Back Again

I am going to assert that Joseph Smith was sane. He is a well attested historical figure and seems to be a deliberate charlitain.

My point is that Joseph Smith was arguably martyred for something that he may not have personally believed.

I'm tired of this nonsense that dying for something means that you believe it. Shit happens...and most martyrs (terrorists aside) are the accidental kind.

Kapyong

Gday,

So now you're going to play silly word games about whether Philo was REALLY a 'historian'?

Philo WAS a historian - he wrote several historical books :
Flaccus, On the Embassy to Gaius, Hypothetica, On The Contemplative Life.

His books have a huge index of names mentioned, including various minor figures.

The issue is whether the empty tomb COULD have been mentioned. It is obvious that Philo's voluminous writing, from that very period, from that very region, covering those very subjects - could EASILY have mentioned the empty tomb.


Consider how in 'Flaccus' he mentions Carabbas :

VI. (36) There was a certain madman named Carabbas, afflicted not with a wild, savage, and dangerous madness (for that comes on in fits without being expected either by the patient or by bystanders), but with an intermittent and more gentle kind; this man spent all this days and nights naked in the roads, minding neither cold nor heat, the sport of idle children and wanton youths; (37) and they, driving the poor wretch as far as the public gymnasium, and setting him up there on high that he might be seen by everybody, flattened out a leaf of papyrus and put it on his head instead of a diadem, and clothed the rest of his body with a common door mat instead of a cloak and instead of a sceptre they put in his hand a small stick of the native papyrus which they found lying by the way side and gave to him; (38) and when, like actors in theatrical spectacles, he had received all the insignia of royal authority, and had been dressed and adorned like a king, the young men bearing sticks on their shoulders stood on each side of him instead of spear-bearers, in imitation of the bodyguards of the king, and then others came up, some as if to salute him, and others making as though they wished to plead their causes before him, and others pretending to wish to consult with him about the affairs of the state.

A minor figure no-one has ever heard of - Philo gives him a whole passage. There are quite a few other such minor figures mentioned in Philo (e.g. Helicon in Embassy.)


In 'Hypothetica',
Philo discusses the Essenes at length, he also discusses other Jewish sects - if he had heard of Christians he would have mentioned them.


In 'Embassy',
Philo discusses various sons-of-god and their transformations and immortality etc. - could easily have mentioned the empty tomb. Philo also dicsusse the trouble at the Temple caused by Gaius - he could easily have mentioned Jesus alleged cleansing of the temple.


In Allegorial Interpretation 1, Philo says :
'(108) Well, therefore, did Heraclitus say this, following the doctrine of Moses; for he says, "We are living according to the death of those men; and we have died according to their life." As if he had said, Now, when we are alive, we are so though our soul is dead and buried in our body, as if in a tomb. But if it were to die, then our soul would live according to its proper life, being released from the evil and dead body to which it is bound.'

Tomb, life and death etc. - an apposite time to mention the E.T.


Philo wrote and length about the Jews, their history, their beliefs, their leaders, their sects, their troubles etc..

If Philo had heard ANYTHING about Jesus, we would expect him to mention it somewhere.


Paul preaches a spiritual resurrection, not a physical one. It is clear he had never heard of the empty tomb, because it goes against his preaching.


Nonsense.
I remember quite well that people believe that.

But the EVIDENCE shows that the early Christian writings do NOT mention anything about the Gospels until early-mid 2nd century.


K.

Kapyong

Gday,

What?
There were NO 'other factions',
but
there WERE 'dissenters' ?

What utter nonsense - orthodoxy was still being argued out in that period.


We have clear evidence of early Christians who thought Jesus was a PHANTOM - an illusion. This Christian sect has a specific name - 'Docetics. How more DIFFERENT could you get ?

We have clear evidence of Christians who did NOT believe Jesus came in the flesh.

Early Christianity was a mess of competing arguments - calling them 'dissenters' while denying there were 'other factions' is simply ridiculous.


K.

Kapyong

Gday,

Scholars agree that NOT ONE single book of the NT was written by anyone who ever met a historical Jesus.

We don't even have ONE authentic claim to have personally met a historical Jesus - NOT ONE Christian themself claims to have personally met Jesus.

(Not counting the forged 2 Peter.)


K.

renassault

Yet where are the countless insurrectionists mentioned by Josephus? Where is Judas of 6 AD, Theudas of 44 AD, the Egyptian? The Sicarii? Much bigger political issues than Jesus and yet they are not mentioned. Where is John the Baptist? As far as the Essenes go, where is the mention of Sadducees and Pharisees?

Philo was more concerned with philosophies and wisdom and he didn't focus on Judea, but the entire known world at the time. Here he is probably talking about the Greek gods/heroes.

Spiritual resurrection of the Greeks doesn't equate into necessity of the Christian belief.

