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Old 01-05-2013, 11:58 AM   #171
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Originally Posted by maryhelena View Post
And Earl [Doherty] supports the idea that the gospel JC crucifixion story came from scripture.
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Where did the crucified Jesus come from, if not from Q which had no crucifixion story? Simple. He came from scripture. Just where the epistles tell us it came from. Everything about the epistles' Jesus came from scripture, which is the only source they ever refer to in making any statements about him, whether personal characteristics, words he 'spoke', the 'events' of his death and rising, even his relationship to David or his connection with Abraham.

here
But notice the switch here. One second Doherty is answering the question of where did the crucified Jesus come from - he says scripture. And the next second Doherty has jumped to the Pauline epistles. Why? If the crucified JC can be interpreted from scripture - then the gospel writers were able to do just that without needing the Pauline epistles!

Paul and the Pauline epistles are not needed for the gospel crucified JC story. The crucified Jesus gospel story preceded Paul.
I don't think Earl put as much emphasis on the Pauline epistles as being primary as you say he does, maryhelena.

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Originally Posted by EarlDoherty View Post
Maryhelena, you have completely garbled what I have said about my position. My "imaginary Q founder" has nothing to do with Paul and the Pillars or the church which he persecuted, either the pre-Pauline phase or the Pauline one. Nor did I say that the Gospel death and rising of Jesus owed nothing to Paul. I said that it could be possible to see the Gospel Jesus' dying and rising dimension as not having to be based on the Pauline celestial sacrifice, but as an allegory of the believer's own fate, but that I still believe that it is more likely the Pauline faith had an influence, and my books put forward that theory.
Earl Doherty
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The entire teaching, miracle-working and prophetic content of the Gospels is derived not from Paul, whose celestial Christ had nothing to do with such things, but from an imagined founder of the Q movement (that he was imagined and inserted into the evolving Q tradition at a later date I have fully argued). Even the death and rising dimension of the Gospel Jesus, which Mark added to the Q Jesus, cannot be firmly shown to be based on the Pauline Christ, though I suspect that the latter type of movement had some influence.

here
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Originally Posted by maryhelena View Post
That statement leads to the very obvious conclusion that the gospel crucified JC story did not, in anyway whatsoever, need the Pauline epistles.

... A conclusion supported by Paul's own story that he persecuted the 'church of god' and that his JC was 'born of a woman' and of the 'seed of David'. That, Earl, is the conclusion your imaginary founder figure of Q leads to. With such an imaginary Q founder figure, you have no need to run rings around these two Pauline quotations. Paul is supporting your imaginary Q founder figure. An imaginary figure, a mythological figure, an ahistorical figure - a figure that can be 'born' any which way and from any lineage it's creators so devise.
the key, especially if you take into account further editing and collating after the Pauline and Gosepl stories were put together, is
Quote:
... it could be possible to see the Gospel Jesus' dying and rising dimension as not having to be based on the Pauline celestial sacrifice, but as an allegory of the believer's own fate, but that .... it is more likely the Pauline faith had an influence [on the final post-Pauline gospel accounts]
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Old 01-05-2013, 12:07 PM   #172
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Originally Posted by maryhelena View Post
And Earl [Doherty] supports the idea that the gospel JC crucifixion story came from scripture.
Quote:
Where did the crucified Jesus come from, if not from Q which had no crucifixion story? Simple. He came from scripture. Just where the epistles tell us it came from. Everything about the epistles' Jesus came from scripture, which is the only source they ever refer to in making any statements about him, whether personal characteristics, words he 'spoke', the 'events' of his death and rising, even his relationship to David or his connection with Abraham.

here
But notice the switch here. One second Doherty is answering the question of where did the crucified Jesus come from - he says scripture. And the next second Doherty has jumped to the Pauline epistles. Why? If the crucified JC can be interpreted from scripture - then the gospel writers were able to do just that without needing the Pauline epistles!

Paul and the Pauline epistles are not needed for the gospel crucified JC story. The crucified Jesus gospel story preceded Paul.
I don't think Earl put as much emphasis on the Pauline epistles as being primary as you say he does, maryhelena.
Methinks Earl might beg to differ....the mythicist position that he advocates is built upon an interpretation of the Pauline epistles....

