Peter Kirby

In that case, it would be clear that the writer accepts that Jesus was human. I would allow for the idea that there are cases in which the truth is not clear to us.

I don't take what a person writes to be a simple function of that person's interests. For example, from most of my posts, you would have no idea that I am very interested in artificial intelligence. And, if you were my teacher in a computer science class, you would not know that I had an interest in applying computational techniques to ancient literature, even though that is a related subject. Similarly, in the case of a modern believer, I don't say that the person is more interested in an earthly Jesus on the day that he writes a homily on a Gospel passage than on the day that he sermonizes on the Old Testament. The content of a document is a function of the writer's aim in writing more than the writer's interests. Since the author of Mark set out to write something like an ancient biography, it is not surprising that this aim in writing produces a different document than a Christian letter.

I have not attempted to construct a historical Jesus from the letters of Paul.

The problem is that a mythologized person can be spoken of in the same way.

I am not familiar with "the unrealistic example Carrier provided." For my part, I seek evidence for any position that I take.

These are two different questions. The first one states, what would be sufficient to show that Jesus was mythical? The second one states, what would be necessarily true (expected) in the case that Jesus was mythical? The answer to these two different questions may be different. In other words, a Jesus Myth hypothesis may be plausible without being demonstrated. I could answer your question with something that would show definitely that there was no historical Jesus, but that is not the same as the minimum amount of evidence that I would expect in the case that there was no historical Jesus.

The matter that started off this discussion was a related but separate matter, that of whether the authors of the NT epistles accepted that Jesus was the name of a human being. It is possible that the epistle writers accepted an earthly Jesus yet that they were mistaken--if, for example, all of the NT epistles were forgeries in the second century. So, what would make me recognize that a writer disbelieved in an earthly Jesus? If the writer made a statement that is incompatible with an earthly Jesus. I think it would go beyond the evidence to hold the belief that the author disbelieved in an earthly Jesus in the case of mere silence.

Of course, I haven't been arguing that there was a historical Jesus, nor have I been arguing that Paul accepted the idea of an earthly Jesus. I have been questioning the case for the idea that Paul disbelieved in an earthly Jesus. The person who would like to persuade others that this case is sound is in need of laying out an argument.

The point of this message is obscure to me.

My question was, "how sure can we be" -- what do you think? It's a fair question.

This is not the same as concluding that he seems to have disbelieved in an earthly Jesus.

Why would you say that a person "needs the OT" simply because that person uses the OT? A person may use the OT because the person believes that it is scripture and that Christ is prefigured in scripture, not because the OT is the person's sole source of information. This should be clear, and it is supported in my original study, in which I quoted this use of the OT to describe Jesus: "Therefore, when you lie alone in your bed, let Christ be as a bundle of myrrh, to sleep and lie all the night between your breasts (Cant. 1:13)." The author of this letter had stories about Jesus (in the Four Gospels) yet chose to use an illustration from the Old Testament.

Why do you suggest that a person has to do research in order to be familiar with stories about Christ?

It can be argued on the basis that the person didn't write it and that most people write what they feel necessary to write in something that they write. Elementary, my dear Watson.

I have not claimed that Paul had met a historical Jesus. I simply doubt the claim that Paul disbelieved in an earthly Jesus.

Does Paul actually say that the heavens in which Jesus existed are sublunar?

There is no question that Paul accepted that Jesus resided in heaven in the present, even among the staunchest HJ believer.

Although there may be exceptions, I don't think that most people give a great deal of research to each of the beliefs that they hold--today or then.

I agree that early Christians did not write about Jesus in the way that they would have written about any other historical person. They did believe that he resided in heaven and that he had reversed death and that he would come in the eschaton. That's a lot of mythology, but piling mythology onto the persona of an actual person would not make that person non-actual.

I suggested that the NT epistles were not written with the concern of imparting historical details. If the NT epistles were gospels, then they would contain details such as the gospels do.

