dogsgod
Well-Known Member
Yes, the arguments as to what he was and whether he physically existed or not varied a great deal. It's nothing new.
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Why do we know so little about Jesus?
- Thread starter Terrywoodenpic
- Start date
Yes, the arguments as to what he was and whether he physically existed or not varied a great deal. It's nothing new.
Dogsgod, before you make yourself appear even more foolish to those familiar with gnosticism, you should be aware of the tenets of various gnostic currents. Some believed the earthly Jesus only appeared human. Some believe the "christ" spirit deserted the "man" Jesus at his death, and so forth. None denied that jesus walked around 1st century palestine teaching, preaching, healing, etc. In other words, none of them thought he only existed as some "sky god" or early mythic god like Zeus.
Also, you have yet to reply to my response on your rather pathetic attempt to limit all of the historical arguments for Jesus to one line from Paul, or to an argument from authority. I understand this is difficult for you, as you lack both the knowledge and the sources, but not even an attempt? Finally, it is a sign of desperation when you have to look to late 2nd and 3rd century sources to contradict the ones far earlier, and far closer to Jesus.
Tell you what. When you know enough to respond rationally to some of the least of the arguments in favor of Jesus' historicity (repeated below), then you might be taken seriously:
1. Sociological study of cults/sects and their leaders (which show that a historical Jesus is necessary to explain the Jesus sect)
2. The studies showing that the gospels fall into the genre of ancient history
3. The importance in Paul, and the gospels, on traditions passed along by "eyewitnesses," which is odd as these same sources (at least the gospels) don't place the events in the distant past.
4. The fact that the first "life" of Jesus was nailed down to a particular place and time, unlike any myth, but very much like the lives of historical figures (who were often credited with miracles or even miraculous births). And the author, if he wasn't alive when Jesus died, was certainly around shortly after.
5. Numerous early and independent documents attesting to Jesus' existence.
6. Zero records of any "christ cult" prior to Paul
7. The largely unchallenged fact that Josephus did mention Jesus in an altered passage, and the virtual unanimity that Josephus did mention James as the brother of Jesus, called christ.
Also, you have yet to reply to my response on your rather pathetic attempt to limit all of the historical arguments for Jesus to one line from Paul, or to an argument from authority. I understand this is difficult for you, as you lack both the knowledge and the sources, but not even an attempt? Finally, it is a sign of desperation when you have to look to late 2nd and 3rd century sources to contradict the ones far earlier, and far closer to Jesus.
Tell you what. When you know enough to respond rationally to some of the least of the arguments in favor of Jesus' historicity (repeated below), then you might be taken seriously:
1. Sociological study of cults/sects and their leaders (which show that a historical Jesus is necessary to explain the Jesus sect)
2. The studies showing that the gospels fall into the genre of ancient history
3. The importance in Paul, and the gospels, on traditions passed along by "eyewitnesses," which is odd as these same sources (at least the gospels) don't place the events in the distant past.
4. The fact that the first "life" of Jesus was nailed down to a particular place and time, unlike any myth, but very much like the lives of historical figures (who were often credited with miracles or even miraculous births). And the author, if he wasn't alive when Jesus died, was certainly around shortly after.
5. Numerous early and independent documents attesting to Jesus' existence.
6. Zero records of any "christ cult" prior to Paul
7. The largely unchallenged fact that Josephus did mention Jesus in an altered passage, and the virtual unanimity that Josephus did mention James as the brother of Jesus, called christ.
dogsgod
Well-Known Member
"Numerous early and independent documents attesting to Jesus' existence." How pathetic.
Dunemeister
Well-Known Member
Yeah, you just gotta despise those who deal with empirical evidence rather than adhere stubbornly to uninformed a priori assumptions.
Dunemeister
Well-Known Member
The issue back then wasn't his existence. ALL HANDS, INCLUDING EARLY PAGAN AND JEWISH CRITICS OF CHRISTIANITY AGREED THAT JESUS HAD EXISTED. The question was what to make of him. Some pagans (what today we call "gnostic Christians") thought that a perfectly good God couldn't have incarnated himself -- notice the stringent adherence to an a priori assumption. Therefore, he couldn't have been physical but only seemed to be physical. But those pagans would still say "Of course Jesus existed."
The problem (at least for you) is that these ancient pagans who questioned the corporeality of Jesus would still answer "yes" to these questions:
"Did Jesus feed the 5000?"
"Did Jesus gather disciples and give them a mission?"
"Did Jesus teach <insert doctrine>?"
"Did Jesus <insert miracle here>?"
There was dispute about his corporeality. So in effect some people thought he was an angel, not a flesh-and-blood human being. So equating these positions with your own (that Jesus never existed in any form, angelic or human) is disingenuous and so misleading as to be false.