The fact is, Philo was removed from Judea. He doesn't seem to know that the Essenes did take children at times (Josephus plus archaeology of Qumran). Not impossible to neglect mention of Christianity seeing he neglects to mention many other things.

Not so. 1 Corinthians 15:51-54 and there was no reason for the empty tomb to be used as evidence since the appearances to witnesses were used.

Only a fraction of history was recorded, and only a fraction of it survived.


If the Apostles who knew Jesus didn't agree with these factions, they were clearly dissenters.

Who came decades after Christian orthodoxy.

Such as mess is not proven to exist. Even if it did exist, it was just minor groups as opposed to the large Orthodox Christianity. Competing arguments does not mean the original Orthodox Christianity was just another sect; obviously whoever knew the founder of a religion was the head of the original religion.

The arguments regarding the Catholic epistles are irrelevant because as Galatians is accepted as coming from Paul, his testimony in Galatians 2 shows none of the Apostles disagreed with him.

This doesn't really have anything to do with the empty tomb. The Catholic epistles, except for 2 Peter, are often considered inauthentic based on this (yet ironically 2 Peter is considered a forgery precisely BECAUSE of such details of knowing the historical Jesus). But the occasion doesn't exist in Jude; it was written on short notice against heretics (1:3). 1 Peter was written about suffering Christians; it does contain a reference to the suffering of Jesus (5:1), though it's somewhat arguable that this is a metaphor; but what else would an eyewitness say? "A witness of the sufferings of Christ, yes I was there and I saw them and I don't mean this metaphorically"? 2-3 John were occasional letters and don't have any purpose in mentioning eyewitness testimony. 1 John may have had an occasion, but this is more of a judgment call. Only James seemingly should have mentioned something about the earthly Jesus. But seeing how James prefers to use Job rather than Christ as an example of righteous suffering (5:10-11), it is obvious he didn't consider examples of Christ's life as a strong apologetic for his reader (as odd as it may be, the example of Job proves that).

Amaleq13

This response fails to address my point entirely. Potential alternate explanations don't change the fact that an empty tomb would automatically and immediately be recognized as a symbol of a claimed resurrection.

Is English your primary language because you are using "symbol" in a strange (ie incorrect) way? Claims or reports of an event are not a "symbol" for the event. They do not represent an object or concept, they describe it.

So you cannot think of a good reason for Paul to ignore such a painfully obvious symbol of the resurrection? I'm not surprised. I don't think there is one.

No, courts wisely do not "prefer" witness testimony because they know how inherently unreliable it is and how easily impeachable it can be. What is actually preferred is objective evidence. You've lost it when you call testimony a symbol of something because that makes no sense.

Wrong again. He is arguing for a general resurrection based on his readers' existing belief that Jesus had risen. They clearly already belief in the risen Christ and he is arguing that this requires that they also accept a general resurrection as well. Why do I know your sacred text better than you?

Not to anyone rational, it isn't. To a thinking reader, it is deeply problematic for the notion of an historical empty tomb. You appear to be more of a believing reader.

What are you talking about "wasn't accepted"? Why introduce another straw man?

That is nothing that makes this wishful claim a fact. He is a remarkable character who appears without warning to serve a very specific plot point before disappearing completely after doing so. Textbook deus ex machina no matter how much you wish it to be otherwise. This creates doubt in the mind of any rational reader though it doesn't prove or even require that the character be fiction. You seem to be having trouble with that concept. Is that too nuanced a view for you?

That isn't "reasoning", it is willful ignorance. There are plenty of Christian scholars willing to admit that Joseph is a suspicious character and I respect their intellectual honesty. Denying he is a character with questionable historicity is not the same as claiming he is fiction. You do understand that, correct? It is simply accepting the facts as they are.

Yes you have. You've even added a new one!! You've been arguing against claims I haven't made so your responses have been consistently off-target. That's what the straw man fallacy is, amigo. And you've been building them like a maniac.

The part that indicates you've lost track of my actual argument and have replaced it with another is the phrase "must have". See above if you are still confused.

Straw man. Nobody is claiming it is necessary that the story is fiction. Please pay attention to what I'm actually arguing. It will help reduce your confusion and wasted time.

Well, that confirms that you haven't a clue. They've been together throughout the argument. I'm sorry I wasted so much time thinking otherwise. :banghead:

And so we continue to have good reason to doubt the veracity of Joseph, the guards, and the empty tomb. :wave:

renassault

No it wouldn't be recognized as a symbol of the Resurrection because of the aforementioned doubts one would have about an empty tomb. The most direct and most authentic way to support the Resurrection, not to mention with the least number of problems, was the appearance to the disciples.

The appearances to the Apostles seeing it was part of a creed was apparently the symbol for the Resurrection, as well as the proof. A symbol doesn't need to be something static.

