How good is science as a religion?

[metis]

In some sense Christianity is taking Greco-Roman moral philosophy and theology and delivering it to the masses, even though they are unaware

Much more the philosophy as the Bible was eventually written in Koine Greek not long after the notable philosophers Aristotle and Plato. OTOH, the Romans and Greeks were polytheistic and were competitors to both Christianity and Judaism, so there's pretty much minimal influence in the religious realm with the exceptions of both heaven and hell that do not appear as such in the Tanakh.

 

[Five Solas]

Jesus is based on older myths. It's the gospel Jesus that is easiest to show is likely a myth

"Within the confines of what was then the Roman Empire, long before and during the dawn of Christianity, there were many dying-and-rising gods. And yes, they were gods—some even half-god, half-human, being of divine or magical parentage, just like Jesus (John 1:1-18; Matthew 1:18-25; Luke 1:26-35; Philippians 2:6-8 & Romans 8:3). And yes, they died. And were dead. And yes, they were then raised back to life; and lived on, even more powerful than before. Some returned in the same body they died in; some lived their second life in even more powerful and magical bodies than they died in, like Jesus did (1 Corinthians 15:35-50 & 2 Corinthians 5:1-10). Some left empty tombs or gravesites; or had corpses that were lost or vanished. Just like Jesus. Some returned to life on “the third day” after dying. Just like Jesus. All went on to live and reign in heaven (not on earth). Just like Jesus. Some even visited earth after being raised, to deliver a message to disciples or followers, before ascending into the heavens. Just like Jesus."

Every dying-and-rising god is different. Every death is different. Every resurrection is different. All irrelevant. The commonality is that there is a death and a resurrection. Everything else is a mixture of syncretized ideas from the borrowing and borrowed cultures, to produce a new and unique god and myth.

Not in ancient Asia. Or anywhere else. Only the West, from Mesopotamia to North Africa and Europe. There was a very common and popular mytheme that had arisen in the Hellenistic period—from at least the death of Alexander the Great in the 300s B.C. through the Roman period, until at least Constantine in the 300s A.D. Nearly every culture created and popularized one: the Egyptians had one, the Thracians had one, the Syrians had one, the Persians had one, and so on. The Jews were actually late to the party in building one of their own, in the form of Jesus Christ. It just didn’t become popular among the Jews, and thus ended up a Gentile religion. But if any erudite religious scholar in 1 B.C. had been asked “If the Jews invented one of these gods, what would it look like?” they would have described the entire Christian religion to a T. Before it even existed. That can’t be a coincidence.

The general features most often shared by all these cults are (when we eliminate all their differences and what remains is only what they share in common):

• They are personal salvation cults (often evolved from prior agricultural cults).
• They guarantee the individual a good place in the afterlife (a concern not present in most prior forms of religion).
• They are cults you join membership with (as opposed to just being open communal religions).
• They enact a fictive kin group (members are now all brothers and sisters).
• They are joined through baptism (the use of water-contact rituals to effect an initiation).
• They are maintained through communion (regular sacred meals enacting the presence of the god).
• They involved secret teachings reserved only to members (and some only to members of certain rank).
• They used a common vocabulary to identify all these concepts and their role.
• They are syncretistic (they modify this common package of ideas with concepts distinctive of the adopting culture).
• • They are mono- or henotheistic (they preach a supreme god by whom and to whom all other divinities are created and subordinate).
  • They are individualistic (they relate primarily to salvation of the individual, not the community).
  • And they are cosmopolitan (they intentionally cross social borders of race, culture, nation, wealth, or even gender).
  You might start to notice we’ve almost completely described Christianity already. It gets better. These cults all had a common central savior deity, who shared most or all these features (when, once again, we eliminate all their differences and what remains is only what they share in common):
  • They are all “savior gods” (literally so-named and so-called).
  • They are usually the “son” of a supreme God (or occasionally “daughter”).
  • They all undergo a “passion” (a “suffering” or “struggle,” literally the same word in Greek, patheôn).
  • That passion is often, but not always, a death (followed by a resurrection and triumph).
  • By which “passion” (of whatever kind) they obtain victory over death.
  • Which victory they then share with their followers (typically through baptism and communion).
  • They also all have stories about them set in human history on earth.
  • Yet so far as we can tell, none of them ever actually existed.
  • This is sounding even more like Christianity, isn’t it? Odd that. Just mix in the culturally distinct features of Judaism that it was syncretized with, such as messianism, apocalypticism, scripturalism, and the particularly Jewish ideas about resurrection—as well as Jewish soteriology, cosmology, and rituals, and other things peculiar to Judaism, such as an abhorrence of sexuality and an obsession with blood atonement and substitutionary sacrifice—and you literally have Christianity fully spelled out. Before it even existed.
    
    Osiris
    Dionysus
    Inanna
    Zalmoxis
    Romulus
    Asclepius
    Baal
    Hercules
  • Dying-and-Rising Gods: It's Pagan, Guys. Get Over It. • Richard Carrier

You are simply not convincing. You're will not sway my view because as a Christian my presupposition is that historical biblical accounts are reliable and trustworthy.
That is where I stand. But you keep throwing this radical nonsense at me. You are wasting your time and chances are 99.99999% that you are completely wrong and out of touch with the academic reality of this topic.