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Well, I've already detailed Paul:
1. You yourself have pointed out Paul's metaphorical use of "brothers in the lord." Yet he used the syntactical form (a genitive construction) to refer to James as the brother "of the lord." There is no evidence anywhere of Price's "special community called brothers of the lord" and several other independent sources also say Jesus had a brother named James.
2. Paul says Jesus was crucified, a roman execution. Now, the romans had Judaea for sometime, but it was only AFTER Herod the great that they really took charge. That makes it much more difficult to assert that a Jews would be crucified, as Paul says Jesus was, in some distant past.
3. Paul refers to Jesus' birth, his death, his meal, his teachings, his being "according to the flesh," "of the seed of david" and so forth. Hardly a purely "spiritual" being who was never on earth.
That's one source.
Josephus:
Virtually no one questions the shorter references, which is the one mentioning James. So even if you completely throw out the longer reference, you are still left with Josephus mentioning James, as Jesus' brother, and James was Josephus' contemporary.
The Synoptics: Mark at least was written while people who were living in Jerusalem and Galilee were still around. Mark himself was born, if not before Jesus died, then close to it. And he nails Jesus down to a specific time and place, which could be denied by anyone, especially the early christian communities, who we KNOW communicated (epistles), and if they thought Jesus was only a spiritual being, Mark would never have lasted, let alone Luke and Matthew.
John: John is an independent source, and while he throws in a great deal of his own theology, he independently confirms many aspects of the synoptics, as well as names his source as being a disciple of Jesus.
The other epistles, like Hebrews
Tacitus: Tacitus' WRITEING is late, but he was a young man when the christians were first starting
Papias: Papias was active in the 1st century, and also knew disciples of Jesus
Polycarp: Same as above
Now, there are almost NO figures from ancient history with so many texts of different genres confirming their historicity.
All of these sources were either written in the first century (at least one, Paul, by Jesus' contemporary), or were written by those active in the first century. With so much communication between both christians and non-christians discussing Jesus, if no one really believed in a historical Jesus until long after Paul, you'd think we'd have at least a shred of evidence to suggest that. Instead every scrap confirms Jesus at least existed and walked the earth, forming the center of the Jesus sect.
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None so blind as those that will not see. I'm not trying to convince you. You aren't looking for answers. You don't even have a skeptical attitude. You will just deny until you are blue in the face because your faith in a mythical jesus is as great as a fundamentalists in the risen Christ.
I've asked you again and again to account for the most basic arguments for historicity, using the most skeptical accounts of the sources and transmission of the Jesus tradition.
1. You can't find any evidence that Paul used "brother of the Lord" metaphorically, as he specifically uses a different syntax to refer to metaphorical brothers, and you can't find any evidence of some group known as "brothers of the lord" who were clearly metaphorical. The simplest reason to say "brother of the lord" is that James was his brother. Your "metaphorical" nonsense is just wishful thinking.
2. You can't account for why their are so many sources so early about Jesus, more than all but a handful of ancient people.
3. You can't account for how the sect started in the first place without the sect's founder.
4. You claim Paul never places Jesus in recent times, yet he says Jesus was crucified, which DOES place Jesus in recent times
5. You can't account for the similarity between the gospels and other ancient historical works, and the dissimilarity between the gospels and greco-roman myth, primarily because you haven't read them.
6. You can't support your theory of that early christians thought christ never walked on earth (even the later gnostics knew he was on earth), because we know the christian communities communicated and yet people who were still living in Jesus' day were being told about his mision in Galilee and Jerusalem by Mark. Not only do we have no evidence of anyone denying he existed, but why would the early christians not dismiss Mark as fiction? That's why REAL myths are set in times long, long ago. No one can say whether they happened or not.
The mythicists don't fail because they are so skeptical of the historicity of the gospels. Bultmann, Mack, and others believe they are almost wholly creations of a garbled tradition. The central reason the mythicists fail is because they can't account for the documented development of christianity without the founder. That's how sects work. You can create a cult around a mythic figure like Apollo, because your foundation story takes place in a time when no one was around. Who can refute it? Sects don't work like that. They have founders, and every christian text points to Jesus. Without him, you can't account for christianity.
And that's without arguments about Paul knowing James, without Josephus, without the general reliability of the gospels, without Papias or Polycarb, without a controlled oral tradition, without the other epistles, etc.