Scare quotes don't excuse you from falsehood.

For the first three points, I am discussing them with other respondents.

For the fourth, why would the authors of the NT epistles be afraid of reinforcing the notion of a spiritual Christ in which they clearly believed?

The arguments are questionable because they are not sound, unless you can present a sound argument for thinking that Paul et al. disbelieved in an earthly Jesus.

I have not argued that we should believe they had historical facts. I am suggesting that the person who sees someone with a cup of tea and says "that guy doesn't like coffee" is making an unsound argument.

This is a separate point. Once we have agreed that there are no sound arguments for believing that the authors of the NT epistles disbelieved in an earthly Jesus, then I may answer this question.

What does it mean to say that "Jesus was not historical"? That would seem to be the place to start, before attempting to draw a conclusion.

I am saying that the method that Doherty uses to determine whether a person believes in an earthly Jesus is flawed because that method leads to an incorrect conclusion in the case of 2 Peter.

No.

The last time that Celsus came up, Quentin had reasonably stated, "yes, I begin to doubt Hoffman a little" with respect to the quote used.

best,
Peter Kirby

Peter Kirby

I am indeed suggesting that it is plausible that Jesus mythicism is a modern phenomenon. Note that I am the skeptic in this context, and it would fall upon a person who wishes to use the premise to justify the idea that hearers of the gospel would have questioned the basic existence of Jesus.

best,
Peter Kirby

Peter Kirby

Thank you for this thoughtful response. It is true that many JMers do not use a simple argument from silence. But it is telling that it took us to the second page before anyone brought up that point. Apparently there are people who think that the argument from silence in itself is persuasive.

I had anticipated this idea, though. I did not merely point out that the collected letters of Samuel Rutherford were silent on specific details in the life of Jesus. I also pointed out instances in which Rutherford draws upon the Old Testament for analogies to Jesus, refers to Gospel sayings without attribution, and speaks of Christ in Gnostic-type or spiritual terms. These features are often taken as indicators that a person disbelieved in an earthly Jesus, but this is not a sound conclusion.

I have read Kurt Rudolph (well, most of it anyway). I agree that the idea of a descending and ascending redeemer was a motif in the air at the time of Paul. What I suggest to be plausible is that some early Christians took that idea and made it their own in applying it to the crucified sophist. Since the idea is indeed a mythological one, and yet is the one that captivated early Christians such as Paul, it is not surprising that mythological language is used in expressing their beliefs. Naturally, though, I am skeptical of attempts to read back either later Gnostics or later Catholics into the letters of Paul.

Something worth pointing out, though, is mentioned by Burton Mack (in the must-read book A Myth of Innocence) and by Earl Doherty (in a message once posted to JesusMysteries). That point is that the equation Mark = Paul + Pilate (this is my trope) doesn't add up. The Gospel of Mark doesn't appear to be simply the concrete expression of the Pauline kerygma. Apart from a couple enigmatic sentences, there is little emphasis on the redemptive atonement which Paul holds so dear, and the level of divinity (if any such in Mark) is not the same. It therefore appears that the author of Mark may be drawing on a tradition independent of Paul. The question of whether that tradition traced back to a historical individual, and whether that person is the same one that Paul mythologized (if Paul had any human person in mind), is an open one.

OK, but: Does Paul really say that he knew Christ in the exact same respect as the pillars of Jerusalem? He does say that he has also seen the resurrected Christ, but that is not the same claim.

And, do we trust Paul to point out that others might have had a more tangible connection to Christ?

I agree that later Christians would have been influenced by the mystical language of Paul. However, as I have mentioned before, it would be false to think that later Christians were purposefully omitting details about an earthly Jesus in imitation of Paul. Not that you have specifically said that, but the point is that the silence on details of an earthly Jesus is not forced. It just does not seem to be a necessary thing to bring up in a Christian epistle, even if one accepts that Jesus was a man.

best,
Peter Kirby

Ted Hoffman

This (your analogy) is different. Interest is intrinsic or immanent.

