Vorkosigan

I'm merely trying to understand your argument here:If you have other more damaging critiques of Meier, then those would be better, rather than saying that Meier's methods are not capable of cross-genre use.

But T & M dump them completely. It is hard to find a greater condemnation than that, wouldn't you say?

Vorkosigan

Justin70

Okay,

Maybe I'm behind the times with logical interpretations and differing methodologies but my gut feeling tells me that Vinnie is doing nothing but churning out a huge word salad.

Maybe I'm too black and white but the way I go about checking to see if someone is historical is very straight forward.

If I wanted to prove that ANYONE back in the past was a historical person instead of a fiction dreamt up in someone's head I would consider evidence in MUCH the same way that a courtroom today would decide. Maybe even simpler.

Person X has been claimed to be a historical figure during a specific time period. What methods of writing and records of history were available at that time? What were their burial practices? (so we can check for a grave) What can we extrapolate about what they did for a living? Their hobbies? What type of person were they? (Not DIRECTLY relevant but could lead to more clues that would construct a life that would possibly lead to more evidence or lack thereof) What did the person claim to do? What did others claim that he did? Are their pictures of this person? Are there HOSTILE sources of information about this person? If there's multiple sources of information about this person, do they conflict or do they correlate?

These are just a very tiny amount of the questions I would ask for ANY historic personage in history. Why would ANY historical figure need a special methodology to prove that they were a living breathing human being?

Why can't the methodology that would be used to prove or disprove that person Y in history was a real person be any different than person X?

I personally think that the reason this whole crap with the HJ has gone one for so freakin' long is because so MANY people on this planet refuse to acknowledge that just MAYBE Jesus was myth. The whole idea is completely repugnant to some people. I think it's intellectually dishonest to toss aside the possibility as much as it would be EQUALLY intellectually dishonest for me to toss aside the possiblity of a HJ.

I think this whole argument stems from the same fundamental illogic that Creation 'science' has been swimming in for years. The idea that you have a SOLUTION and thereby you go looking for evidence to prove your SOLUTION and toss away the information you don't like because of some selfish handicap that you have for WANTING to believe in Christianity and a historical Jesus.

So as much as Vinnie wants to toss up his adoption of some special 'methodology' for researching the HJ, he doesn't show a substantial case WHY he would need this 'methodology' other than hinting at context? Am I reading this right?

I applaud keyser for coming forth as a HJ and poking holes in this. I respect the fact that he may believe differently (or have evidence that I haven't seen) with regards to a HJ and that's just fine. I very much welcome to opportunity to hear the reasons why he holds his 'belief' or 'fact' or whatever he may call it.

I however, don't appreciate the intellectual elitism that Vinnie is trying to foster by such phrases as '... I don't have time for this' and referring to the whole discussion as a '101 lesson' - that's just heavy window dressing that I've seen many times before that leads me to believe that he doesn't really understand jack crap of what he's trying to postulate.

Perhaps I'm way out of line, but, Vinnie, maybe you might consider a more straight forward approach instead of trying to plead special circumstances just because people call him the Messiah.

Just a thought.

Ted Hoffman

Because it was a significant event. Heck, it is considered to have been a fulfilment of the Messianic prophecy of Zechariah (9:9).

If you think it was an insignificant event, just state so.

OTOH, you might find it useful to explain why Paul wrote whatever he wrote. The underlying assumption would be that he wrote what he wrote because he thought it was important - especially to his readers.
Why would he exclude seemingly significant events?

No. I never said all parts are false. You dismissed some parts as unreal without explaining the logic / methodology behind your reasoning. For example, perharps it actually clouded over at noon that day and they overblew it to "darkness at noon" because their emotions/ perceptions were heightened by the events. Perharps Peter cut the right ear of Malchus, but did not amputate it etc.

I am confident that the rest of my post demonstrates how I support this. The manner in which Paul spoke of Jesus was consistent with Jesus as a saviour figure.


This is incorrect Kirby and its insulting. For me to understand the principle does not entail that I agree with how you understand it or how you apply it.
Your initial questions were ambiguous and seemed to conflate "extraordinary" and "rare". And I specifically explained that I regard "extraordinary" to mean something that violates known scientific laws/principles or challenges human knowledge/experience. Something that is unprecedented, like the questions you were asked: "How often did itinerant religious preachers show up in ancient Palestine? How often were heavenly savior gods turned into itinerant Galilean preachers?" do not challenge human experience or violate scientific laws - so they are not extraordinary.
They therefore, IMO, do not require extraordinary evidence but would however require some form of support, just like any other theories/arguments.

