One of the last sane

Ouch!

Family Man

Who says the information came from the disciples? The gospels were written years after the fact by anonymous authors with much interest in promoting a theological point of view, and not much of history, which is why stories like the birth narratives are widely regarded as fiction in the HJ movement. In addition, there was considerable conflict between the Pauline faction of the church and the faction that followed Peter. The church that we know grew out of the Pauline faction. Not a particular surprise the disciples didn't come out too well.

Finally, it is not an uncommon technique to surround the literary hero (Jesus in this case) with less than competent associates to emphasize the superiority of the hero. Hence, the negative portrayal of the disciplines isn't a surprise.

Of course they believed it to be true. The fools that killed themselves at Heaven's Gate must have truly believed the comet was really a spaceship come to take them away. People truly believe all sorts of strange things, even to the point of being willing to die for them. Jesus's divinity happens to be one of those wierd things.

Check any of Bede's posts. I believe he posts a link in all of his posts.

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[ August 29, 2002: Message edited by: Family Man ]</p>

not a theist

What do you mean "doctor"? They didn't have to doctor them; they wrote them.
No one knows for certain but the best theories we have are that this had either to do with Pauline vs. Palestinian Christianity or some other power struggles within the early church. It may also have been to teach moral lessons.

Why do you think they wouldn't have tried to portray the disciples badly?

Also, assuming that the writings are accurate still doesn't solve the problem of why the disciples are portrayed badly. The authors would still have had to pick and choose what to include and what not to include. The fact that they included these incidents rather than simply leaving them out still needs explaining even if one assumes that they are historical.

So really, the position that the gospels are completely historical doesn't solve the problem of why these incidents were left in.
And the position that the gospels are not completely historical is not harmed by their inclusion.

So these incidents demonstrate nothing about the historicity of the gospels.
Because it wasn't the disciples who wrote the gospels.
The authors of the gospels are probably not included at all as characters within the gospel stories.
Killed who? The authors? There is no evidence that the authors of the gospels died for their beliefs.
Why wouldn't who deny what?
Here's Bede's website:
<a href="http://www.bede.org.uk/" target="_blank">Welcome to Bede's Library - the alliance of faith and reason</a>

I don't know if the list comes from his website or from a post here.

[ August 29, 2002: Message edited by: not a theist ]</p>

Sasquatch75

"In addition, there was considerable conflict between the Pauline faction of the church and the faction that followed Peter. The church that we know grew out of the Pauline faction. Not a particular surprise the disciples didn't come out too well."
If the disciples are made to look idiotic because of the fighting between the Pauline faction and the Palestinian faction, why does Luke, an ally of Paul, portray him as a ravenous butcher in Acts? Why does Paul openly admit to his past transgressions in his epistles?

Ron Garrett

Sas:

Set the geneologies of Jesus from Luke and Matthew side by side. Would not God speaking through a Holy Spirit directed author know the names of the progenitors of Jesus? If the authors are not clear on these ery human and simple details, why should they be clear on the cosmic ones?

not a theist

Oddly, in both instances, to actually add to Paul's credibility. If he was so against Christianity, and later became so for Christianity, that is thought by Paul and Luke to be another reason that Christianity should be thought to be convincing.
Christians nowdays do it all the time; look at Mike Warnke's The Satan Seller for an example of it. He claims all sorts of things that are untrue about how awful he was before he converted. So it might well have been an odd form of PR.

The other possibility is that Paul actually was very hostile to Christianity before his conversion. That would not however show in any way that Jesus claimed to be God. The two are unrelated.

Also remember, Luke didn't have to invent the "incompetent disciples" theme, it's already present in Mark upon whom Luke probably depends.

[ August 30, 2002: Message edited by: not a theist ]</p>

Family Man

Now might be a good time to review the point of this thread before it goes too much farther upfield.

Proponents of the HJ movement attempt to apply critical historical methods to get to the man Jesus. The problem is that what they discover doesn't point to a god; it points to a mortal man.

Review the questions you've asked on this thread, Sas. None of them deal with the historical Jesus. All of them deal with what happened after his death. The reason for that is that that was when his divinity was first promoted. I don't think Jesus thought he was God; I think Paul and his followers did.

David Conklin

That they arrived at that conclusion should be no surprise: they start with only naturalistic assumptions and a definite anti-supernatural bias. They would have come a different set of conclusions if they hadn't started with the bias at all.

If you read Martin Hengel's Studies in the Gospel of Mark. Translated by John Bowden (Fortress, 1985) you'll find that he addresses the alleged anonymity of the Gospels which was mentioned.

Family Man

And instead they should have started with your pro-supernatural bias? Tell me, in what scholarly endeavor is it assumed that the supernatural exists? Can you give me one example of a supernatural event outside of the Christian tradition that scholars hold to be true? And if there aren't any, why should we hold that the Christian miracles are somehow true?

In fact, all scholarly research takes a naturalistic viewpoint. Yet only in religious matters is this considered unfair. I'm sorry, but I can't abide the inconsistency.

lcb

if you are "agnostic" on the issue then why are you making conclusory "fait accompli" arguments as to the issue?