What Is Euhemerism?
http://vridar.org/2016/01/25/what-is-euhemerism/
- Was Jesus euhemerized?
So if Carrier says Jesus was euhemerized, then who were the euhemerists? Specifically, here’s the big question: Was the author of the Gospel of Mark a euhemerist? Carrier says:
Mark’s euhemerization would logically transfer Jesus’ demonic enemies to earthly ones, leading to the allegory of internecine betrayal in the Judas narrative (where the whole world conspires to kill him: Romans, Jews and ‘Christians’). (Carrier, 2014, p. 560, n. 62)
Wait. So, were all the gospels really euhemerizations of a cosmic Jesus?
The Gospels were simply constructed to euhemerize Jesus, as all mythical demigods had been (Element 45) . . . (Carrier, 2014, p. 613)
I want to be generous, but I can’t make any sense these statements. For Carrier to be correct, then the word euhemerize would have to be identically synonymous with historicize, and that cannot be the case. If Carrier is right, we would have to leave aside the bulk of what Euhemerus and later euhemerists said and did.
Were the evagelists rationalizing Jesus? Were they desupernaturalizing him? Absolutely not. They may well indeed have been historicizing the life of Jesus on Earth. And that’s a perfectly fine way to put it. Let me be clear: My quibble isn’t with Carrier’s overall thesis. I merely contend that his use of the terms euhemerist, euhemerism, and euhemerize conflicts with Euhemerus’s own writings and all euhemerist practitioners thereafter.
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- Consequently, taking into account the writings of euhemerists in the past as well as its usage by scholars in modern times, euhemerism cannot refer to the gospels,
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Similarly, “doing what Euhemerus did” would be to claim that certain beings we now think of as divine (or semi-divine or heroic) are really just ordinary men and women who once lived among us, were revered because of their good works, and eventually became thought of as gods.
To think of euhemerism as something other than this specific method of rationalization and demythologizing is to misunderstand its proper usage and to misrepresent its well-documented history.