Remember that you have no monopoly over the correct meaning/ application of that principle - we can only share our understandings of it and its quite arrogant of you to state that I don't understand it.

Answered as above.
But you seem to be conflating "extraordinary evidence" with "amount of evidence"/ "adequate evidence" (as in witnesses etc).
After examining the facts presented, one can make the judgement over whether an event is true or not. Impossibility, extraordinariness, rarity etc are more of qualitative judgements and do not themselves lend any strength to the facts available in each case.
If I can show you a snake that speaks and you witness it and everyone witnesses it - it will still be extraordinary ,but possible, but it will also be true.
If I tell you there are snakes that speak, I will need that so-called extraordinary evidence as above - or you might even demand more evidence - because its an extraordinary claim.

That is my understanding of the principle.
What is yours?

You are now conflating significance with (naturalistic) plausibility.

You are shifting the argument.
First you have to admit that being born of woman does not in itself give a saviour figure any earthly connotations.
Conversely, I sould also ask:
What story has Paul saying that Jesus was born anywhere on earth?

How do you know that Semele was an actual human mother?
This discussion is degenerating - now I need to show that Greek gods were not human?

Strawman. I did not interpret it to mean that Jesus was not born to a human mother.
I have demonstrated that it doesnt necessarily mean that Jesus was born of a human mother.
The virgin birth concept itself is inhuman - holy spirit conception, conception via thunderbolts etc are a preserve of mythology.

Caricaturing my arguments is naughty and not acceptable. My point is that Paul, like Isiah, had no specific woman in mind as he said born of woman. If he did, he would have said born of (virgin) Mary.

Why would I want to do that? It seems you are asking me to do some homework that I do not need to do.
I would suggest you read John Dillon, The Middle Platonists. Better yet, since you read Greek, read The Hellenistic Background to the Pauline Allegorical Method in Galatians 4:21-31. I believe it will provide additional insights to the Hellenistic influence on NT literary genre and how allegorical exegesis by Paul falls within accepted OT hermeneutics practiced during the apostolic period.

Add Doherty's website/book to that and you will be home.

It may be apparent to you - but as soon as you can prove its really the case, then we will have something to look at.

It is said that when Karl Marx was on his deathbed, he retorted that he was not a Marxist. People pick ideologies and mould them to serve changing needs and its simplistic to limit meanings on a rigid framework based on a founder-figure of an ideology. We have middle platonists, neo-platonists etc etc, so platonism and its doctrines/manifestations cant be rightly fixated on the pedagogy of the founding figure.
We are looking at competing cultures and ideologies hellenistic Judaism, stoicism, gnosticism and platonism and they influenced thought and literary genres and allegorical styles that early christians like Paul, were exposed to or themselves used.

Thats because we are in the 21st century.

What kind of evidence would you require?
Paul quoting Isiah 7:14?
Read ISAIAH 7:14 AND THE VIRGIN BIRTH OF THE MESSIAH and falsify the arguments in that page.
Notice the authors interpretation/understanding of the phrase "Under the Torah"; commonly known as "under the law".
I find the authors explanation concerning the meanings of the words PARTHENOS, ALMA and BETULAH particularly interesting.

On a different note:
Would you Grant that Mattew 1:22-23 , KJV:
Fulfils Isaiah 7:14:
Would you grant that? If you would - why?

Right. But the point would remains that Paul could have got the info from the OT prophecies - and used his alleged visions and midrash to create his Christ story and fulfil the prophecies for an oppresed people.

More to the point - how many Jews at the time Paul was speaking belonged to the race of Abraham (According to the OT)?
How would you compare "son of Joseph" to "race of Abraham" - in terms of specificity and meaningfulness (information content)? If Paul knew Joseph - wouldnt he have used Josephs name in reference to Christ since it is more specific?

