GakuseiDon

Gah! My irony meter just went off the chart! Is that comment for Doherty as well, or just me???

Aren't we going to look at 2nd C evidence now? I'd like to talk about the Ebionites... Doherty doesn't talk about them. What is the significance of having a group of Jewish Christians, who regarded Jesus as historical, and arguably traced back to TJG?

Or what about Papias, writing in the early 2nd C, who made a point of speaking to those who knew Jesus and the disciples?

Or what about the fact that no one in the 2nd C ever mentions a MJ, even as heresy?

All evidence, I'm afraid.

GakuseiDon

Sure, it's possible. But you are saying that it was a gradual change in a fluid, dynamic, kaleidoscopic religious/philosophical environment. How does that work, then?

Given Paul's apparent importance, I would have assumed that the churches he established would have been competent enough to pass on his ideas, at least in the absense of some kind of oppression or enforced change. It's not that his MJ ideas changed that I find difficult to believe, but that it changed and no-one noticed.

Again, it is possible, but Doherty has the MJ believers as contemporaries with HJ believers in the late 2nd C, and no-one notices. Even if the changed happened gradually, even Doherty doesn't have it occur uniformly.

Irenaeus drew up a list while "MJ" authors (according to Doherty) were writing. Marcion was strenuously fought against around 140 CE when he declared (amongst other things) that Jesus wasn't composed of flesh, but was formed like an angel. Ebionites were declared heretical as they didn't believe in the virgin birth. No-one noticed any MJ sects.

Neo-Platonists influenced Christianity for the following few hundred years, and yet [b]none of them[b/] ever worked out from Paul's writings that Paul believed in a Christ who was born and died in a lower celestial sphere.

So, what you are saying is that it would be clear to anyone reading Phil that the author was talking about an MJ?

As I said, even if it was gradual, even Doherty didn't think it was uniform. At some point around 150 CE, we would have had at least two groups - one a HJ, the other an MJ. Irenaeus and Tertullian were HJers.

It's not that what you are saying is impossible (though I would question the "gradual change in a fluid, dynamic, kaleidoscopic religious/philosophical environment" bit), just that it is unlikely. A HJ nicely explains the gaps. Doherty's theory doesn't, without a number of assumptions being made.

rlogan

heh. Well - i wanted to catch my breath, so to speak. let that soak in.

I have been trying to figure out how to approach what is "next". We have historically the importance of the destrution of the temple. I think I would like to understand better what that did to the Jewish church/political superstructure and the effect this would have on the nascent religion.

The dating of the gospels is a problem. I am favoring later than you, most likely. Doherty is probably earlier than me.

who, specifically?

You read Doherty's 2nd Century apologists, right? Still, that's a little far ahead of where I am thinking at the moment.

GakuseiDon

Yes, I agree that is important.

OK.

James, Thomas, Peter. From here:
Yes, I did. I'm not sure how that helps you. Doherty's 2nd Century apologists apparently wrote MJ tracts around 170 CE, and these seem to have been immediately taken up by HJers (e.g. Irenaeus writes positively about Tatian about 10 years after Tatian wrote "Address to the Greeks") who never notice that those authors were MJers. Nor do any HJers ever seem to worry that there are a group of Christians who didn't believe that there was a HJ. Doherty doesn't look at the pagan philosopher Celsus, who attacks Christianity by saying that Jesus was the illegitimate son of a Roman soldier. Doherty doesn't look at Papias. He doesn't look at the Ebionites. He doesn't look at Tertullian.

Amaleq13

I used "21st century" because you were the one doing the anachronistic projection. I would have used "middle ages" if you had been quoting somebody from that vague timeframe.

I don't think so because Paul's gospel makes the reason irrelevant. The important thing about Christ's sacrifice was apparently that he was done without knowing his true identity. The "crime" apparently did not matter. I think it is problematic to assume Paul's audience would have had a different focus from Paul, himself. I would expect the questions you suggest to have occurred to any non-believer hearing Paul's story but that isn't to whom Paul wrote.

I agree.

Paul mentions no disciples but you are correct that his revealed eucharist seems to imply there were others with Christ the night he was "delivered up". Unfortunately, Paul doesn't directly refer to these presumed witnesses. Given Paul's mystical thoughts, can we safely dismiss the possibility that he is portraying Christ as speaking directly (through Paul's vision) to his later followers rather than someone with him at the time?

I do not consider this singular phrase in Paul's letters to be indicative of a literal sibling relationship. I think it is most likely a marginal gloss subsequently interpolated into the text though I cannot discount Doherty's explanation that it was a title.

Recent appearances of the Risen Christ do not require a recently sacrificed Christ only a recent "awareness" of the existence of this individual in the Hebrew Bible.

I would agree if we had any reliable notion what exactly those "false apostles" were teaching.

I agree but I consider that another example.

Amaleq13

The unsubstantiated opinions of later Church Fathers does not constitute reliable evidence.

