rlogan

Well that's funny because I am watching you do just that with your pretense of "tradition" being some holy (!) concept, above examination.

I noticed how you haven't actually defended this holy concept on any objective basis, but most especially your evasion of the evidence I have now brought forth against how badly biased this approach is, with ignoring the police state suppression of truth - the persecution, torture, and murder of any in opposition to this self-serving group of religious gangsters. The forgeries, the burning of books, and yes even the ghastly sexual improprieties they have gotten away with.

This is not just objectively wrong, but obscene to chirp along with this term "tradition" as if it was a happy, wonderful thing instead of the monstrous crime it is in fact. Do I see you speaking out against any of this? No, I see it being defended. As if it were a thing we should honor. Never explicitly of course because how can we hold up torture, murder, suppression, destruction of priceless history and etc. as a good thing?

Obviously we can't, so we just use smugly this term "tradition" as a fig-leaf pasted over this ghastly, wretched history to make it sound like something good.

Does this sound harsh? Well isn't killing people, torturing them, suppressing them, destroying their documents vastly greater harshness? Shouldn't we be calling it for what it is instead of candy-coating it and doing as you did by giving it this lofty default position of truth? The truth does not need to be defended with these atrocities. We ought to use that very behavior as the demonstration of why we should reject it as the default!


I just stated the proper approach was argument from best explanation, and now you are trying to commandeer my own point yourself.

And that is exactly what is being done in this thread along with a lot of others.

maryhelena

Jake, I'm disappointed! I really did not expect this sort of thing from you. Name calling those who don't agree with your posts as "trolls" - members of this forum - not nice, Jake, not nice at all...

As to your bringing something new to this forum - well, I must have missed it! All I see you doing with this Marcion=Paul idea is dealing with the ideas of Hermann Detering - to which you earlier referred me!

And, actually, within Detering's "Falsified Paul" he makes reference to an idea by Johnson - which, seems to me, to have some merit:

my bolding

That interesting observation does, at the very least, put the figure of Marcion prior to the figure of Paul. That would explain the late mention of Paul in the early christian writings. The NT figure of Paul was late (not prior to 70 c.e.)The Marcionite 'heresy' preceded the NT figure of Paul.

The Paul=Marcion equation cannot be upheld as feasible. Possibly, as the years rolled on and the early history of christianity began to fade into the background, these two figure would seem to combine - with all the who did what, who had what, arguments arising. But to assume that they were one and the same figure is to jettison any forward movement towards understanding early christian origins. These two figures might well be two 'horses' from the same stable - but to assume they were both running at the same time, in the same 'race', is to assume too much.

Yes, the conventional NT chronology for Paul is ahistorical. The evidence of the early christian writers is that the figure of Paul was late and the figure of Marcion was prior to the figure of Paul. The question arises as to what time frame separated these two figures. The early christian writings demonstrate a gap, a period of time, between these two figures. If the NT figure of Paul is the late arrival on the scene (as his NT story itself is saying) then the Marcion figure is prior to Paul - and not synonymous with the Paul figure.

How early was the figure of Marcion? How about swapping the conventional chronology around? Instead of a 1st century Paul and a second century Marcion - try it the other way around. A 1st century Marcion and a 2nd century Paul. After all, if both these figures are from the same theological 'stable' - does name changing really make that much difference? It's not the names that are, ultimately, of importance - it's the historical time frame that these figures have been placed in that has relevance for historical research. One figure is early and the other figure is late. (the attempt by some ahistoricists/mythicists to run away from the 1st century is self-defeating, I'm afraid to say....)

Well now - I'll leave you to do some research on that......

stephan huller

No I am saying that tradition - any tradition - is worthy of being respected. It shouldn't be treated as something contemptuous. Science works by constantly improving and bettering hypotheses. Whether you like them or not the Church Fathers represent a 'science' in the strictest sense of the original term. They offered the world what they considered to be a wisdom of the highest order. It is our job to improve upon their understanding, not push it aside or flush it down the toilet.

stephan huller

This is a very emotional way of looking at the world. It is hardly detached, objective or scientific. The evidence is what it is, whether it comes from a rapist or a therapist. Stop being so emotional.

Who fucking cares. Grow up. You sounding like those people who want their political leaders to never have affairs. Stop whining. You're the inverse of the emotional Christian believer. This is what I hate about this country. Everyone wants passion. I want indifference and you aren't showing enough.