Do you consider Abraham to be a historical figure? If you do, what about Adam and Noah (the Hebrew version of Sumerian Flood hero Unapitshim in [/i]Enuma Elish[/i])?
Its my conviction that Paul was expressing his beliefs (not his knowledge). Some of which were based on the OT. To ascribe human qualities to the Abraham Paul believed in would be tantamount to admitting that those were actual historical characters in the OT. The significance of Pauls belief becomes evanescent as soon as we are clear on the historicity of these shadowy partriarch(s).
We have the responsibity of dissecting whatever Paul believed in because I believe we are better equipped at doing so than Paul.

So what I am saying is that Paul believed in what was written - [b]whether or not Paul believed it because he thought it was historical or whether he just believed uncritically[/i] is another question. After all, these were the scriptures.

I hope you get the difference.

This is besides the point since Paul's Kerygma was not strictly based on what was written alone. He had Platonic and gnostic leanings and was - um - a visionary.

You know of course that the messianic concept had both political and theological dimensions/ underpinnings. The religious dimension/understanding of the messiah was influenced with other Hellenistic and Pagan ideologies and took a largely allegorical form.

This would be the one that Paul talked about.

Apples and Oranges. You are conflating the meanings held by writers who embraced the Galilean tradition with those that ascribed to the Jerusalem tradition. And I believe you know better because you are simply muddying the waters and obfuscating the issue.

The humour/sarcasm in this is lost on me.

Its simplistic and irresponsible to ascribe the same meaning a phrase would have even when its spoken by different people and under different contexts.
It is not necessarily the case that Paul literally meant what he said especially in light of other things he said too about Christ.
And in light of his gnostic and platonic leanings.

You are basically asking us to ignore everything we know about Paul and treat what he said the same way we can treat what anyone else (could have) said.

You are aware that Paul (said he) died and resurrected with christ aren't you?

No I am not. Questioning my motives is shifting the argument and is a form of ad-hominem. My motives remain irrelevant to this discussion.

This is a simplistic statement meant to caricature a complex ideology. Its misleading. You cant capture the full allegorical uses and applications of Platonism in one simplistic statement.

I dont recall them disputing Mary's virginity either. Whether or not Jesus' historicity was disputed could be an artifact of its being held by a minority group, it could be a factor of the manner in which it started as a mystery cult, it could be because people simply ignored it or thought it was foolish, or [most likely] it could be because it started with the concept of Christ Logos (the Jerusalem tradition), perharps it was disputed but the disputes were not recorded maybe because those that disputed were a monority, proto-christianity whas just one among a myriad of other innocuous movements in early Palestine - why would anyone have bothered whether a historical figure was behind it? it can also be argued that people could have accepted it uncritically just like demon posession and births of other early saviour figures were accepted uncritically. And your question ignores the shift in emphasis - we are in the 21st century - where historicity is a factor - in the first century, the prowess of the gods were what were at issue - evrything else was secondary.

It really doesnt prove anything one way or the other that Jesus historicity was not disputed. If you care to eliminate my seven or so possible explanations above, I can still provide others. But it would be nice to see you try.

Ted Hoffman

I did not accuse him of anything. I simply expressed suspicion.
I am suspicious of judiciously ambiguous statements.
OTOH, if something doesnt make any sense, its decent to ask for clarification.
Or ignore it totally.

Will you be addressing my questions concerning the import and validity of the authors deductions?

And Oh, you enjoy "typing with me" alright; its just that sometimes I type things you find offensive.

And that is as it should be because I am not you.

Vinnie

What is your point? I said Meier does not apply his criteria in such ways.

Aren't you cunning. The gospels must contain history if they are to accurately reconstruct history. Way to go Mr. Tautology. Duh. When did I ever say it was otherwise?

This is coming from the man who has never even read Meier and does not know how he implements his sources. Show me how Meier's is guilty of doing this. "As many a weary quester has remarked before, the use of the valid criteria is more an art than a science, requiring sensitivity to the individual case rather than mechanical implementation." (Meier, marginal 1 p. 184). Of course "historical plausibility is used as well. It factors into any judgment.

Fallacy alert! They are only worthless if that prior decision is inaccurate. There are independent vectors which all speak of a historical man. These are not fictional documents like the Lord of the Rings and so fourth.

You know as well as I do that there are a million background decisions going on which all produce different interpretations. Does Mark date to 70 ad or 140? These are key questions. No one ever denied the necessity of evaluating the sources used.

Josephus mentions Jesus in a passing glance and his brother James. GMark independently mentions this and Paul provides primary-contemporary source data on the existence of James, the brother of the Lord.

