Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Layman · 08-15-2002, 02:19 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Peter Kirby:
<strong>Layman writes: Do you think that a Catholic scholar denying Jesus' birth in Bethlehem and affirming the full-brother blood relationship between Jesus and James is taking a "conservative" position?

Whatever kind of position it is, it must not be in clear contradiction with Catholic dogma, or else the books of Meier (and Brown) should not have received the "nihil obstat" and "imprimatur."

I do not have Meier's first volume with me. Does Meier say "I personally believe that Mary had children with Joseph other than Jesus, such as his full brother James"? Or does Meier say, "the historical evidence points to James being a full brother," or "most scholars think that James was a full brother." These last two claims would not contradict the dogma of perpetual virginity because they attribute the claim to "evidence" or "scholars" and not to the writer himself.

That said, I would rank Meier a 6 or a 7 with a perfect 10 going to an inerrantist fundamentalist young earth creationist. Some say "moderate." I do take Meier's work seriously and do not dismiss it by applying ideological labeling.

best,
Peter Kirby</strong>

Your second charactarization is the correct one. Meier is clear that his work is intended to be what several historians from various religious (or nonreligious) backgrounds would agree to. He does not discuss what he personally believes (perhaps by faith), but what he personally believes the evidence suggests.

Steven Carr · 08-16-2002, 01:02 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Layman:
<strong>

Our sources for Jesus' sayings, of course, are the various gospels sources of Mark, Q, M, and L. However, it is almost universally believed that the Gospel traditions are independent of Paul's letters. In other words, the Gospels did not base their account on Paul's account and vise versa
</strong>

Does this mean that you do not believen one of teh Gospels was written by somebody who travelled with Paul and was very familiar with what he said?

How can you claim A is an echo of B and claim that A and B are independent of each other?

Fact. Paul presents his ethical teaching in Romans 12 as his own, in the same way as he presents his teaching on women being silent and his teaching about men having long hair - in both cases there is no hint of his having used anybody else as a source.

Fact. Paul was highly respected, his letters were collected as Scripture and his teachings were revered.

Fact. All of Paul's letters were written before any of teh Gospels.

In which case, the burden of proof is on people who claim that the Gospels do *not* echo the teachings of a teacher who taught before they were written.

It seems incredible to claim that Paul's teachings echo the Gospels when they were written after Paul's letters. Echoes don't work that way around. Clearly, any echoes come from the Christian milieu Paul worked so hard at spreading. The Gospels echo Christian thoughts.

Of course, all this would be different if Paul claimed Jesus was a teacher , but all of his words of the Lord appear to be phrased as though they were revelations - in the same way Christians today interpret speaking in tongues as a word from the Lord.

And , of course, we have parallels of Muslims putting words into Muhammad's mouth.

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