Juliana

Just in case someone believes this pathological liar.

On this website you can read and see (choose streaming video on the right) Cliteur speaking on Dutch television in the program 'Buitenhof' about 'Jesus was Caesar'. You need some Dutch though.

And here he is in another television broadcast from NOVA-TV. In this one you can also see the author. Unfortunately only the questions are in English.

Juliana

Aquila Pacis

Who is this Paul Clistier...sorry Cliteur anyway? Seems to have a cob up his a**...pardon me french...

please read this: http://www.bsw.org/project/biblica/bibl79/Comm05m.htm text originally published by the Vatican's Bible institute. There's Bruno Bauer, there's Stauffer, there are Dormeyer and Bussmann, there's Atwill (although Atwill is an almost complete joke if you ask me). Come on guys, this thing is not like "new", okay?

Juliana: first of all you shouldn't call someone a liar. After all he might be telling the truth... and you should ease down a bit...Jesus, Caesar, whoever...has been dead for a long time...I've read some of your posts...looks like Marc Antony held that funeral speech yesterday evening...if you stay this heated you're not suitable to be called Caesarian, eh? clementia and everything? remember?

Kaas has a point because Carotta doesn't follow the basic ways of modern scholarship. To me this is a major pitfall for Carotta. Of course he doesn't need to follow the rules BTW. But he should if he wants learned people to at least read about his findings. Otherwise it's the usual dorks and cynics on Dutch television. The way Carotta's work is being presented ATM definitely evokes von Daeniken, especially with intelligent people, simply because his method is about 200-years old-school (plus!). I seriously think he should rearrange his findings to meet modern requirements.

Kaas speaks about things being neglected when they don't fit. There also might be a chance that Carotta willfully invented things around certain historical facts, hoping that most of his readers won't see it, tweaked certain passages etc. Whoooaah...wake up, guys, what's the big deal? This is absolutely normal in science, at universities, institutes, government agencies etc. people alter the writings on their desktops, their books, the figures in their statistics, so that deals, assignments, projects etc. go smooth and by the number, especially if some things just won't add up, no matter how hard you try. I've done it myself...statistics for a five-year public transportation deal. Millions at stake. No problem. I mean, this is just a book about a book. Moreover: this is ancient history (PLUS RELIGION) we are talking about: plot holes all over the place. Even if Carotta is right, there will be countless reasons for not believing him, one of them is: believing in God. (Not my cup of tea though.)

Juliana

Yes, actually it's quite "old" already in our fast-moving time, almost six years now, however few have noticed yet. Carotta himself says it's not completely new in the introduction to JWC:
"This discovery is not completely new. In the 50’s the German theologian Ethelbert Stauffer noted that the Easter liturgy did not follow the Gospel narrative, but the funeral ritual of Caesar. Unfortunately, only his early work ‘Christ and the Caesars’ was translated into English, not his later ‘Jerusalem and Rome’, which stated things more clearly. What is new is the proof presented in this study that the entire Gospel is a mutated history of the Roman Civil War, from the Rubicon to the assassination and burial of Caesar, i.e. from the Jordan to the ‘capture’ and the ‘crucifixion’ of Jesus."

The discovery that Christians all around the world (and probably Muslims, too) worship Divus Julius – incognito- that he in fact "shapes the residual religious-moral backbone of the Oikoumene, i.e. our global community", still is very new, I guess.


This is an insult to those people who read the book and for whom it didn't evoke von Daeniken, but on the contrary, who found it very convincing. Are you saying they are not intelligent? And the work has been published in an Italian expert journal, too.
All this talk about formal issues, this whole metadiscussion whether the work meets modern "scholarly" requirements, whether it has been published in the correct form, who Carotta is and who the scholars that endorse it are etc., only serves to distract attention away from the contents in order to not having to deal with the subject. This behavior smacks of intellectual cowardice.