I never said tradition was a happy thing, but it provides a context for everything. The reason I know so much is because I focus on tradition - how it was interpreted. Christians should do the same and atheists too (but then again most like you are only interested in blowing up things so perhaps all you need is a stick of dynamite to carry out your purpose.

Again who fucking cares. Such a cry baby. Without murder, torture and genocide ... Do I have to listen to this?

Blah, blah, blah. There's nothing your post but hate. The opposite of all the bad things you mention isn't more passion and irrationality. It's indifference.

ralfellis

Indeed he was. And although you will not initially like Saul's alternate name, it was in fact Josephus (Flavius).

This suggestion may provoke incredulity at first, but it is an identification that works on all levels. There are many similarities between the lives of Saul and Josephus, including:

both battling against someone called Jesus
both arresting the followers of this Jesus (under what authority did Saul do this?)
both having a flash of inspiration
Both changing sides after this flash
Both being in prison? (Josephus' missing seven years)

And the similarity I like best, is that both were on a prison ship (to do with the Temple Wall affair) that was shipwrecked off Malta and were taken to Naples. Both then went to Rome and had an audience with Nero.


If you can face up to the chronological modifications that this conflation of characters creates, it makes a great deal of sense.

It explains why the NT contains a description of the siege of Jerusalem
It explains why the NTs Zacharias of Barachias and Josephus' Zacharias of Baruch appear so similar.
It explains why Irenius said Jesus was over 50 years old.
It explains under what authority Saul was arresting people.
It explains why Prof Robert Eisenman thinks Mary Boethus is so similar to Mary Magdalene (Mary if Bethany).
It explains why the Talmud is always linking Jesus to the Jewish Revolt.
It explains what revolt Jesus was involved in (the Jewish Revolt)
It explains why the Talmud says Phineas the Robber killed Jesus (Phineas was the temple treasurer in AD 70)
It explains why the armed assault on Jerusalem by the 'Egyptian False Prophet' from the Mount of Olives is so similar to the 'armed assault' organised by Jesus.
It explains why the taking of the 5,000 into the wilderness by the Egyptian False Prophet is so similar to Jesus' similar meeting.
It explains how King Abgarus of Edessa got replies to his letters to Jesus, in the late AD 40s. (check the governor involved in these letters)
It explains why, in the Vulgate Cycle, Joseph of Arimathaea had to go to sleep for 40 years, to continue his life as a contemporary of Vespasian

And it also suggests that the biblical Jesus was Jesus if Gamala. Saul was persecuting Jesus in Galilee, while Josephus was persecuting Jesus of Gamala.



It may be a radical reassessment of the NT accounts, but it is one that makes sense of the story.


.

maryhelena

Jesus, King of Edessa

Jesus, King of Edessa, Ralph Ellis (or via: amazon.co.uk)

and many more books......

Welcome, Ralph......

aa5874

Please, your post is just laughable. The Church Fathers did NOT represent 'science" but Mythology in its stirictest sense.

In the Canon and Church writings it is claimed Jesus of Nazareth was born of a Ghost and Virgin, was God the Creator, that walked on water, transfigured, resurrected, ate Fish AFTER the Resurrection, commissioned the disciples and then ascended in clouds.

Please, please, please!!! The Church Fathers offered mankind Mythology of the highest order.

Even the Pauline writer offered Salvation through Mythology.

Romans 10:9 KJV Some time in the 2nd century or later the Pauline writer claimed that WITHOUT the Resurrection mankind would remain in Sin and the Faith of the Jesus cult would be in vain.

1 Corinthians 15:17 KJVAristides Apology There is NO science at all about Jesus, the disciples and Paul.

They are 'science' fiction characters.

stephan huller

aa do you even know what the original meaning of 'science' was - i.e. the ancient meaning? I would give a hundred dollars for an actual picture of aa.

stephan huller

and let me just say that this attempted negation of religion - that it has no value because it isn't science or 'scientific' - is among the most annoying arguments of modern atheism. Religion never claimed that it could build a plane to fly at twice the speed of sound. If that's the measure of 'truth' - that 'it can help you build stuff' or 'understand stuff' then yes religion is retarded. But that's not what religion claimed to provide mankind. Therefore it is not negated by arguments about its unscientific character.

aa5874

Please, you don't know what you are talking about. And I am not even certain that you have a hundred pennies to spare. Perhaps you are dead broke.

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Science