lpetrich

RC has a *lot* of interesting stuff in "Why the Gospels are Myth".

He presented some for myth:

• Meaningful emulation of prior myths.
• Historical improbabilities that are frequent and central to the story: miracles, remarkable coincidences, people who act in unrealistic ways.
• No external corroboration of central characters, though peripheral ones may be.
• "The smell test". Does it smell fishy?
• Natural probability.
• Vivid narration.
• Emulation criteria.

RC discusses them in his book Proving History.

John Dominic Crossan: the Gospels are parables about Jesus Christ

RC then discussed Virgil's rewrite of a boxing match in Homer to reflect Roman ideals better. Virgil had written an epic poem, the Aeneid, that closely paralleled Homer's epic poems.

RC noted that a lot of Jewish and Xian religious literature from around 2 millennia ago was just plain fake. Some 40 Gospels, some 6 other Acts, some 30 Epistles, several Old Testament and Apocrypha books, and even some of the Nag Hammadi documents. He described a case of an incomplete fake in those documents.

RC mentioned some improbabilities in the Gospels. Beside the usual ones, like miracles and the Virgin Birth and zombies on the march, he mentioned JC's disciples instantly following JC, the Jewish authorities needing Judas to identify JC, and a trial and execution on a very holy day. Also, zapping a fig tree, driving the merchants out of the Jerusalem Temple (a big place), the Jews guarding the tomb in Matthew but not Mark, Luke, or John.

RC then mentioned Lord Raglan's famous mythic-hero scale, but he called it the Rank-Raglan scale, after the earlier work of Otto Rank: The Myth of the Birth of the Hero Index, especially The Myth of the Birth of the Hero: III. The Interpretation of the Myths.

As RC notes, JC scores high up there, alongside people that we don't usually consider historical, like Oedipus and Theseus and Romulus and Perseus and Hercules. So why not consider the JC of the Gospels mythical also?

RC also described what he calls "the ascension mythotype".

Richard Miller, "Mark's Empty Tomb and Other Translation Fables in Classical Antiquity", Journal of Biblical Literature 129, no. 4, 2010

The criteria:
1. The hero is the Son of God
2. Death accompanied by prodigies
3. ...and land covered in darkness
4. Corpse goes missing
5. Receives a new immortal body
6. New body occasionally radiant
7. Meets followers on road from city
8. Speech from a high place
9. Message of resurrection or "translation"
10. "Great Commission"
11. Ascends to heaven
12. Taken up into a cloud
13. Explicit eyewitnesses
14. Frightened by disappearance
15. Some flee
16. "Dubious alternative accounts"
17. Occurs outside of a central city
18. Followers initially in sorrow
19. But resurrection story leads to belief, homage, and rejoicing
20. Hero deified and cult paid

Not just Jesus Christ, but also Romulus (Livy, History of Rome, etc.) and several others.


A talking point of some Xian apologists is that dying and rising gods are mostly known from after Xianity's origins, thus making it possible that Xianity influenced them or that that mytheme was invented so as to compete with Xianity. But RC pointed out some dying and rising gods documented from before Xianity: Romulus, Osiris, Zalmoxis. NOT Mithras!

aa5874

The presumption that the Jesus cult started before dying rising and rising gods is not evidence.

This is exactly what this discussion is about--the fact that there is no known credible evidence for a Jesus cult in the 1st century and before c 70 CE.

All the arguments against the Jesus cult of Christians and the nature of Jesus are found in copies of writings from the mid 2nd century or later.

The problem with the Jesus story is that every single supposed follower of Jesus in the Canon, including the Apostle called Paul, have not ever been found outside Apologetics.

Based on the Pauline writings we would expect that the Jesus story would have had a major impact on the Roman Empire since it was unprecendeted that the Jews were already worshiping a man as a God since the time of Pilate and that Paul a Pharisee would have gone "all over the Roman Empire since c 37-41 telling people that a dead Jew, born of the seed of David was the Son of God.

Where is the outrage against the Pauline letters in the writings of Philo, Josephus, Tacitus, and Suetonius?

Josephus wrote "Wars of the Jews" and mentioned Jesus the Son of Ananus a loner and a madman yet wrote nothing about Jesus of Nazareth of whom there should have been more books about him than the Emperor of Rome.

By c 93 CE, when Josephus wrote "Antiquities of the Jews" there should have been many Gospels of Jesus, the Pauline letters and a Jesus cult of Christians.

In those Gospels, it is claimed Jesus predicted the Fall of the Jewish Temple c 70 CE but when Josephus wrote about the Fall of the Temple he mentioned Jesus the Son of Ananus and nothing of a Jesus of Nazareth and a cult.

It was Jesus the Son of Ananus that predicted the Fall of the Temple--Not Jesus of Nazareth.

mountainman

Thanks very much Ipetrich for this summary.