Not if they weren't asserting something contrary to the "orthodox" view. Holding only Paul's beliefs (as Doherty describes them) does not necessarily require denying the Gospel Jesus or any other "historical" conception. They would have believed what was considered the most important aspect of the faith. The historicity of the Gospel stories did not become crucial until later.

Marcion denies something Paul explicitly states. Well, he denies an interpretation of something Paul explicitly states anyway. There is no reason to assume that others would have found it necessary to make a similar denial. It seems reasonable enough to me to suppose that many who embraced Paul's theology would have considered both Marcion's assertions and the reactions to them to be entirely missing the point.

If believing that the incarnated Christ had a specific life story resulted in accepting the more important post-crucifixion theology, these folks might have thought, more power to them!

If TJG were former followers of the living Jesus, that would clearly provide automatic authority. It would be reasonable to expect them to use that fact in any attempt to denegrate Paul's authority. But there is no evidence in Paul's letters that such an attempt was ever made.

I keep saying it because the text keeps supporting it.

Assuming the kerygma of I Cor 15 is genuine to Paul, their "primacy" was based on the fact that they were the first to witness the Risen Christ. That Paul feels free to immediately denegrate their reputation (presumably based on this primacy) is clearly more consistent with that view than with considering their primacy to be based on being former followers of a living Jesus.

It is clear from Paul's defense of his authority that someone was challenging it. It is only logical that TJG would use such a clearly differentiating source of authority to argue against Paul but we have absolutely no evidence in Paul's many defenses that any such argument was ever used.

Nope. Looks to me like someone taking the nativity stories as fictional additions to the original story (ie Mark) and assuming the opposite to have been the case.

Amaleq13

Papias talked to, at best disciples of the apostles but he may have been talking to disciples of the disciples of the apostles. Regardless, by his time, the first apostles had already been morphed by the Gospel stories into followers of a living Jesus.

Those who accepted the beliefs of Paul would not have been considered heretics unless they added to those beliefs an assertion that the Gospel stories were entirely untrue. I don't see how that is a requirement of Paul's beliefs when confronted with the Gospel stories. Modern Christians have no problem reconciling Paul's powerless Christ-incarnate with the powerful Jesus portrayed in the Gospels so I'm not sure why we should assume earlier Christians weren't just as adept at rationalization.

PS I apologize in advance for my untimely responses but I'm in the process of moving to Alaska and that tends to annoyingly limit my online time because my wife refuses to do everything.

GakuseiDon

Which part is unreliable? That there were Ebionites in the 2nd C who denied the virgin birth?

That they were concerned with Jewish laws and called Paul an "apostate to the law", and in Paul's letters we see him criticised for not sticking to Jewish laws?

That they adored Jerusalem as the most important city, and that they were found in areas that Justin Africanus says that traditionally were known to be the areas where the Jerusalem followers fled after 70 CE?

None of these are extraordinary claims in themselves. Do you have any reason to reject them?

When? Please give me a date.

OK. That's basically Freke and Gandy's view as well.

How does Paul denigrate their authority? AFAICS, it is only in regards to Gentiles following Jewish laws.

Yes, so why bring it up? The only "challenge" to Paul was criticism on allowing Gentiles to not follow Jewish laws. Paul goes to TJG, they approve Paul preaching to the Gentiles, and say that Paul's gospel message is correct, and that is that.

What is the challenge to Paul's authority in Paul's letters?

GakuseiDon

OK.

OK.

No problem!

Amaleq13

The part that suggests the Ebionites were a continuation of the Nazarenes. There is no apparent connection between their supposed beliefs.

How concerned could they have been about Jewish Law when their gospel depicts Jesus declaring an end to Temple sacrifices? Where is the Jerusalem group ever described as holding such a belief?

I don't have a specific date in mind but the argument against Marcion is probably the earliest.

It is more that he is denigrating their claim to greater authority when he dismisses their "high reputation".

It is clear from Paul's defense of his authority that someone was challenging it. It is only logical that TJG would use such a clearly differentiating source of authority to argue against Paul but we have absolutely no evidence in Paul's many defenses that any such argument was ever used.

Obviously because that is precisely the sort of evidence your position requires. If TJG's authority was at all based on their prior relationship with the living Jesus we would certainly expect them to make that argument and we would certainly expect Paul to be compelled to address it. Yet Paul feels free to declare himself to be just as much an apostle and never offers any defense against what would have been a significant deficit in any comparison of authority or legitimacy.

Yet Paul feels compelled to assert in his letters that he is just as much an apostle and he does so without any hint that having known the living Jesus to be relevant. Your position requires that we have a TJG consisting of former followers but that their reputation has nothing to do with the fact that they were former followers. How does that make any sense?

A challenge is implied every time Paul asserts his claim to authority to be equal to the other apostles. These assertions say as much about what Paul and his audience considered to be the basis for authority as it does about criticisms or questions leveled against him. None of it is at all suggestive of the notion that certain apostles had authority because they had been followers of the living Jesus.