This again is a dishonest allegation: "... there also might be a chance that Carotta willfully invented things around certain historical facts, hoping that most of his readers won't see it, tweaked certain passages etc".
There might be a chance, yes, and there might also be a chance that you are just projecting your own lack of integrity on Carotta. If you have reasonable objections give them but don't imply scientific misconduct on the part of Carotta just because it "is is absolutely normal in science, at universities, institutes, government agencies etc" and you yourself have done it and don't seem to have a problem with it.


Non sequitur.
The question whether Carotta is right or not and whether one believes him or not, has nothing to do with believing in God. His work is not about belief but simply about the history (archaeology) of religion. How is it possible that there are faithful, practicing Christians, e.g. Erika Simon (a "devout Catholic") and even clerics who endorse Carotta's work?

Juliana

P.S: The author himself closes the German Introit with the words:

Fas sit vidisse—May it please God, that I have seen what I have seen.

Aquila Pacis

I guess I would be insulting myself then, wouldn't I? Carotta's book didn't evoke von Daeniken when I studied it. However, the word "intelligent" was not well chosen; "academical" or "academically-oriented" would have been more fitting. (see below)

You probably mean Quaderni di storia. This a small journal published by Luciano Canfora, who - as I dimly recall - is a sligthly controversial Caesar biographer as well, ("Caesar, the democrat"!?) and who apparently lent Carotta a helping hand with his book...this looks more like one hand washing the other. (But I could be wrong there.)

Cowardice? D'accord! But that's a minor aspect. You know what the "ivory tower" is? That's probably when scholars say "I heard about the book. I'm not convinced." "Well, have you read it?" "No." ...and you know what? I can't really blame them...these people function according to their institutionalized narrowmindedness. They only (want to) know what they have known all the time. They need to sell books, they need to acquire fundings for their research...if someone like Carotta comes and threatens to destroy the life-long work of thousands of scientists including all foundations that they rested upon, it's absolutely natural that experts in these fields (theology, history etc.) react the way they do...IF they react at all.

Moreover, any sane person's first reaction to the title of the book alone would be: "what a load of cr**" (pardon my french again!). This thing is close to porno in terms of public effect. The first edition was published by Goldmann, who are known for their non-scientific, esoterical and low quality schnickschnack. This alone will deter a lot of people. If you dig a little deeper, Carotta seems to have a pretty wild history of his own: pseudonym articles - including one or two on the Jesus-Caesar-issue - on a satire page in a left-wing German newspaper; staging a Madonna apparition in Germany; history of slightly rebellious behavior (seminar) as well as works in anarchistic circles in Italy. (I personally thinks this makes him likeable. But go and try to tell this to an "expert".)

Many of the books published by his own publishing house look like minor quality, quick money...maybe there's more...Then of course, he has never worked in the fields of history, philology, theology etc. before starting on "Jesus was Caesar", which for scholars is an absolute no-no. These people want others to follow the rules, their rules...if you never published in THEIR realm, if you never worked in THEIR field, if you don't follow THEIR rules, they will ignore you or smash you to pieces if they need to. The world - and the world of science - has become very pragmatic, callous, success-oriented, lean and mean ... every "normal" person - intelligent or not - will think exactly the same way, because they do not question these rules. It's easier to question the ones who break them, because then you're on the safe side.

All of these things - although I personally think that they are not really important - form a huge obstacle for someone to overcome before he even thinks about buying the book. The book itself is like a home run, almost perfect, almost untouchable, unfalsifiable, almost like God himself...maybe because it IS about God after all...and I think that this is what bugs people the most, that they can't find anything substantial to criticise, only minor aspects maybe, that - even if falsified - would not shake the rest of the theory. But there's also a problem for advocators like you: Carotta is not only a paria, the things he writes in his books are unbreakable, for one thing because the facts are all true - maybe he tweaked an aspect here and there, but this would be of little relevance to the overall context - and for another thing, the links and connections that he theorizes including the conclusion, can only be rejected on a personal basis. Scientifically they will hold up, until someone presents solutions, for instance the origin of the name "Maria Magdala" (including a different interpretation of the sources, different analogies, other sources maybe etc.), that come with a higher probability than the solutions Carotta offers in his book.