We can only judge from external facts - what was written.

From what was written, we dont get a historical person.

So we conclude he was not historical but mythological.

You say, no, maybe he was historical but these guys loved mythological language.

You are also arguing that we cant say he was mythological because the fact that people write in mythological terms might mean they werent interested in writing in historical terms.

Your argument suffers a number of weaknesses that Toto and Gregg have pointed out (the Paul versus Samuel Rutherford incongruences etc).

But worse still, you are arguing over intrinsic, unknown things. Like what they were interested in, like what they liked, like what was fashionable, like what is possible - NOT what we know happened. This makes your argument very tenuous.

What happened was that Paul wrote in mythological terms. You say that doesnt mean a damn thing (you have ducked both the historic and ahistoric position).

Well, to me, the gnostic style, mythological nature (Revelation is the best - if you are tired of Paul) point to a Christ Logos.

You have yet to demonstrate that that kind of reasoning is unsound.

Jayhawker Soule

So? To be honest, I don't see a 'there' in you therefore, i.e., 'the absence of evidence is not evidence of absense'.

Gregg

I really do apologize, Peter, this didn't come out the way I meant it to.

No, what I was trying to say is that this particular post seemed so unlike you. I was genuinely surprised that you, given what I know about you and your familiarity with the mythicist case, would make an argument like this, and I thought that perhaps you were just being facetious, or deliberately throwing out a rather strained analogy in order to generate some discussion (which you certainly got).

I mean, I think comparing Rutherford to Paul is an interesting and legitimate exercise, but that's about as far as it goes. In the end it really doesn't tell us much, since these two men were writing in such vastly different historical contexts.

I was also suprised at your rejoinder to one poster who argued that in the earliest Christian correspondence we don't find any historical or biographical data about Jesus, but then later we find piles of it. You stated that you had just "disproved" this claim with your post about Rutherford. But come on, Peter. You know very well that the poster was talking about the entire body of Christian literature from the 2nd c. onward (after the gospels became common knowledge and people began to take them literally), not about individual writings. And you certainly know very well that you don't "disprove" this claim by quoting one 17th c. writer. All you've shown is that not ALL post 2nd c. writings talk about Jesus as a historical person, which, I'm sure, the poster never meant to imply in the first place.

Again, Peter, I'm sorry that my remark came off the way it did. But I also have to say, I honestly find some of the statements you've made in this thread to be out of character for you.

Gregg

Bede

With respect to the others on this thread, I think Peter's only point is that the argument from the silence of Paul's letters is a weak one. In this he is correct. There are dozens of explanations for that silence and some have been explored here, but on its own it tells us very little. Given that many mythicists start their case with Paul's silence and then go on to explain it by postulating that Jesus did not exist, his example is a valid counter to the idea that Paul's silence logically leads to the mythicist thesis.

On the other hand, he is not claiming, IMO, that other possible reasons for Paul saying nothing much about the earthly Jesus (and he did say rather more than mythicists are usually ready to credit), on their own, invalidate the mythicist case.