Listen! I am losing my patience with you now. The Christ myth theory is rejected as a fringe theory by virtually all scholars of antiquity, and mythicist views are criticized in terms of methodologies, conclusions, and outdated comparisons with mythology.

Please see what the scholars say about this: (I.e. that confirms what I tell you --- even scholars that you sometimes abuse to support your weird ideas.)

Van Voorst, Robert E. (2000). Jesus Outside the New Testament: An Introduction to the Ancient Evidence. Eerdmans p. 9;

Van Voorst, Robert E. (2003). "Nonexistence Hypothesis". In James Leslie Houlden (ed.). Jesus in History, Thought, and Culture: An Encyclopedia. Vol. 2: pp. 658–660

Ehrman, Bart D. (April 25, 2012). "Fuller Reply to Richard Carrier". The Bart Ehrman Blog.

Burridge, Richard A.; Gould, Graham (2004). Jesus Now and Then. William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company.

Casey, Maurice (2014). Jesus: Evidence and Argument or Mythicist Myths?. Bloomsbury T & T Clark.

Ehrman, Bart D (2012). Did Jesus Exist?: The Historical Argument for Jesus of Nazareth. HarperOne.

Ehrman, Bart D. (1999). The New Testament: A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings.


Ehrman, for example. He says, "the real problem with Jesus" is not the mythicist stance that he is "a myth invented by Christians", but that he was "far too historical", that is, a first-century Palestine Jew, who was not like the Jesus preached and proclaimed today. And also: "Jesus was a first-century Jew, and when we try to make him into a twenty-first-century American we distort everything he was and everything he stood for."

So, please stop abusing Ehrman

Ehrman, Bart D (2013), Did Jesus Exist?: The Historical Argument for Jesus of Nazareth (First HarperCollins paperback ed.).


About Doherty Ehrman says, he "quotes professional scholars at length when their views prove useful for developing aspects of his argument, but he fails to point out that not a single of these scholars agrees with his overarching thesis. Ehrman has also criticized Doherty for misquoting scholarly sources as if in support of his celestial being-hypothesis, whereas those sources explicitly "[refer] to Christ becoming a human being in flesh on earth—precisely the view he rejects."

See:

Hagner, Donald A. (2011), "The Jewish Quest and Jewish-Christian Relations", in Holmén, Tom; Porter, Stanley E. (eds.), Handbook for the Study of the Historical Jesus (4 Vols), BRILL


Be educated: The Mainstream view is this:

Jesus should be understood in the Palestinian and Jewish context of the first century CE. Most of the NT themes on Jesus have Jewish origins and are elaborations of these themes. Roman-era Judaism refused "to worship any deities other than the God of Israel," including "any of the adjutants of the biblical God, such as angels, messiahs, etc." The Jesus-devotion which emerged in early Christianity should therefore be regarded as a specific, Christian innovation in the Jewish context.

See these sources that confirm the mainstream view:

Evans, Craig A. (2004), "The New Quest for Jesus and the New Research on the Dead Sea Scrolls", in Schmidt, Andreas (ed.), Jesus, Mark and Q, A&C Black

Hagner, Donald A. (2011), "The Jewish Quest and Jewish-Christian Relations", in Holmén, Tom; Porter, Stanley E. (eds.), Handbook for the Study of the Historical Jesus (4 Vols), BRILL

Bernier, Jonathan (2016), The Quest for the Historical Jesus after the Demise of Authenticity: Toward a Critical Realist Philosophy of History in Jesus Studies, Bloomsbury Publishing

 

[joelr]

You are simply not convincing. You're will not sway my view because as a Christian my presupposition is that historical biblical accounts are reliable and trustworthy.

This has nothing to do with the discussion. I do not care what a fundamentalist believes. You can believe in Bob Lazars Area 51 stories, Osirus, Islam and whatever else. I will explain, with the available facts why this is probably false.
ANY presupposition that is not supported first (then it wouldn't be a presupposition) by empirical evidence and a set of reasonable facts is already wrong. The idea that it's correct "on chance" or because you want it to be is the absolute worst way to find truth. You can waste your time with unsupported fantasy, I do not care.

It's an open forum. I'm speaking up for rational and critical thinking and people interested in that and introducing some areas of study that they can research for themselves and decide.
Fundamentalists do not do that and they will not do that. They are usually locked into a belief (just like Islam) and will use cognitive bias to remain there.

That is where I stand. But you keep throwing this radical nonsense at me. You are wasting your time and chances are 99.99999% that you are completely wrong and out of touch with the academic reality of this topic.

When you say things like this it just allows me to realize I'm definitely on the right track. I've posted actual scholarship, all peer-reviewed and often the consensus in the field. When you try to diminish it like this and have not addressed ONE single point except to google some reviews to Carriers book I know you have nothing of substance to add and are just making personal attacks.
The only 99% happening here is that is about the number of points raised by me you have actually responded to.

And I said mythicism doesn't matter. Ehrman and all historians consider Jesus to have been fully human and the Gospels are a mythology using Greek/Persian/Jewish theology. Carrier believes mythicism is 3 to 1 so he doesn't claim it's definitely true either.

Listen! I am losing my patience with you now. The Christ myth theory is rejected as a fringe theory by virtually all scholars of antiquity, and mythicist views are criticized in terms of methodologies, conclusions, and outdated comparisons with mythology.