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Originally Posted by EarlDoherty View Post
Maryhelena, you have completely garbled what I have said about my position. My "imaginary Q founder" has nothing to do with Paul and the Pillars or the church which he persecuted, either the pre-Pauline phase or the Pauline one. Nor did I say that the Gospel death and rising of Jesus owed nothing to Paul. I said that it could be possible to see the Gospel Jesus' dying and rising dimension as not having to be based on the Pauline celestial sacrifice, but as an allegory of the believer's own fate, but that I still believe that it is more likely the Pauline faith had an influence, and my books put forward that theory.
Earl Doherty
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The entire teaching, miracle-working and prophetic content of the Gospels is derived not from Paul, whose celestial Christ had nothing to do with such things, but from an imagined founder of the Q movement (that he was imagined and inserted into the evolving Q tradition at a later date I have fully argued). Even the death and rising dimension of the Gospel Jesus, which Mark added to the Q Jesus, cannot be firmly shown to be based on the Pauline Christ, though I suspect that the latter type of movement had some influence.

here
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Originally Posted by maryhelena View Post
That statement leads to the very obvious conclusion that the gospel crucified JC story did not, in anyway whatsoever, need the Pauline epistles.

... A conclusion supported by Paul's own story that he persecuted the 'church of god' and that his JC was 'born of a woman' and of the 'seed of David'. That, Earl, is the conclusion your imaginary founder figure of Q leads to. With such an imaginary Q founder figure, you have no need to run rings around these two Pauline quotations. Paul is supporting your imaginary Q founder figure. An imaginary figure, a mythological figure, an ahistorical figure - a figure that can be 'born' any which way and from any lineage it's creators so devise.
the key, especially if you take into account further editing and collating after the Pauline and Gosepl stories were put together, is
Quote:
... it could be possible to see the Gospel Jesus' dying and rising dimension as not having to be based on the Pauline celestial sacrifice, but as an allegory of the believer's own fate, but that .... it is more likely the Pauline faith had an influence [on the final post-Pauline gospel accounts]
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Old 01-05-2013, 12:18 PM   #173
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Originally Posted by gurugeorge
... in Paul, "Peter" and "Cephas" could easily be two different people (that there was still a tradition within the Christian cult that held them as two different people at least up till 160 CE is shown by the Epistula Apostolorum), and GMark be an early case of mistaken identity, with GJohn being a later example of the same.
You do not even realize that you have introduced an Apologetic source that DESTROYS your Celestial Never on Earth Jesus and DESTROYS your claim about the Apostles Peter/Cephas and James Not being Disciples of the supposed Jesus.

The Epistula Apostolorum Identifies the Apostles as DISCIPLES of Jesus and List the Names of John, James, Peter and Cephas as Apostles/DISCIPLES of Jesus.
Yes and so do the gospels make that mix of Disciple and Apostle, so what? The point of mentioning the text was simply to show that there was at least one other tradition in Christianity where Peter and Cephas are thought of as two different people, so it's possible for the Paul tradition to have thought of them as two different people. This should be no great problem even for your reading - remember, it would be the same even if Paul was relatively late, as late as the EA itself. We're talking about the relative content of the Paul writings and the gospel writings.

And, to remind you, nowhere in the Paul writings is the word "disciple" used, nor is there any sense (apart from the thin, dubious thread of "Brother of the Lord") that any of the people Paul is talking about are claimed, by Paul, to have personally known Jesus. That's just an inference that everyone makes, presumably because, like you, they think that since both these writings happen to be in the same bundle of texts called the "NT Canon", the assumption is that they must be consistent.

But what if they're not, what if the "NT Canon" is a bunch of texts from different strands of Christianity, with different ideas of "Christ", that are jammed together and glued together by interpolation and a bit of forgery? Given major missing links like no "discipleship" in Paul, isn't that possible?

Quote:
The Epistula Apostolorum utterly DESTROYS the Celestial Never on Earth Jesus and DESTROYS any claim that the supposed Apostles Peter/Cephas and James were NOT the Apostles/Disciples of Jesus in the Pauline letters.
Calm yourself, it does nothing of the sort.
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Old 01-05-2013, 12:56 PM   #174
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You can wiki "Paul the Apostle" and under authorship, "anyone" can read the details that follow my statements directly.
I see. "Saint Paul" represents your hard evidence.

