DCHindley wrote: Once it could be admitted that there might be inauthentic letters based on critical grounds, it would only be a matter of time before all of them could be rejected by taking critical principals to their logical extremes.
God forbid that valid methods should ever be taken to their logical limits!
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DCHindley wrote: Once it could be admitted that there might be inauthentic letters based on critical grounds, it would only be a matter of time before all of them could be rejected by taking critical principals to their logical extremes.
God forbid that valid methods should ever be taken to their logical limits!
Too scary to even imagine!!
The human mind has a very hard time distinguishing between "useful" methodology and "bandwagon" methodology.
DCHindley wrote:The human mind has a very hard time distinguishing between "useful" methodology and "bandwagon" methodology.
I think it's mostly just an absence of concern either way and a willingness to use whatever might be seen as persuasive, because most people's arguments start from the conclusion and work backward to find support.
"... almost every critical biblical position was earlier advanced by skeptics." - Raymond Brown
It seems to me that a lot of these people have made a conscious effort to bypass academia and appeal to the common man with the natural advantage that the common man isn't up to speed on scholarship.
“Finally, from so little sleeping and so much reading, his brain dried up and he went completely out of his mind.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote
DCHindley wrote:The human mind has a very hard time distinguishing between "useful" methodology and "bandwagon" methodology.
I think it's mostly just an absence of concern either way and a willingness to use whatever might be seen as persuasive, because most people's arguments start from the conclusion and work backward to find support.
Ahhh, you Hegelians are all alike...'N I can prove it!
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Salm has published part 3. This struck me as interesting -ie. the term 'synoptic gap' and Detering's synopsis of it: I may have seen the term in passing, but I don't recall investigating it. It seems to summarize an important point in investigating early-Christianity and its development (I quote the whole paragraph but only include the first two sentences so people can find it more readily in the article; in case they want to contextualize it) -
According to Carrier, the Jesus figure of the canonical gospels could not have come about before 70 CE. This may well be. But what about 100 CE? 130 CE? Walther Schmithals wrote of a synoptic gap, of the lack of any reference to the synoptic tradition among the early Church Fathers until late in the second century! As far as we know, an incipient gospel stage is first referred to by Justin. Somewhat later, towards the end of the second century, Irenaeus is the first to signal the existence of a canon of four gospels. In other words: the second century allows plenty of time for the development of the heavenly Son of God into the Man from Nazareth.