Your patience is no no concern to me. I did address every single point, review and comment and used scholarship. So your patience is probably frustration at how much your religion is looking to be complete fiction.
All of these scholars are posting BEFORE CARRIERS BOOK and BEFORE LATASTERS BOOK CAME OUT. Mythicism was fringe then and Carrier was also surprised when he began the research project.
I also listed 26 PhD scholars who now support mythicism. This has all happened since Carrier's book came out.

But Mythicism DOESN'T MATTER?? It's a debate for scholars in the field. All of the scholars you listed in this post believed in a historical Jesus who was preaching Hillelite Judaism and was a human. The gospels are still a myth to all of them. And yes Rabbi Hillel was preaching all the stuff accredited to Jesus, BEFORE JESUS.
Hillel the Elder - Wikipedia

Please see what the scholars say about this: (I.e. that confirms what I tell you --- even scholars that you sometimes abuse to support your weird ideas.)

Van Voorst, Robert E. (2000). Jesus Outside the New Testament: An Introduction to the Ancient Evidence. Eerdmans p. 9;

Van Voorst, Robert E. (2003). "Nonexistence Hypothesis". In James Leslie Houlden (ed.). Jesus in History, Thought, and Culture: An Encyclopedia. Vol. 2: pp. 658–660

Ehrman, Bart D. (April 25, 2012). "Fuller Reply to Richard Carrier". The Bart Ehrman Blog.

Burridge, Richard A.; Gould, Graham (2004). Jesus Now and Then. William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company.

Casey, Maurice (2014). Jesus: Evidence and Argument or Mythicist Myths?. Bloomsbury T & T Clark.

Ehrman, Bart D (2012). Did Jesus Exist?: The Historical Argument for Jesus of Nazareth. HarperOne.

Ehrman, Bart D. (1999). The New Testament: A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings.

27 scholars now find mythicism plausible
List of Historians Who Take Mythicism Seriously • Richard Carrier


Ehrman on Historicity Recap • Richard Carrier Carrier/Ehrman exchange

But yes I've read some of this and I've read the exchange between Carrier and Ehrman. The final exchange was here and was from Carrier - Ehrman's Dubious Replies (Round Two) • Richard Carrier
Carrier debunked Ehrmans points fairly well and he called out some mistakes. Now Ehrman will not do a live debate. Hmmm?


"Conclusion
In the end Ehrman ducks behind the “it was just a pop book, you shouldn’t expect it to be all accurate and the like” defense. This requires no reply. The reader can judge for themselves whether that excuse only makes the whole matter worse. (Can you imagine him accepting that excuse from any of the mythicists he attacks?) He also tries to play the victim card and claim I violated my own principle of interpretive charity. But in fact I did not. I gave him the benefit of a doubt everywhere an innocent explanation was conceivable, exactly as my principle requires (for example, I assumed that when he wrote “Justin of Tiberius” for Justus of Tiberias on p. 50 that that was a mere typo). But my principle also states (exactly as he himself quotes it) that when no such interpretation is plausible, we ought to point that out, so the author can correct their error. Which is exactly what I did.

Thus, his attempt to twist a rule of interpretive charity into a monstrous absurdity doesn’t cut it, and only exposes how poor a grasp he has of logical reasoning. Authors don’t get to say the exact opposite of what they meant and then claim it is our responsibility to telepathically know that that is what happened. Authors don’t get to say things that clearly indicate they badly mishandled their sources, and then claim we are always to assume they never do that. Authors don’t get to say things that clearly indicate they didn’t check their facts, and then claim we are always to assume they nevertheless did. Indeed, as his own quote of me says, if you cannot reconcile a contradiction or error in my work, you should call me on it so I can correct myself. Well, I called him on it."

 

[joelr]

Ehrman, for example. He says, "the real problem with Jesus" is not the mythicist stance that he is "a myth invented by Christians", but that he was "far too historical", that is, a first-century Palestine Jew, who was not like the Jesus preached and proclaimed today. And also: "Jesus was a first-century Jew, and when we try to make him into a twenty-first-century American we distort everything he was and everything he stood for."

So, please stop abusing Ehrman

Ehrman, Bart D (2013), Did Jesus Exist?: The Historical Argument for Jesus of Nazareth (First HarperCollins paperback ed.).

You don't even know the argument you are arguing against. But that seems fair since your entire belief system is based in "It's true because I say so"

I could just see if Carrier answered to this but this isn't even that hard. All modern Christians read the Gospels and Paul (the Epistles even come after the Gospels when they were written decades before) and think of the language in terms of modern day. "Heaven:" is in another dimension. No it isn't, Jewish cosmology had 7 heavens all above Earth. Yahweh lived in the top heaven, angels in a lower heaven the cosmic ocean was above it and everything else below. The lower celestial realm had perfect copies of all things on Earth including the temple. Paul even mentions the 3rd heaven.
Anyway, in the Life of Romulus, the fictional founder of Rome an Earthly biography was created fro him complete with actual Kings from Rome.
Osirus had a religion where outsiders were told of a Passion that took place on Earth with a death and resurrection also on Earth. Insiders were told the true story that Osirus was actually killed in the celestial realm. All of the mystery religions had Earthly biographies set on Earth with actual people in the story.
When people joined the religion they were told the true story that took place in the celestial realm.

The Ascension of Isaiah has a death and resurrection of Jesus in the upper realm as well.

