Carrier at SBL

[manoj]

From Carrier's blog:

The big news is that I’ve been asked by the Society of Biblical Literature (the largest academic society representing the field, of which I am a member) to present and defend the thesis of On the Historicity of Jesus at their Western Regional Conference at Azusa Pacific University next Monday (program here). Notably, Dennis McDonald’s fascinating Homeric emulation thesis will get the same treatment the morning of Monday March 9, and then mine that afternoon.

http://freethoughtblogs.com/carrier/archives/6803
https://www.sbl-site.org/assets/pdfs/Me ... rogram.pdf

If anyone here is planning to attend, please consider putting together a write-up for the rest of us! Probably unlikely, but thought I'd ask.

[Peter Kirby]

Not actually of the SBL event, but the other thread here has a write-up of a talk on Wednesday and some comments regarding that SBL conference.

http://www.earlywritings.com/forum/view ... f=3&t=1397

[Peter Kirby]

In other news, now we also have a retrospective on the debate in Azusa:

http://freethoughtblogs.com/carrier/archives/6917

[Peter Kirby]

In other news, now we also have a retrospective on the debate in Azusa:

http://freethoughtblogs.com/carrier/archives/6917

And a different perspective:

http://simonjjoseph.blogspot.com/2015/0 ... eport.html

In the end, the audience asked questions, nothing was resolved, and we all went home.

[Peter Kirby]

We also meet our old friend here.

http://www.earlywritings.com/forum/view ... 301&p=4341

ARGUMENT FROM MULTIPLE CONSENSUS
(1) There's a consensus about the historicity of Jesus.
(2) There's also a consensus about the authenticity of Pauline letters, the dating of the Gospels, and other things.
(3) Controverting one consensus is bad enough, but trying to controvert several is crazy.
(4) Therefore, Jesus existed.

http://simonjjoseph.blogspot.com/2015/0 ... eport.html

Carrier was clearly aware that he was not preaching to the choir. He summarized his central thesis - that Jesus originated as a celestial myth about a crucified dying-and-rising savior god. According to Carrier, "Jesus" never existed except as an imaginary celestial being who telepathically communicated and appeared to hallucinating “disciples.” The figure of “Jesus” was then historicized via a process known as “Euhemerization.” Carrier assumes a formidable burden of proof in arguing against the consensus of scholarship on multiple fronts. He dismisses Josephus’ references to Jesus. He reads Paul’s Jesus as exclusively celestial. He denies that Jesus had a brother named James. He dismisses the Gospels as historically useless. He denies the existence of Q. He dismisses the criteria of authenticity as completely invalid. And he claims to have found evidence for a pre-Christian Jewish celestial Dying Messiah tradition. Any one of these contested claims – if established - would alone be a significant contribution to scholarship. But to combine them all at once while calling for a fundamental paradigm shift in Jesus Research and historical methodology is to court controversy and, well, rejection.

I actually think that the "Proofs that Jesus Existed" should be required reading for everyone talking about this subject. It's short, sweet, to-the-point, and seems to have grabbed just about every argument ever made for the existence of Jesus (although you're welcome to extend the list if you know of more). Some of them are still usable without gross logical error, but not many.

(PS -- I realize that Simon J. Joseph may not have intended the paragraph as a formal argument. It's certainly not explicitly presented as one.)

[Peter Kirby]

criticized Carrier’s use of “relatively obscure texts” (like the Ascension of Isaiah and Philo)

If Philo of Alexandria and the Ascension of Isaiah are considered "relatively obscure texts," that's hardly to be considered a fault of Carrier. Seems much more like a fault of Waters. Pretty amazing quote, actually, particularly when applied to Philo. I wonder whether any scholars of Philo in the audience were a little hurt. Even the Ascension of Isaiah is difficult to consider obscure, especially when Andrew Criddle has recently presented evidence here that it was quoted in the 2nd/3rd century text Acts of Peter as being words of a "prophet." You don't get to be a prophetic text by being irrelevant or obscure.

Or is this code for "not in the Bible," and therefore not theologically important? No, it couldn't be that. I shouldn't have said it.

[Peter Kirby]

I actually have viewed the "multiple fronts" of controversy to be a bit of a strength at times, rather than a liability. But you have to consider it while throwing away the whole "Simon says" attitude that what the consensus says is of great weight. What you really get, then, is an opportunity to probe the alternative presented from multiple angles, some of which might have a lot more direct evidence than the ontological status of Jesus. Such as the synoptic problem, for example. Or the Josephus passages. For those two particular questions, I started out very firmly believing in "Q" and in "Josephus' references to Jesus" (some of you might not have had this experience but "Q" was in my high school textbooks!), but after interaction with the work of scholars such as Mark Goodacre and Ken Olson, I came to shed my belief in these ideas, even to reject them. It is because of this interaction with these thorny problems and my particular conclusions regarding them that I am more receptive, not less, to work that builds on this scholarship that is not in the mainstream. As far as I'm concerned, the mainstream has taken a convenient nap on these issues, and I am not overly concerned about when exactly they will wake up.

