Roger Pearse

Indeed so. But chronology doesn't seem to be stopping you with Valentinus.

I wonder if anyone told Polycarp that.

But you're welcome to your opinion, if that is what it is. It is always possible to manufacture "equivalences" of this kind, by selection and omission, if sufficiently determined. If you want to engage in such fabrications, however, I suggest you seek someone less familiar with the ancient evidence, and with more patience for them.

All the best,

Roger Pearse

Wooster

Which dictionary are you using?

LogicandReason

Try not to be a bore Roger. Arguing semantics is juvenile. Your syllogism here is:

1. We can only ascribe meaning to the word 'Heretic' by referring to a dictionary in this discussion, a dictionary which defines the word in Christian terms....

2. The dictionary states that a 'heretic' is one who disavows a revealed truth or who dissents from an accepted belief or doctrine,

3. Therefore anyone who disagrees with orthodox church fathers or teachings are in fact heretics and not Christians.

Your straw man depends on too many favorable conditions such as:

a. Orthodox Christianity is true,
b. Those who disagreed with what became the orthodox position and doctrine were not Christians,
c. Hegemony was not forced upon all Christians in the fourth century CE,
d. Irenaeus was right and his adversaries were 'heretics,' and
e. The majority of the population of the world would fit the dictionary definition of 'heretic.'

Your side severely suffers today without the 'stake' to enforce thinking.

andrewcriddle

It may possibly be worth noting that Irenaeus did not in general support the breaking of fellowship betweens Christians who were in disagreement. Eusebius in book 5 chapter 24 of the Ecclesiastical History refers to the attempts by Irenaeus to prevent breach of communion over the correct date of Easter.

Whether right or wrong, his refusal to regard the various heretics as fellow-Christians was not an automatic response to disagreement. His position is more discriminating than that.

Andrew Criddle

angelo

Not one of the above has proved that your 'savior wasn't a myth'.
Storytelling was no different then as it is now. The movie Gone With the Wind is not regarded as factual just because it was set in a war which was a fact.
So it is with the tale of a man-god which has it's birth thousands of years before Jesus was even supposedly born. There are too many similarities with the myths of Osiris-Mithras, ect. stories to be ignored.

LogicandReason

Yes...and the dualism it takes on the part of Christians to state that all other religions are in fact myths while theirs which includes the mythical elements of virgin births, talking animals, feeding masses of people on a couple of Happy Meals, and people reanimated after death is just amazing.

Roger would have us accept these myths because there is a record of people who say these myths are so....not proofs. God's existence is a debate, people do not copulate with gods, people do not return after physical death. Eschatology is the invention of ignorant and superstitious people who wish to live forever. None of the mythical elements mentioned above has ever been documented or has been alleged to have happened in our times of modernity because they are too easily proved a fake. Sure, a mass of people have believed in Jesus and his reported miracles; the same can be said about the 17th century Sabbatai Zevi...at least the latter's historicity is not disputed.

Roger's arguments demonstrate the faulty syllogisms that construct the faith rational behind all religions. He will debate semantics while never offering why we are to believe non-natural mythical stories. Roger, if you wish to believe this, more power to you, but pseudo-history and exegesis will never make a story about a person walking on water true...that is pure myth.

The Gospels are redactions, there are no originals and if there were it would not prove that the two opposing genealogies of Jesus, offered in Matthew and Luke, were anything but contradictions and historical fiction.

Roger Pearse

Surely it is rather unfair to place words in my mouth, or attribute views to me which I have not discussed or advanced? Come, let's talk about what we say, not what we 'must' mean.

My concerns are historical rather than theological. The arguments being used are of a kind commonly used to falsify history.

The comment about "originals" applies equally to all ancient texts, for good or ill, as has been said many times before. The demand for these, selectively, as some kind of guarantee without which we can't use a text seems to presuppose a world other than the one in which we live. But we have discussed this in this forum ad nauseam, so have a search for threads on it.

I am mildly depressed to see the Mithras rubbish reappear. Again, surely we have flogged this Mithras=Jesus myth to death in other threads.

All the best,

Roger Pearse

aa5874

And, your assertion is commonly used to divert from the fact that the information about Jesus in the NT is not history but fundamentally mythology.

Certainly, you must admit that Matthew 1.18 and Acts 1.9 is not history, perhaps elements of mythology to aid in christian theology.

Wooster

Sure, let's talk about what you said here:

I find it difficult to have a serious discussion with any person holding such views. What would the point of such a discussion be?

Opinion

Then why does it mention it on the text. There's even another historian later on that quotes is later on but its revealed to be less christian like and more along the lines on what Josephus said.