Point is fictional biographies set on Earth with real Earth people were made ALL THE TIME in the Hellenistic influenced world of 1A.D. religions. why Ehrman doesn't know this I do not know. The sources are all in Carriers book O.H.J. and THAT is why Mark wrote a story on Earth, or at least possibly. But Ehrmans issue is ridiculous. Romulus is a fictional supernatural messiah who hangs out with real Roman people in his gospel. So that criticism by Ehrman is not a criticism.

About Doherty Ehrman says, he "quotes professional scholars at length when their views prove useful for developing aspects of his argument, but he fails to point out that not a single of these scholars agrees with his overarching thesis. Ehrman has also criticized Doherty for misquoting scholarly sources as if in support of his celestial being-hypothesis, whereas those sources explicitly "[refer] to Christ becoming a human being in flesh on earth—precisely the view he rejects."

Um........Doherty IS A MYTHICIST. He's the FIRST CREDIBLE MYTHICIST but Carrier took the theory much farther with far more evidence. All of the exchange between Ehrmn and Carrier are linked to. Ehrman has some issues with mythicism because it would invalidate his entire career.

He is still an atheist. For anyone who cares, Carrier listens to an interview by Ehrman on mythicism and points out all the misinformation and illogical statements. Judge for yourself.

The Jesus Puzzle: Did Christianity Begin with a Mythical Christ? Challenging the Existence of an Historical Jesus

by Earl Doherty (Author)
"The most compelling argument ever published in support of the theory that Jesus never existed as an historical person." --Frank Zindler, editor, American Atheist Magazine, Autumn 2000.

"Doherty has written a potential modern classic, which deserves to be widely read and discussed." --Jan Koster, Professor of Linguistics, Groningen University, The Netherlands

"I have never read such scholarship in so easy a style. You have a wonderful way of conveying complex ideas." --Judith Hayes, author of "In God We Trust...But Which God?"
https://www.amazon.com/Jesus-Puzzle-Christianity-Challenging-Historical/dp/096892591X

Be educated: The Mainstream view is this:

Jesus should be understood in the Palestinian and Jewish context of the first century CE. Most of the NT themes on Jesus have Jewish origins and are elaborations of these themes. Roman-era Judaism refused "to worship any deities other than the God of Israel," including "any of the adjutants of the biblical God, such as angels, messiahs, etc." The Jesus-devotion which emerged in early Christianity should therefore be regarded as a specific, Christian innovation in the Jewish context.

See these sources that confirm the mainstream view:

Evans, Craig A. (2004), "The New Quest for Jesus and the New Research on the Dead Sea Scrolls", in Schmidt, Andreas (ed.), Jesus, Mark and Q, A&C Black

Hagner, Donald A. (2011), "The Jewish Quest and Jewish-Christian Relations", in Holmén, Tom; Porter, Stanley E. (eds.), Handbook for the Study of the Historical Jesus (4 Vols), BRILL

Bernier, Jonathan (2016), The Quest for the Historical Jesus after the Demise of Authenticity: Toward a Critical Realist Philosophy of History in Jesus Studies, Bloomsbury Publishing

HA!
Those are not mainstream historical views because those are NOT HISTORIANS???? Your copy and paste is a hack job and you are completely lost here?
In fact Evans wrote a book about how scholars distort the Gospels. That is hilarious. Scholars actually study the text, analyze writing styles, comparative mythology, find out where the theology came from, demonstrate it's clearly written as a myth, it's doing the same as all mystery religions did - a Earthly biography but written with no author, no eyewitnesses, improbable events, no sources or explanations (like historical writing at the time does have), emulating the theology of Hellenism and Zoroastrianism and so on.....
And NT theologian apologists get all butthurt because real historians are not believing any of it and so he writes a book about how scholars (who are actually trained in literature of the period and what to look for) are not correct??? Hilarious! No, it's actually a literal reading, why?? Well because that's what his beliefs are. Is he qualified? No. Evidence? No. Why would he make such a claim? Yuup - PRESUPPOSITION.
Why do all Islamic scholars say their Quran is the only true word of God.....PRESUPPOSITION. Why are Mormon revelations from Moroni to John Smith correct? PRESUPPOSITION of course!

Not mainstream.
The specialist in Acts is R. Purvoe
Gnostic Gospels - Elaine Pagels
Synoptic Problem - GoodAcre
Moses/Patriarchs - Thompson
OT - Fransesca Stravopolou
NT - Ehrman
Jesus historicity - Carrier, Lataster
gospels, Satan - Litwa
R. Price, JD Crossan, McDonald
those are a few.
The gospels are considered mythology by all. The arguments every apologist uses are old, debunked and now ignored by scholars in the historical field.

The fact is the results of scholarship are not known among the general public.
Ehrman says this at 29:30

 

[Five Solas]

You don't even know the argument you are arguing against. But that seems fair since your entire belief system is based in "It's true because I say so"

That is a lie. This shows just how dishonest you are.

Be serious or go away.

 

[Five Solas]

This has nothing to do with the discussion. I do not care what a fundamentalist believes

I know. Why have a discussion then?

 

[joelr]

Much more the philosophy as the Bible was eventually written in Koine Greek not long after the notable philosophers Aristotle and Plato. OTOH, the Romans and Greeks were polytheistic and were competitors to both Christianity and Judaism, so there's pretty much minimal influence in the religious realm with the exceptions of both heaven and hell that do not appear as such in the Tanakh.

