Toto

Because we live in a democracy and they vote.

Some scientists don't bother with YEC's because they consider the idea too insignificant. But the YEC's have political influence beyond their numbers, and have threatened the teaching of science at the local and state levels, and the funding of scientific research. Therefore the scientists have had to come out of their labs and learn political skills.

Layman

Well, Jesus-mythers live online and propogate their ideas beyond all measure to their numbers (or any scholarly support). They have spread their propoganda to many unsuspecting people on the internet. Most New Testament scholars and historians don't bother with Jesus-mythers, but because they are so active on the internet many Christian apologists do.

Toto

You miss my point. When scientists argue for evolution, they give facts and explain how those facts are derived and tested. They have learned that they cannot say "9 out of 10 experts with PhD's agree" and sit down.

The Christian apologists on this board prefer to just keep repeating "experts agree that Jesus existed" as if that expert consensus had some evidentiary value of its own. When pressed for details, they claim that the Gospels must be treated as historical evidence. When that is rightly rejected, since the Gospels are theological documents and not self authenticating, they resort to other historical documents, all of which have evidentiary problems. The proof for the historical Jesus always comes down to two disputed passages in Josephus, plus some language in Paul's letters that is not unambiguous, plus the inference that the Christian movement must have had a founder. (The other ancient documents that they produce only show that there was a Christian movement by at least the first century.) Neither Paul nor Josephus ever met Jesus. What we know about Josephus is that he had his own agenda and was not a disinterested observer, that there are no ancient manuscripts from the time in which he wrote, and there is clear evidence of at least some Christian tampering with his work.

If you sort through all this, you may decide that a historical Jesus is the best explanation for what little evidence that we have. Or you might not. There is so much missing and contradictory evidence that a variety of theories can be supported, or at least not disproven. Jesus Mythicism was very popular in the last century, then went out of favor. It might come back into favor. This would not be the case if the evidence for a historical Jesus were so solid.

I am an agnostic on this question, but I object to your attempt to put the existence of Jesus outside the scope of discussion. In many ways the mythicist position makes much more sense than your literalist position. Freke and Gandy in the <a href="http://www.secweb.org/bookstore/booklist.asp" target="_blank">Jesus Mysteries</a> state that there is enough evidence of a historical Jesus to think that he might have existed, but that they prefer the mythicist position. (Of course, they also have an agenda.)

Layman

Actually, that is what many do when they argue against YECers. And I don't blame them one bit.

Well, expert opinion does have a certain amount of evidentiary value.

Yes. Christian apologists, like historians from Michael Grant to Paula Fredrikson to J. Dominic Crossan and the Jesus Seminar, do argue that the Gospels are historical evidence for Jesus.

Begging the question as usual Toto. But even theological document (is that a category of ancient documents that historians regularly describe?) can be historical evidence.


To any unbiased and sensible person, the Letter to the Galatians should be enough to settle the dispute about the historicity of Jesus. Just because a vocal group of anti-theists yell about something loud enough doesn't mean that they have a point.

Toto, you are so boring. All you do is parrot typical skeptic-talk as if its conclusive. Of course the fact that almost every historian and New Testament scholar (secular, Jewish, Catholic, and Protestant) thinks you guys have no point seems lost on you. Or, at the very least, you've convinced yourself it is those who are in accord with the overwhelming academic consensus that are somehow acting unreasonably.

So is this your historical methodology? We only get to rely on a source if it personally knew the object about which it was writing? It's not mine. Nor am I aware that it is the methodology of any historian.

Well, gosh. I guess then that nothing Josephus wrote can be taken as historical evidence. Again, how many historians agree with you?

You so remind me of my YEC friends.

Funny. Creationism was very popular in the last century too. Maybe it will come back into favor? Would that be the case if the evidence for evolution was so solid?


My literalist position?

If you are saying that my belief in Jesus as Son of God makes less sense than the Mythicist position, I guess I could sympathize. At least from your perspective. But that is a false dichotomy. The choice is not between Jesus is God and Jesus Did Not Exist. As you well know.

[ June 03, 2002: Message edited by: Layman ]</p>

Sauron

But only as evidence for what experts are thinking.

As for evidence to support a claim, that depends on the data and methodology that they used to arrive at their opinion.