How can you determine that Josephus is not fiction?

Actually, your view of the Gospels, Q and a hosto of other sources as fiction like the LotR's is bull shit.

First give me a methodology for determining Josephus' works are historical and not fiction. I don't want none of that these other texts confirm Josephus as you've clearly established that multiple attestaion is bankrupt

And what do you mean by which sources are historical? There is history intertwined with the Gospels. There was creativity but we can seem clear lines of limitations in certain points. I would say Mark, Paul, Q, John etc. They all speak of a man who walked the earth and died around 30 ad. Their genre is not fiction. That is why the embarrassment criterion can be used here and not in the LotR Trilogy.

People followed this man under the pretense that he said and did certain things and they wrote about them. When we look at the finished product of Mark it does not look like a person sat down and dreamt stuff up. Mark consists of a bunch of individual pericopes that were stringed together which pushes us to an oral stage of preaching. Gospel formation is inferred through the end product. Try 'Form and Source Criticism for Dummies'. That might help you out.

I haven't read T&M. I will eventualy. But as I've said, I mix his and Crossan's methodology. I agree that you need to always start with the first stratum.

You have no point. You've dreamt up idiocy. You've created a false dilemma here. "Determine whether the Gospels are history"??? This is not an all or nothing thing. We know the sayings material in GJohn is not history remembered. The Gospels contain history. That is the whole point of the exercise. Its not only they are either entirely history or fiction. There is a middle ground, Sherlock.

No. The method of extraction works under a prior consideration of source and historicity.

What do you mean there is "no mutliple independent attestation"???

Vinnie

Vinnie

And I might be adding GThomas to my source list

I am starting to lean against dependence upon the canonical Gospels.

Vinnie

keyser_soze

I might be mistaken, but I thought that at one time you had stated that the gospels used a common source(mark). Am I mistaking you for someone else? The base point being that if the works were built from a single source, then these gospels are invalid even in light of acceptance of meiers methodology(which can't be realistic, because vorks has already shown a glaring flaw with meiers methodology in the first place). Perhaps it was someone else, but even assuming the methodolgy could be made to work, there is too much question as to the origins of the gospels to use them as a baseline for a historical jesus figure(again, note that I am HJ, not MJ....I just can't see past the flaw in your argument). Perhaps if you explain more in depth, we are just missing some part of your argument that you are taking for granted as understood by us, and so we are at an impasse that could be resolved instead of resulting in angry feelings. Tell us why or why not you believe the gospels are valid, unbiased accounts of a historical jesus, and how we should apply meiers methodolgy too it in order to arrive at your conclusion.

Vinnie

lets get down to fundamentals, keyser_soze. What do you think of Josephus? Why is Josephus not fiction? What methodology is used to strip accurate information from josephus? is he an unbiased historian who can be taken at face value?

Yes, I adhere to Marcan priority. This means that Matthew and Luke used Mark as a source when they wrote their gospels. In my above quote I was talking about the Gospel of Thomas. Many scholars see it as being dependent upon the canonical gospels. I am starting to lean away from this view based upon some recent readings. My next step is to purchase and read a full work on the subject.

Why would that make the gospels invalid? If Matthew cited something verbatim from Mark then no, we cannot call this two independent instances of the event. I don't understand how you are reaching a judgment of valid or invalid through this route?

Vork has shown no such flaw. He stated a glaring tautology as if historians do not consider their sources. That is an obvious part of any reconstruction.

I am not using "the Gospels". I rarely use GJohn except for on minor issues. Hardly any of the sayings material can be plausibly attributed to Jesus. This material fill up a good chunk of John. Get a red letter bible and flip through it to see for yourself.

What is to question as to the origin of Mark's gospel?

What does it mean to say the gospels are valid? Valid for what?

The gospels definately are NOT unbiased accounts of the historical jesus.

Crossan is correct in that there is a need for inventory and stratification. Every source has to be identified and dated (to as high a degree as possible). Each source needs to be evaluated and described. Q is considered the sayings of Jesus. I do not know of a single scholar who disputes whether Q was a fictional list or whether it is a list of sayings attributed to an actual historical person. This does not mean every saying is authentic, or that Q always preserves an earlier reading or that it did not undergo redactions.

I disagree at virtually every step of the way from mythicist here.