Do you not perceive that with respect to the field of ancient history the existence of "Saint Paul" is hypothetical. I would have to agree that nearly every single theological student treats this hypothesis as true.


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Can you name credible scholars that discount Paul's first century writing that would surpass the fingers on your hand out of thousands with a real education?

I could start with the Dutch radicals and the followers of Herman Detering who treat the Pauline writing as 2nd century. However I would point out to you that all these thousands of so-called scholars are graduates from theological colleges and other similar institutions and are not, I repeat NOT, ancient historians.

Eduard Meyer was, at least in Germany, the first non-theologian to write a
scholarly history of the origins of Christianity, and this happened only in 1921.

Are non theologians like myself ( I see myself as an amateur historian) entitled and/or qualified to research the history of Christian origins, and are such people entitled to approach the task with different (and perhaps antithetical) hypotheses than the continuous stream of theology graduates?

The evidence is the common ground between theology and ancient history and each discipline makes its own types of hypotheses about this evidence. Where you are essentially content to see the Pauline letters as evidence for the 1st century historical existence of Dear "Saint Paul" I am not so content.

Your hypothesis may be correct.
But it also may not be correct.
Hence these discussions.

While you can challenge the dating of he original Pauline epistles, you cannot do so with any credibility.

the dates I use are from unbiased scholars.


Apologist do not set historical values in scholarships followed today. If you want to dwell on mistakes made in the past you can. Most have moved on.
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Old 01-05-2013, 02:24 PM   #175
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Originally Posted by aa5874 View Post
You do not even realize that you have introduced an Apologetic source that DESTROYS your Celestial Never on Earth Jesus and DESTROYS your claim about the Apostles Peter/Cephas and James Not being Disciples of the supposed Jesus.

The Epistula Apostolorum Identifies the Apostles as DISCIPLES of Jesus and List the Names of John, James, Peter and Cephas as Apostles/DISCIPLES of Jesus.
Quote:
Originally Posted by gurugeorge View Post
Yes and so do the gospels make that mix of Disciple and Apostle, so what? The point of mentioning the text was simply to show that there was at least one other tradition in Christianity where Peter and Cephas are thought of as two different people, so it's possible for the Paul tradition to have thought of them as two different people.
The Epistula Apostolorum does NOT say the Apostle/disciple Peter was NOT called Cephas or the Apostle/disciple Cephas was NOT called Peter.

I have merely EXPOSED the fact in stories about Jesus that characters called Peter, James and John were Apostles/Disciples of Jesus and that it is claimed in the Epistula Apostolorum that those very Apostles/Disciples MET Paul.


Quote:
Originally Posted by gurugeorge
And, to remind you, nowhere in the Paul writings is the word "disciple" used, nor is there any sense (apart from the thin, dubious thread of "Brother of the Lord") that any of the people Paul is talking about are claimed, by Paul, to have personally known Jesus. That's just an inference that everyone makes, presumably because, like you, they think that since both these writings happen to be in the same bundle of texts called the "NT Canon", the assumption is that they must be consistent.
So it is quite reasonable for you to infer that the Apostles Peter and James in the Pauline writings are different to the Apostles in the Gospel of the very same Canon which is contrary to every known apologetic writings about Paul and Peter but others are wrong to infer that the Apostles in the Pauline letters are the same Apostles in the Canon.

In gJohn, the Apostle Peter a disciple of Jesus is called Cephas so it is completely reasonable to infer that the Apostle Peter is the same character throughout the NT Canon.
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Originally Posted by gurugeorge View Post
But what if they're not, what if the "NT Canon" is a bunch of texts from different strands of Christianity, with different ideas of "Christ", that are jammed together and glued together by interpolation and a bit of forgery? Given major missing links like no "discipleship" in Paul, isn't that possible?
So, you don't know what you are talking about. What if this and what if that is NOT evidence of anything. I am dealing with the TEXTS-- not imagination and speculation.

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Originally Posted by aa5874
The Epistula Apostolorum utterly DESTROYS the Celestial Never on Earth Jesus and DESTROYS any claim that the supposed Apostles Peter/Cephas and James were NOT the Apostles/Disciples of Jesus in the Pauline letters.
Quote:
Originally Posted by gurugeorge
Calm yourself, it does nothing of the sort.
Well, I know the Epistula Apostolorum DESTROYS a Celestial Never on Earth Jesus and cannot ever be used as evidence that the Apostles Peter, James, and John were NOT also called disciples.