I'm not being dishonest. I simply know how people work out there in the scientific world, in the tower. Common practice. And unless Carotta is a truly outstanding person, there is definitely a small chance - mind: chance, possibility - that he tweaked a thing here and there. But again, I personally wouldn't see that as something discrediting. (Because it's normal.) And again: history, archeology and history of religion are full of holes: you have to work with possibilities, probabilities, envision things, invent things, analogies etc. to bridge those holes. Carotta does that from time to time, but every sincere historian has to, because there is no other choice.

(For instance, I would desperately like to know the "exceptional" speech (Nikolaos of Damascus; Life of Augustus) that Iunius Brutus held after he and some of the conspirators against Caesar climbed down from the Capitol to adress the people and Antony's party. Things like Nikolaos' collection of speeches are lost. But since Nikolaos says "exceptional", one only needs to look into Brutus' other, standard speeches and extrapolate from that. What would make an "exceptional" speech coming from Brutus? The historian's imagination is needed here, inspired by other pieces of corresponding literature etc.)

If they are catholic clerics, this wouldn't astonish me at all. Carotta's book has nothing to do with belief, that's true. But the consequences of his book will have EVERYTHING to do with belief, if there are any consequences at all. Assuming the man is right, what would this mean for the canon (apocalypse, judaisms etc.), the legitimacy of the Pope? (After all Simon Peter - according to Carotta - was Marc Anthony, Caesar's - i.e. the young Caesar's, i.e. Augustus' adversary. Jesus killed Simon Peter? That's what I call serious news!!

But all in all, what I wanted to say is: it probably won't be a difficult job for Carotta to re-arrange the findings and theories presented in his book to meet the requirements of modern day "scholarship". Mommsen would probably have loved his book. But Mommsen was a long time ago. Scientific approaches have changed since then.

Aquila Pacis

One way to re-arrange his findings would be to use the chapter "Synoptic Comparison" as a basis and include all the relevant details from the other chapters in his book...and to look for more details and possibilities in Mark.

One thing about Carotta's method: his choice of indirect comparison between Mark and Asinius Pollio (via Plutarch, Appian, Sueton et al.) is absolutely reasonable, and it works. But he often leaves the context of Mark's Gospel and utilizes other Gospels when suitable. This doesn't diminish his work with Mark, but one would normally expect a scope restricted to one piece of scripture. Consecutive publications could deal with the other Gospels. I know that his book was written as a "investigation report", and especially the first half of his book fits this description.

A good example is the way how Carotta deals with Caesar's assassins:

The conversion Iunius > Judas is linguistically probable, especially when one looks at the Greek renditions of the names, Decimus > "one of the twelve" is very probable, the conversion sicarius > Iskariot is highly probable, and has been proposed by various theologians, decades before Carotta published his book. The fact that Judas has the primary role as traitor, is logical because Decimus Iunius Brutus Albinus - although not the driving force behind the assassination - was the one closest to Caesar, one of his secondary heirs. (Marcus Iunius Brutus, who we know as "Brutus", the murderer of the tyrant, is rightfully seen in the assassin Barrabas. This Brutus is so well known today because he was a renowned Roman person with a glorious family history.)

The leader of the conspiracy however was C. Cassius Longinus. No records in Mark. Instead, Carotta leaps first to the Gospel of John, which in this context is outside of the Mark-Pollio method, but gives valuable information, since John was written much later, probably at a time, when the death of Caesar's assassins had already made it into imperial literature. But still no Longinus. Then he leaps further, to the Acts of Pilate, to the centurion Longinus stabbing Jesus on the cross, although Caesar's assassination corresponds structurally to Jesus' capture in Gethsemane and not to his crucifixion. Carotta's remarks on the lectio difficilior and lectio facilior - concerning the name "Longinus" - are true, but he leaves the boundaries of his own method and moreover ignores the analogous dramatic structure which he presupposes for his synoptic comparison. Therefore the comparison between Cassius Longinus and the centurion Longinus - although there may be some probability of an analogy - is worthless. It's a detour, a mere anectode. It would need more material to back it up.