Exactly. Had you actually been familiar with the last 2 centuries of critical scholarship, you would know how critical various scholars have been of the gospels historicity. Yet they all realize that without Jesus, you can't explain how the sect started and developed in the way that it did. Apart from all the other evidence, that is the biggest failing point for the mythicist argument, and why no ancient historians (apart from 2 or 3 in the last century) buy it.
opcorn:
Dunemeister
Well-Known Member
The thing is I don't respond to dogsgod for his sake. It is quite clear he is not interested in evidence. Why else would he commit himself to online source over and above scholarship? But this is a public forum. I don't like the idea of others thinking his web links are representative of actual scholarship, or that they are plausible methods of accounting for the sources.
dogsgod
Well-Known Member
Your tired appeals to scholarship are absurd. They're an excuse to cover for your lack of reasoning skills along with the ability to assess information, and quite frankly I'm bored of your same old nonsense. I don't care what you believe, if it gives you comfort to believe ancient Jewish mythologies are actual historical accounts then who am I to try and be reasonable with you. Believe what you want, I really don't care.
Dunemeister
Well-Known Member
Dunemeister
Well-Known Member
Right. Appeals to the people who are more than anybody in the position to render a verdict are "tired." How right you are. Instead, we should rely on a select group of websites.
I already gave you the most basic support for the historical Jesus, discounting loads of other evidence. When you can come can address these points, let me know:
Translation: "I only have a handful of sources to depend on, and only 2 or three with any expertise at all, compared to hundreds, both christian and non-christian, who think my argument is pathetic. Quitting is the best option, but I should put a spin on it."
When you can show that you have read the primary sources, let alone the secondary, then maybe someone should pay attention to you.
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dogsgod
Well-Known Member
You dismiss any reasoned argument should it come from a website rather than address the argument at hand. You dismiss any scholar that does not agree with the scholars you agree with rather than address the argument itself. Credible scholars are those that see an historical Jesus and non credible scholars are those that don't, I get your point.
I don't dismiss reasoned arguments. I am arguing they are NOT reasonable, and that you think they are reasonable because you lack the requisite knowledge with which to judge. I have read classical myths and works of ancient history, as well as the studies on the genre of the gospel, so yes I reject the UNreasonable view that simply because the gospels contain unhistorical aspects means they are myths.
I dismiss Price's arguments about a hypothesized group of "brothers of the lord" because there is no evidence for it. Price simply can't hold onto his theory if Paul knew Jesus' brother, so he comes up with an alternative explanation. That's fine, but there's no evidence for it.
I reject the arguments that Josephus never mentioned Jesus, because in the line James, the brother of Jesus, the one called christ, there is no reason to suppose interpolation: christians would say "the christ" or Lord or whatever.
I reject the view that Paul never thought there was a recent earthly jesus because the manner in which he describes Jesus' death was a form of execution which could not have taken place in some distant past, and because he does occasionaly talk about "earthly" aspects of Jesus' mission and nature (according to the flesh, seed of David, eating with disciples, etc).
I reject the view that Mark was pure allegory or myth because of genre comparisons, because if christians viewed Jesus as having never preached and taught in 1st century palestine, Mark would never have been used by christian communities. Mark nails Jesus down to a specific place and time, and people were around who could say "this is bogus." Which, again, is why real myths take place in the far distant past.
I could go on. The point is, the arguments you present aren't reasonable to those who have done the research. You haven't, so you can't judge.
First, we are talking about ONE N.T. scholar, Price. Carrier comes close, as he is an ancient historian, so we'll say two for the sake of argument. Second, I don't dismiss them because they don't agree with "the scholars I agree with." I disagree on different points with virtually all NT scholars, because all those who research the historical Jesus have different takes. However, in 2+ centuries of critical inquiry, the one thing they all keep determining is that at the very least Jesus was historical. So this isn't a matter of "my scholars vs. your scholars." This is a matter of the entirety of N.T., biblical, and classical scholarship for over two centuries versus maybe half a dozen in that whole period who have found the "mythicist position" convincing.
No, credible scholars are those who have studied the field in depth required. Doherty, Wells, etc, are either not experts in anything or they are in other fields. I haven't seen anything by Carrier showing his knowledge of the Judaism of Jesus' day, which is VITAL to assessing Jesus' historicity. That leaves Price. Now, why is it that out of the thousands of PhDs in relevant fields, including non-christians (and by the way, Price is christian) you have maybe one or two who don't think that the mythicist position is without any basis?
In other words, I'm not appealing to consensus or majority. I'm noting that despite so many thousand and thousands of pages dedicated to this issue by critical scholars, virtually no one thinks the mythicist argument is anything but worthless, except for one or two relevant scholars and a whole lot of amateurs.
Finally, I don't need to depend on the scholars themselves when I've read the primary and secondary sources myself. If you weren't so religiously dedicated to your position, you might try the same. But then, you aren't actually interested in history, just your dogma.