I will not stay calm while you promote unsubstantiated claims about the Pauline writings.

It is time FOR the Pauline writings to be EXPOSED.

The Pauline writings are totally uncorroborated as 1st century letters in the NT even up to the mid 2nd century and are historically bogus.
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Old 01-05-2013, 02:43 PM   #176
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Originally Posted by gurugeorge
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Originally Posted by tanya
What is missing from your otherwise excellent text, in my homely critique, is a rational elaboration of how Paul's epistles came to be the "earliest Christian writings".

Evidence please.....
Hey Tanya, so far as I'm concerned, it's partly trust that biblical scholars are not complete buffoons and, apart from their monomania about a historical Jesus, know what they're about when they do philological investigations; partly considerations about simple-to-complex (as mentioned above to aa); partly my own idea that given the positive tone (the sense of "good news of victory won", evangelion) in the Paul writings, then if you were to find a moment in time when Jews felt somewhat positive about the future, about an imminent change, it would have been that short period after Caligula died circa 40 CE.
Thank you George, for your patience, here.
Sorry, I don't mean to come across as always disagreeing with you.

What you have written, is not wrong, or inconsequential, or off topic, but, in my view, you have offered only your opinion, not evidence.

You have provided a succinct rationale for accepting as valid the hypothesis of Pauline authorship preceding creation of the gospels.

I disagree with your assessment, and remain unpersuaded, and the point of this rejoinder is to urge you to reconsider your position, offering not "tone", or "expert" opinion, or Jewish euphoria following the death of Caligula, as a rationale for claiming Pauline priority.

Those may, or may not, be persuasive to someone as skeptical as I am, but, what I need is not "opinion", but data.

How do I know, with conviction, that Herodotus preceded (by several centuries) Diodorus Sicculus, who, in turn, lived and wrote historical texts a century, or more, before Plutarch?

Is my conviction about the dates of authorship of these three Greek authors, as fragile, and as tenuous, and as insubstantial, in your view, as my claim that your assertion of Pauline primacy rests upon the same hot air transporting the magic carpet of Baghdad?

Quote:
Originally Posted by stephan huller
I normally don't reach out to the impossibly misguided but I am firmly convinced that the Epistula Apostolorum is for the most part preserved from the second century. Look at the order of the gospel listed in the contents. It matches no known gospel text.
Which sequence of gospels/epistles copies another? Athanasius? Eusebius?

Metzger, Bruce M. The Canon of the New Testament: Its Origin, Development, and Significance.

I am firmly convinced that the supposedly unique sequence of texts presented in EA, offers no clue whatsoever, regarding the date of EA authorship. Misguided, indeed.

Quote:
Originally Posted by gurugeorge
And, to remind you, nowhere in the Paul writings is the word "disciple" used, nor is there any sense (apart from the thin, dubious thread of "Brother of the Lord") that any of the people Paul is talking about are claimed, by Paul, to have personally known Jesus. That's just an inference that everyone makes, presumably because, like you, they think that since both these writings happen to be in the same bundle of texts called the "NT Canon", the assumption is that they must be consistent.

But what if they're not, what if the "NT Canon" is a bunch of texts from different strands of Christianity, with different ideas of "Christ", that are jammed together and glued together by interpolation and a bit of forgery? Given major missing links like no "discipleship" in Paul, isn't that possible?
Thanks, George. Yes, in my opinion, that is possible. What, in my opinion, is not possible, is to claim dates of composition of various texts in this amalgam, based on the presence or absence of this word μαθητής Strong's 3101. I don't argue that this word is not found in Paul's writings, though it is found in Acts 20:1, and Acts is often cited in claiming historicist conviction for Paul's existence. I find Paul a purely mythical person, but if he really did walk the planet earth, I doubt that it was before the conclusion of the third Jewish Roman war, circa 135 CE. The point is that absence or presence of a single Koine Greek word in various texts, while perhaps having profound theological significance, is not persuasive in assigning a date of authorship. I do applaud you, for pointing this out, or for signaling the accomplishment of whoever first noted this omission from Paul's texts.