In addition, Carotta mentions Casca, but omits that he played a decisive role, not necessarily during the assassination, but much later: P. Servilius Casca Longus is the first to stab Caesar; from behind actually. Carotta shows how elements of the fight between Casca and Caesar made it into the Gospel, but oversees one thing which should at least have been mentioned in the notes: tyrannicide was not uncommon in Rome, and it was Roman tradition that the first assassin be explicitly mentioned in literature. So one would normally expect Casca or the name "Casca" to appear in the Gospel in a more prominent form than one of young men laying "hold on him" etc., but obviously he doesn't. Carotta doesn't even mention that Casca may have had a much more prominent role in literature - especially since he took the office of Tribune later, against the young Caesar's will - and that the evangelist may have dropped him, referring exclusively to the "action", remnants of the fight in the Senate.

The assassination anecdote is just to show that Carotta, even if he does have a method that he utilizes, often leaves the Mark-Pollio terrain, sometimes legitimately so (as with the Gospel of John), sometimes wildly far out (as with the Acts of Pilate).

Clivedurdle

But which Caesar? Or is there an amalgam of Julius and Titus (Atwill)?

Atwill argues for a close relationship between Josephus and in fact all the Gospels and Paul.

His discussion of the myriad Simons and Mary's is very interesting - is Martha the Aramaic version of Mary? Are they all one Simon - Peter - and one Mary - the one who ate her child?

So a satire with allusions to the death of Julius to make the concoction that bit tastier? Nothing like a bit of name dropping in a satire!

Aquila Pacis

According to Carotta, it's an amalgam for sure, although not in the Gospel of Mark. According to Carotta, Mark tells of the civil war, of the life of Julius Caesar, the divus iulius. The young Caesar - i.e. Octavian (as we call him) - entered the following Gospels (Matthew etc.) and apocryphal writings through Jesus' childhood story, including the so-called sidus iulium, Caesar's comet - which the young Caesar also claimed for himself in order to become the son of divus iulius, God's son, divi filius - as the star of Bethlehem. So everything that came after Mark is supposed to contain elements of the young Caesar's story, including the Apocalypse which is nothing else than a rendition of the young Caesar's victory over Egypt, Marc Antony and Cleopatra. (!!!?)

The close relationship between Josephus and the New Testament is also stated by Carotta, who sees Josephus as something like a midwife for the "historiographical" Jesus. There seems to have been a fair amount of editorial work on the Gospels, judaisations, revisions etc. done by Josephus' editors - who probably also made up the Test. Flav. - demanded by the Flavian Caesars. What's new in Carotta's book is the insufficiently explained assumption that Flavius Josephus and Paul are one and the same person...although Carotta does present us with some striking parallels. But this is merely a side aspect, since Carotta deals primarily with the parallels between Jesus and Divus Iulius, not Paul and Josephus.

So there are overlapping areas between Carotta and Atwill, but the initial approach is a different one. It might well be that some references to other Caesars, like Titus, overlay the Gospels. But since Carotta hasn't omitted anything substantial from the Markan pericopes, the Titus-redactional level can be excluded ATM, at least for Mark. Atwill would have to go through Mark step by step in a similarly dense matter like Carotta and present us with a rock-solid alternative theory of the Gospel's origin and development.

I have a problem though with Atwill labeling the NT as a satire. The Gospels often read like a dead serious drama, tragic events included...and I'm saying this without any Christian bias. Satire? Pretty devious, if you ask me.

Clivedurdle

The thing that struck me about satire from Atwill is the prophecy of Jesus about Peter's death. That is read as Jesus being sympathetic, but Atwill comments imagine Jesus is Titus pronouncing a death sentence on Peter!

I think there is definite room for comparing and contrasting Carotta and Atwill and seeing what comes out in the wash.

Aquila Pacis

Hehe, yeah!! That sounds like a typical Joseph fire At will.

Could you give me the page numbers in his book? (I suppose you're referring to "Caesar's Messiah".) Thanks!