As it has been explained many times before, the empty tomb had the problem of only implying that Jesus rose. The doubt of a stolen body was there, and an appearance by the risen Jesus is much more powerful than the empty tomb. It would be unnecessary therefore to mention it alongside the mentioning of appearances. It's not impossible to have had it mentioned as part of the argument, but it's not something that should have been mentioned.

I'm pretty sure eyewitness testimony is the only source for events that cannot be verified through objective, undisputable, evidence...as it was in the case of the Resurrection. The empty tomb was objective, highly disputable, evidence.

Your quote talked about Christ's Resurrection. If you weren't talking about it, then one might as well wonder whether English can even be considered a language you know at all. You were claiming Paul was outlining general Christian beliefs and wasn't proving the resurrection, and that he should have mentioned the empty tomb (again proof that you're talking about Christ's Resurrection as you admit above the obvious, that he is proving the general resurrection). Paul was using proof of Christ's Resurrection as part of his argument. The lack of an empty tomb in that argument would imply the non-unanimous evidence the empty tomb provided, and as Matthew shows, this was due to the Jews' claim that the body was stolen. If Paul didn't believe that Christ's tomb was empty, then he has more of a reason to mention the tomb as full and explain how Christ rose from the dead with a full tomb.

No, because the empty tomb in and of itself doesn't prove anything; the body could have been stolen. It can only be used as a minor footnote in the year 50 AD. Now in the year 2009, the empty tomb means that the body really was missing and the mythicists, of which this board is incredibly plagued, might actually be wrong about there not existing a historical Jesus.

Clearly your argument is that Jesus was still in his tomb according to Paul's belief, because Paul certainly believed the historical Jesus died (Galatians 3:13) and lived some few decades ago (1 Corinthians 9:5). For Paul not to explain why the tomb wasn't empty, yet Jesus resurrected from the dead is more of a challenge than for him to omit mentioning the empty tomb as a fact.

He is a remarkable character? How did you decide that one? The fact that this character is so important in Jesus' death and has no other legends around him points toward authenticity. That he is mentioned nowhere else simply means, as I've said a bunch of times already, that he had nothing else worth mentioning. Thus the appearing and disappearing to which you refer doesn't mean much for non-historicity. It would be one thing for Joseph of Arimathea to come in times of need in multiple places, without explanation regarding how he got there when one is needed, any conversations if such were likely with Jesus.


The whole point of my argument with you on this has been exactly this: that Joseph of Arimathea's one and only appearance doesn't need to make him ahistorical. It may make him look suspicious, but that is explainable. I know saying he has questionable historicity is not the same thing as claiming he's fictional, but it seems pretty certain you've been arguing for the latter. Regardless of which position you took, the suspicions are fairly explainable.

Let’s examine the three strawmen you’ve accused me of:

#1
#2
#3
What, O, my brilliant scholar are the strawmen? Proof that the empty tomb wasn’t mentioned because they didn’t use it as an argument (your alleged strawman #1)? Proof Joseph of Arimathea was unlikely to have been mentioned aside from recovering Jesus’ body because Jesus had hundreds of followers? (your #2) Your claim Joseph of Arimathea was ahistorical which means either the Evangelist or the community forged it? (your #3)??


In the field of textual criticism, nothing is proven. Either it is strongly implied, or somewhat implied. In this case, to have doubts based on your arguments about Joseph of Arimathea's existence means that you're questioning whether he exists. Since the Gospel texts state he existed, you're saying that their authenticity is doubtful. The implication is these doubts make it likely Joseph of Arimathea is a fictional character.

What I'm doing is assuming the Gospel text about Joseph of Arimathea is doubtful (not claim you consider it so), and proceed from there to point out how these doubts might be explained. Nothing else. I'm not claiming Joseph of Arimathea must have existed based on this reasoning, but only that his existence can't be negated based on these doubts because they're explainable.

It was my mistake, I was a bit focused on the Joseph of Arimathea part.

Kapyong

Gday,

1 Cor 9:5 :
"Don't we have the right to take a believing wife along with us, as do the other apostles and the Lord's brothers and Cephas?"

?

What on earth does that have to do with Jesus living some few decades ago?

Oh, do you think "Lord's brothers" is something more than a title?


K.

renassault

Seeing how Paul separates Cephas and other apostles from those designated as "the Lord's brothers" means the Lord's brothers are relatives by blood, not spiritual brothers. This point is made by P.R. Eddy, and Boyd in "The Jesus Legend" against Wells' supposition that Paul believed Jesus Christ to be someone who existed in the past a long time ago.

spamandham

Fair enough. I think the point though is, that no sane person would invent a lie that they *knew* would probably get them killed.

In the case of Paul, there is no sign in his writings that this situation applies, ....but I agree it's a sophomoric argument I'm weary of as well.