I think absence of the word μαθητής from Paul's epistles is noteworthy, but I don't accept it as evidence that Paul's texts preceded Mark's gospel, anymore than I accept (the false notion) that Plutarch's omission of the word heliocentrism indicates that he wrote before Aristarchus of Somos.

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Old 01-05-2013, 04:39 PM   #177
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If the Saul/Paul story in the epistles and Acts is merely a cut and paste job , a composite of stories set up by the emerging church that believed in a first-century Jesus, then the story would have had no relevance to anything to do with a mythic Christ interpretation of those texts at all.

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Originally Posted by EarlDoherty View Post
... If the Pauline literature derived its dying and rising motifs from the JC story (IOW, as mh thinks, Paul comes after the Gospels and is basically based upon them) why do he and all the other epistle writers not show a knowledge of all the other elements of the JC story, the teaching, miracle-working and prophetic activities of the JC?..
Your question is really irrelevant because the author of Acts presented a story of Paul which clearly places Saul/Paul AFTER the Birth, Miracles, Crucifixion, Resurrection and Ascension of Jesus, After the preaching of the Jesus story by the Disciples and AFTER the Persecution of the Jesus cult---After the death of the supposed Stephen.

And further, in Acts, it is claimed Saul/Paul consulted with the disciples in Damacus before he preached the Jesus story. See Acts 9.19-20.

In Acts, Saul/Paul does NOT preach a Celestial Never on Earth Jesus.

These are the words of Paul in Acts.

Acts 13
Quote:
..... he raised up unto them David to be their king; to whom also he gave testimony , and said , I have found David the son of Jesse, a man after mine own heart, which shall fulfilall my will.

23 Of this man's seed hath God according to his promise raised unto Israel a Saviour, Jesus

24. When John had first preached before his coming the baptism of repentance to all the people of Israel. 25And as John fulfilled his course, he said , Whom think ye that I am ? I am not he. But, behold , there cometh one after me, whose shoes of his feet I am not worthy to loose .

26Men and brethren, children of the stock of Abraham, and whosoever among you feareth God, to you is the word of this salvation sent .

27For they that dwell at Jerusalem, and their rulers, because they knew him not , nor yet the voices of the prophets which are read every sabbath day, they have fulfilled them in condemning him.

28And though they found no cause of death in him, yet desired they Pilate that he should be slain . 29And when they had fulfilled all that was written of him, they took him down from the tree, and laid him in a sepulchre.

30But God raised him from the dead

31 And he was seen many days of them which came up with him from Galilee to Jerusalem, who are his witnesses unto the people.
In the Canon itself it is actually claimed Paul preached that Jesus was SLAIN by people in Jerusalem and was placed on a tree and then buried after which he resurrected and was seen by his followers.

It is clear that there is NO story anywhere about Paul that he preached a Celestial Never on Earth Jesus.

The Celestial Never on Earth Jesus of Paul is a modern invention--completely unheard of in all antiquity by any source.
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Old 01-05-2013, 05:56 PM   #178
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The Epistula Apostolorum does NOT say the Apostle/disciple Peter was NOT called Cephas or the Apostle/disciple Cephas was NOT called Peter.
There are two different names that aren't visibly applied to one person, it's as simple as that. There are quite a few possibilities as to why that should be, one of them is that it was a mistake. Another possibility is that it's a scribal error. And another possibility is that there was a tradition which thought of Peter and Cephas as two different people.

Quote:
So it is quite reasonable for you to infer that the Apostles Peter and James in the Pauline writings are different to the Apostles in the Gospel of the very same Canon which is contrary to every known apologetic writings about Paul and Peter but others are wrong to infer that the Apostles in the Pauline letters are the same Apostles in the Canon.
No, it's that both positions are inferences from some contradictory evidence. Which way you choose to go and is not mandated by anything in the texts.

Quote:
In gJohn, the Apostle Peter a disciple of Jesus is called Cephas so it is completely reasonable to infer that the Apostle Peter is the same character throughout the NT Canon.
Yep, it's reasonable, if you assume that the NT Canon isn't a patchwork quilt.

Quote:
So, you don't know what you are talking about. What if this and what if that is NOT evidence of anything. I am dealing with the TEXTS-- not imagination and speculation.
But you don't know the first thing about the texts, do you? You don't know who wrote them, or when. You are making up a story to fit the evidence (in ENGLISH TRANSLATION ONLY, no less), based on the notion that the NT Canon is consistent and not internally contradictory.