The Hellenistic Greeks and Persians occupied Israel for 500 years right before Christianity.
All of the theology is GReek and Persian and the later theology from Origen, Agustus, Aquinas.... is Platonic.


The Platonic ideas used by later theologians is covered here:

Christianity is monolatric the same as the Greek and Roman religions were. One supreme deity and lower divinities. Christianity has Yahweh as supreme, angels, Satan and many other supernatural beings.
Same with Greek Hellenistc religions. A supreme deity has a son/daughter, angels and a devil, that is Greek.

They were not competitors. Every different culture had a different mythology. They were not evangelistic they did their thing and it was for the local people. Greek Hellenism is where Cosmopolitinism comes from, the idea of a multi-cultured religion.

Hellenistic religion
-The temples and cult institutions of the various Hellenistic religions were repositories of the knowledge and techniques necessary for salvation and were the agents of the public worship of a particular deity. In addition, they served an important sociological role. In the new, cosmopolitan ideology that followed Alexander’s conquests, the old nationalistic and ethnic boundaries had broken down and the problem of religious and social identity had become acute.

- Particularly noticeable was the success of a variety of prophets, magicians, and healers—e.g., John the Baptist, Jesus, Simon Magus, Apollonius of Tyana, Alexander the Paphlagonian, and the cult of the healer Asclepius—whose preaching corresponded to the activities of various Greek and Roman philosophic missionaries

-the seasonal drama was homologized to a soteriology (salvation concept) concerning the destiny, fortune, and salvation of the individual after death.

-his led to a change from concern for a religion of national prosperity to one for individual salvation, from focus on a particular ethnic group to concern for every human. The prophet or saviour replaced the priest and king as the chief religious figure.

-his process was carried further through the identification of the experiences of the soul that was to be saved with the vicissitudes of a divine but fallen soul, which had to be redeemed by cultic activity and divine intervention. This view is illustrated in the concept of the paradoxical figure of the saved saviour, salvator salvandus.

-Other deities, who had previously been associated with national destiny (e.g., Zeus, Yahweh, and Isis), were raised to the status of transcendent, supreme

 

[joelr]

Be educated: The Mainstream view is this:

Not the Biblical historical field. It's what I posted.
Historicity Big and Small: How Historians Try to Rescue Jesus • Richard Carrier -excerpt
full article explains where historians are at and answers comments
-When the question of the historicity of Jesus comes up in an honest professional context, we are not asking whether the Gospel Jesus existed. All non-fundamentalist scholars agree that that Jesus never did exist. Christian apologetics is pseudo-history. No different than defending Atlantis. Or Moroni. Or women descending from Adam’s rib.

No. We aren’t interested in that.

When it comes to Jesus, just as with anyone else, real history is about trying to figure out what, if anything, we can really know about the man depicted in the New Testament (his actual life and teachings), through untold layers of distortion and mythmaking; and what, if anything, we can know about his role in starting the Christian movement that spread after his death. Consequently, I will here disregard fundamentalists and apologists as having no honest part in this debate, any more than they do on evolution or cosmology or anything else they cannot be honest about even to themselves.

Here I will summarize the best arguments for historicity and the logic behind the best case for it. And this only means mundane historicity; not the Gospel Jesus, but the Jesus of honest mainstream scholarship. I am most interested in finding out if I have left any good arguments out. So please add more in comments, if any you think remain that aren’t ridiculous and can be taken seriously by mainstream experts. Likewise if you think the logic of any argument I do present can be better formulated.

[paste:font size="3"]shibboleth is a characteristic cultural touchstone by which insiders distinguish themselves from outsiders. Jesus was constructed by different authors (both inside and outside the canon) to represent their own (or their community’s) ideal of what they wanted or needed Jesus to have been and done, so they could teach their worldview through the fabricated authority of “their” founder (who by this point was more a construct of the imagination, than the actual founder himself) and so they could test someone’s commitment to their view of things by testing their commitment to “their” account of Jesus. The Jesus of the NT is therefore not the founder of the Christian religion, but the fictional founder of one or another version of the Christian religion. The debate consuming academia now is whether from this we can reconstruct the actual founder, the real historical Jesus “behind” these various shibboleths. You will find that any (non-fundamentalist) expert on Jesus or early Christianity will agree that this is the top question still occupying their field. (For a list and discussion of several other big questions still vexing the field, see Burton Mack’s The Christian Myth.)

The mythic and rhetorical structure of the Gospels renders them, at best, extremely problematic as sources. In contrast, if we order the evidence from most to least reliable, we must start with the authentic letters of Paul. These most scholars agree are Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians, 1 Thessalonians, and maybe Philemon. From these it is apparent that before Paul “had a revelation” (i.e. in modern scientific likelihood: hallucinated, or pretended to have hallucinated, the Christ Jesus preaching a new teaching to him from beyond the grave) the Christian “community” was wholly Jewish (this is evident in Galatians 2, for example), obeying Torah laws (including dietary restrictions and circumcision), and thus Christianity was just another Jewish sect. Not uncommon in deviating from the mainstream; I survey the evidence of some ten to thirty other known sects of Judaism at the time in The Empty Tomb (pp. 107-13), almost all of which deviated from what modern observers consider “mainstream” Judaism of the time. This new sect’s “pillars” Paul says were widely recognized as being Cephas (“Peter”), James, and John, who were possibly thus called because they were its actual founders. For “pillars” would suggest it was their testimony on which the sect stood, and Paul’s evident need to “get their approval” to maintain his mission suggests all Christians everywhere looked to them as the final authorities on legitimacy.