[andrewcriddle]

criticized Carrier’s use of “relatively obscure texts” (like the Ascension of Isaiah and Philo)

If Philo of Alexandria and the Ascension of Isaiah are considered "relatively obscure texts," that's hardly to be considered a fault of Carrier. Seems much more like a fault of Waters. Pretty amazing quote, actually, particularly when applied to Philo. I wonder whether any scholars of Philo in the audience were a little hurt. Even the Ascension of Isaiah is difficult to consider obscure, especially when Andrew Criddle has recently presented evidence here that it was quoted in the 2nd/3rd century text Acts of Peter as being words of a "prophet." You don't get to be a prophetic text by being irrelevant or obscure.

Or is this code for "not in the Bible," and therefore not theologically important? No, it couldn't be that. I shouldn't have said it.

One possible constructive response to Richard Carrier's book would be increased discussion of the potential importance of works such as the Ascension of Isaiah for understanding early Christian belief.

Andrew Criddle

[Bernard Muller]

Even the Ascension of Isaiah is difficult to consider obscure, especially when Andrew Criddle has recently presented evidence here that it was quoted in the 2nd/3rd century text Acts of Peter as being words of a "prophet.

But what are the odds that AoI (even in a version chosen by mythicists) would be available in the 30's or 40's or 50's (or at least representative of early Christianity beliefs then)? Close to zero, in my views.
http://historical-jesus.info/100.html

Cordially, Bernard

[Bernard Muller]

Peter Kirby wrote:
In other news, now we also have a retrospective on the debate in Azusa:

http://freethoughtblogs.com/carrier/archives/6917

On this blog post:

Waters also incorrectly gave in his handout the translation of Romans 1:3 as “descended from David,” even though the Greek says no such thing. It says Jesus was made (using the same exact word Paul used of the making of Adam and the making of our future resurrection bodies) from the sperm of David. Not from the sperm of a descendent of David. Or anything of the kind.

"descended" from David is what exactly what "seed" means when applied to human origin according to (from http://historical-jesus.info/70.html) (emphasis mine):

>> (the same kind of inference Paul makes in Gal. 3.13-4.29, where he infers Jesus is also the 'seed of Abraham' also spoken of in scripture).

My note:
Gal 3:16 "Now to Abraham and his seed ['sperma'] were the promises made. He said not, And to seeds, as of many; but as of one, And to your seed ['sperma'], which is Christ."
It is clear here that Paul did not use the word "seed" to indicate "sperm", but "descendant".

Ro 11:1 "I say then, Has God cast away his people? God forbid. For I also am an Israelite, of the seed ['sperma'] of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin."
2Cor 11:22 "Are they Hebrews? *I* also. Are they Israelites? *I* also. Are they seed ['sperma'] of Abraham? *I* also"
The same goes here. Certainly Paul did not pretend to have been conceived (according to the flesh!) with a sperm from Abraham. He simply indicated his belief he was a descendant of Abraham (like many others).

Therefore Carrier's literal interpretation of "seed" = "sperm" in Romans 1:3 is rather stupid, as "corrected" in the RSV:
"the gospel concerning his Son, who was descended from David ["become from David's seed"] according to the flesh"

Sperms were not discovered and observed before 1677. So there is no way that 'sperma' could be translated by "sperm" (the same goes for Romans 1:3). This is a minor point, because 'sperma' can also mean "semen". Regardless, Carrier's translation cannot be right.

About translations, I checked 20 of them for 2 Samuel 7:12 (from the Hebrew 'zera') and for Romans 1:3 (from the Greek), and none of them has "sperm" (or "semen") for 'zera' or 'sperma'. Most translations have "seed", offspring(s), descendant(s), etc. My question: from where did Carrier get his "sperms", except from his own biased imagination?

Without considering 2 Samuel 7:12, there are eight occurrences of 'zera' (all of them showing as 'sperma' in the LXX) in 1 Samuel & 2 Samuel: 1 Samuel 1:11, 2:20, 8:15, 20: 42 (twice) & 24:21 2 Samuel 4:8, 22:51.
None of them can be translated, according to the context, as "sperm" or "semen". Why would that be different for 2 Samuel 7:12?
In the LXX:
- 'sperma' means "semen" only nine times (once in Genesis (38:4) and eight times in Leviticus (15:16,17,18,32, 18:20,21, 19:20 & 22:4)).
- Out of the two hundred & two verses where 'sperma' occurs, it means descendant(s) in around three quarters of them, in twenty-five different books (other meanings are either "semen" (as previously mentioned) or plant seed).
- 'sperma' means descendant(s) of David in seven verses (1 Samuel 20:42, 24:21, 2 Samuel 7:12, 22:51, 1 Kings 2:23 & 1 Chronicles 17:11).

And Carrier ventures on page 579:
"As we have seen, Paul already says (even in this very argument: Gal. 3.16) that Jesus is of the seed of Abraham and David."
So now the sperm from David is also the one from Abraham!
Ridiculous, but understandable if "seed" means "descendance" (or "descendant").

"It would not be unimaginable that God could maintain a cosmic sperm bank."
<<

Cordially, Bernard