Rick Sumner

My reference was to a sect and "texts." Either you made a mistake or you didn't, it's not my fault if you don't read the thread.

For any historical method to be truly viable, it needs to rely on external sources, unless the internal evidence is overwhelming (I can date John Adams letters on internal evidence, for example, because he wrote the date on them).

We don't have that here, which was my point.

Regards,
Rick Sumner

Toto

To clarify, it was the habit among ancient historians to compose speeches for historical characters that epitomized what the historian thought they really meant. It seems most likely that the author of Acts composed a speech and put it in Gamaliel's mouth that was a summary of what a prominent Pharisee like Gamaliel would have thought about early Christians.

But notice that even Gamaliel's speech in Acts does not speak about Jesus (much less Jesus of Nazareth).

Vinnie

It is of course true that speeches were commonly created in antiquity....

Ted Hoffman

Of...um...Nazarios...um...Nazareth. Um...the Nazarene...the...um...well, you know...Na.z..e..um sorry.

Anyway, I am just trying to uniquely identify the guy in question. I know Nazareth did not exist until much later and am aware about the argument for later redaction etc etc.

Ted Hoffman

You are being polemical but I have to take issue with this.

First of all, its fallacious of you to purport to claim that good films have explanatory power. Provide an example and explain what explanatory power the movie has and tell us who exactly thinks the movie has explanatory power and over what. For example if George Bush Jr. thinks Passion of The Christ has great explanatory power, it would be a banal example.

If you can provide an authority in a field falsely deducing that a movie has great explanatory power over something he is expert in, then you have a case. Because your argument is that good writers or movie directors can swindle 'conviction' through an unreliable means called 'explanatory power'.
Otherwise withdraw the argument because it has no basis in fact.

You have diminished the value of 'explanatory power' to an emotion or a feeling that does not necessarily entail accounting for available facts. This is a fallacious.

It is false to use novels and movies as an analogy to a book that is written academically - not as a popular book. You can only compare 'popular' books like Freke and Gandy's The Jesus Mysteries to movies and novels. But not the books by the authors mentioned here. Maybe you failed to note this distinction.

Movies provide entertainment and explanatory power here is not about a giddy feeling or something that captures ones imagination. Its about soberly and methodically accounting for all known historical, cultural and anthropological facts and making them fit together. Movies, with the sound and special effects, are not about sober assesment. They are about getting a 'high': about adrenaline and hormones and imagination. Not about sober, critical thought regarding facts in the absence of special effects and rhetoric.

You are attempting to shuffle the two. We are watching you trying this stunt and we are not falling for it.

Judges listen to cases and don't use any methodology in arriving at a judgement - is their manner of examining evidence therefore faulty because of lack of methodology? Don't they also rely on 'sufficient, reliable testimony' like historians?
Don't historians also rely on testimony that is sufficient and reliable, as a source of unimpeachable, indisputable knowledge of historical events?

Are you claiming that 'historical methodology' is the only tool of analysis available?

What do you mean by 'historical methodology'? Is it different from historical method which involves internal and external criticism of source and content?

Without explaining your understanding of 'explanatory power' (- and it seems your understanding is faulty - since good novels provide you with explanatory power), its unclear how you arrive at the conclusion that "explanatory power without historical methodology has no value in a historical pursuit".

Because it appears that you are assuming your conclusion in the definition of explanatory power.

Ted Hoffman

Hence my earlier question.