It's only with that background assumption that the "evidence" you put forward looks like evidence for your position. Well, that's possible, but there's nothing that compels one to think that way.

I prefer to assume as little as possible, and read the texts as they are as much as I can (including checking interlinear translations as much as I can, given that I don't know the primary languages by heart). And I certainly am not prepared to take Church tradition's word for it that the NT Canon is a coherent set of texts all about the same things.

And the consensus, amongst "liberal" biblical scholars at least, even amongst historicists, is that the Canon is a bit of a hodge-podge in some respects.

Quote:
The Pauline writings are totally uncorroborated as 1st century letters in the NT even up to the mid 2nd century and are historically bogus.
I understand that you believe that, and you argue well for it, but, just like several other people on the board, I'm not convinced.

The Pauline writings are TOTALLY corroborated as 1st century letters in the NT Canon because that's where they're placed in the Canon, they're represented as being from that time in the Canon. It's you who is bringing in arguments from silence in some Apologists and Church Fathers to deny that.

As I said, I'm not convinced the the silence about Paul in Justin and other writers (who are clearly proto-orthodox, concerned above all to uphold a claim to lineage going back to discipleship) is due to their not having heard of him, and not rather simply because they didn't like Paul's version of Christianity (which internally claims a lineage going back only to visionary experience, not just for Paul, but also for the Apostles).

I'm not convinced that you can lay as much weight as you do on arguments that depend on a prior acceptance that the NT Canon is internally consisent in terms of its purported characters and meanings.
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Old 01-05-2013, 05:58 PM   #179
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Great! That allows for the gospel JC story to be a story that does not need any Pauline input. That position shoots down the argument, of some mythicists, that a Pauline cosmic crucified JC has been historicized as the gospel crucified JC.
LOL. Hardly. It merely states what Earl's opinion is.
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Old 01-05-2013, 06:15 PM   #180
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Thanks, George. Yes, in my opinion, that is possible. What, in my opinion, is not possible, is to claim dates of composition of various texts in this amalgam, based on the presence or absence of this word μαθητής Strong's 3101. I don't argue that this word is not found in Paul's writings, though it is found in Acts 20:1, and Acts is often cited in claiming historicist conviction for Paul's existence. I find Paul a purely mythical person, but if he really did walk the planet earth, I doubt that it was before the conclusion of the third Jewish Roman war, circa 135 CE. The point is that absence or presence of a single Koine Greek word in various texts, while perhaps having profound theological significance, is not persuasive in assigning a date of authorship. I do applaud you, for pointing this out, or for signaling the accomplishment of whoever first noted this omission from Paul's texts.
But the presence or absence of the word does suggest an earlier date, since it hardly seems likely that the Paul writings would have been invented late without that word, since it's so integral a part of the gospel Jesus story:-

1) We have scholarship generally assigning a post 70 CE date for GMark.

2) Discipleship is integral to the internal logic of the GMark story of Jesus, and the gospels that follow it (130-150 CE-ish); the theme of the ignorance of the disciples is integral to GMark, and the story of pre-crucifixion ministry is an integral part of the other gospels.

3) For whatever reason, the Paul writings have no discipleship. It's true that the omission could be due to chance or error, or some quirk of the Paul writer's theology or psychology, etc., but it's also possible that it's ommitted because the Paul writer had no sense of discipleship for the Apostles. If the Paul writer actually had no sense of the Apostles as disciples of Jesus, and actually didn't think that anybody personally knew Jesus before his crucifixion, that's a very different "story" from the gospel story, where discipleship is integral.

4) It's unlikely that a no-discipleship story would be invented after the discipleship story, since another version of discipleship story would be more natural to invent for people who already had a discipleship story in mind.

5) Therefore, it's likely that the no-discipleship story was conceived prior to the discipleship story (which pretty definitely appears post-70CE).

Now I agree with you about the dubiousness of the "Paul" character as he appears in the NT, particularly in Acts. But just in terms of the sheer content of the writings (their internal meaning - I keep forgetting the technical term for that, it's not "internal meaning" it's something else isn't it, I mean the meaning-meant-to-be-accepted-by-readers) the above seems to be an ok argument for relative creation in time.
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