The earliest evidence concerning the creed’s origin is in 1 Corinthians 15:3-8, which is also questioned, but however meddled with it may be, odds are it confirms at least that the movement began (as is even more plainly claimed in Romans 16:25-26) from a combination of finding “secrets” in “scripture” and recent “revelations” (i.e. dreams or hallucinations, actual or pretended) of a resurrected Jesus by the church’s first devotees. It notably does not say these revelations occurred “on the third day” but that the resurrection was said in scripture to have then occurred, and then Jesus later appeared to confirm this, which appearance may have occurred at any time; Paul doesn’t specify when.

Paul similarly says, in 1 Cor. 11:23-27 (compare 1 Cor. 15:1 and Gal. 1:11-12) that he learned of the Eucharist blessing and ritual (now called “the last supper,” but not so called by Paul) directly from Jesus (which means, by dream or hallucination, since Paul did not know Jesus alive), rather than historical or eyewitness testimony. Paul also says he introduced the version of Christianity that we now know as something distinct from Judaism (Gal. 1-2), abandoning Jewish law. It follows that a historical Jesus never taught that in life. Thus modern Christianity (being no longer “kosher,” i.e. observantly Jewish) is not based on the teachings of a historical Jesus, even if there was a historical Jesus. It is based on the pious dreams or hallucinations of Paul (or Paul’s lies thereof). The original Christian religion, a sect of Jews, continually shrank and died out within a few centuries. The “new” Christian religion, essentially founded by Paul and not Jesus, then evolved and survived to become what we now call “Christianity” (on its continual evolution and fragmentation, see David Eller’s survey in The End of Christianity). Perversely, Islam may be the only surviving fragment of the original Torah-observant Christianity (halal being an evolution of “kosher”).

This creates an even greater problem for reconstructing what role Jesus may have played in founding Christianity: how much of what is later claimed about Jesus (things he did, things he taught) is an evolution of Paul’s ideas about Jesus (or even dreams or hallucinations by Paul, or even by his congregations or successors) rather than deriving from Jesus originally? Or the ideas of other thought leaders in Christianity besides Paul? Because of data like this, attempting to reconstruct the real origins of Christianity from the Gospels (or even Acts) is next to impossible. Hence the pervasive and unresolved disagreements over this in the scholarly community, from Bart Ehrman’s “apocalyptic Jesus” to Reza Aslan’s “zealot Jesus” and everything in between, and beyond

 

[joelr]

That is a lie. This shows just how dishonest you are.

Be serious or go away.

That is presupposition. It's true because you say so? You just will it into being true? YOU SAID IT? No evidence required, you just said it?

Then explain how presupposition is not that. Use your words for something besides ad-hom attacks.

Remember any other religion can and does use the same method yet we know they are incorrect. J. Wittnesses consider all other Christians as hellbound. Presupposition. What makes yours correct and theirs not correct?

 

[joelr]

I know. Why have a discussion then?

Because I care about what is true. I care about the possibility of being challenged and learning something new. I want to learn as well. But true things. So beliefs must be warranted by reasonable evidence. I care about speaking up for things that are true and demonstrating false beliefs.
Not even beliefs but methodologies to belief.
We have recently seen belief in voter fraud, Trump as a savior figure and numerous conspiracy theories. All things that rational, critical and skeptical thinking can address. Not praying for it to change. That won't help. Religious indoctrination does not teach these skills because it will lose members.

If the person I'm debating with is stuck in false beliefs I cannot change that and likewise choose not to care. It's for people who may want to change or begin examining their beliefs in an honest and rational way. It's an open forum. Also a Harvard study demonstrated indoctrinated belief systems do not change by facts, even good facts. They have to be ready to examine beliefs in a non-bias way and open to having beliefs crushed and facing that dissapointment to move past them.

 

[joelr]

I know. Why have a discussion then?

1 Peter 3 you are supposed to defend your faith also.

 

[metis]

Same with Greek Hellenistc religions. A supreme deity has a son/daughter, angels and a devil, that is Greek.

The Greek deities all had their own "jurisdiction", which in not the case with either Judaism nor Christianity nor Islam. Prometheus was a creator-god, whereas Zeus was the top honcho.

 

[joelr]

The Greek deities all had their own "jurisdiction", which in not the case with either Judaism nor Christianity nor Islam. Prometheus was a creator-god, whereas Zeus was the top honcho.

It's exactly the case for all 3 religions. They all worship Yahweh who started out as a warrior deity and in an early Hebrew version of Deuteronomy Israel was given to him at a council of Gods by EL the most supreme God who was the Canaanite supreme deity.
Even without the early variant Yahweh was the God of Israel, not the world. He claimed that the Israelites would conquer all the world through force.
During the Greek occupation one of the attributes of Hellenism that religions picked up when they were Hellenized was local deity becomes supreme deity.
Once Origen, Agustus, Aquinas and other theologians borrowed Platonic/Greco Roman philosophy and theology for Yahweh in later centuries, Yahweh and Allah (same really) were thought of in those terms, supreme, tri-omni and so on.