If it were not so, then we could poll all the creationist "experts" and conclude that creationism was correct, because their expert opinions all concurred on that point.

[ June 03, 2002: Message edited by: Sauron ]</p>

Toto

I have nothing to say about your belief in Jesus as the Son of God, because you had not mentioned it up to now, and I don't know why you mentioned it. The idea that the gospels were written as gnostic allegory makes a lot more sense to me than the idea that there was a Jewish carpenter who started a movement that escaped the attention of most of the people around it, had some improbable experiences, and was crucified for no good reason.

I'm not sure it's worth responding to the rest of your rant. Josephus cannot be read uncritically. I think what I said about him would be acceptable to most historians, since I got it out of Steve Mason's book. Were you under the misimpression that Josephus is accepted at face value by historians?

Answerer

Just curious Toto, just who the hell are those experts?

Toto

My point being that they are usually not named, just as the shakey foundation of their conclusions is swept under the rug, and the fact that they don't agree on very much is ignored. Layman has listed his favorites before.

If this was more than a rhetorical question, you might want to check out Peter Kirby's guide:

<a href="http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/theories.html" target="_blank">Theories of the Historical Jesus</a>

The Christian apologists' favorites are clustered at the end of the list, and they would deny expert status to some at the beginning (in order to preserve their consensus).

RyanS2

Accidental double-post

[ June 04, 2002: Message edited by: RyanS2 ]</p>

RyanS2

"As Ryan pointed out, a lot of what is taught as history is bunk (he could have added the Flat Earth and the conflict between science and religion)."

Never thought the day I'd be quoted by a Christian in defense of Christianity.... will wonders never cease. The truth of the "flat-Earth" belief is that it appears the majority of Christians didn't believe the Earth was flat in medieval times. I am curious about that on two fronts though.

I've seen one often used quote by Magellan, which is something the effect of, "I've seen the shape of the Earth on the moon and if I am to believe the Church or the Moon, I choose the moon." (Paraphrased from memory). I've never seen the source for that quote though on any website which lists it, so I take it with a big bag of salt, I can't imagine most of those websites not being proud to show the original source of that quote. Even our knowledge from Greece came mostly from Arabia, which was brought there by Nestorian Christian monks, Christian heretics, and Jews. (Who seemed to have thought, like Eusebius, that the Greeks were somehow endowed to them for that knowledge).

The second one is where most of the Middle Ages information came from, which was Arabia. Most of our knowledge and science came from Muslims through Spain into Europe. Now, Muslims do believe in a flat-Earth, hardcore believers at least, one making the comment that the Earth is flat, and anyone who says different is a godless liar. Was this position held into the Middle Ages by Arabians? If so, isn't it possible this information passed onto the Middle Ages as having a flat-Earth model? However, these are only anamolies and not actual evidence, unless someone can give a specific (first-source) quote.

If you're interested in a book dealing with modern myths' taught widely, I'd suggest the book "Lies my teacher told me", which was written by a sociologist instead of a historian, but it's still accurate about what's wrong in the books.

To the person whom replied to me, I don't feel like digging back through here to find your name, unfortunately, or finding your thread. I may have gotten the details of the story wrong, (forgive my ever fragile memory, which ironically, is what we're debating at least somewhat), but the point is not diminished. One can even watch a normal talk-show like Jay Leno's "Jaywalking" to see how very little your average person knows, in our enlightened age. Better, just visit Richard Carrier's article on what is science where he documents that around 70% of Americans don't know what science is, and why are we to assume that the methods of historiography are somehow more well-known to them?

Now, in the method of historiography, we go off things based upon which side has the greatest preponderance of evidence. I.e. who has the most to show for their beliefs? Christians really have almost nothing to show that Jesus is the Son of God, the evidence points at him being mythicized. The extent of the mythology, (did Jesus really rise into heaven? Anyone care to show me evidence for this even being physically possible?), is debateable. Also, it would be highly inaccurate to say "All Christ-mythers" live on the internet, Robert Price, for one, has been featured in numerous magazines and articles, has written a book, etc. Far as I'm aware, the articles of him on this website are not taken from a website which he owns, they are taken from articles which he has written in. See how much fun we can have quibbling about the minutiae of each statement?

[ June 04, 2002: Message edited by: RyanS2 ]</p>