εὐδαιμονία | eudaimonia

andrewcriddle

In most accounts Romulus either died or ascended to heaven. Not both.

Osiris dies, is briefly resuscitated to beget Horus, then passes on to become Lord of the Dead, ruler of the underworld, the "great weary one."

Zalmoxis is really only a dying and rising God in the speculative reconstruction of Mircea Eliade and followers. Not in any explicit statement from antiquity.

Andrew Criddle

aa5874

In most accounts Jesus was either fathered by the Holy Ghost, or was God the Creator, a Transfiguring sea water walker who was with Satan on the pinnacle of the Jewish Temple before his resurrection and ascension.

outhouse

Very interesting to look at how a mortal man was deified through typical mythology of this time.


One thing RC fails to address, why was Jesus the most human out of them all? Why do we see the gospel authors paralleling the mortal Emperors divinity constantly through their works? Much of the euhemerizing going on was the same for the living Emperor.


If they were creating 100% mythology they could have created a regal character that was sponsored by the government. That is not what we see. What we have is Hellenistic Proselytes to Judaism that have created a deity out of one of their oppressed peasants from a craphole like Nazareth that was nothing but a hovel. Tekton translates to handworker, and they were known to be displaced renters forced off their lands by Herodians taking their lands to feed cities like Sepphoris and Tiberius. Recent digs in Capernaum have show it to be a poverty riddled little craphole too.


The socioeconomics of the time, were pretty bad for the real Jew's of Israel, while the Hellenist were living in luxury.

Yet according to RC were supposed to believe, these Hellenist would create a deity out of a peasant.


RC makes great sound bites, but he cant get past the logic of the whole picture.





But ignoring the current myths including the divinity of the living Emperor, as well as the OT mythology which was typical in the parallels he uses but places origin somewhere else.



Its mythology, it is what it is. It is the way people wrote back then when euhemerizing someone and competing against the living Emperors divinity.

Adding fiction was very normal, if we did not have it, I would be more worried.



These were not history books, thus they were not written as such, and we shouldn't use the same criteria out of context and claim victory.





Exactly why RC will spend his career standing in the corner with little to no peer review.

It doesn't smell fishy at all.

Nothing like a man martyred at Passover with 400,000 attendance, fighting the known corrupt government, and a resurrection myth spiritual perceived as physical that generated oral tradition.


Very natural for martyrs to be remembered.

The only reason Jesus was different from other martyrs, and the oral tradition grew. Was a split in Judaism between Hellenistic Proselytes, and born and raised Israelite Jews, had been brewing for centuries. Hellenization benefited the rich, but did nothing for the poor.

Were not really talking about someone that popular anyway. All it would take to make this 100% plausible, is a few hundred Hellenistic Proselytes who had been worshipping in Synagogues for centuries that would never ever fully convert that found appeal in this new movement. It is exactly what we see.



If you were show casing your deity, you would have vivid narration




Bingo!

Emulating the living Emperor! also called the "son of god" a very mortal phrase.

outhouse

Something had happened after Passover, enough to scare the authorities who hire Paul to hunt the sect down.

Why a threat? Zealot uprising? or did they perceived this as a financial threat as the movement had mocked the temple from the get go, and tried to take Yahweh out of the temple and place him back into the hands of oppressed poor Jews who didn't have the tithes to worship. This might have pleased the Hellenist, as once they were out of the temple, they were free to worship Judaism how ever they wanted too.

Horatio Parker

Their model was a Socrates -> Diogenes -> John the Baptist type, instead of an emperor.

I've heard arguments that Q is similar to the sayings of the Cynics. I've also heard arguments that some the of the directions in gMark are intended to distinguish Jesus people from Cynics. Either way, it's a very different model from what you're suggesting.

Another thing - you're always talking about how the deification of mortal emperors was commonly accepted in the west, but wasn't this idea imported by Alexander to the west from the Persians?

outhouse

Not everyone places Jesus as a Cynic.

Different gospels also have different but purposeful parallels. We see parallels to Moses, Herod, besides the Emperor.


It matches more Suetonius's lives of Caesar, then anything you mentioned. [and that's not really up for debate]







I've heard arguments that Q is similar to the sayings of the Jesus.




My model as you call it, is not reflected in the bible as much as real history and cultural anthropology.




I have ever once stated who accepted this in the west. Nor do I know where it was imported from, but do know that when Augustus viewed a event in the sky, shooting star or comet. he then proclaimed that his father had become resurrected and thus labeled himself "the son of god" all about the time of Jesus birth give or take a few years. Another parallel is both use forms of Adoptionism.

It was this parallel the authors were using in the fiction of Jesus birth and the "Star Sign" as well as the "son of god"

Horatio Parker

Sorry, I meant could've been a Cynic type.

The Cynics were not real?