Hellenistic religion
"-Other deities, who had previously been associated with national destiny (e.g., Zeus, Yahweh, and Isis), were raised to the status of transcendent, supreme"


Yahweh

Although the biblical narratives depict Yahweh as the sole creator god, lord of the universe, and god of the Israelites especially, initially he seems to have been Canaanite in origin and subordinate to the supreme god El. Canaanite inscriptions mention a lesser god Yahweh and even the biblical Book of Deuteronomy stipulates that “the Most High, El, gave to the nations their inheritance” and that “Yahweh's portion is his people, Jacob and his allotted heritage” (32:8-9). A passage like this reflects the early beliefs of the Canaanites and Israelites in polytheism or, more accurately, henotheism (the belief in many gods with a focus on a single supreme deity). The claim that Israel always only acknowledged one god is a later belief cast back on the early days of Israel's development in Canaan.

The character and power of Yahweh were codified following the Babylonian Captivity of the 6th century BCE and the Hebrew scriptures were canonized during the Second Temple Period (c. 515 BCE-70 CE) to include the concept of a messiah whom Yahweh would send to the Jewish people to lead and redeem them. Yahweh as the all-powerful creator, preserver, and redeemer of the universe was then later developed by the early Christians as their god who had sent his son Jesus as the promised messiah and Islam interpreted this same deity as Allah in their belief system.



Exodus 15:3:

Yahweh is a man of war;

Yahweh is his name.

Isaiah 42:13:

Yahweh goes forth like a mighty man;

like a man of war(s) he stirs up his fury.

Zephaniah 3:17: Yahweh, your God, is in your midst,

a warrior who gives victory.

Psalm 24:8:

Who is the King of Glory?

Yahweh, strong and mighty;

Yahweh, mighty in battle.

In these passages Yahweh is explicitly called a warrior or directly compared to a warrior. If one moves out from simple designations to actual functioning, the metaphor or image is even more
extensively present. Yahweh is the subject of many verbs that belong to the sphere of warfare.

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

It's exactly the case for all 3 religions. They all worship Yahweh who started out as a warrior deity and in an early Hebrew version of Deuteronomy Israel was given to him at a council of Gods by EL the most supreme God who was the Canaanite supreme deity.
Even without the early variant Yahweh was the God of Israel, not the world. He claimed that the Israelites would conquer all the world through force.
During the Greek occupation one of the attributes of Hellenism that religions picked up when they were Hellenized was local deity becomes supreme deity.
Once Origen, Agustus, Aquinas and other theologians borrowed Platonic/Greco Roman philosophy and theology for Yahweh in later centuries, Yahweh and Allah (same really) were thought of in those terms, supreme, tri-omni and so on.

Hellenistic religion
"-Other deities, who had previously been associated with national destiny (e.g., Zeus, Yahweh, and Isis), were raised to the status of transcendent, supreme"


Yahweh

Although the biblical narratives depict Yahweh as the sole creator god, lord of the universe, and god of the Israelites especially, initially he seems to have been Canaanite in origin and subordinate to the supreme god El. Canaanite inscriptions mention a lesser god Yahweh and even the biblical Book of Deuteronomy stipulates that “the Most High, El, gave to the nations their inheritance” and that “Yahweh's portion is his people, Jacob and his allotted heritage” (32:8-9). A passage like this reflects the early beliefs of the Canaanites and Israelites in polytheism or, more accurately, henotheism (the belief in many gods with a focus on a single supreme deity). The claim that Israel always only acknowledged one god is a later belief cast back on the early days of Israel's development in Canaan.

The character and power of Yahweh were codified following the Babylonian Captivity of the 6th century BCE and the Hebrew scriptures were canonized during the Second Temple Period (c. 515 BCE-70 CE) to include the concept of a messiah whom Yahweh would send to the Jewish people to lead and redeem them. Yahweh as the all-powerful creator, preserver, and redeemer of the universe was then later developed by the early Christians as their god who had sent his son Jesus as the promised messiah and Islam interpreted this same deity as Allah in their belief system.



Exodus 15:3:

Yahweh is a man of war;

Yahweh is his name.

Isaiah 42:13:

Yahweh goes forth like a mighty man;

like a man of war(s) he stirs up his fury.

Zephaniah 3:17: Yahweh, your God, is in your midst,

a warrior who gives victory.

Psalm 24:8:

Who is the King of Glory?

Yahweh, strong and mighty;

Yahweh, mighty in battle.

In these passages Yahweh is explicitly called a warrior or directly compared to a warrior. If one moves out from simple designations to actual functioning, the metaphor or image is even more
extensively present. Yahweh is the subject of many verbs that belong to the sphere of warfare.

You also have to include the ideas of philosophy and the influence of the Roman Empire.
Western religion is a combination of those 3 and not just the idea of God in the religious sense.

 

[joelr]

You also have to include the ideas of philosophy and the influence of the Roman Empire.
Western religion is a combination of those 3 and not just the idea of God in the religious sense.

The question I'm answering here is "isn't Yahweh different from Greek Gods because Greek Gods have a territory while Yahweh is God of everything?"
The answer is - no Yahweh also had a territory.
I don't see why you needed to add this?

 

[mikkel_the_dane]

The question I'm answering here is "isn't Yahweh different from Greek Gods because Greek Gods have a territory while Yahweh is God of everything?"
The answer is - no Yahweh also had a territory.
I don't see why you needed to add this?

