oracles had begun when Apollo's wisdom
advanced with the culture of the prophets.
They ended when christians tortured the prophets.
who had recently helped to torture them too. [ED: DISPUTED]

Quote:

And are you going to answer my question of whether Hart misrepresents what Eldlestein & Edlestein say about Asclepius and Asclepius and Jesus? Do you know?

It is irrelevant to my series of questions.

Quote:

As an afterthought, Cosmas and Damian are inventions of a christian forger living after the time of Eusebius, who had to salvage some of the memory of the asclepius tradition and shovel it into the inauthentic forgery of christianity.

Does Hart say this? Or the Edlesteins? OR Lane-Fox?

Hart supplied the (mainstream) discussion of Cosmas and Damian. The afterthought of that discussion is mine. There appear to be at least three different pairs of Saints named Cosmas and Damian known to church history. Do you know who forged their memory Jeffrey?

Best wishes,

Pete Brown

Steven Carr · 03-27-2008, 12:16 AM

Here is Justin Martyr on the subject in his Dialogue with Trypho the Jew :-

'And when he [the devil] brings forward Æsculapius as the raiser of the dead and healer of all diseases, may I not say that in this matter likewise he has imitated the prophecies about Christ?'

But these raisings of the dead are nothing at all parallel with how a Jew would understand the term?

Yet early Christians saw the parallels between Asclepius and Jesus and used them in dialogues with Jews.

I'm confused.

MarkA · 03-27-2008, 01:31 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by andrewcriddle

Quote:

Originally Posted by MarkA

Where is Asclepius said to have undergone the experience that Jews of Jesus day thought "resurrection" involved and entailed?

He was killed by Zeus and then resurrected by him. Dead and then brought back to life. I think Jews would understand that experience.

It may be worth noting that the resurrection of Asclepius seems rather late in the tradition. (Ovid may be our earliest surviving witness.) In the original versions Asclepius is killed by Zeus, Apollo takes revenge for the killing of his son and suffers for it.

The idea of Asclepius being resurrected seems to be a Hellenistic mechanical reworking of the story in order to reconcile the story of Asclepius the (living) God with that of Asclepius the (dead) Hero.

Andrew Criddle

Thank you for that Andrew.

I was unaware Ovid may be the earliest primary source for this part of the myth. If so this is interesting in that the span of his life (43 bce - 17/18ce) coincides with any possible influence this change (if indeed it is a change or simply a reiteration of earlier traditions) may have had on the development of a mythological link between Jesus and Asclepius.

Thread Tools	Search this Thread
Show Printable Version	Search this Thread: Advanced Search

03-26-2008, 09:21 AM	#21
No Robots Veteran Member Join Date: Jan 2006 Location: Edmonton Posts: 5,679	The doubts which have been cast upon the historical reality of Jesus are, in my judgment, unworthy of serious attention.--Frazer, The Golden Bough (3rd ed.), p. 412.

03-27-2008, 12:16 AM	#29
Steven Carr Veteran Member Join Date: Jul 2001 Location: England Posts: 5,629	Here is Justin Martyr on the subject in his Dialogue with Trypho the Jew :- 'And when he [the devil] brings forward Æsculapius as the raiser of the dead and healer of all diseases, may I not say that in this matter likewise he has imitated the prophecies about Christ?' But these raisings of the dead are nothing at all parallel with how a Jew would understand the term? Yet early Christians saw the parallels between Asclepius and Jesus and used them in dialogues with Jews. I'm confused.

Freethought & Rationalism Archive

The archives are read only.