First stratum. They usually see no references to the historical Jesus in Paul.

All the Gospels are dated significantly later than is the consensus position which I share.

Some accept Johannine independence of the canonical Gospels and some don't.

Some naively think that the miraculous material in Mark warrants cavalier dismissal.

Mark shows clear evidence of earlier sources (oral and probably written) and consists of contained and movable pericopes that were stung together into a narrative fashion. Vork seems to have disputed this above. He hand-waved it away as conjecture.

Some date Q to the 50s, some date it to around the time of Mark's Gospel. Some date a stage in GThomas to the 50s and many others date it to the second century.

Some think Corinthians 15 is an interpolation and some don't.

Some accept the TF as authentic and Tacitus' reference. Some don't.

Some accept the shorter reference on jesus from Josephus and some don't.

Most think the Gospels were written independent of the Pauline corpus. Some might dispute this for certain works.

Some think the early Christians simply engaged in wild flights of fancy. Others can demonstrate that while there certainly was a good deal of creative activity going on, it was limited.

The dating, genre, location, the author, the recipients, assumed background knowledge, contents, purpose, sources, textual integrity etc., all play their roles in this.

Naturally one who disagrees at every step of the way on sources and stratification will not even begin to talk meaningfully about a methodology. I believe that stratification and an inventory of the sources plays a role in the methodological considerations. All sources are not given the same benefit of the doubt. The laurels of the alleged author come into play and we cannot mechanically implement any methodology like this in ancient history. As i quoted Meier above, "As many a weary quester has remarked before, the use of the valid criteria is more an art than a science, requiring sensitivity to the individual case rather than mechanical implementation."

We must learn to look for redactional tendencies of the alleged author (this is easier when we have a source the author used), what goes with the grain, what goes against it, possible sources, lines of transmission, etc. It gets very complex and that is why I don't have the time to go through all of it now.

When T&M critqued Meier's methodology did they bother with any sort of stratification of Jesus sources? Did they offer a discussion of their sources in comparison to Meiers? The differences between their view and Meier's on Johannine dependende on Mark? Do they agree or disagree? That is where I findd Crossan's critique of Meier lacking. Their stratification and outlook on several of the sources is so completely different that they would appear to talk past one another at points.

Crossan's stratification has a shitload of first stratum material. It is no wonder that he stays with multiply attestee material in the first stratum. Meier's first stratum (using Crossan's scheme of 30-60 ad) has only the Pauline corpus that I can remember. I know of no other first stratum work that Meier has.

Plus, if any of you have actually read Meier you would know that in his first volume he devotes over 100 pages to a discussion of sources (pp 41-166). he did not neglect this issue. Again, its all source and method when dealing with history.

Vinnie

Ted Hoffman

Keyser:
Why, exactly do you believe this?

Ted Hoffman

I agree with Joedad that we should give Vinnie time to prepare his case against mythicists - as it is, he is getting foul-tempered and is lashing out quite a bit (aah, that post to Keyser is better quality). He is a mite defensive. Lets give him a break . The lad has been roughed up enough.

But before Vinnie does that (damn, I am salivating - cant help myself), could Vinnie please share with us his argument as far as embarrasment criterion is concerned - especially with regard to my response on it in the previous page (3).

I believe Vork has handled MA quite well.

Now, Vinnie half-heartedly mentioned dissimilarity and weakly talked of stratum material. Vinnie, could you briefly outline exactly how you intend to reconstruct HJ starting from the Pauline corpus?
I am especially keen on the embarrasment criterion (if you could strengthen it) and MA since at the onset of the thread, you sounded very cocky about them.
Get out of the special pleading mantra and show some solid arguments. Vorks advantage is that his historical knowledge is wide and he can draw from an almost infinite source of examples to floor your pet methodology. What rendered your tack inferior is expecting us to selectively apply the methodology yet, by definition, our job is to asess every argument rigorously and not to pamper them. Your Catholic friend (Meier) never had this kind of audience in mind - sorry about the rough handling of the delicate methodology <Vork, be gentle this time - okay?>.

This could be a nice place to brainstorm your ideas before you finally write them in your upcoming - um <clears throat> thesis - after all, this is almost as harshest as your critics will ever get .

There is no point in living to fight another day. Get out your arsenal now and get it done with with these idiotic mythers. What do you say?


Bring it on. You can do it.