Because single causal claims of complex culture can be done differently if you accept complex explanations.
Religion is either simple as in the end supernatural or complex as a part of human behavior.

 

[metis]

It's exactly the case for all 3 religions. They all worship Yahweh who started out as a warrior deity and in an early Hebrew version of Deuteronomy Israel was given to him at a council of Gods by EL the most supreme God who was the Canaanite supreme deity.
Even without the early variant Yahweh was the God of Israel, not the world. He claimed that the Israelites would conquer all the world through force.
During the Greek occupation one of the attributes of Hellenism that religions picked up when they were Hellenized was local deity becomes supreme deity.
Once Origen, Agustus, Aquinas and other theologians borrowed Platonic/Greco Roman philosophy and theology for Yahweh in later centuries, Yahweh and Allah (same really) were thought of in those terms, supreme, tri-omni and so on.

Hellenistic religion
"-Other deities, who had previously been associated with national destiny (e.g., Zeus, Yahweh, and Isis), were raised to the status of transcendent, supreme"


Yahweh

Although the biblical narratives depict Yahweh as the sole creator god, lord of the universe, and god of the Israelites especially, initially he seems to have been Canaanite in origin and subordinate to the supreme god El. Canaanite inscriptions mention a lesser god Yahweh and even the biblical Book of Deuteronomy stipulates that “the Most High, El, gave to the nations their inheritance” and that “Yahweh's portion is his people, Jacob and his allotted heritage” (32:8-9). A passage like this reflects the early beliefs of the Canaanites and Israelites in polytheism or, more accurately, henotheism (the belief in many gods with a focus on a single supreme deity). The claim that Israel always only acknowledged one god is a later belief cast back on the early days of Israel's development in Canaan.

The character and power of Yahweh were codified following the Babylonian Captivity of the 6th century BCE and the Hebrew scriptures were canonized during the Second Temple Period (c. 515 BCE-70 CE) to include the concept of a messiah whom Yahweh would send to the Jewish people to lead and redeem them. Yahweh as the all-powerful creator, preserver, and redeemer of the universe was then later developed by the early Christians as their god who had sent his son Jesus as the promised messiah and Islam interpreted this same deity as Allah in their belief system.



Exodus 15:3:

Yahweh is a man of war;

Yahweh is his name.

Isaiah 42:13:

Yahweh goes forth like a mighty man;

like a man of war(s) he stirs up his fury.

Zephaniah 3:17: Yahweh, your God, is in your midst,

a warrior who gives victory.

Psalm 24:8:

Who is the King of Glory?

Yahweh, strong and mighty;

Yahweh, mighty in battle.

In these passages Yahweh is explicitly called a warrior or directly compared to a warrior. If one moves out from simple designations to actual functioning, the metaphor or image is even more
extensively present. Yahweh is the subject of many verbs that belong to the sphere of warfare.

That doesn't go against what I wrote.

BTW, did you by chance read the summer edition of BAR that deals with the "Cult of YHWH" as it developed in the southern Arabian Peninsula and then brought north by Jewish traders? It pretty much goes along with what you posted above.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

Darwin wanted to believe in science and survival of the fittest so he did and he took the world with him down the rabbit hole.

bs

There is no "want" there.
Theists want to believe.

Scientists want to uncover what is actually true. Scientists want to follow the evidence.

Theists are the ones who have the a priori beliefs which they then super-impose on reality. It's theism that pretends to have the answers before even asking the questions. It's theism that tries to draw the bullseye around the arrow.

Science does not. Science moves where the evidence points to. Wherever that my lead.

You don't like where the evidence leads - we get it.

Just be honest about it.

If it weren't Darwin someone else would have dreamed it up.

Nothing was "dreamed up". Evolution was concluded from the data.

Now we have an economy without morals that answers to Greed. It runs on inefficiency and waste because profits are no longer dependent on building a better mousetrap but on using employees, suppliers, and customers. If you run short then call up your favorite government official to change the rules in your favor.

Capitalism is based on competition and this includes competition for capital. No such competition exists any longer.

Capitalism has nothing to do with morality.
Business can act in moral ways and they can act in immoral ways.
Businesses can be greedy and they can not be.

There's nothing in "capitalism" that dictates that it has to be one or the other.

Morality pertains to behavior of moral agents, in this case humans.
There is nothing moral or immoral in making a bundle if you sell a product and have a lot of success.

Except that most believers in science already have every answer.

This is just empty meaningless rhetoric that is neither here nor there.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

I was not referring to science and specifically said so.

I was referring to those who hold it as a belief system, most of whom call themselves "skeptics". I was referring to the many people who believe they know everything because they saw it in a book or know some expert they can eMail.

Who are these people?

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

No. It is not.

Metaphysics is far more complex than some silly flow chart. Many of these silly flowcharts now days even include "Peer review" as though experiment or truth can't exist until it sanctioned by just the right people.

Peer review only exist because no scientist's claims are taken at face value.
One doesn't do "blind trust" in science. So you don't trust another's results, tests, conclusions.
So before you accept them, your review their work and try to find holes in it. And that's just the first hurdle to get published. After publications, it gets "peer reviewed" by thousands of others also.

That's the thing in science. You don't trust people.
So you review their work, double check their results, repeat their experiments, etc.

This is why science works. It's built from the ground up to remove human bias.