Yours

Bede

Bede's Library - faith and reason

Gregg

Well, Peter, I certainly don't. And this is a pretty strong conclusion to reach based on one page of posts. Your original post was related to the argument from silence, so that is what I addressed. I know that you're intimately familiar with the MJ case. You know that I'm intimately familiar with the MJ case. Do I have to repeat the entire MJ case every time I reply to one of your posts? (And before you say that I've just made your argument for you, please keep in mind that the argument from silence encompasses the ENTIRE BODY of 1st c Christian correspondence, and that the epistle writers had many reasons to bring up the historical Jesus at least once in a while in their letters--see below.)
I'm sorry, but I just can't help but find this mind-boggling. God (or the Logos, if you want to split hairs) comes to earth as a little bitty baby, grows into a child prodigy, becomes a popular preacher, eats a sacred meal with his disciples in which he initiates an important Christian ritual, causes a ruckus in the Temple courtyard that gets him arrested, is tortured and crucified, and supposedly walks out of his grave and talks to his friends before going into the sky. And all of this happened just 20 years ago, and many of the people who were there are still alive. And, except for brief references to the Last Supper and the appearances (and of course plenty of references to the suffering, crucifixion, and resurrection, but all of them drawn from the Jewish scriptures, not from eyewitness testimony) no one wants to write about it. I mean, OK, they don't have to repeat the whole story every time they exchange letters. But you know, just a quick reference to a particularly memorable incident in the life of God? A direct quote from Jesus on a contentious point of doctrine? A rebuke to Christians who were claiming that Christ never came in the flesh, along the lines of "They wanna say that to Peter's face?" An "Oh, by the way, Jesus' mum sends her love" ?

However, as I said, the argument from silence alone does not persuade me. The entire mythicist case is what persuades me. Given what we know about the philosophical and religious ideas that were prevalent in Paul's day, a historical Jesus really isn't necessary to explain the origins of Christianity. It could have emerged quite easily without one. So, why is it so important to postulate some shadowy figure back there, who was somehow charismatic enough to attract a considerable number of followers (who were so impressed by him and so devastated by his loss that they started believing--maybe after one of them had a vision--that he was the incarnate Logos, that he'd risen from the dead, and that he was now part of the Godhead), somehow controversial enough to draw the attention of both Jewish and Roman authorities and be sentenced to crucifixion, and yet somehow lived a life so obscure and forgettable that he escaped being mentioned by any chroniclers of the era (except for Josephus in those two hotly debated passages), and even his own followers didn't bother to write down anything about it until 30 some odd years later?

Gregg

Gregg

I don't know who's claiming that the argument from silence is the entire mythicist case, Bede, because I'm certainly not. I can't help it if the argument from silence is what most HJers want to discuss. As I mention in another post in reply to Peter, do I have to repeat the entire mythicist case every time I post? Both of you are focusing your attacks on the argument from silence (I assume because you feel that this is the weakest part of the MJ case), leaving MJer's little choice but to respond in defense of the argument from silence--then you claim that our only argument for the MJ case is the argument from silence.

I think your assessment of the argument from silence as "weak" is entirely subjective, but leaving that aside, no one here is claiming that that AFS is the be-all and end-all of the mythicist case. It just seems to be the aspect of the case that HJers most want to discuss.I agree that this isn't what Peter is saying.

And as to Paul saying more about the earthly Jesus than MJers are "ready to credit," well, don't count me among the timid. Put these passages up and let's talk about them.

Gregg

Clutch

I thought it was pretty clear that Peter argued that Rutherford is a clear case of someone who believed in a historical Jesus and yet who wrote lots of metaphorical stuff about Jesus. Rutherford therefore counts as a disproof of premise (1) in the following inference:

(1) S has historical knowledge of J --> (S writes about J --> S reveals or discusses many historical details about J)

(2) Paul writes about Jesus & does not reveal many historical details about Jesus.

(3) Not-(Paul writes about Jesus --> Paul reveals many historical details about Jesus) (Logical equivalent to 2)

(4) Not-(Paul has historical knowledge of Jesus) (1,3, modus tollens)

But nobody ever thought -- correct me if I'm wrong, of course -- that (1) holds as a general law. Presumably there were supposed to be a bunch of things special to Paul's situation that made it plausible (like, that he didn't live in a culture where everyone already believed "There was a man named Jesus who was God"). And even at that, the arrows could not represent logical entailment but are surely more of the "you'd expect that" variety.

If the point is now just supposed to be that the silence argument can hardly carry the day on its own, then (i) I agree completely and (ii) what's the point of the analogy to Rutherford, given the powerful disanalogies between Rutherford and Paul?